CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

December 20, 2024December 20, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

WeAct RP2350A_V20 is a cheap Raspberry Pi RP2350 board with up to 16MB flash

WeAct RP2350A_V20 may be the world’s cheapest Raspberry Pi RP2350 board around with a design similar to the official Raspberry Pi Pico 2, but featuring a black PCB, a Reset button, a USB-C port and offered with either 4MB or 16MB flash. WeAct is selling its RP2350 board for $3.47 (4MB) and $4.46 (16MB) respectively before shipping and potential taxes are taken into account. WeAct RP2350A_V20 specifications: SoC – Raspberry Pi RP2350A CPU Dual-core Arm Cortex-M33 @ 150 MHz with Arm Trustzone, Secure boot OR Dual-core RISC-V Hazard3 @ 150 MHz Up to two cores can be used in any combination Memory – 520 KB on-chip SRAM Package – QFN-60 Storage – 4 MB or 16MB on-board QSPI flash USB – USB Type-C 1.1 host/device connector for power and programming Expansion – 2x 20-pin headers 26x GPIO 2x UART 2x SPI controllers 2x I2C controllers 16x PWM channels 3x ADC […]

December 20, 2024December 19, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

$59 Voice “Preview Edition” adds an offline smart speaker to your Home Assistant server

Nabu Casa has just launched the Home Assistant Voice Preview Edition, a little ESP32 device with an XMOS XU316 audio processor, a dual-microphone array, an internal speaker, and a 3.5mm audio jack, that adds offline smart speaker functions to your Home Assistant server through WiFi. If your Home Assistant server is powerful enough, voice processing will be done directly on your local hardware using Home Assistant Voice software, but with lower-end hardware like a Raspberry Pi 4, audio processing can be done via a privacy-focused cloud instead. The solution also supports expansion thanks to a Grove connector on the bottom of the device. Voice Preview Edition specifications: SoC – Espressif ESP32-S3 dual-core Xtensa LX7 @ up to 240 MHz with vector extension for ML acceleration, 2.4 GHz WiFi & Bluetooth 5.0 LE connectivity Memory- 8 MB octal PSRAM Storage – 16 MB flash Audio DSP/Processor – XMOS XU316 with 16 […]

ArmSoM CM5 Raspberry Pi CM4 alternative with Rockchip RK3576 SoC

December 19, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

AAEON’s first Arm-based SMARC 2.1 module is NXP i.MX 8M Plus-powered uCOM-IMX8P system-on-module

AAEON has released its first Arm-based SMARC 2.1 compliant CPU module, the uCOM-IMX8P built on the NXP i.MX 8M Plus SoC and offered with up to 4GB RAM, up to 128GB eMMC flash. and support for a range of interfaces such as dual Gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.0, PCIe 3.0, and more. The 82mm x 50mm SMARC system-on-module is designed for industrial use with a -40°C to 85°C operating temperature range, Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) support, CAN Bus, MIPI interfaces, and more. That makes it suitable for applications such as predictive maintenance, process optimization, and automated control systems with cameras and displays. AAEON uCOM-IMX8P specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Plus CPU – Quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 processor @ 1.6 GHz GPU – Vivante GC380 2D GPU and GC7000UL 3D GPU VPU – 1080p60 video decoder & encoder AI accelerator – Optional 2.3 TOPS Neural Processing Unit (NPU) System Memory – Up […]

December 19, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Iridium Certus 9704 Satellite IoT Developer Kit supports Arduino programming, integrates with Blynk IoT Cloud

Iridium Certus 7904 Satellite IoT Developer Kit is a compact Arduino-programmable devkit with satellite connectivity, a microSD card for data storage, USB and LiPo battery power support, and various expansion options designed for IoT and M2M applications. Featuring a pre-provisioned Iridium Certus 9704 module, the developer kit also supports expansion headers and connectors for Adafruit FeatherWing modules, Arduino Shields, Qwiic/STEMMA QT modules, and Arduino I2C (ESLOV) add-on boards. We have written about several Iridium satellite solutions over many years, but I think it’s the first time we’ve come across an easy-to-use Satellite IoT development kit programmable with the Arduino IDE and with Blynk IoT Cloud integration. Iridium Certus 9704 Satellite IoT Developer Kit specifications: Iridium Certus 9704 Module Max Message Size – 100 KB including images & soundbites through IMT (Iridium Messaging Transport) service Command Interface – JSON-Based Serial Protocol for REST (JSPR) Interfaces – Serial data; SPI; GPIOs; GNSS […]

