sipeed News - Page 2 of 7 - CNX Software

April 30, 2024April 29, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

SBC Case Builder v3.0 can create thousands of cases for popular SBCs and standard motherboards (mini-ITX, Pico-ITX, NUC…)

SBC Case Builder V3.0 case design utility has just been released with the ability to create over 1,000 standard cases – not including customization – for popular SBCs from Raspberry Pi, Hardkernel, Orange Pi, Radxa, and others, as well as standard motherboards following Mini-ITX, Pico-ITX, NUC, Nano-ITX, etc.., and SBC adapters following these standards, meaning you could install a Raspberry Pi 5 into a mini-ITX case if needed. SBC Case Builder started as a command line utility for designing DIY case for SBCs relying on OpenSDAD in April 2022, but Edward Kisiel (hominoids) quickly released version 2 with a GUI in October or the same, and has now further improved the utility with the release of SBC Case Builder v3.0. Version 3.0 comes with many improvements but the main focus was to reuse existing and new PC standard form factor cases by creating SBC adapters and custom I/O Shields since […]

March 18, 2024March 17, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Sipeed MaixBox M4N AI Box with 43.2 TOPS AXera AX650N SoC can decode/encode up to 32 videos

Sipeed MaixBox M4N is an AI box for video analytics and computer vision equipped with an AXera-Pi Pro (AX650N) octa-core Cortex-A55 SoC with a 43.2 TOPS (INT4) or 10.8 TOPS (INT8) AI accelerator and an H.265/H2.64 video encoder/decoder supporting up to 32 1080p30 videos. The AI box is based on the Sipeed Maix-IV motherboard, an upgrade to the Maix-III devkit with an AX620A quad-core Cortex-A7 SoC with a 14.4 TOPS AI accelerator (INT4). It comes with 8GB RAM shared for Linux and the AI accelerator, 32GB eMMC flash and an M.2 SATA socket for storage, two HDMI outputs, two gigabit Ethernet ports, optional WiFi or 4G LTE mini PCIe module, a few USB ports, and RS232 and RS485 interfaces. Sipeed MaixBox M4N specifications: SoC – AXera AX650N CPU – Octa-core Arm Cortex-A55 @ 1.7 GHz with NEON support NPU – 43.2 TOPS @ INT4, 10.8 TOPS @ INT8 with support […]

March 11, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Linux 6.8 release – Notable changes, Arm, RISC-V, and MIPS architectures

Linus Torvalds has just announced the release of Linux 6.8 on the Linux kernel mailing list: So it took a bit longer for the commit counts to come down this release than I tend to prefer, but a lot of that seemed to be about various selftest updates (networking in particular) rather than any actual real sign of problems. And the last two weeks have been pretty quiet, so I feel there’s no real reason to delay 6.8. We always have some straggling work, and we’ll end up having some of it pushed to stable rather than hold up the new code. Nothing worrisome enough to keep the regular release schedule from happening. As usual, the shortlog below is just for the last week since rc7, the overall changes in 6.8 are obviously much much bigger. This is not the historically big release that 6.7 was – we seem to […]

February 8, 2024February 13, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 31 Comments

LicheeRV Nano – A low-cost SG2002 RISC-V and Arm camera and display board with optional WiFi 6 and/or Ethernet

When I wrote about the SOPHGO SG2002 (and SG2000) RISC-V, Arm, and 8051 AIoT processor yesterday, I noted several boards were in development, but I had not noticed the Sipeed LicheeRV Nano (Beta) was already available for sale, so let’s have a closer look. It’s an inexpensive, tiny camera and display board running Linux with optional support for WiFi 6 and 10/100M Ethernet connectivity which somewhat reminds me of the Breadbee SBC based on MStar MSC313E Camera SoC. Sipeed also provides accessories such as a camera module and a touchscreen display to quickly get started. LicheeRV Nano specifications: SoC – SOPHGO SG2002 Main core – 1GHz 64-bit RISC-V C906 or Arm Cortex-A53 core (selectable) Minor core – 700MHz 64-bit RISC-V C906 core Low-power core – 25 to 300MHz 8051 MCU core NPU – 1 TOPS INT8, supports BF16 Integrated 256MB DDR3 (SiP) Storage – MicroSD card slot and SD NAND […]

