SiFive unveils P870 high-performance core, discusses future of RISC-V

SiFive Hot Chips 2023 x86 vs Arm vs RISC-V

SiFive has just given a presentation at Hot Chips 2023 introducing the new high-performance P870 RISC-V core and its automotive equivalent the P870-A core, plus discussing RISC-V in general, its previous generation RISC-V cores, and what to expect going forward. SiFive has not officially announced the P870 and P870-A cores just yet, so most of the information we have from the English-speaking Internet is from ServeTheHome who managed to get some presentation slides, but this is also corroborated by various Chinese sources on Baidu and Guokr. SiFive P870 and P870-A The P870 and P870-A RISC-V cores are new cores from the SiFive Performance family compatible with the RISC-V RVA23 profile and succeeding the SiFive P670 core. The SpecINT2k6 benchmark reports 17 points per GHz on the P870 compared to 13.2 points per GHz for the P670 (comparable to the Arm Cortex-A78) or about a 29% higher performance at the same […]

Blackview MP80 review – Part 2: An Intel Processor N95 mini PC tested with Windows 11

Blackview MP80 review windows 11

In the first part of our Blackview MP80 Mini PC review we’ve looked at the specifications of the Intel Alder Lake-N Processor N95 pocket-sized mini PC, gone through an unboxing, a (limited) teardown, and given it a quick try in Windows 11. We’ve now had time to test the mini PC with Windows 11 more thoroughly and the MP80 mini PC works quite well and smoothly for its size. So in the second part of the review, we’ll report our experience, run some benchmarks, test hardware features, and so on. Software overview and Blackview MP80’s features testing The System->About section in Windows settings confirms the Blackview MP80 mini PC is powered by an Intel Processor N95 Alder Lake-N CPU with 16 GB RAM, and comes with Windows 11 Pro version 22H2 OS build 22621.1702. HWiNFO64 provides more details about the Intel Processor N95 Alder Lake-N quad-core/quad-thread processor, the motherboard (Shenzhen […]

ArmSoM CM5 - Raspberry Pi CM4 alternative with Rockchip RK3576 SoC

LoRaWAN IoT Button ships with open-source firmware, bootloader, and Android app

LoRaWAN IoT button

LoRaWAN is often used for asset tracking or environmental monitoring, for example, to track cattle location, or monitor temperature and humidity in a field, but n-Fuse’s “LoRaWAN IoT Action Button” enables human interaction and comes with open-source firmware, bootloader, and soon the source code for the Android app. Most of the n-Fuse STx-LR family of LoRaWAN nodes integrates environmental sensors but the LoRaWAN IoT Action Button is different with support supports single, double, and long presses, as well as tactile feedback. n-Fuse STx-LR family comes in three variants with the following key features: MCU – STMicro STM32L071KZU6 Arm Cortex-M0+ microcontroller @ 32 MHz with 192KB flash, 20KB RAM sta-lr – Action button with tactile feedback. stx-lr – TI HDC2080 environmental sensor (Temperature, Humidity), BMA400 motion sensor (acceleration), magnetic field sensitive Reed switch, ambient light sensor, and proximity sensor. ste-lr – Bosch BME680 environmental sensor with temperature, humidity, air pressure, and […]

ASRock launches Intel Processor N100 motherboards with 24-pin ATX connector or DC-in jack

ASRock N100DC-ITX motherboard

ASRock has launched two new similar low-cost Alder Lake-N motherboards powered by a 3.4 GHz Intel Processor N100 quad-core CPU with the N100M micro-ATX motherboard featuring a 24-pin ATX connector for power, and the N100DC-ITX mini-ITX motherboard getting powered through a DC-in jack compatible with 19V power adapters. Both motherboards have very similar specifications with support for up to 32GB DDR4 single-channel memory, M.2 NVMe SSD and two SATA drives, and offer multiple video outputs including HDMI, VGA, and DisplayPort (N100M only), Gigabit Ethernet, up to sixteen USB interfaces, PCIe slots, and more. ASRock N100M/N100DC-ITX specifications: SoC – Intel Processor N100 quad-core Efficient “Alder Lake-N” processor clocked at up to 3.4 GHz with 24EU Intel UHD graphics up to 750 MHz System Memory – Up to 32GB DDR4-3200 memory via DDR4 DIMM slot Storage 1x M.2 socket (M2_1, Key M), supports type 2242/2260/2280 PCIe Gen3 x2 (16 Gb/s) mode 2x […]

