CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

May 18, 2023May 19, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Sumolink Erhu RP2040 is a $3.60 Raspberry Pi Pico clone with a USB-C port

The Sumolink Erhu RP2040 is a Raspberry Pi Pico clone with the exact same features except the micro USB port has been replaced by a USB-C port that may be preferred by some people, and the Wisdpi claims it is one of the world’s cheapest RP2040 MCU boards at $3.60, although that price does not include shipping. We had seen some other replicas, but most offer something different rather than just the USB-C port. Two examples that come to my mind are the WeAct RP2040 with a USB-C port, but also a Reset button and up to 16MB SPI flash, instead of the 2MB flash in the original board, and the Banana Pi BPI-Pico-RP2040 with an extra I2C connector and an RGB LED. Sumolink Erhu RP2040 specifications: MCU – Raspberry Pi RP2040 dual-core Cortex-M0+ microcontroller @ 133 MHz with 264KB SRAM Storage – 2MB QSPI flash (Note: the specs list […]

May 18, 2023May 18, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

BeepBerry handheld Linux computer drives 2.7-inch display with Raspberry Pi Zero W

Good news! The PocketCHIP handheld Linux computer is back! OK, not quite but that’s what the Raspberry Pi Zero-powered BeepBerry reminds me of with a Blackberry-like keyboard, a small 2.7-inch display, and a 2,000mAh LiPo battery for power. The BeepBerry is another open-source hardware design from SQFMI, who previously did the Watchy ESP32 E-Ink smartwatch, that runs Raspberry Pi OS Lite on the Raspberry Pi Zero/Zero W, and also includes a Raspberry Pi RP2040 to handle the keyboard and peripherals. BeepBerry specifications: SBC – Raspberry Pi Zero board with a Broadcom BCM2835 ARM11 processor @ 700 MHz, VideoCore IV GPU, or Raspberry Pi Zero W with WiFi and Bluetooth Storage – MicroSD card slot Display – Ultra-low power high contrast 2.7-inch Sharp Memory LCD with 400 x 200 resolution User input – QWERTY tactile keyboard w/ backlight and touchpad based on Solder Party BB Q20 Keyboard USB – USB-C programming […]

ArmSoM RK3588 AIModule7 NVIDIA Jetson Nano-compatible SOM

May 18, 2023May 18, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

AndesAIRE AnDLA I350 AI/ML IP block is configurable from 64 GOPS to 8TOPS for Edge AI SoCs

Andes Technology has just announced the AndesAIRE product line, where AndesAIRE stands for Andes AI Runs Everywhere, comprised of the AndesAIRE AnDLA I350 (Andes Deep Learning Accelerator) AI/ML hardware accelerator intellectual property (IP) and the AndesAIRE NN SDK with neural network software tools and runtimes. AndesAIRE AnDLA I350 AnDLA I350 specifications: Configurable MACs from 32 to 4096 (INT8) Maximum performance – 8 TOPS at 1GHz Configurable local memory – 16KB to 4MB Multi-dimension DMA Four 64-bit AXI bus interfaces NN type – CNN inference NN models Image and Video: AlexNet, VGG-16/19, MobileNet-v1/v2/v3, ResNet-8/50, Tiny YOLO v1/v2, YOLO v1/v2/v3/v4/v5, SSD MobileNet v1/v2, Inception v2, EfficientNet-lite, MobileFaceNet, BlazeNet Speech/Voice and audio: LSTM, RNN, GRU Operators: Conv2d, depthwise convolution, pointwise convolution, transpose convolution, dilated convolution, element-wise (add, sub, mul), fully-connected, activation (ReLU, leaky ReLU, sigmoid, Tanh, ReLU6, SiLU), pooling (max, ave), upsample, concatenation, batch normalization, channel padding Operator fusion NHWC data format The IP […]

May 17, 2023May 18, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

$25 Renesas “HMI Board” features RA6M3 microcontroller for RT-Thread & LVGL development

The Renesas HMI board is a Renesas RA6M3 Cortex-M4F development board with a 4.3-inch LCD developed in collaboration with the teams behind the RT-Thread RTOS project and LVGL open-source graphics library. Besides a color display for HMI (Human Machine Interface), the board also features a microSD card for data storage, Ethernet and WiFi connectivity, Arduino headers and PMOD connectors for expansion, a microphone and a speaker, a CAN bus terminal block, and two USB-C ports for debugging and power. Renesas HMI board specifications: MCU – Renesas RA6M3 (R7FA6M3AH3CFB) Arm Cortex-M4F microcontroller @ 120MHz with 2MB Flash, 640KB RAM, TFT controller, 2D accelerator, and JPEG decoder. Storage – MicroSD card slot Display – 4.3-inch LCD (RGB 888) Audio – Microphone and speaker Networking Low-profile 10/100M Ethernet RJ45 port RW007 SPI WiFi module by Shanghai Ruiside Electronic Technology USB – 2x USB Type-C ports Serial – 2-pin CAN bus terminal block Expansion […]

