Intel to Give Away 5 Atom D2700 Development Kits to Selected Engineers

As part of its “Eureka! Design Challenges“, Intel is asking hardware engineers to submit ideas about what they’ll do with an Intel Atom D2700 development kit with 2Gb RAM, a 40 GB SSD drive & lots of ports and expansions, and will give one to the 5 candidates with the best project ideas. Here are the key features of this development kit: Development board with the Intel Atom Processor D2700, and IntelNM10 Express Chipset Board Support package from the Linux Foundation’s Yocto Project 2GB DDR21066 MT/s non-ECC memory 40GB SSD, installed, with SATA extension cable Power supply The Intel Software Development Tool Suite (GNU tool compatible) Documentation and software Comes in a mini-ITX chassis with dual independent display capabilities. I’m not sure why Intel is focusing on hardware engineer for this type of project, and I suppose if you have some embedded systems development ideas that interface with external hardware, […]

$86 ZAP-A10 Android 4.0 Set-Top Box Powered by AMLogic AML8726-M3

You may already know that XBMC has been working on the Pivox XIOS DS set-top box based on AMLogic AML8726-M3. Pivosgroup has sponsored the development of XBMC for Android and Linux on their new media player, and it costs about $115 on sites like Amazon, but it’s not available worldwide right now. If you’re looking for an alternative AMLogic AML8726-M3 device, and are a bit adventurous, you may have a look at the ZAP-A10, an Android 4.0 networked media player featuring AML8726-M3 Cortex A9 processor, with 1GB RAM and 4 GB Flash. Here are the specs of this set-top box: SoC – Single core Cortex A9 @ 1GHz (AML8726-M3) with Mali-400 GPU System Memory – 1 GB RAM Storage – 4GB Flash & SD card slot Connectivity 10/100M Ethernet Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n USB – 4x USB Host port Video Output – HDMI and component (YPbPr) Video Containers – M2TS / […]

More AMLogic AML8726-MX Source Code Released by Ainol

Last week, I found out that AMLogic released the kernel source code for AML8726-MX, its dual core Cortex A9 processor, but this code is only for the “common” platform, and some source code specific to tablets or media players is missing (e.g. some drivers). But today, Ainol released the source code for the Ainol Novo 7 Elf II and Aurora II tablet, both of which are based on on AML8726-M6 dual core processor: Ainol Novo 7 Elf II Source Code (2 GB) – http://dl.vmall.com/c0yqzpadah Ainol Novo 7 Aurora II source code (2 GB) – http://dl.vmall.com/c0imlixp7d The files are pretty big, and the download very slow on my side (“1 day, 16 hours remaining”), so I’ll probably have to give up. I assume “fards” will import the source code into a new repo in his github account. Anyway, this potentially makes AMLogic AML8726-MX a very interesting development platform, although we’ll have to […]

QuickEmbed UPuter Pi – $69 AllWinner A10 Development Board

I’ve been informed of a new AllWinner A10 development board which is marketed as some sort of Raspberry Pi “clone”, although the hardware is different. The UPuter Pi is a small board designed by QuickEmbed Technology, a Shanghai based company, that features AllWinner A10 processor @ 1.5 GHz, 512 to 1 GB RAM, and 4 to 8 GB Flash. Here are the specs as mentioned on the company website: CPU 1.5GHz ARM Cortex-A8 multi-core Mali400 graphic engine Memory 512M/1GB DDR3 Flash 4G/8G DC 5V USB power working temperature -10 to 70C storage temperature -20 to 80C Android 4.0 WIFI/RJ45 network USB/Wireless keyboard/mouse 3G usb card TF card, U-disk, usb harddisk 720P/1080P/2160P I must have gone blind because I don’t see any RJ45 connector (for Ethernet). The board will support Android 4.0 and all the usual Linux distros supported by Allwinner A10 processor. QuickEmbed may have pushed the clone concept a […]

Timesys Unveils LinuxLink BSP/SDK for MityARM-3359 SoM (TI AM335x)

