Posted on - 1 Comment on Khadas Tone High Resolution Audio Board is Designed for Khadas VIM/VIM2, PCs, and Other SBCs

Khadas Tone High Resolution Audio Board is Designed for Khadas VIM/VIM2, PCs, and Other SBCs

Khadas VIM and Khadas VIM2 are development boards powered respectively by Amlogic S905x and S912 processors that come with decent software support. The company also provides application specific add-on boards for their SBCs, and a while ago, I reviewed VIM2 with their dual tuner board and showed how to stream videos from my satellite dish or terrestrial antenna to the local network. Their latest solution is Khadas Tone board for high-quality audio applications. Khadas Tone “VIMs Edition” specifications: Multicore MCU – XMOS XU208-128-QF48 with 8x xCORE-200 cores up to 500 MIPS DAC – ES9038Q2M 32-Bit Stereo Mobile Audio DAC THD+N – ≤ 0.000337% @1KHz SNR – ≥ 120dB @ 10Hz~20KHz DNR – ≥ 120dB @ 10Hz~20KHz Crosstalk – ≥ 127dB @ 10Hz~20KHz Frequency Response – ±0.08 dB @ 10Hz~20KHz Sampling Frequency PCM: Up to 768KHz @ 32bit DSD: Up to DSD256 @ 1bit Clock Jitter Reference Clock Jitter < 3ps Data Clock Jitter < 30 ps Audio Formats – APE2, …

Continue reading… “Khadas Tone High Resolution Audio Board is Designed for Khadas VIM/VIM2, PCs, and Other SBCs”

Posted on - 7 Comments on Xiaomi Mi Router 4 is a $60 AC1200 Router with Three Gigabit Ethernet Ports

Xiaomi Mi Router 4 is a $60 AC1200 Router with Three Gigabit Ethernet Ports

Xiaomi Mi Router 3 AC1200 router based on Mediatek MT7620A processor was launched in 2016 for just under $40 on online retailers. It had at least one caveat however, since it only supported Fast Ethernet. The company has now launched an upgraded version – Xiaomi Mi Router 4 -, still an AC1200 router, but equipped with a faster Mediatek MT7621A processor, and three Gigabit Ethernet ports. The new router sells for 199 RMB ($31 US) in China, but it’s also found for under $60 including international shipping on sites like Banggood or GearBest. Mi Router 4 (Miwifi 4) specifications: WiSoC – Mediatek MT7621A dual core MIPS processor @ 880MHz System Memory – 128 MB DDR3-1200 Storage – 128 MB SLC NAND Flash Wi-Fi 2.4GHz – 2X2  MIMO up to 300Mbps 5GHz – 2X2  MIMO up to 867 Mbps Wireless Security – WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK encryption, wireless access control (black and white list), SSID hiding, Intelligent Protect network 4x external antennas Ethernet – …

Continue reading… “Xiaomi Mi Router 4 is a $60 AC1200 Router with Three Gigabit Ethernet Ports”

Posted on - 5 Comments on Android 8.1 Firmware and SDK Released for Orange Pi 4G-IoT Board

Android 8.1 Firmware and SDK Released for Orange Pi 4G-IoT Board

Orange-Pi-4G-IoT-Android-8.1

When Orange Pi 4G-IoT board launched a few months ago, it shipped with a not so recent Android 6.0 operating system. But the good news is that Shenzhen Xunlong Software has now released Android 8.1 firmware for their Mediatek MT6737M quad core Cortex A53 LTE Cat 4 board, as well as the corresponding SDK. This makes it the cheapest Android 8.1 board with LTE connectivity available on the market so far as it goes for just under $50. The SDK is a large tarball (22.6 GB) split into 11 smaller files. It’s hosted on MEGA so download is fairly fast, but due to the size I had to install MEGA Sync software in order to download it easily. Once the download is complete, it’s not recognized in Nautilus, but you can extract the SDK as follows in a terminal:

This will take a while and extract over a million files for a total of 64.8 GB. We can now …

Continue reading… “Android 8.1 Firmware and SDK Released for Orange Pi 4G-IoT Board”

Posted on - 14 Comments on Beelink S2 Gemini Lake Mini PC Comes with an Intel Pentium N5000 Silver Processor, 8GB RAM, a 128GB SSD

Beelink S2 Gemini Lake Mini PC Comes with an Intel Pentium N5000 Silver Processor, 8GB RAM, a 128GB SSD

Gemini Lake 8GB RAM

I’ve written about Beelink S2 mini PC based on Intel Celeron N4100 Gemini Lake processor several times, simply because the motherboard appears to be used in other OEM models including Alfawise T1 and CHUWI GBox among others. However, all models I covered so far only came with 4 GB RAM, and 64GB storage, and Intel Celeron N4100 processor, so if you need something with more memory and storage, as well as a faster processor GeekBuying is now taking orders for Beelink S2 with Intel Pentium N5000, 8GB RAM and 128GB storage. Price: $299.99 including shipping. Specifications of the model offered on GeekBuying: SoC – Intel Celeron N5000 quad core processor up to 2.7 GHz with Intel UHD Graphics 605; 6W TDP System Memory – 8GB LPDDR4 Storage – 128GB SSD, 2.5″ SATA bay, micro SD card Video Output –  2x HDMI 2.0 ports Audio – Via HDMI, 3.5mm audio jack Connectivity – Gigabit Ethernet, dual band 802.11a/b/g/n/ac WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0 …

Continue reading… “Beelink S2 Gemini Lake Mini PC Comes with an Intel Pentium N5000 Silver Processor, 8GB RAM, a 128GB SSD”

