Android Things 1.0 Released with Support for NXP i.MX 8M, Qualcomm SDA212/SDA624 and Mediatek MT8516 SoMs

Brillo Project was renamed to Android Things with the release of a developer preview back in December 2014, and the operating system enabling developers and companies to build and maintain Internet of Things devices at scale. The OS has now graduated so-to-speak with the release of Android Things 1.0 with long-term support for production devices, and this was to be expected as several Android Things devices were announced earlier this year. The new release adds supports for new system-on-modules (SoMs) based on the NXP i.MX8M, Qualcomm SDA212, Qualcomm SDA624, and MediaTek MT8516 SoCs. These modules are certified for production use with guaranteed long-term support for 3 years, and development hardware and reference designs for these SoMs will be available in the coming months. The Raspberry Pi 3 Model B and NXP i.MX7D boards and system-on-modules are still supported, but support for NXP i.MX6UL devices will be deprecated. Check out the […]

AAEON Releases an Intelligent Vending Machine Development Kit based on UP Board

UP board is a low cost development board powered by an Intel Atom x5-Z8350 Cherry Trail processor with 1GB to 4GB RAM, and 16 to 64GB eMMC flash that mostly follows Raspberry Pi 3 form factor. AAEON is now offering an “intelligent vending development kit” featuring UP board together with a vending machine controller (VMC) board, a motor for the machine’s internal mechanisms, a camera, a QR Code device, and all the necessary cables, as well as optional WiFi and Bluetooth modules. Some details about AIOT-MSSP01 Mini SSP Vending control board: “Intel Intelligent Vending Based” Motor Control – 24V or 12V, Supports GPIO, DC, PWM Type, Supports up to 160 DC Motors Support LCD and Keypad Feature I/Os Vending machine specific interfaces / standards 1x MDB (MultiDrop Bus) 1x DEX (Digital EXchange) 1x Protocol A (EXE) 1x 1-WIRE 4-channel ADC x 1 4-channel Relay GPIO for 12V & 5V by […]

Khadas Edge2 Arm mini PC

Kite is an Open Source Hardware Android Smartphone Powered by Snapdragon 450 Processor (Crowdfunding)

Kite is an open source hardware Android phone kit specifically targeting makers which you can assemble yourself into a Kitephone. The phone is based on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 450 mainboard (Kiteboard v2), and comes with  a 720p touchscreen display module, a 12MP camera, antennas, buttons, a 3,000 mAh battery, and a Raspberry Pi HAT compatibility board to optionally interface to external hardware. Kiteboard v2 specifications: SoC – Qualcomm Snapdragon 450 octa-core Arm Cortex A53 @ 1.8 GHz with Adreno 506 GPU System Memory – 2 GB RAM Storage – 16 GB storage + microSD card slot Connectivity Cellular LTE Cat. 6/3G/2G, 2x nano SIM slots (dual-SIM dual standby) Two variant North America with LTE FDD Bands: 2,4, 5, 7, 12, 13, 14, 25, 26 LTE TDD Bands: 41 WCDMA 850, 1700, 1900, 2100 GSM 850, 1900 Rest of the World (Europe, Russia, etc…) LTE FDD Bands: 1, 3, 5, 7, […]

Linux Development Boards – 2013 Edition

This list of Android/Linux development board lists does not intend to be exhaustive. On the contrary, I only plan to list the boards that I find remarkable either by the level of community support, price or features, and I plan to keep the list shorter than 10 boards. For more Linux boards, you can read “List of 39 Low Cost Linux Friendly Boards and Products” and the corresponding comment section. The boards are listed in no particular order. Raspberry Pi The Raspberry Pi is the lowest ARM Linux platform current available, it is based on Broadcom BCM2835 (ARM11) processor and comes in 2 flavors: Model A – 256MB RAM, HDMI & composite out, 1x USB Host, Audio output and SD card slot Model B – Same as Model A, but uses 512MB RAM instead, and comes with one extra USB host port and 10/100Mbit Ethernet This board currently supports a […]

Com Hem TV Hub is an Hybrid TV Box Powered by Broadcom BCM7271 SoC with VideoCore V GPU

