wearables News - Page 7 of 29 - CNX Software

February 3, 2023February 3, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Nordic Semi nRF7002 DK low-power dual-band WiFi 6 IoT development kit launched for $56 and up

Nordic Semi nRF7002 DK is an IoT development kit based on the nRF5340 dual-core Cortex-M33 multi-protocol wireless SoC and nRF7002 companion chip adding low-power dual-band (2.4GHz and 5.0 GHz) WiFi 6 connectivity. When Nordic Semi introduced the nRF7200 dual-band WiFi 6 companion chip for nRF52840 and nRF5340 wireless SoCs and nRF9160 cellular IoT SiP last summer, the “nRF7002-PDK” development kit was only mentioned in passing with a 3D render and not much else. The company has now announced the availability of the nRF7002 DK to help developers create low-power Wi-Fi 6 IoT applications. nRF7002 DK specifications: Wireless MCU – Nordic Semi nRF5340 dual-core Arm Cortex-M33 microcontroller @ 128/64 MHz with 1 MB Flash + 512 KB RAM for the application core and 256 KB Flash + 64 KB RAM for the network core, Bluetooth 5.1 LE with direction-finding support, Bluetooth mesh, NFC, Thread, Zigbee, 802.15.4, ANT, and 2.4 GHz proprietary […]

January 21, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 10 Comments

ZSWatch open-source hardware nRF52833 smartwatch runs Zephyr RTOS

ZSWatch is an open-source hardware smartwatch based on an u-Blox ANNA-B402 module with Nordic Semi nRF52833 Bluetooth 5.1 SoC and running Zephyr real-time operating systems. We’ve seen several open-source hardware smartwatches over the years, as well as open-source firmware projects such as AsteroidOS or InfiniTime with the latter used in the PineTime smartwatch, and the ZSWatch adds to the list of interesting open-source wearables with all source files made public. ZSWatch specifications: Wireless module – u-blox ANNA-B402 based on Nordic Semi nRF52833 Arm Cortex-M4F microcontroller with Bluetooth LE 5.1 and direction finding support Storage – 8MB flash (MX25R6435FZNIL0) Display – 1.28-inch 240×240 IPS TFT circular display with GC9A01 driver; covered with Sapphire Crystal Glass. Sensors Accelerometer (LIS2DS12TR) for step counting, etc… MAX30101EFD for pulse oximetry and heart rate monitoring Misc 3x buttons for navigation (prev, next, enter) Vibration motor (DRV2603RUNT) with haptics driver to give better vibration control. Power Management […]

December 2, 2022December 2, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 17 Comments

PineBuds Pro ANC & TWS Bluetooth earbuds with open-source firmware launched for $70

Pine64 has just started taking orders for the PineBuds Pro ANC (Active Noise Cancellation) & TWS (True Wireless Sound) earbuds based on the Bestechnic BES2300-YP dual-core Arm Cortex-M4F Bluetooth audio microcontroller found in the PineSound development board. There are plenty of TWS earbuds on the market, but the PineBuds Pro earbuds are hackable thanks to an open-source firmware that could pave the way to interesting features, and potentially the development of open-source firmware transforming the earbuds into hearing aids. PineBuds Pro specifications: WiSoC – Bestechnic BES 2300YP dual-core Arm Cortex-M4F @ up to 300 MHz with HW DSP instruction, 992KB SRAM, 4MB flash, Bluetooth 5.2 dual mode. Supports hybrid ANC (active noise cancellation) and TWS (true wireless stereo). Wireless Bluetooth 5.2 dual-mode connectivity Bluetooth Profile: A2DP, AVRCP, HFP Audio 3x microphones: FeedForward, FeedBack, Talk with Hybrid Adaptive ANC technology blocking out background noise up to 45dB 6 mm dynamic transducer […]

November 2, 2022November 2, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 10 Comments

SiFive P670 and P470 RISC-V processors feature RISC-V Vector Extensions

SiFive Performance RISC-V processors Roadmap

SiFive has announced two new RISC-V Performance cores with the P670 and P470 processors with RISC-V Vector Extension for AI/ML, media and sensor processing, and designed for high volume applications such as wearables, smart home, industrial automation, AR/VR, and other consumer devices. The P670 is comparable to the Cortex-A78, and the P470 is comparable to the Cortex-A55. Both support the standardized RISC-V RVA22 profile for better OS compatibility and implement RISC-V Vector v1.0 and Vector Cryptography extensions. The SiFive Performance P470 and P670 share the following features: Full RISC-V RVA22 profile compliance Full, Out-of-Order, RISC-V Vector implementation, based on the ratified RISC-V Vector v1.0 Specification RISC-V Vector Cryptography extensions SiFive WorldGuard system security Support for virtualization, including a separate IOMMU for accelerating virtualized device IO Advanced Interrupt Architecture (AIA) compliant interrupt controller with better support for Message Signal Interrupts (MSI) and virtualization Enhanced scalability with fully coherent multi-core, multi-cluster, with […]

