CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

September 5, 2022September 5, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Telink energy harvesting wireless module to enable batteryless remote controls

Telink Energy Harvesting Multi protocol Wireless module TV remote control

Telink TLSR8273-M-EH is a multi-protocol wireless connectivity module with energy harvesting capabilities implemented through Nowi’s PMIC, and designed for batteryless devices (or ones with “forever batteries”) such as TV remote controls, but also wearables, and electronic shelf labels among others. The solution is based on a 48MHz RISC microcontroller that supports Bluetooth 5.1 LE, 802.15.4 (Zigbee/RF4CE/6LoWPAN/Thread), and 2.4GHz proprietary protocols. With a single module integrating all main components required for batteryless operation, Telink says its solutions reduce BOM and size, as well as supply chain complexity, and improves user-friendliness by removing the need for battery swaps. Telink TLSR8273-M-EH specifications: Core – 32-bit RISC microcontroller @ up to 48 MHz (CoreMark 1.25/MHz) Memory – 64 KB SRAM with 32 KB retention Storage – 512 KB flash RF Bluetooth 5.1 LE up to 2 Mbps, with AOA/AOD support, Bluetooth Mesh IEEE 802.15.4 radio for Zigbee, RF4CE, 6LoWPAN, Thread 2.4GHz proprietary protocols RX […]

September 4, 2022September 4, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Wi-SUN: An LPWAN standard for Smart Cities, Smart Agriculture, large scale IoT deployments

Wi-SUN is a standard (IEEE 802.15.4g) managed by the Wi-SUN Alliance and designed for Smart Cities, Smart Agriculture, and other large scale IoT deployments with a large number of devices thanks to the use of IPv6 mesh networking. The organization was founded in 2011 to “support the worldwide development of Wireless Communications Networks for Utilities, Smart Cities and IoT”, but due to the niche nature of target applications, it does not get that much press coverage and was only recently brought to my attention. Wi-SUN stands for “Wireless Smart Utility Networks”or “Wireless Smart Ubiquitous Networks”, and the standard aims to connect streetlights, cameras, weather stations, smart metering, utility transmission systems, and others to enable data-sharing between city services to improve their efficiency, save costs, and offer improves services to citizens. Wi-SUN FAN (Field Area Network) is the latest protocol managed by the Wi-SUN Alliance with over 95 million units shipped […]

September 3, 2022September 3, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Intel Loihi 2 high-efficiency neuromorphic chip works with the Lava open-source framework

Neuromorphic AI accelerator chips relying on spiking neural networks (SNN), which we’ve seen from companies such as Innatera or Brainchip, will be used more and more in the future as they provide much higher efficiency compared to traditional deep neural networks (DNN) solutions. Intel is also working on SNN, and recently announced the Loihi 2 second-generation neuromorphic research chip with up to 1 million neurons (the human brain has 86 billion of those on average) that delivers up to 175x lower energy to learn a new object instance with similar or better speed and accuracy compared to conventional methods running on a central processing unit (CPU). The new Loihi 2 neuromorphic chip offers the following improvement over the first generation Loihi: Up to 10x faster processing capability (2x for simple neuron state, 5x for synaptic operations, 10x for spike generation) Up to 60x more inter-chip bandwidth achieved through a combination […]

September 2, 2022September 2, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

AAEON launches UP Xtreme i11 & UP Squared 6000 robotic development kits

AAEON’s UP Bridge the Gap community has partnered with Intel to release two robotic development kits based on either UP Xtreme i11 or UP Squared 6000 single board computers in order to simplify robotics evaluation and development. Both robotic development kits come with a four-wheeled robot prototype that can move omnidirectionally, sense and map its environment, avoid obstacles, and detect people and objects. Since those capabilities are already implemented, users can save time and money working on further customization for specific use cases. Key features and specifications: SBC UP Squared 6000 SBC – Recommended for power efficiency and extended battery power SoC – Intel Atom x6425RE Elkhart Lake processor clocked up to 1.90 GHz with Intel UHD Graphics System Memory – 8GB LPDDR4 Storage – 64GB eMMC flash, SATA port UP Xtreme i11 SBC – Recommended for higher performance SoC Intel Core i7-1185GRE clocked at up to 4.40 GHz and […]