Orange Pi Compute Module 4 – A low-cost Rockchip RK3566-powered alternative to Raspberry Pi CM4

Orange Pi Compute Module 4

Orange Pi Compute Module 4 is a system-on-module mechanically and electrically compatible with the Raspberry Pi CM4, but powered by a Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 AI processor just like the Radxa CM3 introduced a few years ago, or more recently the Banana Pi BPI-CM2 (RK3568). The new module, also called Orange Pi CM4 for shorts, comes with 1GB to 8GB RAM, 8GB to 128GB eMMC flash, and an optional 128/256MBit SPI flash, as well as a Gigabit Ethernet PHY and on-board WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0. It comes with the two 100-pin high-density connectors found on the Raspberry Pi CM4, and a smaller 24-pin connector for extra I/Os. Orange Pi Compute Module 4 specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor @ 1.8 GHz with Arm Mali-G52 2EE GPU, 0.8 TOPS AI accelerator, 4Kp60 H.265/H.264/VP9 video decoding, 1080p100f H.265/H.264 video encoding System Memory – 1GB, 2GB, 4GB, or […]

SemiDrive D9-Pro (D9360) Arm Cortex-A55/R5 processor powers industrial CPU module for motor control

MYD JD9360 SemiDrive D9 Pro Development Board

MYiR MYC-JD9360 is a CPU Module powered by SemiDrive D9-Pro (D9360) processor with six Arm Cortex-A55 application cores, a dual-core lock-step Cortex-R5 real-time core along with a PowerVR GPU, 4Kp30 H.265/H.264 VPU and a 0.8 TOPS NPU, and designed for motion control and industrial applications. The MYC-JD9360 CPU module also comes with 2GB LPDDR4, 16GB eMMC flash, 16MB QSPI Flash, 256Kbit EEPROM, and exposes I/Os such as PCIe 3.0, USB 3.0, CAN FD, and TSN-enabled Gigabit Ethernet through a 314-pin MXM connector. The company also provides the MYD-JD9360 development board to quickly get started with the module and evaluate the solution. MYiR MYC-JD9360 CPU module with SemiDrive D9-Pro SoC Specifications: SoC – SemiDrive D9-Pro (D9360) CPU Application – Hexa-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor @ 1.6 GHz Real-time – Dual-core lock-step Cortex-R5 cores @ 800MHz GPU – Imagination PowerVR 9XM GPU @ 100 GFLOPS VPU – 4Kp30 H.265/VP8/VP9 video decoder, 4Kp30 H.264 […]

Rockchip RK3568/RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs

Sipeed unveils RISC-V tablet, portable Linux console, and cluster

Sipeed RISC-V tablet, cluster, Linux console

Sipeed has unveiled three new hardware platforms based on the LM4A RISC-V system-on-module found in their LicheePi 4A SBC, namely the Lichee Cluster 4A cluster for native RISC-V compilation, the Lichee Pad 4A 10.1-inch tablet running Android 13 or Debian, and the Lichee Console 4A a portable Linux console with a small 7-inch display and a built-in keyboard. As a quick reminder, the Sipeed LM4A SoM is based on the Alibaba T-Head TH1520 quad-core RISC-V processor @ 1.8 to 2.5 GHz that has just gotten some support in Linux 6.5, comes with up to 16GB RAM and up to 64 GB eMMC flash, integrates two Gigabit Ethernet PHY, and exposes all I/Os through a 260-pin SO-DIMM connector. We’ve previously noticed the TH1520 module delivers performance similar to the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4 and even more when using a customized toolchain. Lichee Cluster 4A All new Sipeed hardware platforms feature […]

Linux 6.5 release – Notable changes, Arm, RISC-V and MIPS architectures

Linux 6.5 release

Linus Torvalds has just announced the release of Linux 6.5 on the Linux Kernel Mailing List (LKML): So nothing particularly odd or scary happened this last week, so there is no excuse to delay the 6.5 release. I still have this nagging feeling that a lot of people are on vacation and that things have been quiet partly due to that. But this release has been going smoothly, so that’s probably just me being paranoid. The biggest patches this last week were literally just to our selftests. The shortlog below is obviously not the 6.5 release log, it’s purely just the last week since rc7. Anyway, this obviously means that the merge window for 6.6 starts tomorrow. I already have ~20 pull requests pending and ready to go, but before we start the next merge frenzy, please give this final release one last round of testing, ok? Linus The earlier […]

Boardcon Rockchip and Allwinner SoM and SBC products