July 20, 2022July 20, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Qualcomm Snapdragon W5+ and W5 wearables platforms promise higher efficiency and performance

It’s been a while since Qualcomm released a new platform for wearables. More exactly, the Snapdragon 4100 platform was announced a little over two years ago, and now Qualcomm has just introduced the Snapdragon W5+ and W5 Gen 1 platforms with up to 50% longer battery, twice the performance, and 30 percent smaller size. Just like the Snapdragon 4100, the Snapdragon W5 comes with four Arm Cortex-A53 processor (SW5100), but is clocked at 1.7 GHz and manufactured with a 4nm process, while the always-on (AON) co-processor is upgraded from a Cortex-M0 chip to the QCC5100 Cortex-M55 chip manufactured with a 22nm process. Snapdragon W5+/W5 specifications: W5100 SoC CPU – Quad-core Cortex-A53 processor @ up to 1.7 GHz GPU – Qualcomm Adreno A702 @ up to 1 GHz with OpenGL ES 3.1 API support DSP – Qualcomm Hexagon DSP V66K System Memory – 16-bit LPDDR4 up to 2,133 MHz […]

June 24, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Renesas SmartBond DA1470x Bluetooth 5.2 LE SoC features a 2D GPU

I would not usually ask myself “is there a GPU?” in a Bluetooth LE SoC, but that’s exactly what Renesas SmartBond DA1470x Bluetooth 5.2 LE microcontroller offers with a 2D GPU used to accelerate the rendering of user interfaces in wearables, healthcare devices, home appliances with displays, industrial automation and security systems, as well as consoles in e-bikes and gaming equipment. The DA1470x also comes with a Cortex-M33 application core, a Cortex-M0+ sensor node controller, 1.5MB SRAM, and an ultra-low-power hardware VAD for always-on audio processing, as well as various peripherals. Specifications: CPU cores Arm Cortex-M33 core @ up to 160 MHz for the application Arm Cortex-M0+ core acting as a sensor node controller (SNC) GPU – 2D GPU for advanced graphics processing Memory – 1.5MB SRAM Storage 4 kB OTG, 32KB ROM on-chip Decrypt-on-the-fly Octa/Quad SPI flash interface Dedicated QSPI PSRAM and QSPI flash interfaces eMMC interface supporting up […]

June 20, 2022June 20, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

Think Silicon NEOX RISC-V GPU offers 3D graphics or AI acceleration

Think Silicon NEOX GPU family with models optimized for graphics (NEOX|G) or artificial intelligence (NEOX|A) is based on the RISC-V RV64C ISA instruction set with adaptive NoC, and offers up to 64 cores delivering up to 409.6 GFLOPS at 800MHz with support for FP16, FP32 and optionally FP64 and SIMD instructions. The NEOX GPUs can be integrated into microcontrollers, crossover processors, and even more powerful application processors, and target AI, IoT/Edge, and media processing in consumer and industrial devices. Each shader of the GPU is a programmable 64-bit RISC-V (RV64GC) core running a real-time operating system (RTOS) and the GPU is supported by lightweight graphics and machine learning frameworks. The multi-threaded GPU system can be customized for graphics, machine learning, vision/video processing, and general-purpose compute (GPGPU) workloads. The solution is meant to be integrated into 32-bit SoCs designed for smartwatches, augmented reality (AR) eyewear, video surveillance, and smart display terminals […]

June 19, 2022June 20, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

BP Doctor PRO review – A 2-in-1 smartwatch and blood pressure monitor

YHE BP Doctor Pro 2-in-1 smartwatch & blood pressure monitor

So far, If I wanted to monitor my blood pressure monitor and overall fitness, I’d use a Bluetooth blood pressure monitor (Koogeek BP2) plus a fitness tracker/smartwatch such as Weloop Key S3. It does the job, but WearWiz has come up with something much more compact with the BP Doctor Pro 2-in-1 device that acts as both a smartwatch/fitness tracker and a blood pressure monitor, and at $299, offers a cheaper alternative to the $500 FDA-approved Omron Heartguide. The company sent a sample to CNX Software for review, so we’ll have a look at the device and accessories, the Android app, and features such as blood pressure monitoring, HRM, SpO2 level monitoring, and more. The review is rather long, so if you are short on time, you may want to check the two sections: Blood pressure monitoring with BP Doctor PRO smartwatch Conclusion with Pros and Cons BP Doctor PRO […]