Critical Link is an electronics product development company that provides “MityDSP” and “MityARM” System on Modules and Timesys is a software company working on Embedded Linux, which provides LinuxLink, a software development framework for embedded Linux application development. Both companies have partnered to offers LinuxLink BSP/SDK for MityARM-3359 SoM based on Texas Instruments Sitara AM335x Cortex A9 processor. LinuxLink (for MityARM-335x) comes in 2 versions: A free version which includes: A wizard-based interface that simplifies the selection of a Linux kernel, software packages and tools Kernel, toolchain and debugger Access to hundreds of open-source software packages Support by Timesys for build/boot issues. A PRO version (Starts at $5495 per developer) which includes extra “features” such as: TimeStorm IDE – A desktop-based development environment Tools for advanced customization and integration unmetered support Everything is built on Timesys servers, but the web interface makes it quite customizable and offers lots of options […]

Codethink Launches The Baserock Slab ARM Server

Codethink has just announced an ARM based server called “The BaseRock Slab” powered by Marvell ARMADA XP quad core ARMv7-A processors with 2 GB RAM and 30GB (up to 120GB) mSATA SSD Storage per node, which targets applications such as cloud computing infrastructure and native ARM build and test. This 32 cores server comes in a 1U chassis (483mm x 44mm x 355m), is powered by a 260 PSU, integrates eight Cogent CSB1726-ArmadaXP SoM (Marvell Armada XP quad-core ARMv7-A CPUs, 1.33Ghz + 2 GB ECC DDR3 RAM) in to a carrier board featuring the following: 30GB (max 120GB) mSATA SSD, max 250MB/sec read/write, per SoM SATA port for additional dedicated storage, per SoM Dual 2.5Gbit/s full-duplex ethernet, trunkable into a single 5Gbit/s link Management SoM for remote power, fan and reset control Firmware upgrade via the network The server is managed by Cogent CSB1724 SoM powered by Marvell Armada 300 […]

ISEE Announces Low Cost IGEP COM ELECTRON & SPIN Computers-on-Module

ISEE, the manufacturer of the IGEPv2 board, has recently announced 2 new industrial grade computers on module based on TI Sitara AM3703 Cortex A8 Processor: IGEP COM ELECTRON – AM3703 with 256 MB RAM / 512 MB Flash – 59 Euros IGEP COM SPIN – AM3703 with 64 MB RAM / 128 MB Flash – 49 Euros Here are the specifications of IGEP COM ELECTRON module: CPU – Texas Instruments AM3703 @ 1GHz with L1 cache (112 KB (DSP) / 64 KB (ARM)) and L2 cache (96 KB (DSP), 256 KB (ARM)) System Memory – 256 MB Mobile DDR @ 200 MHz (32-bit) Storage: 512 MB NAND FLASH On board micro-SD socket Connectors: 1 x USB 2.0 OTG interface + USB mini-AB connector 1 x MICRO-SD socket 2 x EXPANSION 70-pin connector Device: 1 x USB 2.0 HOST (connector NOT included) 1 x DOUBLE LED INDICATOR Expansion connectors – 2 […]

AMLogic Releases AML8726-MX Linux 3.0.8 Source Code

While doing a Google search to locate the open Linux page of AMLogic, I noticed another link reading “Amlogic AML8726-MX Linux kernel code released“. Interesting. So AMLogic appears to have released the kernel source code for their latest dual core Cortex A9 processor at the beginning of August and the tarball is available from their open source site:  kernel-common-2012-08-03-git-a63244fb9c.tar.gz. A github user (fards) also imported the code to github, but he’s not affiliated with AMLogic, so don’t expect commits from AMLogic there. Let’s retrieve it:

AML8726-MX is codenamed MESON6 in the source code, and the code is in arch/arm/mach-meson6/, but let’s see if we can find a config file in arch/arm/configs. Yes! There are 4: meson6_android_defconfig – Android config file (Single core) meson6_defconfig – Linux config file (Single core) all Android config disabled. meson6smp_android_defconfig – Android config file with smp (symmetric multiprocessing) support meson6smp_defconfig – Config file with smp […]

UP 7000 x86 SBC