Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft), Author at CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

November 16, 2012November 17, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

$199 GIZMO EXPLORER KIT – Embedded Development Kit Based on AMD G-Series G-T40E APU

I’ve just stumbled upon a low cost and open source embedded development kit featuring AMD G-Series G-T40E dual core APU that comes with the following: The Gizmo Board – A compact (10×10 cm) development board for powered by an AMD G-Series APU. The Explorer Board – An expansion I/O board providing an alpha-numeric keypad, a micro-display, and a breadboard area for prototyping and customization. Sage SmartProbe JTAG Development Tool – The kit includes the SmartProbe hardware and 20 hours of trial time use. Ethernet & USB Cables – The USB cable lets you connect the SmartProbe to your PC. The Ethernet cable is for networking connectivity, which can be used to access the SmartProbe as well. USB wall charger Power Supplyand Cable – A universal power supply for the Gizmo board, with a U.S.-standard cord. 6x standoffs with nuts Alpha-numeric keypad – To connect to the explorer board Installation DVD […]

November 16, 2012November 30, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

Kimdecent T21 Android 4.1 HDMI TV Stick Features Nufront NS115 Dual Core Cortex A9 Processor

After all the Rockchip RK3066 mini PCs (UG802, MK808, UG007…), and a few AMLogic AML8726-MX mini PCs (announced but yet to be available), there’s a new dual core HDMI TV stick platform in town: Kimdecent T21 based on Nufront NS115 dual core cortex A9 processor with a dual core Mali-400 GPU. Apart from the new processor, the specifications are pretty standard: SoC – Nufront NS115 Cortex-A9 Dual-core @ 1.2GHz + Mali400 GPU System Memory – 1 GB DDR III Storage – 4 GB NAND Flash + microSD card socket (Up to 32 GB) Connectivity – Wifi 802.11 b/g/n USB – 1x USB Host port + 1x micro USB (Host or OTG?) port Video Output – HDMI 1.4 (Up to 1080p) Video Formats – 3GP, MPEG4, AVI, RMVB, MKV, FLV… Video & Audio Codecs – H.264, MVC, SVC, MPEG-2/4, DivX, VC-1, RealVideo, AVS, VP8(WebM, WebP), Sorenson, MJPEG, MVC, AAC+, WMA, MP3, […]

November 15, 2012November 15, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Congatec Reference Board for Video Wall Systems Powered by AMD Embedded R-Series APU

congatec AG has introduced a new reference board for video wall system design. This reference design is based on a baseboard, an AMD Embedded R Series APU COM Express CPU module (conga-TFS) & an optional AMD Radeon E6760 GPU MXM module, and can support up to 9 independent displays. The video wall baseboard includes a wide range of ports and features for embedded applications such as : Video Output – VGA, 18/24Bit single/dual channel LVDS, 3x DisplayPort 1.2, 1x HDMI 1.4 and 2x single-link DVI (All ports are available when both the CPU and MXM graphics modules are used) Ethernet – 2x Gbit Ethernet SATA – 4x SATA (for 2.5″ SATA or SSD) USB – 4x USB 3.0 and 4x USB 2.0 PEG Port 2.0 7x PCI Express 2.0 x1 lanes RF4CE (ZigBee) receiver enabling remote control 19V power supply for standard notebooks Developers can optionally integrate an additional graphics […]

November 15, 2012November 15, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Microchip Announces MGC3130 3D Gesture Controller Featuring GestIC Technology

Microchip Technology has recently announced the MGC3130, the world’s first electrical-field (E-field)-based 3D gesture controller based on Microchip’s patented GestIC. This technology allows you to use hand gestures to control a computer with the accuracy of a mouse. The end result looks somewhat similar to what is done with the Leap Motion controller but the range is shorter as you need to be within 15cm of the surface with the electrodes. However, I would suspect this technology to be cheaper and consume less power. The picture above is the development kit with MGC3130 chipset at the top center of the board. With a power consumption as low as 150 microwatts in active sensing state, the MGC3130 enables always-on 3D gesture recognition (even for battery powered devices). The power consumption is up to 90% lower than camera-based gesture systems. Here are MGC3130 key features: 0 (touch) to 15 cm detection range […]

