CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

August 15, 2021August 19, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 11 Comments

Debian 11 “BullsEye” released with Panfrost & Lima GPU drivers, exFAT support, driverless printing

Debian 11 “BullsEye” has been released with Panfrost & Lima open-source drivers for Arm GPUs, in-kernel exFAT file system, driverless printing, and many more updates, plus a 5-year support window. Debian’s release is significant as the Linux operating system serves as the base for Ubuntu and derivatives, Raspberry Pi OS, and together with Ubuntu, is one of the operating systems supported by Armbian which offers images for a range of Arm-based single board computers. Arm Mali GPU support in Debian 11 I remember a few years ago 3D graphics acceleration on Arm boards was news, as it was quite a challenge to get it working due to binary blobs. But Debian 11 now comes with Mesa 20.3 framework which includes Panfrost and Lima open-source Mali GPU drivers by default, as well as the Vulkan 1.0 conformant V3DV driver for Raspberry Pi 4. As noted in the documentation that means the […]

August 14, 2021August 20, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 19 Comments

NanoPi R2C is a cheaper dual GbE mini router with YT8521S Gigabit Ethernet PHY

FriendlyELEC’s NanoPi R2C is an updated version of NanoPi R2S dual GbE mini router that replaces Realtek RTL8211E Gigabit Ethernet transceiver with a Motorcomm YT8521S chip. NanoPi R2C mini router still comes with a Rockchip RK3328 quad-core Cortex-A53 processor, 1GB DDR4 memory, and a Realtek RTL8153 USB 3.0 to Ethernet controller for the second Ethernet port. NanoPi R2C specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3328 quad-core Cortex-A53 @ 1.5 GHz with Arm Mali-450MP2 System Memory – 1GB DDR4 RAM Storage – MicroSD Slot, SPI flash footprint Connectivity 1x Gigabit Ethernet (WAN) up to 941 Mbps (measured) via MotorComm YT8521S Gigabit Ethernet transceiver 1x Gigabit Ethernet (LAN) up to 941 Mbps (measured) via Realtek RTL8153 USB 3.0 to Ethernet controller USB – 1x USB 2.0 Type-A host port, USB Type-C port Debugging – 3-pin 2.54mm pitch header for serial console Expansion – 10-pin GPIO header with GPIOs, I2C, UART, IR_Rx, 5V, 3.3V and GND […]

ArmSoM CM5 - Raspberry Pi CM4 alternative with Rockchip RK3576 SoC

August 13, 2021August 13, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Xiaomi CyberDog quadruped robot is based on NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX

We’ve previously written about consumer-grade smart robotic dogs selling for several hundred dollars with Petoi Bittle equipped with Arduino & Raspberry Pi, as well as XGO Mini Pro with Kendryte K210/K510 AI processor. Xiaomi has now launched its own quadruped robot that looks like a dog with the Xiaomi CyberDog equipped with a more powerful NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX system-on-module (SoM), a larger and heavier body than competing consumer models, and a price tag of a little over $1,500. Xiaomi CyberDog specifications and key features: SoM – NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NXwith an hexa-core NVIDIA Carmel 64-bit Arm processor, a 384-core NVIDIA Volta GPU with 48 Tensor Cores, 2x NVDLA deep learning accelerators delivering a total of 21 TOPS at 15 Watts, 8GB RAM. Storage – 128GB “near” industrial-grade SSD Xiaomi’s in-house developed servo motors offering Maximum torque – Up to 32N·m Rotation speed – Up to 220Rpm Maximum speed – […]

August 13, 2021February 19, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Arduino programmable wireless multitool offers color display, touch controls (Crowdfunding)

QUARK may look like the perfect weapon to hijack a plane, but instead, it’s an open-source, Arduino-based wireless multitool for hardware engineers equipped with a full-color screen and touch-based controls. Based on ESP32 WiFI & Bluetooth wireless SoC, Mulin Group’s QUARK is an ultra-portable multimeter, signal generator and oscilloscope, a bit like IkaScope WiFi Pen-Oscilloscope, except having a laptop or phone to visualize measurements is only optional. The company also compares it to DT71 smart tweezers which do not have an oscilloscope function due to the tiny display. QUARK features & specifications: WiSoC – ESP32 dual-core processor with WiFI & Bluetooth connectivity Display – 240 x 134 IPS display Measurements Voltage – 0 to 26 V Current – 0 to 3.2 A Resistance from 0 to 2 MΩ Capacitance from 2 pf to 1000 uF Inductance up to 1 H Sampling rate for oscilloscope function – 400 ksps Features – […]

