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

December 9, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

Sonoff SC WiFi Environmental Monitor Sells for $20

ITEAD Studio has done some good job with their Sonoff home automation devices based on Espressif ESP8266 WiSoC, as they are affordable, working as advertised with default firmware, and hackable with our own. The company has now added a new model, which may or may not be as useful, with Sonoff SC environmental monitor device that detects current temperature, humidity, light intensity, air quality, and sound levels, and sends the data to eWeLink app installed on your Android or iOS phone. You may be thinking it can be used as a home assistant since it really looks like a speaker and include some sort of microphone, but the top of the device is probably used to let air and dust go through. Sonoff SC specifications: WiSoc – Espressif ESP8266 Tensilica L106 processor @ 80/160 Mhz with WiFi MCU – Atmel ATMega328 MCU Connectivity – 802.11 b/g/n WiFi Sensors Sharp GP2Y1010AU0F dust sensor […]

December 9, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Rockchip Introduces RK3228H and RK3228B Processors for IPTV/OTT TV Boxes

Rockchip has just tweeted about their RK3xxx processors family, and two new processors appear to have been included in the list with Rockchip RK3228H quad core Cortex A53 processor and RK3228B quad core Cortex A7 processor both supporting 4K video playback and ouput, as well as HDR. Rockchip RK3228H has many of the same features as Amlogic S905X with a quad core Cortex A53 processor, an ARM Mali-T450 GPU, 4K H.265/H.264 video support, and HDR10/HLG, but it also adds something extra with a USB 3.0 interface. RK3328B is lower end with its quad core A7 processor, but still supports H.265/H.264 up to 4K resolution, and include the usual interfaces such as HDMI, CVBS, and a Fast Ethernet PHY. There may be more details on the press release, but the page won’t load for me right now. Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting […]

December 9, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Junsun H552C Android 4.4 Car DVR and GPS Navigation System Comes with a 7″ Display

There are plenty of Android car systems for sale with DVR and/or GPS navigation capabilities on the net, but sometimes they lack some features, or come in a 2 DIN form factor, which is nice if you know how to disable your car dashboard, but it might be a little complicated if you don’t. An alternative is to get an Android rear view mirror, but obviously the display is much smaller, and it reduces the usable space on the rear view mirror to see what’s going on behind. However, this morning I’ve come across Junsun H552C Android 4.4 system with a 7″ display, rear and front cameras, and GPS navigation system that might be easier to install since it sits on top of the dashboard, and is selling for $118.54 on Dealextreme. Junsun H552C specifications: Processor – Quad core CPU @ 1.3 GHz System Memory – 1GB RAM Storage – […]

December 9, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 18 Comments

$59 RetroEngine Sigma Retro Game Console is Based on Orange Pi Lite Board (Crowdfunding)

2016 has been the year of retrogaming comeback with products like PocketCHIP, Nintendo NES Classic, GPD Win and quite a few other projects. There will soon be a new option with RetroEngine Sigma, an inexpensive Linux based retro-gaming console based on Allwinner H3 processor. RetroEngine Sigma fanless game console hardware specifications: SoC – Allwinner H3 quad core Cortex A7 @ 1.2 GHz with an ARM Mali-400MP2 GPU up to 600 MHz System Memory – 512 MB DDR3 Storage – 16 or 32GB micro SD card Video & Audio Output – HDMI port Connectivity – 802.11 b/g/n WiFi USB – 2x USB 2.0 host ports, 1x micro USB OTG port Misc – Programmable status LED, 2 user configurable buttons P1 & P2 Power Supply – 5V/2A via power barrel Dimensions – 110 x 85 x 33.5 mm The specifications look similar, so I went to my little list of Allwinner H3 […]

December 8, 2016December 9, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

STMicro SensorTile is a Tiny STM32 Module with Bluetooth 4.1 LE and Four Sensor Chips

