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

June 6, 2016June 16, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Energympro EP-SH09 Bluetooth LE Fitness Tracker Features AMS AS7000 Biosensor

I wrote about AMS AS7000 biosensor designed for heart rate monitors last fall, and one of my regular reader noticed the sensor, made his company evaluate it, and since the results were pretty good, designed a product with it. And here I am with a sample of Energympro EP-SH09 fitness tracker with an OLED display, HRM based on AS7000 sensor, and IP67 ingress protection rating. Some of Energympro EP-SH09 technical specifications: MCU – Texas Instruments CC2640 ARM Cortex-M3 48 MHz Display – 0.86″ OLED display, 96×32 resolution Connectivity – Bluetooth 4.0 LE Input – Touch area at the bottom of the display Sensors – AMS AS7000 biosensor for HRM, motion sensors Battery – 45 mAh LiPo battery which looks good for 4 to 5 days. Dimensions – 40 x 18 x 12.9 mm Weight – 6 grams Ingress Protection Rating – IP67 The device can pair with smartphone using Smart […]

June 6, 2016June 6, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

Intel Atom x7-Z8700 (Cherry Trail) vs Intel Celeron N3150 (Braswell) Benchmarks Comparison

Intel tend to release lots of processors, and it’s not also clear how they perform against each others, but generally the rank from slowest to highest goes something like Atom < Celeron < Pentium < Core M < Core i3 < Core i5 < Core i7. Recently, I’ve seen and reviewed a few low power Intel Atom x7-Z8700 “Cherry Trail” and Intel Celeron N3150 “Braswell” mini PCs, both quad core processors @ 1.6 GHz (base), and I could not find much differences between the two during use. So to have a clear and objective view of the relative performance of the two processors, I’ve compared the results I got with Intel Atom x7-Z8700 based Beelink BT7 mini PC to the ones I got with MINIX NGC-1 mini PC powered by Celeron N3150 processor in the table below. Both machines have been designed quite well (good heat dissipation) and with storage […]

June 6, 2016June 6, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

SD 600eval Development Board Compliant with 96Boards CE Extended To Sell for $279

Last month, we found out that Arrows Electronics was working on DragonBoard 600c development board featuring Qualcomm Snapragon 600 processor and based on 96Boards CE Extended version which allows for extra features such as SATA and Ethernet ports. At the time, the complete specifications were not available, and neither pricing. We do now have more details, as the board designed by Elinfochips is (also) called SD 600eval, and is available on back order for $279. SD 600eval specifications: SoC- Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 (APQ8064) quad-core Krait 300 processor @ up to 1.7 GHz with Adreno 320 GPU @ 400MHz supporting OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0, OpenCL 1.1, WebGL 1.0, and DirectX 9.3 System Memory – 2GB PoP LPDDR2 @ 533 MHz Storage – 16GB eMMC Flash + micro SD 3.0 (UHS-1) slot + SATA port Video Output – HDMI up to 1080p Video – 1080p@30fps HD video playback and capture (h.264/AVC) Connectivity – […]

June 6, 2016June 6, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

On/Off Switch USB Cables & Power Adapters for Development Boards

Many development boards don’t have a power switch, and simply boot when you apply power. So if you need to turn off and turn on your board, you’d either remove the power cable and re-insert it, or do the same with the power adapter on the power strip or socket, but the latter is not always convenient, and the former may damage the power connector, especially if the board uses a fragile micro USB connector for power. The solution to this small problem is to use a USB cable with an on/off switch. The example above is a 5V/2A with a switch button with the plug working with Orange Pi, Banana Pi M2, and other board using a 4mm jack (like PS4) for power. That model sells for $3.90 on Aliexpress. Another solution is instead to buy a short USB cable with an on/off switch instead for just around $1 […]

June 5, 2016June 27, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 35 Comments