August 13, 2021August 13, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

MiTAC introduces Intel Elkhart Lake & Comet Lake thin Mini-ITX motherboards

MiTAC has unveiled three industrial thin mini-ITX motherboards based on Elkhart Lake and Comet Lake processors with respectively MiTAC PD10EHI with a choice of low-power Intel Atom, Celeron and Pentium Elkhart Lake processors, and two more powerful motherboards with MiTAC PH11CMI & PH12CMI based on up to an Intel Core i9 Comet Lake processor, and which are virtually identical except for a different chipset allowing vPro features and RAID support. MiTAC PD10EHI Elkart Lake thin mini-ITX motherboard Specifications: Elkhart Lake SoC (one or the other) Intel Atom x6413E quad-core processor @ 1.5 GHz / 3.0 GHz (Turbo) with 16EU Intel UHD graphics; 9W TDP Intel Celeron N6210 dual-core processor @ 1.2 GHz / 2.6 GHz with 16EU Intel UHD graphics; 6.5W TDP Intel Celeron N6211 dual-core processor @ 1.2 GHz / 3.0 GHz with 16EU Intel UHD graphics; 6.5W TDP Intel Celeron J6413 quad-core processor @ 1.8 GHz / 3.0 […]

August 12, 2021November 4, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Bluetooth 5.3 new features lower latency, interference, improve battery life, security

Bluetooth 5.3 Channel Classification Enhancement

Bluetooth 5.3 Core Specification was adopted on July 13, 2021, without fanfare, and the only related announcement that I could find is CEVA RivieraWaves Bluetooth IP getting support for Bluetooth 5.3. Bluetooth 5.3 brings four new features or enhancements and removes one extension from the core specification: Periodic Advertising Enhancement – The AdvDataInfo (ADI) field of the common extended advertising payload format may now be included in AUX_SYNC_IND protocol data units (PDUs) which are broadcast when a device is performing periodic advertising. The Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) controllers may now use the information in the ADI field to recognize packets that contain retransmitted copies of identical or semantically equivalent data, and discard those packets in order to prevent unnecessary processing on the nodes, and make sure the overall throughput is not affected due to retransmitted packets. Encryption Key Size Control Enhancement – In Bluetooth BR/EDR, encryption key sizes are negotiated […]

Rockchip RK3568/RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs

August 12, 2021August 12, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

UP Xtreme i11 Tiger Lake SBC launched for $299 and up

UP Xtreme i11 Tiger Lake-SBC with AI accelerator

Ever since the launch of Intel Atom Cherry Trail powered Up Board SBC in 2015, AAEON has kept launching more UP boards with faster, yet still low power processors, as well as complete turnkey solutions based on their x86 SBC such as the UP Xtreme Smart Surveillance kit. The company has now started taking pre-orders for the UP Xtreme i11 Tiger Lake SBC, and a UP Xtreme i11 Edge Compute Enabling kit mini PC based on the board will become available in Q3 2021. The board features a choice of Intel 11th generation Tiger Lake Embedded “GRE” Core or Celeron processors, an Intel Altera MAX V FPGA, up to 64GB RAM, Gigabit Ethernet, 2.5GbE networking, and more. UP Xtreme i11 SBC Specifications: Tiger Lake “E”/”GRE” SoC (one or the other) Intel Core i7-1185G7GRE quad-core/8-thread processor @ up to 4.4 GHz with 96 EU Intel Iris Xe Graphics; up to 28W […]

August 11, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Geniatech DB10 – An AI development board with Amlogic A311D SoC, HDMI input, optional TV tuner

Amlogic A311D hexa-core Cortex-A73/A55 AI processor has found its way into a limited number of platforms including Khadas VIM3 SBC, Zora P1 development board for Orbbec 3D cameras, as well as the upcoming Jevois Pro AI camera. Another development board that takes advantage of the Amlogic A311D processor is Geniatech DB10 which ships with up to 4GB LPDDR4, up to 64GB eMMC flash, and offers interesting features like a digital TV tuner, HDMI input, support for 3G/4G modems, and more. Geniatech DB10 specifications: SoC – Amlogic A311D hexa-core processor with quad-core Arm Cortex-A73, dual-core Arm Cortex-A53 processor, Arm Mali-G52 MP4 (6EE) GPU with OpenGL ES 3.2, Vulkan 1.0 and OpenCL 2.0 support, 5 TOPS NPU System Memory – 2GB LPDDR4 (4GB optional) Storage – 16GB eMMC flash (8 to 64GB optional) Video Output HDMI 2.1 up to 4Kp60 Dual-channel LVDS (shared with eDP) via 30-pin connector Input HDMI input up […]