February 7, 2024February 7, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 16 Comments

SOPHGO SG2000/SG2002 AI SoC features RISC-V, Arm, and 8051 cores, supports Android, Linux, and FreeRTOS

SOPHGO SG2000 and SG2002 are new SoCs featuring a bunch of RISC-V and Arm cores capable of running Linux, Android, and FreeRTOS simultaneously, and to maximize the fun an 8051 MCU core is also in the mix along with a 0.5 TOPS (SG2000) or 1 TOPS (SG2002) AI accelerator. More specifically we have one 1GHz C906 64-bit core capable of running Linux, one 1GHz Arm Cortex-A53 for Linux or Android, another 700 MHz C906 RISC-V core for FreeRTOS, and a 300 MHz 8051-core for real-time I/Os, as well as 256MB or 512MB SiP DRAM. The chip is designed for AIoT applications such as Smart IP cameras, facial recognition, and smart home devices. SOPHGO SG2000/SG2002 specifications: CPU cores 1x C906 64-bit RISC-V core @ 1GHz 1x C906 64-bit RISC-V core @ 700MHz 1x Arm Cortex-A53 core @ 1GHz MCU – 8051 8-bit microcontroller core @ 25 to 300 MHz with 6KB […]

January 29, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Lichee Console 4A RISC-V devkit testing – Part 2: benchmarks and features in Debian 12

Sipeed Lichee Console 4A RISC-V devkit review

When checking out the hardware of the Lichee Console 4A portable RISC-V development terminal in the first part of the review, I noted that I had some troubles with the display that did not work properly. I did a little massage to “fix” the display, but unsurprisingly it ended up not being a long-term solution. So I had to open a case a few times and ended up breaking the wires to the fan… Each time I reassembled the device, the display only worked for a few seconds or minutes if at all. So I decided to test the system by keeping it open, as the display is working reliably that way. So I won’t be able to do a proper review testing the device on the go, but I still tested all features and benchmarked the T-Head TH1520 mini laptop with Debian 12, and will report my findings in […]

January 14, 2024January 14, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

How I “fixed” the display on Lichee Console 4A terminal

When I wrote a hands-on post about Lichee Console 4A RISC-V development terminal I noted the display would sometimes have strange effects or simply go black. I’ve now fixed the issue, and I was just probably unlucky since the issue must be rare, but I’ll still document it in case somebody encounters a similar problem and for fun! First, the video below shows what I would see on my terminal after using it for a few minutes. Since then, the display has gone completely dark, and all I see is the backlight, but I can still access the device through an SSH terminal. It looks like a bad connection issue, but I still contacted Sipeed and they told me it must have been the display connector. So I turned off the device and reopened the enclosure to remove and reinsert the cable for the display as shown in the photo […]

January 10, 2024February 6, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

Lichee Console 4A portable RISC-V development terminal review – Part 1: Unboxing, teardown, and hands on

Sipeed has just sent me a “Lichee Console 4A portable RISC-V development terminal” for review. It’s a quad-core RISC-V mini laptop based on the Alibaba T-Head TH1520 processor with a 7-inch touchscreen display, and my model is equipped with a Lichee LM4A module fitted with 16GB RAM and 128GB eMMC flash. I’ll start the review of the RISC-V developer kit with an unboxing, a teardown, and a quick try with the preinstalled Debian 12 “Bookworm” image, before testing the latter in the second part of the review. The second part will take some time as we have about twenty reviews planned for now, four of which I’ll be taking care of myself… Lichee Console 4A unboxing I received the device in a package indicating I had been sent the 16GB+128GB model and reading “Lichee Console 4A portable RISC-V developer terminal” which makes it clear it’s based on RISC-V, is portable […]