Sierra Wireless, a company providing machine-to-machine (M2M) solutions, has recently introduced a new (nameless) architecture for embedded wireless communications comprised of a multicore (again, nameless) “high speed application processor” + Cortex M0 MCU + Radio SoC, secure cloud services (AirVantage) to store the data, and an open application framework with M2M libraries and development tools. This new architecture will be available in the company’s AirPrime WP & AR Series wireless modules to provide 2G to 4G technologies for the Internet of things. WP Series are industrial grade modules to be embedded into applications such as smart metering, remote monitoring, transportation, security systems, networking, and healthcare, whereas AR series will be used for automotive applications. The 2G versions will feature an M2M system-on-a-chip with a advanced tri-core architecture that includes a 2G EDGE modem, a Cortex A5 ARM application processor, and an ARM Cortex-M0 processor to enable ultra-low power operation. The […]
AllWinner Announces A31s Processor for Phablets, Hints about Ubuntu Devices
AllWinner is currently a Mobile World Congress 2013, and Charbax had the chance to interview Eva, manager at AllWinner, and learn more about new processors, and future plans by the company. They spent some time discussing about AllWinner A31 and AllWinner A20 quad and dual Cortex A7 processors, but since we’ve know about those for a while I’ll skip this part. The most interesting part is about AllWinner A31s, a cost down version of A31, specifically designed for phablets (smartphones with 5″ to 7″ screens). Like AllWinner A31, AllWinner A31s is also a quad core Cortex A7 processor with PowerVR SGX544MP2 GPU (8 shader engines) and the following specifications: CPU – ARM Cortex-A7 Quad-Core with 256KB L1-Cache/1MB L2-Cache GPU – POWERVR SGX 544MP2 with 8 logic cores. OpenGL ES2.0, Open CL1.x and DX 9_3 compliant. Memory 32-bit Dual-Channel LPDDR2/DDR3/DDR3L Controller, 8-bit NAND FLASH Controller with 64-bit ECC Video UHD H.264 […]
Ronetix SAMA5D3x-CM System-on-Modules Powered by Atmel SAMA5D3 eMPUs
Earlier this month, Atmel launched SAMA5D3 Cortex A5 embedded processor family, and Ronetix recently unveiled CPU modules based on the platform. SAMA5D3x-CM are SODIMM SoM based on SAMA5D3 series processor with 512MB DDR2, 256MB NAND Flash, 4MB SPI Flash, and Gigabit Ethernet. The key features of the modules are as follows: MCU – AT91SAMA5D3x series, 536 MHz ARM Cortex-A5 @ 1.2V (SAMA5D31, SAMA5D33, SAMA5D34 or SAMA5D35) System Memory – 512 MB DDR2 SDRAM, 32-bit Storage: 256 MB NAND Flash 16 MB NOR Flash (optional) 4 MiB Atmel SPI Flash One Wire 1024-bits EEPROM and 64-bits ROM Connectivity – 10/100/1000 MBit/s Ethernet Dimensions – 67.6x40mm (SO-DIMM 200 JEDEC MO-274 module) Temperature range – 0° +70°C or -40° to +85° C SAMA5D3-CM boards support Linux 3.6.9 and Android 4.0. Those are actually the modules used in Atmel SAMA5D3 evaluation kits, so Linux and Android support, starter kits, as well as documentation (except […]
$35 expEYES Junior Transforms the Raspberry Pi, Aakash2 Tablet or any Linux Powered Device into an Electronics Lab
I remember in high school in France, our class only had 2 oscilloscopes and few other electronics equipment, needless to say I did not actually get to use an oscilloscope until I went to university. It would have been nice to be able to play around with oscilloscopes, frequency generators, etc… earlier, but due to budget constraints, this was not possible. Dr Ajith Kumar, a scientist working with the Inter University Accelerator Centre of India, has spent several years working on an ultra low cost electronics lab composed of an oscilloscope and a signal generator to provide students attending schools that cannot afford regular equipments. This learning & experimentation tool is called expEYES, and a prototype was demonstrated last year with the Raspberry Pi. At the end of last year, the final version called expEYES Junior (aka expEYES 2.0) was announced, and is now available to schools and hobbyists in […]
