Posted on

Rikomagic MK80LE (Linux Edition) Octa-core Ubuntu mini PC

Allwinner A80 based Rikomagic MK80 Android TV box, now has a Linux sibling with Rikomagic MK80LE (Linux Edition) running Ubuntu 14.04, and allegedly supports 2D/3D graphics acceleration, and hardware video decoding. Two versions are available MK80LE with 2GB RAM & 16GB Flash, and MK80LE Plus with 4GB RAM & 32GB flash. The hardware specs are the same as the Android versions (and Tronsmart Draco AW80 Meta / Telos): SoC – AllWinner Ultra Core A80 4x Cortex 15 @ 2016 MHz, 4x Cortex A7  @ 1320 MHz big.LITTLE processor with Imagination Technologies PowerVR GC6230 GPU with support for OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0/3.0, Directx 9.3 System Memory – 2GB (MK80LE), or 4GB (MK80LE Plus) RAM Storage – 16 GB (MK80LE) or 32GB (MK80LE Plus) eMMC, external SATA port (via a USB 2.0 bridge), and micro SD slot up to 64GB Video Output – HDMI 1.4 + AV port Audio Output – HDMI, AV […]

Posted on

Experimental Android 5.x Lollipop Port for Raspberry Pi 2?

When Raspberry Pi 2 was announced, I was quite hopeful Android would be ported to the board since it now had the processing power and memory requirements to run Android. But members of the Raspberry Pi foundation put a damper on this expectation directly in their Android forums by closing some Android related threads, and stating the mobile operating system does not bring anything to the educational goal of the Raspberry Pi. But yesterday, I’ve been informed that there was an experimental Android 5.1 port for ODROID-C1 and another Android 5.x port for Raspberry Pi 2. One of the key challenges to port Android to Broadcom BCM2836 is allegedly the large number of changes required for VideoCore 4 GPU’s buffer management, which was done by Broadcom internally for BCM2835, but never ported to the Raspberry Pi. So it does not quite seem an easy task. The README on github describes […]

ArmSoM RK3588 AIModule7 NVIDIA Jetson Nano-compatible SOM
Posted on

Theobroma Systems Introduces A31-μQ7 Micro QSeven System-on-Module Powered by Allwinner A31 Processor

Most standardized system-on-modules for embedded and industrial applications are still based on established Silicon vendors such as Freescale, Texas Instruments or Atmel, simply because documentation and support is generally much better than relatively new SoC vendors, most of the time China-based, such as Allwinner or Rockchip. That does not mean nobody is using Rockchip or Allwinner on their modules, as shown recently with Olimex RK3188-SOM, and previously with an Allwinner 10 CoM. But Theobroma Systems, an Austrian based engineering services and embedded systems solutions company, may have a first with a Micro Qseven compliant modules powered by Allwinner A31, simply called A31-μQ7. A31-μQ7 module specifications: SoC – Allwinner A31 quad core ARM Cortex A7 processor up to 1.2GHz with 256KB L1 cache / 1024KB L2 cache, and PowerVR SGX544MP2 GPU System Memory – Up to 2GB DDR3 Storage – Up to 64GB eMMC, Up to 16MB SPI NOR flash, On-board […]

Posted on

Emcraft Systems STM32F7 ARM Cortex M7 SoM and Development Kit Run uClinux

STMicro announced their STM32F7 MCU family the same as ARM announced their latest ARM Cortex M7 core for high-end micro-controllers last September. Emcraft Systems have now launched a STM32F7 system-on-module with 32MB SDRAM and 16MB NOR flash, and ported uClinux to the platform. The company has also launched a STM32F7 starter kit for evaluation and development. Both target industrial automation, system and power management, wireless networking / sensors and other embedded applications. STM32F7-SOM-1A Module STM32F7 system-on-module specifications: MCU – STMicro STM32F746 Cortex M7 MCU up to 200 MHz with 320KB RAM, 1MB flash in TFBGA-216 package System Memory – 32MB SDRAM Storage – 16MB NOR flash Connectivity – 802.3 Ethernet PHY SoM connectors – 2x 80-pin (0.4mm pitch) Debugging – ARM SWJ-DP combined JTAG and serial wire debug port Misc – Watchdog, RTC, USB and other I/Os via SoM connectors Power – 3.3V DC; Low-power mode with short startup times; […]

