Zidoo M6 RK3566 mini PC & SBC supports GbE, WiFi 6, 5G connectivity

Zidoo M6 mini PC & SBC

Zidoo M6 is both a complete mini PC and a single board computer based on Rockchip RK3566 processor with up to 8GB RAM with plenty of peripherals connectivity options including built-in Gigabit Ethernet, WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5, and support for 5G modems. Several years ago, Zidoo used to serve the TV box market, but they’ve now veered towards higher-end media players, digital signage players, and industrial applications. While we’ve already seen some RK3566 TV boxes on the market, using the AIoT processor does not make much sense in this type of product, and instead, Zidoo M6 targets AI Edge gateways, digital signage, and other AIoT products. Zidoo M6 specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3566 with a quad-core Cortex-A55 processor @ up to 1.8GHz, Arm Mali-G52 2EE GPU with support for OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0/3.2. OpenCL 2.0. Vulkan 1.1, 0.8 TOPS AI accelerator, 4K H.265/H.265/VP9 video decoder, 1080p100 H.265/H.264 video encoder. System Memory […]

Forlinx OK1028A-C networking SBC supports LVDS displays, 4G/5G modules

Forlinx-OK1028A-C Single Board Computer

Forlinx released two networking SBC’s with 10Gbps Ethernet powered by NXP LS1043A and LS1046A processor nearly exactly one year ago. Like many other networking SBCs they do not come with video output so configuration is done via a computer or laptop either through a UART interface or a web interface. But in some cases, such boards may be integrated into machines that require a display for human-machine interaction. That’s why Forlinx has now released a new networking board – OK1028A-C – powered by NXP QorIQ Layerscape LS1028A dual-core Cortex-A72 processor that natively supports video output up to 4K UHD resolution via an eDP/DisplayPort interface which the company used to provide an LVDS header. The board also offers 5 Gigabit Ethernet ports, as well as optional WiFi, Bluetooth, and 4G or 5G cellular connectivity via M.2 and mPCIe modules. Forlinx OK1028A-C specifications: FET1028A-C system-on-module SoC – NXP LS1028A dual-core Cortex-A72 processor […]

Qt for MCUs 1.1 Adds Support for more STM32 and NXP i.MX RT Boards, FreeRTOS

Qt for MCUs 1.1 Installer

The first stable version of Qt for MCUs was released in August 2019 in order to bring Qt graphical toolkit to microcontrollers such as STMicro STM32F7,  Renesas RH850, or NXP i.MX RT1050.   Qt for MCUs would run bare metal on supported boards, and software engineers would develop graphical interface using QML and C++. Qt for MCUs 1.1 has just been released with the addition of more STM32 and i.MX RT boards, support for FreeRTOS real-time operating system, and more. Qt for MCUs 1.1 highlights: Five new supported boards:  NXP i.MX RT 1064 EVK, STM32 H750B-DK, STM32 F469i-disco, STM32 L4R9i-disco, and STM32 L4R9i-eval Asset management Optional PNG compressions for assets to lower storage footprint Option to read data directly from flash memory for lower RAM consumption, or copy to RAM for better performance, at the cost of higher RAM consumption. FreeRTOS support (technology preview) to run background tasks without blocking the […]

Boardcon EM-IMX8M-MINI SBC Drives a MIPI DSI Display via NXP i.MX 8M Mini Processor

Boardcon EM-IMX8M-MINI Board

We’ve been covered SBC’s and SoM’s from Boardcon for at least 5 years,  with our latest article detailing Boardcon Idea3399 SBC powered by Rockchip RK3399 processor, and launched this September. The company has now launched another single board computer with EM-IMX8M-MINI featuring an NXP i.MX 8M Mini system-on-module (SoM) with 2GB LPDDR4, 8GB eMMC flash, and wireless connectivity. The board is designed for a “wide range of multimedia applications” and offers a MIPI DSI interface for LCDs up to 1920×1080 resolution. Boardcon EM-IMX8M-MINI specifications: SOM-IMX8M-MINI SoM (aka PICO-IMX8MM-V1) SoC – NXP i.MX8M Mini Quad with 4x Arm Cortex-A53 @ up to 1.8GHz, Arm an Arm Cortex-M4F real-time microcontroller @ 400MHz, Vivante GCNanoUltra 3D GPU, and Vivante GC320 2D GPU System Memory – 2GB LPDDR4 RAM Storage – 8GB eMMC 5.1 flash, QSPI NOR flash Connectivity – 802.11n WiFi 4 and Bluetooth 4.0 via an Ampak AP6236 module I/Os via 200-pin […]

