BeagleV Starlight SBC won’t be mass manufactured, redesigned BeagleV RISC-V SBC expected in Q1 2022

BeagleV Starlight Not Manufactured

There was lots of excitement when BeagleV Starlight single board computer was announced in January of this year. With a price tag of $119 and up, it promises to be an affordable RISC-V SBC with StarFive JH7100 dual-core SiFive U74 Vision SoC with AI accelerator, H.265/H.264 hardware video decoding, up to 8GB RAM, HDMI output, Gigabit Ethernet, and so on. Several beta testers even received BeagleV Startlight prototypes, providing instructions for buildroot, boot Linux, or even a video review with Fedora.  The first version lacked a GPU, and the initial schedule planned for a new revision with an Imagination GPU to be manufactured in September. But there have been some changes, as BeagleV Starlight SBC will not go into mass production, but not all is lost, as the Foundation and Seeed Studio are working on a new BeagleV community board slated to be released in Q1 2022. Drew Fustini made […]

AudioMoth Dev is a full-spectrum acoustic development board based on SiLabs EFM32 MCU

AudioMoth Dev

AudioMoth is a low-cost, open-source acoustic monitoring device that can record uncompressed audio from 8000 up to 384,000 samples per second onto a microSD card. With sensitivity to audible sounds as well as ultrasonic frequency range, It is mostly used for monitoring wildlife including bats, cicadas, the rainforest, etc… The manufacturer, Open Acoustic Devices, is now offering the development board version with AudioMoth Dev, based on a Silicon Labs EFM32 Wonder Gecko MCU like the full device, for $79.99 + shipping on GrougGets. AudioMoth Dev board specifications: Wireless microcontroller – Silicon Labs EFM32 Wonder Gecko Cortex-M4F MCU @ 48MHz with 256kB Flash, 32kB RAM External RAM – 256kB SRAM Storage – MicroSD card slot Audio capture On-board analog MEMS microphone, sensitivity -38 dBV/Pa, 63 dBA SNR, 10Hz to 192kHz Sample rates up to 384kHz 3.5 mm jack socket for external electret condenser microphones (Note: the optional case not compatible when […]

TurboX C865 CPU module and 96Boards devkit feature Qualcomm QCS8250 IoT processor

TurboX C865 96Boards development kit

Thundercomm has unveiled another Qualcomm IoT module and development kit with the TurboX C865 SOM and development kit based on Qualcomm QCS8250, based on Snapdragon 865 but for IoT applications, which follows our coverage of the company’s TurboX CM2290 and C2290 SoM & devkit based on Qualcomm QCM2290/QCS2290 quad-core Cortex-A53 processor several days ago. The new TurboX C865 system-on-module is for higher-end IoT applications with a faster processor combines with 8GB LPDDR5 RAM, and 128G UFS storage, WiFI 6 & Bluetooth 5.1 connectivity, and the company also offers a 96Boards compliant development kit to help with the development of more advanced IoT products running Android 10. TurboX C865 SoM Specifications: SoC – Qualcomm QCS8250 octa-core Kryo 585 processor with Adreno 650 GPU, Adreno 665 VPU, Adreno 995 DPU, Hexagon DSP with quad HVX, Spectra 480 ISP; 15 TOPS AI processing power System Memory – 8GB LPDDR5 (PoP) Storage – 128G […]

Tiny Seeeduino XIAO board gets Raspberry Pi RP2040 MCU

Seeduino XIAO RP2040

Seeeduino XIAO is a tiny Arduino Zero compatible board with battery support that was launched last year with Microchip SAMD21G18 ARM Cortex-M0+ microcontroller at up to 48MHz. Seeed Studio has now launched the XIAO RP2040 board with the same form factor but upgrading to a more powerful Raspberry Pi RP2040 dual-core Cortex-M0+ microcontroller clocked at up to 133 MHz. XIAO RP2040 specifications: MCU – Raspberry Pi RP2040 dual-core Cortex M0+ up to 133 MHz, or even 252 MHz (48MHz default) with 264 kB SRAM Storage – 2MB SPI flash USB – 1x USB type C port for power and programming Expansion I/Os 2x 7-pin headers with 11x 4x analog inputs, 11x digital I/Os / PWM, 1x DAC, SPI, UART, and I2C; 2.54mm pitch 3.3V I/O voltage (not 5V tolerant) Misc – 1x user LED, power LED, 2x LEDs for serial port downloading, Reset Button/ Boot Button, RGB LED, SWD pads […]