iWave Systems Announces RainboW-G15S Pico ITX Board Powered by Freescale i.MX6 Duallite/Solo Processor
iWave Systems has just launched the RainboW-G15S, a Pico ITX single board computer featuring Freescale i.MX 6 Solo and Dual Lite processor at Embedded World 2013, in Nuremberg, Germany. This embedded board targets intelligent industrial control systems, industrial human machine interface, ultra portable devices, home energy management systems, and portable medical devices. RainboW-GS15 Specifications: SoC – Freescale i.MX6 Dual Lite/Solo, (Quad /Dual compatible) System Memory – 512MB DDR3 (Expandable up to 2GB) Storage – On-board Micro SD slot, standard SD/SDIO slot, optional eMMC support, and an optional SATA 7-pin connector (Probably just to make the board pretty since i.MX6 Solo and Duallite do not support SATA…) Connectivity – 10/100/1000Mbps Ethernet USB – 2x USB Host Connector + micro USB OTG connector Misc – Half mini PCIe card connector, CAN Header Audio & Video interfaces: AC97 Audio Codec with Audio Out Jack & Audio In Header HDMI Port LVDS connector with […]
F9 Android Set-Top Box Features Samsung Exynos 4412 Processor
Geekbuying just announced they would be soon selling a tiny Android set-top box powered by Samsung Exynos 4412 quad core processor. This media player will come with 1 to 2 GB RAM, 8G to 16G flash, and run Android 4.0 (ICS), upgradeable to Android 4.1 or 4.2. Here are the specifications of this device: SoC – Samsung Quad Core Cortex-A9 Exynos 4412 @ 1.6GHZ + Mali-400 Quad Core GPU System Memory – 1GB RAM (optionally 2G) Storage – 8GB flash (optionally 16GB) + microSD slot Connectivity – WIFI 802.11 b/g/n Video Output – HDMI Audio Codec – MP3, WMA, APE, FLAC, OGG, WAV, etc. Video Containers – AVI, MKV(XVID/px/H.264), MOV, TS, M2TS, RM/RMVB, FLV, 3GP, MPEG, DAT, MP4 USB – 2x USB 2.0 Power Supply – 5V/2A Weight – 109g The device will come with an HDMI cable, a power adapter, a 2.4Ghz remote control, and a user guide. Geekbuying […]
Sailfish OS SDK Alpha Release Is Now Available for Linux
Sailfish OS is a new mobile operating system based on the Qt platform that will soon end-up in mobile phone near you. Until now it was possible to build the SDK yourself, but it was pretty challenging since the documentation was lacking, as Jolla, the company behind Sailfish OS, focused on development. The good news is that you don’t need to build the SDK yourself anymore, since Jolla has just released Sailfish SDK Alpha for Linux 32-bit & 64-bit, and Windows & Mac OS versions will come later. You’ll need a computer that meet the following requirements: A host machine running a Linux operating system Oracle’s VirtualBox version 4.1.18 or higher pre-installed on the host machine. About 5GB of free disk space 4GB of RAM or more is recommended You can get started in two steps: Install the SDK – Download the 32 bit or 64 bit Linux installer. (~650 […]
Adding Wi-Fi to Emcraft Systems K70 SoM
Emcraft Systems K70 SoM is a system-on-module powered by Freescale K70 Cortex M4 micro-controller with enough RAM (64 MB) to comfortably run uClinux. They used to charge $99 for their uCLinux BSP, but it’s now free of charge, and the company also provides full hardware and software documentation, including a getting started guide, schematics and BoM for the baseboard, application notes and more… Many of their clients want to use Wi-Fi with K70 SoM, and it can easily be done by using Wi-Fi USB dongles based on Ralink RT5370 chipset such as D-Link DWA-140 (H/W rev B3) or Comfast CF-WU815N. Emcraft has provided detailed instructions to do so with K70 SoM, their latest baseboard (SOM-BSB-EXT) and a demo image based on their uClinux BSP. I’ll summarize the instructions to use K70 SoM as a Wi-Fi access point below. Connect the baseboard and K70 SoM with an Ethernet cable, a mini […]