NanoPi M4V2 Kit Review – Part 2: FriendlyCore Desktop

NanoPi M4V2 Review

We’ve already seen how to assemble NanoPi M4V2 metal case kit which offers an Arm mini PC solution with support for NVMe SSD. The new NanoPi M4V2 Rockchip RK3399 SBC is an evolution of the M4 board that brings faster LPDDR4 memory and adds power & recovery buttons. Since we’ve already tested several RK3399 SBC‘s and TV boxes, I planned to focus the review on thermal design evaluation (i.e. see how well the board cools), and see how memory bandwidth evolved from LPDDR3 to LPDDR4. I wanted to do so both with Linux and Android, since I could compare NanoPC-T4 (LPDDR3) benchmarks in Android. But this requires an eMMC flash module, and I don’t own any. So instead I planned to run Armbian because of support for armbian-monitor for nice temperature chart but it’s not working just yet, so instead I’ve done all tests with FriendlyCore Desktop (rk3399-sd-friendlydesktop-bionic-4.4-arm64-20190926.img) based on […]

Qt for MCUs – Qt Announces support for Microcontrollers

QT_TitleImage1

[Update August 24, 2019: Added information about expected release date and license] About Qt for MCUs Qt- The well known opensource toolkit for creating graphical interface announced their new release: Qt for MCUs, targeting MCU’s. The new graphical toolkit will be capable of running on devices without operating system. This may be a game changer in the entire MCU world, since Qt for MCUs allows developers to create fluid user interfaces on cost-effective micro controllers. This means we will be able to see smartphone like GUI’s which are running on low-end  MCU’s with limited resources. With reference to their press release, assuring that Qt-GUI will consume less power to save the battery life. Qt for MCUs Software Stack While developing any applications for MCU,  developers still can use their powerful declarative UI language QML and rich set of ready-made Qt Quick controls.  And the C++ APIs, helps the user interface […]

Qihua CQH6 SoM – A Better Alternative to Raspberry Pi Compute Model 3+?

Allwinner H6 SoM

The Raspberry Pi Foundation just launched the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 3+ for $25 and up with Broadcom BCM2837B0 processor offering better thermals than BCM2837 processor. As is often the case, this post generated some insightful comments from the smart readers of CNX Software, and they pointed out some of the shortcomings of the module such as the lack of Ethernet support that would be required for cluster use cases for example. You can also add a USB to Ethernet chip to the carrier board, but that’s not ideal, and instead someone linked to Qihua CQH6 system-on-module powered by Allwinner H6 processor and sold for 158 RMB ($23.5 USD) or 199 RMB ($29.65) for respectively 512MB RAM/4GB flash and 1GB RAM/8GB flash configurations. Qihua CQH6 module specifications: SoC – Allwinner H6 quad-core Cortex A53 processor @ 1.8 GHz with Arm Mali-T720MP GPU System Memory – 512MB, 1GB or 2GB DDR3L […]

Forlinx OK5718-C Development Board is Powered by TI AM5718 Cortex-A15/M4 processor

TI AM5718 Development Board

Forlinx Embedded Technology (Forlinx) has just launched a new development board for indsutrial applications with audio and video processing requirements.  OK5718-C development board features Texas Instruments AM5718 Sitara SoC with a single Arm Cortex-A15 core, two real-time Cortex-M4 cores, a dual PRU, and a TI C66x DSP core. OK5718-C development board consists of a carrier board and FET5718-C SoM with the following specifications: FET5718-C System-on-Module SoC – TI AM5718 Sitara Arm Cortex-A15 processor @ up to 1.5GHz, C66x DSP @  750MHz, dual-core Arm Cortex-M4 @ 213MHz, dual core PRU @ 200MHz, PowerVR SGX544 3D GPU,  Vivante GC320 2D GPU, IVA-HD video accelerator subsystem (H.264, MPEG4, MPEG2, VC1) System Memory – 1GB DDR3L Storage – 8GB eMMC flash Board-to-board connectors for interface with baseboard – 320–pin exposing USB 3.0, PCIe 3.0, HDMI 1.4a, LCD RGB, 10x UART, 1x QSPI, 2x CAN, 2x Gigabit Ethernet, etc… PMU – TI TPS659162RGZR Supply Voltage – […]

EDATEC Raspberry Pi 5 fanless case