Beelink BT7 Review – Windows 10 mini PC Based on Intel Atom x7-Z8700 Processor

Beelink BT7 mini PC powered by Intel Atom x7-Z8700 processor offers an interesting alternative to the fanless Voyo V3 mini PC, as it is actively cooled by a small fan, supports (Gigabit) Ethernet, and comes with three full USB 3.0 ports. There are three versions with either 64, 128 (64+64) or 320 (64+256) GB stortage, and I got Beelink BT7 128GB to play with. Since I’ve already checkout the hardware, I’ll focus on the performance and stability of the device on Windows 10 in the second part of the review. Setup and System Information I placed the mini PC on my desk, made use of the three USB 3.0 ports with a USB keyboard, a USB mouse, and a Seagate USB 3.0 hard drive, and connected Ethernet, HDMI and the power cable. However, if you happen to own a TV or monitor that supports VESA mounts, you can use the […]

June 4, 2016June 4, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 23 Comments

$35 R-Box Rockchip RK3229 4K Android 5.1 TV Box Comes with 2GB RAM

While Rockchip RK3229 SoC has a pretty weak processor (4x Cortex A7) and GPU (Mali-400MP2), its media capabilities are very good for the price, as it can handle 4K video playback of 10-bit H.265 @ 60 fps, as well as 10-bit H.264 @ 30 fps reasonably well based on my experience with Zidoo X1 II. However ,so far all RK3229 devices I’ve seen ship with 1GB RAM, which may be fine for video playback with Kodi using the default skin, but may be a limiting factor if you have higher requirements. R-BOX fills the void in the market by being the first RK3229 TV box with 2GB RAM for just $35 including shipping. R-BOX specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3229 quad core ARM Cortex A7 processor @ 1.5 GHz with ARM Mali-400MP2 System Memory – 2GB DDR3 Storage – 8GB eMMC flash + micro SD slot Video Output – HDMI 2.0 […]

June 3, 2016June 3, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

VATek VMB8202D Enmoder SoC Supports DVB, ATSC, DTMB and ISDB Modulation, H.264 & MPEG-2 Encoding up to 1080p30

Terrestrial digital TV transmitters normally cost over 1,000 dollars because there are usually implemented with expensive FPGA chips, but Taiwan based VATek has designed a low cost chips such as VMB8202D Enmoder (aka B2 Enmoder) capable of encoding 1080p60 video input to MPEG-2 (1080p30 max) or H.264 (SD resolution max), and transmitting the resulting video over DVB-C, DVB-T, ATSC, DTMB, or ISDB-T standards. VATek B2 Enmoder SoC specifications: CPU – 32-bit RISC @ 400MHz Memory – Built-in DDR Modulation Engine – VATek Multi-standard Modulator 1.0 ATSC / DTMB / DVB-T / DVB-C Media Encoder – VATek Ultral Low Latency HD Encoder supporting 1080p30 or SD MPEG-2 and SD H.264 encoding Audio Formats – MPEG-1 Layer 2, AAC Raw Video Inputs – 1x ITU-R BT.1120 or 2x ITU-R BT.656 up to 74.25MHz pixel clock Raw Audio Inputs – I2S up to 48kHz sample rate Stream Input Interface – Ethernet, Transport Serial […]

June 3, 2016June 3, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

D9+ DLP Pico Projector is also a Dock for iPhone 6

There’s an embarrassment of choice if you plan to purchase a small projector, but D9+ DLP pico projector is quite peculiar, as beside a male HDMI input port, it is specifically designed for iPhone 6, and works as dock adding a projector to the Apple phone, but also extra USB ports and a headphone jack. D9+ pico projector specifications: Projector – 854 x 480 Pixels; 80 Lumens ; 2000:1 contrast ratio; Lamp life: 30,000 hours Video Input – HDMI male connector for DVD player, laptop computer, set-top boxes, gaming consoles, etc.. Audio – 3.5mm audio jack USB – 2x USB ports Battery – 2400mAh lithium-ion battery. Dimensions – 17.50 x 9.00 x 2.50 cm Weight – 199 grams Certificate – CE,FCC,PSE The projector ships with a USB cable and a power adapter, but it does not include the 8-pin digital AV adapter necessary to connect the iPhone 6. It’s unclear […]