December 19, 2024December 18, 2024 by Sayantan Nandy - 1 Comment

iBASE IB996 full-size PICMG 1.3 CPU card features Intel Q670E chipset, supports 12th to 14th Gen Intel Core desktop processors

The iBASE IB996 full-size PICMG 1.3 CPU card, built on the Intel Q670E chipset, supports 12th to 14th Gen Intel Core desktop processors. It is designed for industrial and embedded applications with dual 2.5GbE LAN, DDR5 support, and extensive I/O options including PCI and PCIe x16 interfaces. We haven’t covered this type of card on CNX Software before, so some basic explanations are needed. PICMG 1.3, or SHB Express, is an industrial standard for System Host Boards (SHBs) supporting PCIe, PCI, and PCI-X interfaces first ratified in 2005 (PCIMG 1.0). It uses a backplane to separate the processing unit from I/O, enabling modular design and easy integration. Commonly used in industrial automation, medical systems, and embedded computing, it ensures compatibility and scalability for high-performance applications. iBASE IB996 CPU card specifications: Supported SoC – 14th, 13th, and 12th Gen Intel Core i9/i7/i5/i3 desktop processors (LGA1700 socket) based on the Raptor Lake-S […]

December 18, 2024December 20, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 52 Comments

Radxa Orion O6 mini-ITX motherboard is powered by Cix P1 12-core Armv9 SoC with a 30 TOPS AI accelerator

Radxa Orion 06 Armv9 mini ITX motherboard

Radxa Orion O6 is an Arm mini-ITX motherboard with performance similar to Apple M1 and Qualcomm 8cs Gen3 platform thanks to the Cix P1 12-core Armv9 processor with four Cortex-A720 cores clocked at 2.8 GHz, four Cortex-A720 cores at 2.4GHz, and four low-power Cortex-A520 cores clocked at 1.8 GHz. The Cix P1 SoC also features an Arm Immortalis-G720 GPU for graphics and AI computing, a 30 TOPS AI accelerator for a combined 45 TOPS of AI inference performance, an 8Kp60 video decoder, and an 8Kp30 video encoder. The Orion O6 SBC ships with up to 64GB LPDDR5, features a 4Kp60 HDMI 2.0 port, a 4Kp120 DP 1.4 connector, two 5Gbps Ethernet ports, M.2 socket for storage and wireless, a PCIe x16 slot, and more. Radxa Orion O6 specifications: SoC – Cix P1 (Codename: CD8180, not the CP8180 variant for AI PCs) 12-core DynamIQ processor 4x Cortex‑A720 big cores @ up […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs abd SoMs

December 18, 2024December 18, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Orange Pi CM5 “Tablet” Base Board drops Ethernet for WiFi 5, adds battery support, M.2 socket, 26-pin GPIO header…

The Orange Pi CM5 was launched as an alternative to Raspberry Pi CM4/CM5 last July with a Rockchip RK3588S octa-core Cortex-A76/A55 SoC, up to 16GB LPDDR4x, 256GB eMMC flash, and three board-to-board connectors maintaining partially compatibility with the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4. At the time, Orange Pi also introduced the Orange Pi CM5 Base Board with HDMI 2.1, one Gigabit Ethernet port, two 2.5GbE ports, USB 3.0/2.0 ports, four camera connectors, and more. The company has now launched the Orange Pi CM5 “Tablet” Base Board without Ethernet ports, making use of WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 for networking instead. It keeps many of the same features but adds a 26-pin GPIO header, an M.2 Key-M socket for SSD storage, DP 1.4 and MIPI DSI display interfaces, and various audio interfaces. However, it does with “only” three camera interfaces. It’s quite thick to be used in a typical tablet, but […]

December 18, 2024December 18, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

$249 NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit targets generative AI applications at the edge

NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Super Development Kit

NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit is an upgrade to the Jetson Orin Nano Developer Kit with 1.7 times more generative AI performance, a 70% increase in performance to 67 INT8 TOPS, and about half the price, making it a great development platform for generative AI at the edge, mostly robotics. We’ve seen several AI boxes and boards in the last year capable of offline generative AI applications like the Firefly AIO-1684XQ motherboard or Radxa Fogwise Airbox which I reviewed with Llama3, Stable diffusion, Imgsearch, etc… A product like the Fogwise Airbox delivers up to 32 TOPS (INT8) and sells for around $330 which was very competitive then (June 2024). However, the Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit will certainly disrupt the market with over twice the performance, a lower price, and a larger developer community. NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Super specifications: NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano 8GB Module CPU […]