Pico-ITX i.MX8M Board Enables Offline Voice Control with Snips

Estone EMB-2238

A few days ago, we covered Estone Technology’s MJ-100 RK3399 rugged tablet. I’ve just realized Estone Technology used to promote their embedded product under the Habey USA brand, which we covered a few times here, and the company has also announced another new product ahead of Embedded World 2019 with their EMB-2238 Pico-ITX i.MX8M board specifically designed for voice control applications. The company setup two voice control demos with the board: one with Amazon Alexa Voice Service (AVS) and another with Snips that works locally without any Internet connection. We actually came across Snips previously for an article comparing microphone arrays, but I never looked into Snips into details or saw an actual demo. Let’s have a quick look at EMB-2238 board specifications first: SoC –  NXP i.MX 8MQuad  with 4x Arm Cortex-A53 cores @ 1.5GHz, 1x Arm Cortex-M4 realtime-core @ 266MHz, Vivante GC7000L/GC7000LVX with support for OpenGL/ES 3.1, OpenGL […]

Nitrogen8M_Mini is the First NXP i.MX8 8M Mini SBC

Having just written about one of the first NXP i.MX 8M Mini systems-on-module, let’s stay with NXP’s latest 14-nm processor as Boundary Devices have been working on a variant of their Nitrogen8M SBC based on MXP i.MX 8M Mini processor and aptly called Nitrogen8M_Mini. The board is also known as the less human-friendly Nit8MQ_Mini_2r8e SBC, and comes with the following specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini with 4x Cortex A53 cores, 1x Cortex-M4F real-time core, Vivante GCNanoUltra 3D GPU, Vivante GC320 2D GPU System Memory –  2GB LPDDR4 (Optional 4GB version) Storage – 8GB eMMC flash, expandable up to 128GB, UHS SD card slot Display – 4-lane MIPI DSI interface up to 1080p Video Encode / Decode – 1080p H.264, VP8/1080p60 H.265, H.264, VP8, VP9 Audio – 3.5mm headphone jack, analog MIC jack, 2W audio amplifier, L&R speaker headers Camera Interface – 1x 4-lane MIPI-CSI interface Connectivity Gigabit Ethernet […]

F&S Elektronik PicoCore MX8MM System-on-Module Features NXP i.MX 8M Mini Processor

FS i.MX 8M Mini SoM

Embedded World 2019 will take place at the end of this month on February 26-28 in Nuremberg, Germany, and we can expect plenty of news related to embedded systems. It’s very likely NXP i.MX 8M Mini processor will officially be launched, and we’ll see several modules and boards announced with the lower cost 14-nm processor. F&S Elektronik Systeme has already been promoting their upcoming PicoCore MX8MM system-on-module based on NXP i.MX 8M in their newsletter ahead of Embedded World, where they’ll showcase their solutions at booth 621 in hall 2. PicoCore MX8MM specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini single, dual, quad core Arm Cortex-A53 @ 1.8 GHz processor, Cortex-M4 real-time core @ 400 MHz, 512KB L2-Cache, 2D/3D GPU System Memory – Up to 8GB LPDDR4 Storage – Up to 512MB SLC NAND flash or up to 32GB eMMC flash Video Decode – 1080p60 HEVC H.265, VP9, H.264, VP8 Connectivity 802.11ac […]

Adding Machine Learning based Image Processing to your Embedded Product

Convert model tensorflow runtime to NNEF

CNXSoft: This is a guest post by Greg Lytle, V.P. Engineering, Au-Zone Technologies. Au-Zone Technologies is part of the Toradex Partner Network. Object detection and classification on a low-power Arm SoC Machine learning techniques have proven to be very effective for a wide range of image processing and classification tasks. While many embedded IoT systems deployed to date have leveraged connected cloud-based resources for machine learning, there is a growing trend to implement this processing at the edge. Selecting the appropriate system components and tools to implement this image processing at the edge lowers the effort, time, and risk of these designs. This is illustrated with an example implementation that detects and classifies different pasta types on a moving conveyor belt. Example Use Case For this example, we will consider the problem of detecting and classifying different objects on a conveyor belt. We have selected commercial pasta as an example […]