Posted on

Calaos is an Open Source Home Automation Suite for Raspberry Pi, Allwinner A10/A20 and x86 Platforms

Calaos is a Linux based home automation software released under GPLv3 license that works on Raspberry Pi, some Allwinner platforms like Cubiebaord 1/2, Mele A1000(G)/A2000, as well as x86 / amd64 hardware platforms that allows you control switches & lights in the rooms of your home or office, control your music, and manage security cameras.. The developers have recently released Calaos v2.0, the first stable release, so it’s a good time to have a look. The software stack is comprised of 6 main components: Calaos Server – Daemon that exports the state of the house via a JSON protocol. It can currently manage the following hardware components and protocols: Wago’s PLC, with digital or analog I/O, DALI or DMX light bus IPX800 web relay board GCE Electronics Eco Devices used to monitor power consumption. Web API 1-Wire, X10 Zibase I/O GPIO (Linux based GPIO, for direct use of RaspberryPI GPIO […]

Posted on

Sigrok and Pulseview in Ubuntu 14.04 with UNI-T UT61E Digital Multimeter

A couple of months ago, I received a new digital multimeter UNI-T UT61E that can send data to a computer via a serial cable, and allows you draw some nice charts. I’ve already done that in Windows 7 with the provided tools, and reported on the power consumption of some Chinese Android TV boxes. However, since I use Ubuntu 14.04 as my main operating system, Linux based tools would be more convenient, and open source sigrok-cli command line client and its graphical interface pulseview are supposed to support UT61E DMM, so I had to give it a try. A Quick Look at UNI-T UT61 Digital Multimeter Before going into Sigrok, I’ll quickly show what the multimeter received from DealExtreme . It took longer than expected to ship because of of  included 9V battery, and at the first shipping attempt it was returned to DX, but after 8 weeks or so, […]

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

DonglePi is a USB Dongle with a Raspberry Pi Header for your PC

While the newer Raspberry Pi A+, B+ and B2 boards feature the new 40-pin connector, the Raspberry Pi boards Model A and B have a 26-pin expansion header, but both are use to access GPIOs, UART, SPI, I2C and interface with external hardware, and many add-ons boards have been developed for the Raspberry Pi. But what if you’d like to use R-Pi add-ons board on your PC, or instead you are developing your own add-on board, but would like to do so directly on your PC for convenience? DonglePi is the answer. It’s a small USB dongle with Atmel SAMD21 MCU and a 26-pin Raspberry Pi compatible header, that you could use connect to your Android/Linux/Windows PC to play with GPIO, I2C, SPI, Serial, PWM just like on a Raspberry Pi, and using RPi/GPIO or smbus Python libraries for programming. The project is still in development, and so far most […]

Posted on

Xilinx Introduces Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC with Cortex A53 & R5 Cores, Ultrascale FPGA

Xilinx Zynq-7000 dual core Cortex A9 + FPGA SoC family was announced in 2012, and provides a wide range of SoC with features and price range, and led to low cost ARM + FPGA such as ZedBoard, and more recently Parallela and MYiR Z-Turn boards. The company unveiled its successor with Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC providing five times more performance per watt, with four ARM Cortex A53 cores, two ARM Cortex R5 real-time MCU cores, a Mali-400MP GPU, an UltraScale FPGA fabric manufactured with 16nm FinFET+ process. There are two main sub-families in Zynq Ultrascale+ MPSoC for “smarter control & vision”, and “smarter network”. Both share the same processing systems (CPU, GPU, MCU, Peripherals, Security), but the networking family has beefier FPGAs,  and lacks the H.264/H.265 video processing unit found in the control & vision version: Processing Systems Processor – Quad ARM Cortex A53 MPCore up to 1.3GHz Real-time Processor – […]

Boardcon CM3588 Rockchip RK3588 System-on-Module designed for AI and IoT applications