2.5-inch Pico-ITX SBC Offers LVDS, HDMI & DisplayPort Video Interfaces, Dual Gigabit Ethernet

Today I learned that Pico-ITX boards were also called 2.5-inch boards since they are about the size of a 2.5-inch SATA drive. Kontron pITX-APL V2.0 is one such 2.5-inch Pico-ITX SBC powered by an Intel Atom E39XX or Celeron Apollo Lake processor.

The board can drive three independent displays via its 24-bit LVDS interface, HDMI and mini DisplayPort 1.2 output, comes with two Gigabit Ethernet ports and support for 4G LTE connectivity via M.2 slot and SIM card socket. Those features make it suitable for a wide range of applications including industrial client applications, kiosk, infotainment, digital signage, and POS systems.

Kontron pITX-APL V2.0 specifications:

• Apollo Lake SoC variants
  • Intel Atom x7-E3950 quad-core processor @ up to 2.0 GHz with 18EU Intel HD graphics; 12W TDP
  • Intel Atom x5-E3940 quad-core processor @ up to 1.8 GHz with 12EU Intel HD graphics; 9.5W TDP
  • Intel Atom x5-E3930 dual-core processor @ up to 1.8 GHz with 18EU Intel HD graphics; 6.5W TDP
  • Intel Celeron N3350 dual-core processor @ up to 2.3 GHz with Intel HD graphics; 6W TDP
  • Intel Celeron J3455 quad-core processor @ up to 2.3 GHz with Intel HD graphics; 10W TDP
  • Intel Pentium N4200 quad-core processor @ 2.3 GHz with Intel HD graphics; 6W TDP
• System Memory – 4x channel LPDDR4 up to 16 GB RAM
• Storage
  • SATA 3.0 connector
  • mSATA socket (see Expansion section)
  • MicroSD card socket via microSD/microSIM combo connector
  • 128 Mbit SPI flash for AMI Aptio V BIOS
  • Atmel AT24C32 EEPROM to store board information
• Display Interface
  • HDMI and mini DisplayPort 1.2
  • 24-bit dual-channel LVDS interface with 5V backlight
• Audio – HD Audio with microphone, stereo Line-in & stereo Line-out internal header, SPDIF
• Connectivity
  • Dual Gigabit Ethernet with Wake-on-Lan (WoL) support
  • Optional 3G / 4G LTE via M.2 card + SIM card slot
• USB – 2x USB 3.0 Type-A ports, internal headers for 2x USB 2.0 interface
• Serial – 1x RS232 port
• Expansion
  • 1x mPCIe (PCIe Rev 2.0) / (SATA Gen 3.0) with USB 3.0 and microSIM interface
  • 1x M.2 slot with a USB 3.0 and microSIM interface
  • 9-pin SPI header
• HW Security – Infineon SLB9665XQ2.0 TPM 2.0 chip
• Misc – Power button; BR2032 battery bay; NCT7802Y HW monitoring chip for temperature, voltage, and fan speed; 2x 5-pin header for the front panel
• Power Supply – 12VDC via power barrel jack or 2-pin power connector
• Power Management – ACPI 5.0 support
• Dimensions – 100 x 72 x 41 mm (Pico-ITX form factor)

Kontron provides six different Board Support Packages (BSPs) for the board namely Windows 10 IoT Enterprise 64 bit, Windows 10 IoT Core, Redstone 64-bit, Windows 7 64 bit, Windows ES 7 64 bit, Linux 64 bit (Yocto), and VxWorks 7.x or newer.

Some of the specifications are unclear since information is all over the place notably with regards to M.2 / mPCIe sockets. The press release reads “an M.2 slot with a USB 3.0 and microSIM interface as well as a half-size mPCIe slot and a uSD/uSIM combo slot”, but the block diagram above only shows mPCIe/mSATA, and the datasheet only mentions an “M.2 B-key connector”.

One potential reason for the confusion is that the product page contains information for both Kontron pITX-APL V2.0 reported above, and Kontron pITX-APL SBC with only one Gigabit Ethernet port and no mini DisplayPort output.

Via EENewsEmbedded

Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.

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