development kit News - Page 28 of 42 - CNX Software

July 3, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Peek into the Smart Home of the Future with ARM Seamless Computing IoT Demo

We’ve seen lots of home automation being launched on crowdfunding platforms in the last year or so, and companies like Samsung, Archos, Google and Apple have launched, announced, or bought smart hone solutions. Recently ARM has hosted a demo for the smart home based on Cortex-M MCU mbed development boards, a single board computer gateway, and sensinode connected home software framework. Although some parts of the demo are unlikely to really have uses, e.g. you can look at the window to check the weather, I found the demo to be very interesting, especially with regards to the central role of the smartphone, and computing convergence. The list of different demos that can be seen in the video below is as follows: As you walk close to the main door, the system checks the weather, and if it rains, blinks a LED and emits a sound close to your umbrella, and […]

July 2, 2014July 3, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 10 Comments

Texas Instruments Announces Sitara AM437x Cortex A9 SoCs and Evaluation Modules

The first time I heard about Texas Instruments Sitara AM437x was via a TechNexion EDM-CT-AM437x system-on-module back in 2012, but Texas Instruments Sitara Cortex A9 processors development seems to have dragged a little longer than expected. Nevertheless, the company has now formally announced their Sitara AM437x ARM Cortex A9 SoC targeting automation, IoT gateways, and other industrial applications, and featuring four PRUs (Programmable Real-time Units), and support for dual camera for terminals with bar code scanning. At launch there will be four AM437xprocessors: AM4376, AM4377, AM4378, and AM4379. The processors will all be based on a single Cortex A9 core @ 800 to 1000 MHz with 64KB SRAM shared with 32KB data cache and 32KB programmable cache, 256 KB L2 and L3 caches, a 32-bit memory interface supporting LPDDR2, DDR3, and DDR3L, a 2-port Gigabit Ethernet switch , two USB 2.0 OTG + PHY and the following other interfaces: Serial Ports […]

June 30, 2014June 30, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Toradex Customized Single Board Computers Powered by Freescale Vybrid and i.MX6 Sell for 39 Euros and Up

Toradex has launched what they call “Customized SBCs” (Single Board Computers) comprised of the usual carrier board an computer-on-module (CoM) combination, using their Apalis & Colibri families. The company offers various combination of Freescale i.MX6 and Vybrid VF50 single board computers, with price starting at 39 Euros for 1k order, or 49 Euros for samples. I’ve already featured Toradex Colibri VF50 (and VF61) modules in another post, but to summarize Colibri VF50 is a computer modules based on Freescale Vybrid VF50 ARM Cortex A5 CPU with 64 to 128MB DDR3, and 128MB NAND flash that targets industrial applications requiring long term availability (15 years). VF50 sells as low as 19 Euros per unit for 10k orders. Viola is a new open source hardware carrier board with the following features: Compatible with all Toradex Colibri CoMs External Storage – microSD interface Video – RGB LCD Interface, 4 wire resistive touch interface […]

June 27, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Element14 Design Center Helps You find a Development Board and Tools for Your Project

Element14 has just launched a Design Center, currently in beta version, which let’s you do parametric searches for development kits, debuggers, software tools, by tools vendor, silicon manufacturers, board features, and processor architecture / type. So for example if you want to work on a low power Linux based gateway with Ethernet and Zigbee, you may search for a board with Ethernet and Zigbee, and comes with an ARM Cortex A5 processor. In this example, the website returned four SAMA5D3x evaluation kits from Atmel which support Ethernet, as well as Zigbee via an external module. Then if you want to find which tools are available from Atmel, you can select “Emulation and Debugging”, “IDE & Compiler”, and “Operating Systems & Stacks”, as well as “Atmel” and “ARM” core architecture which will return Atmel Studio 6, and a JTAG emulator. It’s not quite perfect, as the only features you can search […]

June 25, 2014June 25, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Low Power Mode (Suspend to RAM) in uCLinux for Freescale Kinetis K70 MCU