November 15, 2012November 15, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

ISEE is Working on IGEPv5 Board with TI OMAP 5 and Needs Your Feedback

ISEE IGEPv2 is a low cost development board based on TI DM3730 (Cortex A8) that is relatively popular with the development community, used by Free Electrons for their embedded Linux training courses, and part of a List of 39 Low Cost Linux Friendly Boards and Products I published earlier this year. Yesterday, Michael Opdenacker, founder of Free Electrons, wrote a blog post saying ISEE was working on IGEPv5 development board based on Texas Instruments OMAP5 dual core Cortex A15 processor that can run up to 2 GHz, supports DDR3 RAM, full HD 3D recording, and 4 displays and cameras simultaneously among other things. This is still early development and the board exact features have not been defined yet. ISEE is actually looking for the community feedback to provide the best board possible and you can leave your inputs and expectations by commenting on Free Electrons blog. You could have a […]

November 15, 2012November 15, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Infineon Unveils Low Cost XMC4500 Relax & Relax Lite Kits For Cortex M4 XMC4500 MCUs

Infineon XMC4500 micro-controller family is based on ARM Cortex-M4 core @ 120 MHz, comes with 128 to 160 KB SRAM, 512 KB to 1 MB “Program Memory” as well as interfaces & peripherals, such as DMA, Ethernet, USB, ADC, DAC, SPI, I2C, I2S, UART and more. They are specifically designed for industrial applications supporting temperatures up to 125°C. The family was announced at Embedded World 2012 in February, and mass production started in May. This week at Electronica 2012, the company announced two low cost development kits for XMC4500 MCU: XMC4500 Relax Lite Kit (10 Euros): XMC4500 Microcontroller (ARM® Cortex™-M4F based) Detachable on-board debugger Power over USB ESD and reverse current protection 2 x user button and 2 x user LED 4 x SPI-Master, 3x I2C, 3 x I2S, 3 x UART, 2 x CAN, 17 x ADC (12 bit), 2 x DAC, 31x PMW mapped on 2 Pin Headers […]

November 14, 2012November 30, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

Kontron ULP-COM-sAMX6i – Freescale i.MX6 Solo, Dual and Quad Computers on Module

Freescale i.MX6 series was first announced in January 2011, and there have been delays due to problem with the silicon, but now the i.MX6 processors are finally in mass production, and lots of different products are using this SoC. The latest product I found is ULP-COM-sAMX6i by Kontron which is a series of computers on module based on ULP-COM (Ultra Low Power) standard featuring Freescale i.MX6 solo, dual and quad processors. Those commercial and industrial grade modules target markets such as transportation, medical and military. Here are the technical specifications of the modules: CPU – Freescale i.MX 6 Single, Dual and Quad Core ARM Cortex-A9 @ 800 MHz (Industrial grade), 1 GHz and 1.2 GHz System Memory – Up to 2 GB DDR3 Storage – Optional onBoard NAND/eMMC up to 64GB Graphics / Video – Dual Display, HD 1080p Decode/Encode and 2D/3D acceleration Video Output Resolution Parallel LCD 18/24 bit […]

November 14, 2012November 14, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Learn How to Write a Driver for Linux 3.x With The Linux Driver Template

A Linux Driver Template (LDT) has been published to help new Linux kernel developers writing hardware device drivers. Constantine Shulyupin posted the Linux Driver Template (LDT) on the Linux mailing list in order to merge it into the mainline Linux kernel. The code can be used as as a starting point for new drivers, and shows how to use several Linux facilities such as module, platform driver, file operations (read/write, mmap, ioctl, blocking and nonblocking mode, polling), kfifo, completion, interrupt, tasklet, work, kthread, timer, simple misc device, multiple char devices, Device Model, configfs, UART, hardware loopback, software loopback and ftracer. This sample has been added to other device drivers samples in eLinux.org. And if you want to learn further there’s always the Linux driver bible: “Linux Device Drivers, Third Edition” which can be downloaded for free as PDF, although it’s for 2.6.10 kernel and many parts may not be up-to […]