September 2, 2022September 2, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

USB4 Version 2.0 to enable speeds of up to 80 Gbps, introduce “active” USB cables

The USB Promoter Group has just pushed a press release about the “pending release” of the USB4 Version 2.0 specification that promises up to 80 Gbps of data performance over the USB Type-C cable and connector. The group also explains both the USB Type-C and USB Power Delivery (USB PD) specifications will also be updated, and everything will be published right before the USB DevDays developer events planned for November 2022 in the US and South Korea. So that’s basically an announcement about a future announcement, but we were still provided with some highlights of the upcoming USB4 v2 specification: Up to 80 Gbps operation based on a new physical layer architecture, using existing 40 Gbps USB Type-C passive cables and newly-defined 80 Gbps USB Type-C active cables. Updates to data and display protocols to better use the increase in available bandwidth. USB data architecture updates now enable USB 3.2 […]

September 2, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Kubuntu Focus NX is a Linux mini PC with a Tiger Lake processor, two Thunderbolt 3 ports

Kubuntu Focus NX is a mini PC running Kubuntu Focus Linux operating system on an Intel Core i5-1135G7 or i7-1165G7 Tiger Lake processor, with up to 64GB RAM, support for NVMe and SATA storage, offering four HDMI/DisplayPort video outputs, two Thunderbolt 3 / USB-C ports, and three extra USB 3.2 Type-A ports. The mini PC also comes with decent networking and wireless connectivity thanks to a 2.5GbE port and an Intel AX601 module enabling WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2. Mini PCs shipping with Linux by default are quite rare, and most that do are fairly expensive ones, so it’s nice to see a more affordable mid-range mini PC working with Kubuntu Focus out of the box. Kubuntu Focus NX mini PC specifications: SoC (one or the other) Intel Core i7-1165G7 Tiger Lake quad-core/8-thread processor @ 2.8 GHz / 4.7 GHz (Turbo) with 12MB cache, 96EU Intel Xe graphics ; TDP: […]

Rockchip RK3568/RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs

September 1, 2022December 4, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Trigkey Speed S3 review – Part 2: AMD Ryzen 5 3550H mini PC tested with Windows 11 Pro

After checking out Trigkey Speed S3 mini PC hardware in the first part of the review, it’s now time to power up Trigkey Speed S3 Mini PC and test it with the preinstalled Windows 11 Pro operating systems. Booting up is fast, and the system runs smoothly while visiting various websites while listening to music, and watching YouTube videos. But in this second part of the review, let’s test the performance of the Trigkey Speed S3 mini PC on Windows 11 Pro in detail. Trigkey Speed S3 memory We can see the two 8GB Crucial memory sticks detected in Windows 11 Pro with a 2,400 MHz speed, while the sticks are rated up to 3,200 MHz. But a quick check on AMD’s website reveals this may be normal since the maximum memory frequency for the AMD Ryzen 5 3550H is listed as 2,400 MHz. Checking out the USB ports Since […]

September 1, 2022September 1, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

$5 CH347 board is a USB 2.0 bridge to I2C, SPI, UART, JTAG, and GPIO

MuseLab USB-HS-Bridge is an inexpensive ($5) board based on WCH CH347 chip with a USB 2.0 Type-C interface that acts as a bridge for I2C, SPI, UART, and JTAG interfaces, as well as GPIOs. It’s notably useful to debug and download bitstreams to FPGA development boards, but it can also be used to connect various peripherals such as I2C sensors, SPI flash devices, UART devices to basically any host with a spare USB 2.0 host port. USB-HS-Bridge specifications: Chip – WCH CH347 high-speed USB to UART, I2C, SPI and JTAG chip (See link to the datasheet for details) USB – 1x USB 2.0 Type-C port with up to 480 Mbps data rate I/Os – 2x 16-pin header with 2x UART interfaces up to 9 Mbps baudrate 1x I2C for EEPROM or sensors 1x SPI master interface with 2 chip select signals to control up to 2x SPI slave devices. The […]