Linux 4.5 Released – Main Changes, ARM and MIPS Architectures

Linus Torvalds released Linux Kernel 4.5 on Sunday: So this is later on a Sunday than my usual schedule, because I just couldn’t make up my mind whether I should do another rc8 or not, and kept just waffling about it. In the end, I obviously decided not to,but it could have gone either way. We did have one nasty regression that got fixed yesterday, and the networking pull early in the week was larger than I would have wished for. But the block  layer should be all good now, and David went through all his networking commits an extra time just to make me feel comfy about it, so in the end I didn’t see any point to making the release cycle any longer than usual. And on the whole, everything here is pretty small. The diffstat looks a bit larger for an xfs fix, because that fix has […]

The First Devices and Routers with WiFi 802.11ad Delivering Up 7Gbit/s Transfer Rates at 60 GHz Will Be Available This Year

802.11ad is the latest and fastest WiFi standard working in the 60 GHz band and delivering up to 7 Gbit per second data transmission rates. The 60 GHz  frequency band offers both advantages and disadvantages because it does not penetrate through walls nor water, meaning it can only be used within a room limiting the range, but at the same time it’s more secure since it cannot be snooped from the outside, and for people who worry about health effects it does not penetrate the human body. 802.11ad routers will also be able to switch to 2.4 and 5.0 GHz frequency bands in order to go through walls. The table above nicely summarize the key features of 802.11ad over 802.11ac and 802.11n, however the throughput row shows the theoretical maximum throughput, but in practice, using 802.11ac as example, clients are often limited to 433 or 866 Mbps, and distance and […]

Samsung Exynos 8890 Processor with Custom Exynos M1 and ARM Cortex A53 Cores Benchmarked

When Samsung announced Exynos 8890 processor, it promised 10% lower consumption and 30% high performance compared to Exynos 7 Octa. The company also said it make its own custom ARMv8 cores for the new, but at the time details were limited. Anandtech has now published more information, and Exynos 8890 octa-core processor will make use of four Exynos M1 custom cores combined with four low power ARM Cortex A53 cores, combined with a Mali-T880MP12 GPU. Exynos 8890 key features: Low power cores – 4x ARM Cortex A53 cores @ 1.586GHz High performance cores – 2x Exynos M1 @ 2.60 GHz, 2x Exynos N1 @ 2.29 GHz; If 4 cores are running at the same time: 2.29 GHz maximum Memory – 2x 32-bit LPDDR4 @ 1794MHz; 28.7GB/s bandwidth GPU – Mali-T880MP12 @ 650 MHz Manufacturing process – Samsung 14nm LPP Now that Samsung Galaxy 7 has been announced with Exynos 8890 […]

Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon Wear 2100 for Smartwatches, 3 New Cortex A53 Mobile SoCs

Qualcomm has unveiled four new Snapdragon processors with three quad and octa core Cortex A53 processors for smartphones with 4G LTE connectivity, and a new wearables SoC with lower power and, area compared to Snapdragon 400 series processor often used in smartwatches. Snapdragon Wear 2100 SoC is the first processor part of Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear, of new platform targeting wearable devices, with the company listing the following highlights: Quad core Cortex A7 processor @ up to 800 MHz or 1.2 GHz Adreno 304 GPU 30% smaller than Snapdragon 400 25% percent lower power than Snapdragon 400 Integrated, ultra-low power sensor hub Available in both tethered (Bluetooth and Wi-Fi) and connected (4G/LTE and 3G via X5 LTE modem) pin-to-pin compatible versions The SoC supports Android Wear, and Android, and should be found in smart watches, smart bands, smart eyewear and smart headsets. Snapdragon Wear 2100 and other Snapdragon Wear products are […]

DragonBoard 410c Development Board Quick Start Guide and Android Benchmarks

Linaro’s 96Boards initiative was announced in February with the introduction of Hikey board, and while progress has been rather slow, there are now two boards available for sale: Lemaker Hikey and Qualcomm Dragonboard 410c. The main advantage of these board is that 96Boards is not only an hardware specification, but also a software specifications that mandate most code to be open source, with recent versions of Linux and U-boot, and in the case of Dragonboard 410c work is being done with Freedreno open source GPU drivers. Now that I’ve got a board I’ll explain my experience with the purchasing process, take a few pictures, and show how to get started with Android, and install the latest version, before running a few benchmarks. Ordering DragonBoard 410c Development Board I normally don’t like purchasing from North American and European distributors, because of the potential documentation involved to comply with silly laws, high […]

Qualcomm DragonBoard 410c Board Now Supports Windows 10 IoT Core

Microsoft announced Windows 10 IoT Core for Raspberry Pi 2 and Minnowboard MAX boards a few months, and now the company has added a new ARM board to their Windows 10 IoT program with the soon-to-be-available Qualcomm DragonBoard 410c development board compliant with 96Boards specifications. Windows 10 IoT Core for DragonBoard 410c adds support for onboard WiFi and Bluetooth, as well as DirectX graphics on top of features already supported on the Raspberry Pi 2. To get started, you’ll need a computer running Windows 10, and follow DragonBoard’s Winfows 10 IoT Core guide. I assume most people familiar with Linux operating systems won’t suddenly jump ship to run a Windows operating systems, but Windows developers who got used to work with Visual Studio may be more comfortable with Microsoft’s environment. Out of curiosity, I’ve checked out if anybody had done any project with Windows 10 IoT core, and was surprised […]

Qualcomm Unveils Octa-core Cortex A53 Snapdragon 430 and 617 Processors

Qualcomm has unveiled two new octacore 64-bit ARM processors for mid-range smartphones with Snapdragon 430 and Snapdragon 617 Cortex A53 SoCs, both of which support the recently announced Quick Charge 3.0 standard and embed LTE connectivity. Snapdragon 430 Snapdragon 430 key features and specifications: CPU – 8x ARM Cortex A53 up to 1.2 GHz GPU – Qualcomm Adreno 505 GPU supporting up to OpenGL ES 3.1+ DSP – Qualcomm Hexagon 536 DSP Memory –  LPDDR3 800MHz Storage –  eMMC 5.1, SD 3.0 (UHS-I) Modem – Snapdragon X6 LTE – LTE Cat 4 (up to 150 Mbps DL/75 Mbps UL) Wireless Connectivity – WiFi 802.11n/ac  (Qualcomm VIVE 2-stream with MU-MIMO),  Bluetooth 4.1 + BLE, GPS (Qualcomm IZat Gen8C) Display – Up to 1080p on device and output Video – Up to 1080p at 30 FPS; Codecs: H.264 (AVC), H.265 (HEVC) Audio – Fluence HD noise cancellation technology Camera – Up to […]

Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 Promises to Charge Phones About 3x Faster Than Conventional Devices

Qualcomm has recently announced the latest version of its Quick Charge technology that allows to charge supported smartphones much faster than typical smartphones using a 5V charger. The company claims that Quick Charge 3.0 enabled smartphones can typicallly charge from zero to 80 percent in about 35 minutes compared to almost 90 minutes with conventional devices. Quick Charge 3.0 adds support for Intelligent Negotiation for Optimum Voltage (INOV), a new algorithm developed by Qualcomm Technologies that allows mobile devices to request optimal power transfer (3.6V to 20V in 200mV increments), while maximizing efficiency, which – together with other improvements – increases power efficient by 38% compared to Quick Charge 2.0, and allows charging the device twice as fast as possible with Quick Charge 1.0. That means the voltage and amperage will change during charging between 3.6V to 20V by 200mV increments, instead of 5V, 9V, 12V, and 20V for QC […]

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