May 17, 2023May 17, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Micro-ATX motherboard takes socketed Raptor Lake CPUs, offers PCIe Gen 5 slots, 2.5GbE, up to 8x SATA ports…

AAEON MAX-Q670A is an industrial micro-ATX motherboard that accepts socketed 13th Gen Intel Core Raptor Lake processors, supports up to 128GB DDR5, offers eight SATA ports with RAID 0/1/5/10, up to four Ethernet ports (GbE and 2.5GbE), and two 16-lane PCIe Gen 5 slots. Other features include five display interfaces with HDMI, DisplayPort, VGA, LVDS, and eDP, four bootable USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports, an RS232/RS422/RS485 COM port, and plenty of internals headers for more serial and USB ports, as well as M.2 expansion sockets and a digital I/O port AAEON MAX-Q670A specifications: SoC – 12th/13th Generation Intel Core LGA1700 Socket processors (Alder Lake or Raptor Lake) with up to 125W TDP Chipset – Intel Q670 Express Chipset I/O Chipset – NCT6126D System Memory – Up to 128GB via 4x DIMM slots for DDR5 4,000MHz non-ECC, un-buffered memory Storage 8x SATA III ports with support for RAID 0, 1, […]

May 17, 2023July 3, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 36 Comments

Pocket-sized 2.8-inch mini PC features an Intel N100 processor, 12GB RAM, up to 2TB storage

Pocket-sized mini PC Intel Processor N100

A pocket-sized 2.8-inch (72 x 72 x 45mm) mini PC based on an Intel Processor N100 SoC with 12GB LPDDR5, and up to 2TB storage has started to show up on Aliexpress for $154 and up under the names ZX01 Plus and Topton M6S. This is the most compact Alder Lake-N mini PC we’ve seen so far, yet it still comes with two HDMI 2.0 ports, a 3.5mm audio jack, Gigabit Ethernet and WiFi 5 connectivity, and three USB 3.2 ports, plus a non-standard 12V USB-C port that’s now common for this type of mini PC. ZX01 Plus / Topton M6S specifications: SoC – Intel Processor N100 Alder Lake-N quad-core processor @ up to 3.4 GHz (Turbo) with 6MB cache, 24 EU Intel HD graphics @ up to 750 MHz; TDP: 6W System Memory – 12GB LPDDR5 @ 4800 MHz Storage Optional 128GB to 2TB M.2 2242 SATA SSD, but […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs and SoMs in 2025

May 16, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Gigadevice GD25LE128EXH is a tiny 3x3mm 128Mbit SPI NOR flash

GigaDevice Semiconductor has just launched the GD25LE128EXH 128Mbit SPI NOR Flash in a tiny ultra-compact 3x3x0.4mm FO-USON8 package designed for IoT, wearables, healthcare, and networking products. The GD25LE128EXH supports up to 133MHz frequency with four channels delivering up to 532Mbit/s data throughput. GigaDevice also highlights the low power consumption of just 6mA when reading, or a reduction of power consumption by 45% compared to previous devices. GD25LE128EXH specifications: Density – 128Mb I/O Bus – Single I/O, Dual I/O, Quad I/O, QPI Frequency – 133 MHz (x1 x2 x4) Features H/W RESET WP# Security Registers with OTP Locks Suspend Unique ID HOLD# Voltage – 1.65V~2.0V Package – FO-USON8 3x3mm Temperature Range – -40°C~85°C; -40°C~105°C, or -40°C~125°C The GD25LE128E SPI flash is also available in SOP8 208mil, USON8 4x4mm, WSON8 6x5mm, WSON8 8x6mm, and WLCSP (4-4 ball array) packages, which means the GD25LE128EXH’s FO-USON8 package reduces area by 70% and thickness by […]

May 16, 2023July 8, 2023 by Ian W MORRISON (Linuxium) - 56 Comments

Beelink EQ12 Review – An Intel Processor N100 mini PC tested with Windows 11, TrueNAS, pfSense, Ubuntu, and more

Beelink’s new EQ series of mini PCs form their base product range and feature low-powered Jasper Lake and Alder Lake-N processors with relatively basic port and memory/storage configurations. Perhaps more importantly, they are also the cheapest mini PCs they offer. Having recently announced the EQ12 mini PC featuring an Intel Processor N100 ‘Alder Lake-N’ CPU with up to 16GB RAM, Beelink have now sent one for review. Whilst I’ll cover the basic Windows operation and performance, I’ll also explore how this new mini PC performs when used as an integrated router and NAS. Beelink EQ12 specifications Beelink list the EQ12 specifications as: It is worth noting that the Processor N100 processor only supports a single memory channel and that according to Intel’s specification for the processor, the maximum memory supported is only 16 GB. Intel’s specification for the number of graphical execution units (EUs) also states 24 however software such […]