STMicroelectronics SensorTile is a 13.5 x 13.5mm sensor board based on STM32L4 ARM Cortex-M4 microcontroller, a MEMS accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer, pressure sensor, a MEMS microphone, as well as a 2.4Ghz radio chip for Bluetooth 4.1 Low Energy connectivity for wearables, smart home, and IoT projects. SensorTile hardware specifications: MCU – STMicro STM32L476 ARM Cortex-M4 microcontroller@ up to 80 MHz with 128 KB RAM, 1MB flash Connectivity – Bluetooth 4.1 Smart/LE via BlueNRG-MS network processor with integrated 2.4GHz radio compliant with Sensors LSM6DSM 3D accelerometer + 3D gyroscope LSM303AGR 3D Magnetometer + 3D accelerometer LPS22HB pressure sensor/barometer MP34DT04 digital MEMS microphone I/Os – 2x 9 half holes with access to UART, SPI, SAI (Serial Audio Interface), I2C, DFSDM, USB, OTG, ADC, and GPIOs signals Debugging – SWD interface (multiplexed with GPIOs) Power Supply Range – 2V to 5.5 V Dimensions – 13.5 x 13.5 mm Software development can be done through […]

December 8, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

SDMC DV8219-LTE Android TV Box Comes with a Built-in 4G LTE Modem

Most users connect their TV boxes to the Internet through WiFi or Ethernet, but in some specific use case, such as digital signage in mass transport or in remote locations, it might be useful to get access to cellular networks. We’ve seen a few Android TV boxes with a built-in 3G modem in the past including CS918S and MBX-3G, but the former is based on the rather old Allwinner A31s processor, and the latter did not raise enough found on Indiegogo. But there’s nothing new, as SDMC DV8219-LTE is a more recent TV box powered by Amlogic S905X processor and running Android 6.0, equipped with a 4G LTE modem. SDMC DV8219-LTE TV box specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905X quad core Cortex A53 processor @ up to 1.5 GHz with a Mali-450MP GPU System Memory – 1GB DDR3 SDRAM (2GB as option) Storage – 8GB eMMC flash (4 to 64GB as […]

December 8, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Qualcomm Starts Sampling of Qualcomm Centriq 2400 ARM Server SoC with Up to 48 ARMv8 Cores

Qualcomm has announced commercial sampling of Qualcomm Centriq 2400 series server SoC built with 10nm FinFET process technology and featuring up to 48 Qualcomm Falkor custom ARMv8 CPU cores “highly optimized to both high performance and power efficiency, and designed to tackle the most common datacenter workloads”. Qualcomm Datacenter Technologies demonstrated the new processor in a Live demo showing Apache, Spark, Java, and Hadoop on Linux running on a SBSA compliant server powered by Qualcomm Centriq 2400 processor, but the company did not provide any further technical details or preliminary benchmark results for the solution. The Qualcomm Centriq 2400 processor series is now sampling to select customers and is expected to be commercially available in H2 2017. That’s about all we know from the press release. However, Linaro have been working on Qualcomm Technologies QDF2432 based board for several months with support for Debian 8.x ‘Jessie’ and CentOS 7 operating […]

December 7, 2016December 9, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 11 Comments

How to Install ThingSpeak in Ubuntu 16.04

Last week-end I installed ESPurna open source firmware with MQTT server on Sonoff POW WiFi switch, and the next step is find a way to draw power consumption charts in some web based interface. We could do this in the IoT cloud with services like Xively or ThingSpeak, but since one of the goals of replacing the default firmware was not to rely on a proprietary cloud based solution, I decided to find a way to draw those chart in a local server, and it so happens that ThingSpeak is also open source with the code available on Github. Hardware platforms like NanoPi NEO / NEO Air, or Orange Pi Zero boards appear to be particularly well suited for the task of running an MQTT broker and Thingspeak, but at first I wanted to install ThingSpeak in my own Ubuntu 16.04 computer to have a try. As you can see […]