USA Based Startup Builds RPi Add-on Pi-oT, a Cleveland based startup has launched a Kickstarter campaign for a Raspberry Pi add-on for commercial and industrial IoT automation. The unit is a full mountable chassis with fan and DIN-rail that extends the Pi’s GPIO with 26-pin terminal connectors and provides 5x relays, 8x ADCs, and power outputs. We have reported on a variety of uses for the Raspberry Pi SBC, from home automation to development in IoT, to hobby projects, and in education settings. It is not surprising to see an automation module developed for IoT industrial applications around the popular and powerful SBC. The Choices The Kickstarter campaign has passed its low initial target and is set to ship at the end of October. There is an early launch discount on the unit’s price of $40 for commercial and $50 for industrial backers. That early bird type special is 15% […]
Arm Cortex-A34 is a 64-bit Only Low-Power Core
Arm previously announced Cortex-A35 64-bit & 32-bit lower-power CPU core, and later on Cortex-A32 32-bit only Armv8 CPU core with the usual press release, and blog posts providing details about their new offering. But this morning, I saw a tweet about Cortex-A34… https://twitter.com/never_released/status/1157107187375886337 Based on the twitter handle, I first assumed it was “never released” ;), and was just an internal part name at Arm. But the new Cortex-A34 was actually very discreetly outed last month when Arm announced Flexible Access to lower the barrier of entry by allowing IC designers to access all Arm IP in the program, and only pay for IP blocks they actually use in the final product. Nevertheless, the product page and developer documentation are now up – albeit with limited info for the latter -, so we have more details. Some of the highlights of Arm Cortex-A34 core include: Architecture – 64-Bit Armv8-A Multicore […]
Espressif to Launch ESP8285 WiSoC Variants with Extended Industrial Temperature Range
Espressif Systems first introduced ESP8285 WiFi SoC in 2016. The chip is similar to ESP8266 WiFi chip but includes 1MB flash making it more suitable for space-constrained applications since an external flash chip is not required. Since the launch, we’ve seen several modules and final products based on the solution including ESP-WROOM-5C and PSF-A85 modules, as well as Sonoff B1 WiFI RGB light bulb. The original chip (ESP8285N08) would work in -40°C to 85°C industrial temperature range, but in their recent newsletter, the company announced plans to launch two new variants in the ESP8285 series with an extended temperature range up to 105°C and different flash capacities: ESP8285H16 with 2 MB flash, -40°C to +105°C operating temperature range ESP8285H08 with a 1 MB flash, -40°C to +105°C operating temperature range ESP8285H16 is slated to launch at the end of August 2019, and the company plans to provide more details next month, […]
Arm Techcon 2019 Schedule – Machine Learning, Security, Containers, and More
Arm TechCon will take place on October 8-10, 2019 at San Jose Convention Center to showcase new solutions from Arm and third-parties, and the company has now published the agenda/schedule for the event. There are many sessions and even if you’re not going to happen it’s always useful to checkout what will be discussed to learn more about what’s going on currently and what will be the focus in the near future for Arm development. Several sessions normally occur at the same time, so as usual I’ll make my own virtual schedule with the ones I find most relevant. Tuesday, October 8 09:00 – 09:50 – Open Source ML is rapidly advancing. How can you benefit? by Markus Levy, Director of AI and Machine Learning Technologies, NXP Over the last two years and still continuing, machine learning applications have benefited tremendously from the growing number of open source frameworks, tools, […]
AAEON Launches BOXER-8150AI Compact Embedded Box PC Features 8 USB 3.0 Ports
The new compact embedded solutions’ addition to the BOXER-8100AI family is specially designed for artificial intelligence (AI) support. According to its makers, AAEON, it has a configuration of eight USB 3.0 ports made available through four USB controllers chips. This makes it perfect for a wide range of computer vision applications, some of which are visual inspection, quality control, and facial recognition. Now, each USB chip controls a pair of USB 3.0 ports. By dedicating one chip to one pair of ports, each chip handles less data traffic overall. This also improves bandwidth from connected devices and allows the BOXER-8150AI to maximize speeds and framerates of AI image processing. The product is currently in stock and available for purchase on AAEON online store for $1,142.00. Key Features of BOXER-8150AI Nvidia TX2 Module HMP Dual Denver 2 + Quad ARM A57 8GB LPDDR4 32GB eMMC 5.1 HDMI 2.0 8x USB […]
ASRock 4×4 Box is a Compact Mini PC Based on AMD Ryzen Embedded R1000/V1000
The mini PC market has a new product from ASRock, a company, well known for its motherboards and Mini PCs. Following up on their iBOX-R1000 Ryzen Embedded R1000 mini PC, the ASRock 4×4 Box is now available with either the AMD Ryzen Embedded R1000 processor or the AMD Ryzen Embedded V1000 processor in a smaller form factor. Right now, the new mini PC targets the industrial sector, and not the consumer market. This addition to the industrial motherboards and rugged mini PCs line, the 4×4 Box R1000 and V1000 offers more features and are designed to fit in a smaller case, hence the 4×4 name which likely refers to the 4″x4″ dimensions of the motherboard. The AMD Ryzen Embedded is finding its way into all kinds of industrial and medical uses, because of its Radeon VEGA graphics capability and processing enhancements over the R or C series processors. The ASRock […]
ModBerry M500 Industrial Computer Gets Upgraded to Raspberry Pi 4
We first wrote about Modberry M500 industrial computer when it was upgraded from Raspberry Pi 3 to Raspberry Pi 3 B+, and added PoE support. With the launch of Raspberry Pi 4 model B, it should come as no surprise that Techbase has now announced Modberry M500 would be available with the latest board from the Raspberry Pi Foundation. Modberry M500 RPI 4 preliminary specifications: SoC – Broadcom BCM2711B0 quad-core Arm Cortex-A72 processor @ 1.5 GHz with VideoCore VI GPU System Memory – 1GB, 2GB or 4GB LPDDR4 Storage – 4GB eMMC flash (TBC), and/or 8GB micro SD card Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0 up to 4K @ 60Hz and 3.5mm jack for CVBS (composite + stereo audio) Connectivity True Gigabit Ethernet, up to 2x optional 10/100M Ethernet ports Dual band 802.11 b/g/n WiFi and Bluetooth 5.0 LE Optional Zigbee, LTE/3G, GPS, WiFi, and Bluetooth cards USB – […]
iWave Systems Unveils iW-RainboW-G34M-SM i.MX 8M Mini/Nano System-on-Module
NXP nomenclature for their i.MX 8M processors can be a little confusing. First discovered in 2016, the original i.MX 8M processor family comes with one to four Arm Cortex-A53 cores, a real-time Cortex M4 core, targets multimedia application with FullHD or 4K decoding/encoding support and is manufactured using a 28nm process. NXP then announced i.MX 8M Mini processor family in February 2018 with a 14-nm FinFET processor allowing a higher maximum CPU frequency of 2.0 GHz, less video output interfaces (no HDMI, nor DisplayPort), and optional Full HD video encoder and decoder, .e.g no 4K. Finally, earlier this year, the company unveiled NXP i.MX 8M Nano further power-optimized with the same 14nm manufacturing process, but a lower frequency of 1.5 GHz, and a Cortex-M7 core replacing the Cortex-M4 core found in previous i.MX 8M processors. This allows i.MX 8M Nano SoC to have a 2W TDP, and achieve sub-watt power […]