NXP Immersiv3D Enables DSP-Free Dolby Atmos & DTS:X Audio Systems

NXP Immersiv3d audio reference design

High-fidelity audio systems such as soundbars, smart speakers, and AV receivers have traditionally relied on DSPs (Digital Signal Processors) to deliver low-latency audio processing, and enable audio and video synchronization. DSPs add to the cost of the overall design however, and with Immersiv3D technology, NXP has leveraged Arm Cortex-A53 and M4 cores in their NXP i.MX 8M Mini processor to completely remove the need for DSP in audio systems, shaving the BoM cost by up to 20%  according to an article on EETimes. Immersiv3D also enables immersive audio support with Dolby Atmos and DTS:X, advanced audio pre/post processing, advanced features like voice control for the smart home. Immersiv3D audio solution was designed to help OEMs to bring to market affordable consumer audio devices with Dolby Atmos and DTS:X, and beside the audio processing software, NXP is also offering an Immersiv3D audio reference design to help them delelop sound bars based […]

Necunos NC_1 is a Pricey Open Source Linux “Phone” without Modem

Necuno Mobile

Several weeks ago, I wrote about the upcoming “Necuno Mobile” phone made by a company called Necunos and running Linux on NXP i.MX6 Quad processor. The phone was supposed to be 100% open source hardware which all software and hardware resources to be made available publicly. There has been progress since then, as well as a name change since Necunos NC_1 is now up for pre-order for 1,199 Euros including VAT and international shipping with delivery promised in March 2019. Necunos NC_1 specifications are said to include: SoC – NXP i.MX 6Quad quad-core Arm Cortex-A9 processor with Vivante GPU System Memory – 1GB RAM Storage – 8 GB storage Display – 5″ touchscreen (attached or detached) Audio – 3.5mm audio jack, built-in microphone, and speaker Connectivity – 2.4 GHz 802.11 b/g/n WiFi Misc – Power, volume, and user programmable buttons USB – 1x micro USB port Battery – 3,500 mAh […]

NXP i.MX 6ULZ Cost Efficient Processor Drops Ethernet, Display, & Camera Interfaces

NXP i.MX 6ULZ

Freescale i.MX 6 processor was first announced in January 2011, and in the first few years I covered many products and development boards based on the single to quad core Cortex A9 processor. Further down the road, the company became part of NXP, and launched Cortex A7 variant such as i.MX 6ULL providing both lower costs and power consumption. But now, I usually skip new products based on i.MX6 because they are often just more of the same, and not really new worthy. But yesterday while writing about Linux 4.20 release, I realized I missed the announcement of i.MX 6ULZ processor similar to i.MX 6UL (UltraLight), but cost optimized for applications that do not require Ethernet, display, nor camera interfaces. NXP i.MX 6ULZ key features and specifications with differences with i.MX 6UL highlighted in bold or stricken-through: CPU – ARM Cortex A7 core @ up to 900 MHz with 128KB […]

Purism Librem 5 Linux phone development kits are now shipping

Purism Librem5 development kit

Purism Librem 5 is a privacy-focused open source Linux smartphone powered by NXP i.MX 8M processor that was launched via a crowdfunding campaign in August 2017 that ends up being extremely popular with over 1.5 million dollars raised. At the time, the phone was scheduled to ship on January 2019, but a $299 development kit with board, display and accessories was slated to ship in June 2018. There have been some delays, but the good news is that Librem 5 development kits are now shipping so third party software development for the phone will now really get started. Librem 5 development kit preliminary specifications: System-on-Module – Emcraft SOM-IMX8M module with NXP i.MX 8M Quad core Cortex A53 processor, at least 2GB LPDDR4 RAM and 16GB eMMC flash (I could not find exact RAM and storage capacities for the module used in the board) Display – 5.7″ LCD touchscreen with a […]

UP 7000 x86 SBC