Most people reading this blog will know VideoCore IV is the GPU used in Broadcom BCM283x processors found in Raspberry Pi board, but we’ve previously seen work was done on its successor – VideoCore V GPU – in the Linux kernel. It’s unclear whether the GPU will be used in the next generation Raspberry Pi boards, but there’s a least one hardware platform featuring VideoCore V GPU with Com Hem TV Hub, an Android TV TV box for the Swedish market based on Broadcom BCM7271 SoC. UZX8020CHM specifications based on AndroidTV Guide page: SoC – Broadcom BCM7271 quad core processor @ 1.6 GHz with VideoCore V (V3D-520) GPU System Memory – 2GB RAM Storage – 16GB eMMC flash, microSD slot, optional stackable 1TB hard drive Video Output – HDMI 2.0 up to 4K 60 Hz with HDR support Connectivity – Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11 n/ac WiFi 4×4 MIMO Tuner – Quad […]

Automation & IoT How-tos

Automation used to happen in your local network, while the Internet of Things obviously relies on an Internet connection, but in recent years both categories merged in some ways, so I’ve gathered related links in this page to offer an easy access to those resources. ESP8266 & ESP32 Getting Started Guides Espressif Systems WiFi SoCs have become really popular in the maker community thanks to their low cost, and great community and software support around the platforms. Over the years, I’ve written a few tutorials showing how to get started on ESP8266 WiSoC or the newer ESP32 WiFI + Bluetooth LE SoC: Getting Started with NodeMCU Board Powered by ESP8266 WiSoC (Lua programming Getting Started with Wemos D1 mini ESP8266 Board, DHT & Relay Shields (Arduino firmware) Getting Started with ESP32-Bit Module and ESP32-T Development Board using Arduino core for ESP32 Getting Started with Espruino & JavaScript on ESP32 with […]

Rockchip RK3568/RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs

Fipsy is a $10 Breadboard-Friendly FPGA Board for Education (Crowdfunding)

We’ve already seen several cheap FPGA boards in the past with the $25 miniSpartan3 (Xilinx), $34 Spartixed (Xilinx), or 40 Euros Olimex iCE40HX8K-EVB boards (Lattice), but if you have a really tight budget you can now plat with FPGA for just $10 thanks to Fipsy board. With its 256 LUTs Lattice Semi MachXO2 FPGA, you’ll be limited to what you can do for specific projects, but it could be useful to teach yourself or students FPGA programming, especially it also happens to be breadboard-friendly. Fipsy specifications: FPGA – Lattice Semiconductors MachXO2 (LCMXO2-256HC-4SG32C) FPGA @ 269 MHz max. with 256 LUTs, 2 kbit Distributed RAM, 32 LABs (Logic Array Blocks) Programmable by SPI and I2C Expansion – 2x 10-pin header supporting various interfaces including: LVCMOS 3.3/2.5/1.8/1.5/1.2  LVTTL  LVDS  Bus-LVDS  MLVDS  RSDS  LVPECL SSTL 25/18 HSTL 18 Schmitt trigger inputs, up to 0.5 V hysteresis Misc – Onboard LED Operating Supply Voltage – 3.3 […]

FOSSASIA Summit 2018 Schedule – March 22-25

FOSDEM is the “Free & Open Source Software Developers’ European  Meeting” takes place the first week-end of February every year in Brussels, Belgium.  It turns out there’s an event in Asia called FOSSASIA Summit that’s about to take place in Singapore on March 22-25. There are some differences however, as while FOSDEM is entirely free to attend, FOSSASIA requires to pay an entry fee to attend talks, although there are free tickets to access the exhibition hall and career fair. There are also less sessions as in FOSDEM, but still twelve different tracks with: Artificial Intelligence Blockchain Cloud, Container, DevOps Cybersecurity Database Kernel & Platform Open Data, Internet Society, Community Open Design, IoT, Hardware, Imaging Open Event Solutions Open Source in Business Science Tech Web and Mobile Since the event is spread out over four days, it should be easier to attend the specific sessions you are interested in. I’ve […]

Khadas VIM4 SBC