A Smaller STM32MP1 SoM – Meet MYIR MYC-YA15XC-T CPU Module

Smaller STM32MP1 SoM

MYIR launched a fairly compact SoM and accompanying development board based on STM32MP1 Cortex-A7 microprocessor in January 2020. But apparently, the 45mm by 43mm MYC-YA157C module was too big (or expensive) for some customers, so the company has now designed a smaller STM32MP1 SoM with MYC-YA157C-T measuring just 39mm by 37mm thanks to the removal of the Ethernet PHY. MYC-YA15XC-T STM32MP1 system-on-module Specifications: SoC (one or the other) STM32MP151AAC3 single-core Cortex-A7 processor up to @ 800 MHz with Cortex-M4 core @ 209 MHz STM32MP153AAC3 dual-core Cortex-A7 processor up to @ 800 MHz with Cortex-M4 core @ 209 MHz, and CAN FD interface STM32MP157AAC3 dual-core Cortex-A7 processor up to @ 800 MHz, with Cortex-M4 core @ 209 MHz, 3D GPU, DSI display interface, and CAN FD Two configurations for memory and storage 256MB DDR3L, 256MB Nand Flash, 32KB EEPROM or 512MB DDR3L, 4GB eMMC Flash, 32KB EEPROM 148-pin stamp hole expansion […]

ESP32-C3 board comes with 16340 battery holder, D1 mini compatibility

LilyGO TTGO T-OI Plus

It looks like ESP32-C3 floodgates have opened. We’ve just written about several NodeMCU ESP32-C3 boards, and now there’s another board with the RISC-V WiFI & Bluetooth processor. Meet LilyGo TTGO T-OI PLUS equipped with a 16340 battery holder. Getting a battery-powered ESP32-C3 board could prove to be very interesting as ESP32-C3 power consumption is much lower than ESP8266 and ESP32, notably in deep sleep mode, where the RISC-V processor consumes just 5uA, against 20 uA for ESP8266 and ESP32, and the difference is even greater in light sleep mode (ESP8266: 2000 uA vs ESP32-C3: 130 uA). LilyGo TTGO T-OI PLUS specifications: SoC – Espressif Systems ESP32-C3 single-core RISC-V processor @ 160 MHz with 2.4 GHz WiFi, Bluetooth 5.0 LE Storage – TBD flash (probably 2MB or 4MB) Antenna – Ceramic antenna and IPEX connector USB – USB-C port for power and programming Expansion 2x 8-pin headers with 12x GPIO, 1x […]

LP-AM243 dual Gigabit Ethernet MCU board features TI Sitara AM243x Cortex-R5F microcontroller

LP-AM243 Sitara AM2434 development board

The few microcontroller boards that get Ethernet, are often limited to 10 Mbps or 100 Mbps, but the LP-AM243 LaunchPad development kit comes with two Gigabit Ethernet ports controlled by the newly announced 800 MHz Texas Instruments Sitara AM243x Cortex-R5F microcontroller with industrial communication and security features. TI Sitara AM243x Cortex-R5F microcontroller The Sitara AM243x is the first family of microcontrollers part of the larger Sitara AM2x  MCU series that, a bit like NXP i.MX RT crossover processors, aims to combine the advantages of traditional microcontrollers and microprocessors by leveraging the real-time capabilities of the former and the high performance of the latter, but in a way optimized for industrial communication and safety. The Sitara AM243x family is comprised of three processors with one, two, or four cores with the following key features and specifications: CPU AM2431 – Single-core Cortex-R5F real-time core @ 800 MHz with 128KB TCM AM2432 – Dual-core […]

NodeMCU ESP32-C3 WiFi & BLE IoT boards show up for about $4

ESP-C3-01-M developmentkit

ESP32-C3 RISC-V IoT processor with 2.4 WiFI and Bluetooth LE 5.0 was unveiled in December 2020, and Espressif Systems’ own ESP32-C3-DevKitM-1  board has been available in limited quantities as an “engineering sample”. But now I’ve noticed third-party NodeMCU ESP32-C3 boards are being sold on Aliexpress for around $4 with ESP32-C3S_Kit and ESP-C3-01M-Kit both based on AI Thinker ESP32-C3 modules announced a few months ago. NodeMCU ESP32-C3S_KIt Specifications: Wireless module – AI Thinker ESP32-C3S (footprint compatible with ESP32-S / ESP32-WROOM-32D) with ESP32-C3 RISC-V processor @ 160 MHz, 2.4 GHz WiFi, Bluetooth 5.0 LE, 4MB flash, on-board PCB antenna, and IPEX connector (which may be soldered or not). USB – Micro USB port for power and programming via CH340C USB to TTL chip Expansion – 2x 15-pin headers with GPIO, SPI, UART, ADC, I2S, 3.3V, GND Misc – RGB LED, Reset key, user-programmable key Dimensions – 49 x 26 mm ESP32-C3S_Kit is […]