Posted on - No Comments on ESP8266 based ANAVI Light Controller can be Programmed with Home Assistant or the Arduino IDE (Crowdfunding)

ESP8266 based ANAVI Light Controller can be Programmed with Home Assistant or the Arduino IDE (Crowdfunding)

ANAVI Technology previously launched a Light pHAT allowing for RGB Light strip connection to Raspberry Pi boards, and during my review of ANAVI Light pHAT with Raspberry Pi 2, it did the job, but if that’s all you want to do, the  Raspberry Pi board is clearly oversized & overpowered for the job. So Leon ANAVI got back to the drawing board and designed a similar open source hardware board – called ANAVI Light Controller – with an built-in ESP8266 module that removes the need for a fully fledged Linux board. ANAVI Light Controller specifications: Wireless Module – ESP8266MOD module based on ESP8266 Tensilica L106 32-bit processor Connectivity – WiFi 802.11 b/g/n Expansion Terminal block for 12 V RGB LED strip 3x I2C headers for sensors Debugging – UART header Misc – Button Power Supply – 12 V via power barrel jack Dimensions – 75 mm x 40 mm Certification – Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA) BG000005 The board can …

Continue reading… “ESP8266 based ANAVI Light Controller can be Programmed with Home Assistant or the Arduino IDE (Crowdfunding)”

Posted on - 5 Comments on Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 Brings AI To Mid-Range Smartphones

Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 Brings AI To Mid-Range Smartphones

Qualcomm Snapdragon 710

Neural processing units (NPU) – also called Neural network accelerators (NNA) – can now be found in all premium smartphone SoCs in order to assist with artificial intelligence applications such as object recognition, face unlock, and better photography. There seems to be a trend now to add such AI accelerators into what some refers to as mid-range premium smartphones, and Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 mobile platform is another of those processors placing itself between mid range Snapdragon 600 series and premium Snapdragon 800 series. Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 mobile platform (SDM710) specifications: CPU – 8x Qualcomm Kryo 360 CPU @ up to 2.2 GHz (in two clusters) GPU – Qualcomm Adreno 616 Visual Processing Subsystem supporting  OpenGL ES 3.2, OpenCL 2.0, Vulkan, DirectX 12 DSP – Qualcomm Hexagon 685 DSP with 3rd Gen Qualcomm Hexagon Vector Extensions (HVX),  Qualcomm All-Ways Aware Sensor Hub Memory I/F – LPDDR4x, 2x 16-bit up to 1866MHz, 8GB RAM Storage I/F – No info provided Display – Up …

Continue reading… “Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 Brings AI To Mid-Range Smartphones”

Posted on - 17 Comments on FriendlyELEC Launches a Rockchip RK3399 SBC for $129. Meet NanoPC-T4

FriendlyELEC Launches a Rockchip RK3399 SBC for $129. Meet NanoPC-T4

Earlier this year, we have a number of SBCs based on Rockchip RK3399 hexa-core processor from Orange Pi RK3399 to ODROID-N1, or Pine64 RockPro64 boards. FriendlyELEC has joined the fray with their NanoPC-T4, which they claim is the  the smallest RK3399 based high-performance ARM board. The SBC comes with 4GB RAM, 16GB eMMC flash,  dual-band WiFi module and an  M.2 PCIe interface with  NVME SSD support. NanoPC-T4 board specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3399 hexa core big.LITTLE processor with two Arm Cortex-A72 cores up to 2.0GHz, four Cortex-A53 cores up to 1.5GHz, and a Mali-T864 GPU withsupport for OpenGL ES1.1/2.0/3.0/3.1, OpenVG1.1, OpenCL, DX11, and AFBC System Memory – 4GB dual channel LPDDR3 Storage –  16GB eMMC 5.1 flash, M.2 slot for NVMe SSD,  1x microSD slot Display / Video Output HDMI 2.0a up to 4K @ 60Hz withHDCP 1.4/2.2 DisplayPort 1.2 Alt Mode on USB Type-C LCD I/F – 1x eDP 1.3（4 lane，10.8Gbps）, 1x 4-Lane MIPI-DSI Video – 4K VP9 and …

Continue reading… “FriendlyELEC Launches a Rockchip RK3399 SBC for $129. Meet NanoPC-T4”

Posted on - No Comments on A Closer Look at Mediatek MT8516 Cortex A35 SoM / Devkit for Android Things

A Closer Look at Mediatek MT8516 Cortex A35 SoM / Devkit for Android Things

Mediatek-MT8516-SoM

Earlier this month, Google released Android Things 1.0, the first stable release for the IoT operating system, and announced several certified SoMs (systems-on-module) based on NXP i.MX 8M, Qualcomm SDA212 & SDA624, and MediaTek MT8516 SoCs. However at the time, beside some information about the processor itself, there was not many details about MT8516 system-on-module. Since then, MediaTek wrote a blog post about their Cortex A35 solution for Android Things & Google Assistant, so let’s have a look. First the MT8516 SoM is not exactly what I had expected, but instead a complete single board computer, and this is why they call it virtual SoM (vSOM). Google defines the latter as reference design provided by the chip vendors and certified by Google. Mediatek MT8516 quad core Cortex A35 vSoM / development board specifications: SoC – MediaTek MT8516 quad core Cortex A35 processor without GPU System Memory – 4Gbit (512MB) DDR3L Storage – 4GB eMMC flash Connectivity – 802.11ac 2×2 MIMO …

Continue reading… “A Closer Look at Mediatek MT8516 Cortex A35 SoM / Devkit for Android Things”