All ARM based micro-controllers and processors implement multiple power mode in order to save optimize power usage depending on the tasks. However, I’ve been told by some hobbyists/developers/makers that low power modes are not always implemented in Linux, especially for low cost systems either because of hardware limitations or the software is not implemented. EmCraft Systems has just released their latest embedded (uC-) Linux distributions for the MCU boards, and one of the features now available is “suspend to RAM” for their K70 SoM development kit, based on Freescale Kinetis K70 Cortex M4 MCU, which consume just around 600 to 700 uA @ 3.3V (2 to 2.3 mW) in this low power mode. They have connected a multimeter to measure the current drawn at different power modes. If you want to know all the details, you should probably read the company’s article on “Linux Low-Power Mode on Kinetis“, but I’ll […]

June 24, 2014May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

CubieTruck’s DVK570 Daughter Board and Add-ons (GPS, Zigbee, Sensors, RS485, and SPI Flash)

CubieTruck is one of the development boards made by CubieTech. It is powered by AllWinner A20 with 2GB RAM, Gb Eternet, various ports, and supports Android and multiple Linux distributions. Waveshare Electronics has just launched DVK570 daughter board for the CubieTruck which adds support for TV in and out, a buzzer, and headers to connect modules such as GPS, RS485, an SPI flash, a Zigbee module, a magnetometer, or a temperature sensor. Hardware features of DVK570 daughter board: CubieTruck Headers – 1x 30-pin header and 1x 24-pin header for connection with the CubieTruck Video – TVIN in, and TV Out interfaces (CVBS) Audio – 3.5mm Line IN interface Debugging – UART interface, micro USB port with USB to UART chip (Profilic PL2303) Expansions for add-on modules: 1x 4-pin I2C interface to connect I2C modules such as PCF8563 RTC Module, MAG3110 Board, and more 2x 6-pin UART interfaces (UART4 and 7) […]

June 24, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Raspberry Pi Compute Module Development Kit Is Now Available for $200

The Raspberry Pi foundation announced a computer-on-module which they called the (Raspberry Pi) Compute Module that will be mostly software compatible with the Raspberry Pi board, and sell for $30 in quantities. They have now announced the availability of the development kit that includes a baseboard (called Compute IO board), display & camera adapter boards, as well as a 5V power adapter, jumper wires, and a USB cable. As a reminder the Compute Module has the following hardware specifications: SoC – Broadcom BCM2835 ARM 11 processor @ 700 MHz with Videocore IV GPU System Memory – 512MB RAM Storage – 4GB eMMC Flash SoM Connector – DDR2 200-pins SODIMM Dimensions – 67.6x30mm board which fits into a standard DDR2 SODIMM connector The Compute IO Board come with two micro USB connectors (one reserved for power), a USB 2.0 host port, two DSI ports for display, two CSI ports for a […]

June 16, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

ARM Introduces DSP ‘Lab-in-a-Box’ For Education Combining STMicro STM32F4-Discovery Board and Wolfson Audio Card

DSP (Digital Signal Processing) courses at University have traditionally used software simulation packages (Matlab), or hands-on labs using development kits costing around $300 per student. In order to reduce costs, ARM University program and their corporate partners have launched a DSP ‘Lab-in-a-Box’ so that university students can learn DSP and audio systems with hardware selling for about $50, or over 80% cheaper than previous educational hardware. A typical DSP Lab-in-a-Box (LiB) would come with: STMicroelectronics ARM Cortex-M4-based STM32F4 Discovery MCU board Wolfson Microelectronics and Farnell element14 Wolfson Audio Card. ARM Keil MDK-Professional development tool with a 1-year renewable software license. Teaching materials such as lecture slides, code samples, and hands-on lab manuals. STM32F4-Discovery board features an STM32F407VGT6 MCU (ARM Cortex-M4F core) with 1 MB Flash, and 192 KB RAM, sensors (motion and accelerometer), a digital microphone, and audio DAC, a micro USB connector, and various buttons and LEDs. The Wolfson […]