Month: February 2014

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments on Tivizen USB Dongles Bring Digital TV (DVB-T, ATSC, 1Seg) to Your Android or iOS Devices

Tivizen USB Dongles Bring Digital TV (DVB-T, ATSC, 1Seg) to Your Android or iOS Devices

If you want to watch digital terrestrial TV on your Android tablet / phone / mini PC, or your iPad / iPhone, I’ve already written about Geniatech WiTV / Yeshgo Meron, as well as Geniatech PT115m / PT115e. The former are battery powered DVB receiver sending TV channel to your mobile via Wi-Fi, and is already available for purchase. The latter are micro USB or USB DBT-T dongles that you can insert into your Android or iOS devices, but they still do not seem to be available for purchase. Today, I’ve come across Tivizen USB dongles that appears to be very similar to PT115m/PT115e except there are several models with support for DVB-T, DVB-H (iOS and PC), ATSC (iOS only), 1Seg, and SBTVD standards, and they’ve been available since 2012… I won’t list the available technical specs for each device (mainly connector, dimensions, and weight), but here are the key […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments on Cute Embedded Nonsense Hacks, Nouveau Driver for Tegra K1, and Android Defaults to ART

Cute Embedded Nonsense Hacks, Nouveau Driver for Tegra K1, and Android Defaults to ART

There’s been some news at the end of this week that may not warrant a full article, but are still fun and/or interesting nonetheless: comments by the lead developer of Fedora ARM  led to “Cute Embedded Nonsense” meme on Google+, preliminary commit for open source drivers for Tegra K1’s GPU, and Android Open Source Project defaults to ART instead of Dalvik. If you have a Google+ account, and circled a few people involved in ARM Linux, you must have seen a few postings about “Cute Embedded Nonsense Hacks” in your feed. It all started when Jon Masters posted about Red Hat’s ARM SBSA platform requirements, and in particular one comment that reads: I am all for people installing their own kernels if they want to. I support aggressively defined standard platforms (not cute embedded nonsense hacks) but not locked platforms. You can keep both parts when it breaks, of course. […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments on The Internet of Insects Is Coming to You Powered by Fuel Cells

The Internet of Insects Is Coming to You Powered by Fuel Cells

Connected_Coackroach

We’ve had the Internet for a few decades, and recently terms such as the Internet of Things, previously as (connected) embedded systems, and the Internet of Everything have started to become a common features of tech speak. But following research from Osaka University and the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (TUAT), we may soon start to talk about the Internet of Insects. Japanese researchers have developed a fuel cell that can be mounted on an insect, and generate powered from sugar (trehalose) found in the insect’s body fluid (blood lymph). The fuel cell consists of electrodes, a tank of body fluid and a pipe to be inserted into the insect. Then some chemical “magic” occurs. There’s already a prototype, which has been unveiled at IEEE MEMS 2014, an academic conference that tool place on January 26-30, 2014, in San Francisco. The prototype has been 3D printed, measures about approximately 20 […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments on DENX MCV Systems-on-Module Feature Altera Cyclone V SX FPGA + ARM SoC

DENX MCV Systems-on-Module Feature Altera Cyclone V SX FPGA + ARM SoC

DENX Computer has announced a new systems-on-module (SoM) powered by Altera Cyclone V dual ARM Cortex A9 + FPGA SoCs. DENX MCV SoMs also feature 1GB DDR3, 256 NAND Flash, and various memory interfaces and peripherals including PCI Express Gen2 and high-speed serial 3.125Gb transceivers. DENX MCV SoM specifications: SoC – Altera Cyclone V SoC with FPGA and two ARM Cortex A9 core @ 800 MHz. Four SoC are available: A2 – 5CSXFC2C6U23C7N – 25KLE, 36 DSP blocks, 6 transceivers 3.125Gbit/s A4 – 5CSXFC4C6U23C7N – 40KLE, 58 DSP blocks, 6 transceivers 3.125Gbit/s A5 – 5CSXFC5C6U23C7N – 85KLE, 87 DSP blocks, 6 transceivers 3.125Gbit/s A6 : 5CSXFC6C6U23C7N – 110KLE, 112 DSP blocks, 6 transceivers 3.125Gbit/s System memory – 1 GB DDR3 Storage – 256 MB NAND Flash, 256 Mbit Configuration Device HPS (Hard processor system) peripherals Clock distribution Default configuration: Gigabit Ethernet UART, SPI, I²C CAN USB Additional optional interfaces: One […]