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August 23, 2012August 23, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Nikon Announces Coolpix S800c Android 2.3 Camera

Nikon announced the first Android camera to hit the market. The Coolpix S800c is a 16 MP Wi-Fi camera powered by an unnamed ARM Cortex A9 processor with 512 MB RAM running Android 2.3.3 that will sell for $349. The S800c is basically a smartphone without the voice network capabilities, but with a proper camera capable of shooting clear pictures and videos, and a 10x optical zoom. Nikon also included a GPS to add localization info to pictures. Nikon lists the primary features of their Android camera as follows: Android 2.3 and Wi-Fi Simple setup and connection Browse and post to social networking sites (SNS) such as Google+, Facebook and Twitter. Support for Google Play and built-in Google apps Simple image transfer to other smart devices via “Upload to Smart Device” app. Better shooting performance and images quality and definition (compared to a smartphone). 10x optical zoom, NIKKOR lens and […]

August 22, 2012May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

IP878 Android TV Box – $40 AllWinner A10 mini PC?

I’ve been tipped off about a new Android mini PC called IP878 selling for less than $40 on a site called ahappydeal.com. This HDMI Stick is said to run Android 2.3, features an ARM CPU, 512 MB RAM and 4 GB flash and comes with a basic remote control. There’s no mention of the exact processor on the website mentioned above, but I found what looks like the (a?) manufacturer website (NewMi), which describes IP878 features as follows: SoC – ALLWINNER TECH A10S RAM – 512MB DDR2 Storage – 2GB Flash + microSD card slot Video and Audio out – HDMI (high-resolution video output up to 720P ???) Video Containers – *.mkv,*.wmv,*.mpg, *.mpeg, *.dat, *.avi, *.mov, *.mp4 *.wmv, *.FLV, *.3GP Video Codecs – H.264, H.263,VP8,RV8/9,MPEG4,Xvid,Divx 3/4/5,MPEG1/2 USB – USB 2.0 Host & OTG Wi-Fi – 802.11 b/g Power – 5V/1A Remote control – IR extender Weight – 25 g Dimensions […]

July 24, 2012July 24, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

VIA Announces VIA VAB-800 Pico-ITX Board Based on Freescale i.MX537 Processor

VIA Technologies has announced the VIA VAB-800 Pico-ITX board powered by a Freescale i.MX537 (ARM Cortex A8) processor clocked at 800MHz or 1GHz depending on the requirements, with 1GB DDR3-800 SDRAM and support for eMMC Flash with a capacity of up to 64 GB. The VIA VAB-800 is an industrial board that can operate in a wide temperature range and targets high-end industrial and in-vehicle embedded applications. Here are the specs of the board: Processor – Freescale Cortex-A8 single core iMX537 @800MHz System Memory – 1GB DDR3-800 SDRAM, using 128M x16 memory devices Flash – eMMC Flash, up to 64GB Graphics – Supports two independent, integrated graphics processing units: an OpenGL® ES 2.0, 3D graphics accelerator and an OpenVG™ 1.1 2D graphics accelerator Ethernet – SMSC LAN8720A 10/100 PHY transceiver with HP Auto-MDIX support Audio – Freescale SGTL5000 low power stereo codec with headphone amp HDMI – Silicon image SiI9024A […]

June 1, 2012May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 33 Comments

MINI X Android 2.3 Network Media Player Based on AllWinner A10

Here’s another tiny device based on AllWinner A10 processor. The MINI X is an Android 2.3.4 set-top box with 512MB RAM and 4GB NAND Flash that costs 77.50 USD including worldwide shipping. Here are the device specifications: CPU – AllWinner A10 (Cortex A8) with Mali-400 GPU Memory – 512MB DDR3 RAM Storage – 4GB NAND Flash, microSD slot Video Output – HDMI 1.3 USB – 2x USB 2.0 host Connectivity – WiFi 802.11 b/g/n Video Formats – MKV, TS, TP, M2TS, RM/RMVB, BD-ISO, AVI, MPG, VOB, DAT, ASF, TRP, FLV etc Video Codecs – MPEG1/2/4, H.264, VC-1, Divx, Xvid, RM8/9/10, VP6 Subtitle – SRT, SUB, IDX, SSA, SMI Audio Formats – MP3, ACC, OGG, WMA, WAV, M4A, APE Image format – JPG, BMP,GIF, TIF, PNG IR Remote Control Dimension: 72 x 61 x 13mm Weight: 51g This device is half-way between the MK802 HDMI stick and the Mele A1000 STB. […]

May 22, 2012May 22, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Droid Stick KVD-13 Another Low Cost Android mini-PC

Following the steps of the $74 Android 4.0 mini PC (MK802), a couple more ARM based mini PCs have shown up, including Shenzhen Kimdecent Technology Droid Stick KVD-13 powered by a Renesas processor based on Cortex A9 with a PowerVR SGX530 GPU (possibly Renesas NEC EV2 processor), featuring 512 MB RAM, 4GB Flash and running Android 2.3. The good thing with this mini PC is that the HDMI connector is of the right gender: male. No offense to HDMI female connectors ;), but for this type of device, it’s just neat to plug it directly into the TV/monitor HDMI connector. Here are the device specifications: CPU Renesas Cortex-A9 Dual Core Processor @ 1GHz with PowerVG SGX530 GPU System Memory 512MB DDR3 Storage 4GB NAND Flash microSD card Connectivity WiFi 802.11b/g/n USB Ports 1x USB 2.0 Host 1x mini USB (for power) Video Output 1x HDMI 1.4 (Up to 1080p) Video Codecs […]

May 8, 2012May 8, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Build Your Phone Android Distro with CyanogenMod Compiler 0.4 GUI (Cmc-pygtk) for Ubuntu

Lithid, a member of XDA Developers Forum, has recently released the 4th version of a GUI tool (Cmc-pygtk) to build Android for a given smartphone as long as it is supported by CM. The CyanogenMod Compiler is supported by Ubuntu 10.04 32/64-bit and greater, and you can either download a deb file or build it yourself by following the instructions below: Install dependencies:

sudo apt-get install build-essential devscripts ubuntu-dev-tools debhelper \
dh-make diff patch cdbs quilt gnupg fakeroot lintian pbuilder piuparts \
flex bison gperf libsdl1.2-dev libesd0-dev libwxgtk2.6-dev squashfs-tools \
libncurses5-dev  zlib1g-dev openjdk-6-jdk pngcrush schedtool

sudo apt-get install build-essential devscripts ubuntu-dev-tools debhelper \

dh-make diff patch cdbs quilt gnupg fakeroot lintian pbuilder piuparts \

flex bison gperf libsdl1.2-dev libesd0-dev libwxgtk2.6-dev squashfs-tools \

libncurses5-dev zlib1g-dev openjdk-6-jdk pngcrush schedtool

Clone the source tree:

git clone git://github.com/lithid/Cmc-pygtk.git

1	git clone git://github.com/lithid/Cmc-pygtk.git

Generate a gpg key:

keygpg --gen-key

1	keygpg --gen-key

Delete the changelog or dpkg will use lithid key instead.:

cd Cmc-pygtk
rm os-versions/common/changelog

1 2	cd Cmc-pygtk rm os-versions/common/changelog

Edit the EMAIL field in the Makefile and replace it with the one used to generated the gpg key. Build it for your version of Ubuntu. For Ubuntu 12.04 32-bit:

make cmc-12.04-32

1	make cmc-12.04-32

And install it:

cd out
sudo dpkg -i cmc-12.04-32-v0.4.deb

1 2	cd out sudo dpkg -i cmc-12.04-32-v0.4.deb

Before using CyanogenMod Compiler (CMC) is installed, you need to install google repo tool:

curl https://dl-ssl.google.com/dl/googlesource/git-repo/repo &gt; repo
chmod a+x repo
sudo mv repo /usr/local/bin/repo

curl https://dl-ssl.google.com/dl/googlesource/git-repo/repo > repo

chmod a+x repo

sudo mv repo /usr/local/bin/repo

Now that everything is setup, you can run CyanogenMod Compiler: cmc A disclaimer message telling […]

March 10, 2012March 10, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Shenzhen Wabook EPC1029 ARM Netbook Runs Android 2.3 / 4.0

Shenzhen Wabook Technology, a manufacturer with a factory based in Zhuhai, China, showcases their Wabook Netbook at Cebit 2012. The Wabook EPC1029 is a netbook running Android 2.3 (upgradable to Android 4.0) on a Rockchip RK2918 (ARM Cortex A8) @ 1.0 GHz. The device features a 10.1″ TFT LED display (16:9 aspect ratio) with a resolution of 1024×600, 3 USB host ports, Ethernet. No other technical specs are available yet. Only Android is available, but it might be possible to hack Ubuntu or another distro to run on it. You can watch the video below by Charbax of armdevices.net to see the device. Don’t worry pink is not the only color as white and black are also available. The price for 1,000 pieces (MOQ) is 93 USD and it takes around 25-30 days to get your order. They have already sold tens of thousands to a company in France. With […]

March 10, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Huawei M2M Solutions: Android Rear-View Mirror, Smart Grid and more

Huawei is exhibiting their Machine to Machine (M2M) solutions at Cebit 2012 until March 10, 2012. They are showcasing Smart Meter solutions with home energy gateways, smart gas meters, smart electric meters, in-home displays.. all communicating via Zigbee. Their solution is currently being implement in the UK market. They are also exhibiting diverse modules (mainly based on Freescale i.MX5 processor) featuring Huawei 3G technology that could be used in tablets among other things. But the thing is really found interesting was their M2M solutions for the auto industry especially the Android car rear-view mirror where you can have the left half of the rear-view mirror displaying a menu so that you can access apps such as GPS maps, control your music or your phone and see information about your car. Here are some details above this rear-view mirror: Samsung SP5V210 Cortex A8 Processor 4.3″ TFT capacitive touchscreen – Resolution: 800×480 […]