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

February 5, 2015February 5, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 20 Comments

Onkyo TX-NR636 AV Receiver Setup and Audio Pass-through with OpenELEC / Kodi

Following up on my LG 42U820T 4K TV review, I’ll know checkout the second item purchased for my reviews thanks to the help of my readers, with Onkyo TX-NR636 7.2 channel AV receiver combined with Pioneer S-11 speaker set. As this is my first AV receiver, I still have a lot to learn, I can’t really comment on audio quality (except it sounds much better than my TV speakers, and is more powerful), so I won’t do a full review, but I’ll show some details about the receiver, explain how to it setup with speakers, show how to setup OpenELEC / Kodi for HDMI audio pass-through, and test it with various Dolby and DTS video files. Onkyo TX-NR636 Specifications But before all that, I’ll list some of the specifications of this cool AV receiver. Amplified Rated Output Power: 95 watts minimum continuous power per channel, 8 ohm loads, 2 channels driven […]

February 5, 2015February 5, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Winbook TW700 Windows 8.1 Tablet with micro HDMI, Full Size USB Port Sells for $60

MeegoPad T01, Pipo X7, MeLE PCG03, MINIX NEO Z64, etc.. you could name a pretty long list of Intel Bay Trail-T Z3735 mini PCs running Windows 8.1… They all cost above $100, but the ones that include a valid Windows 8.1 license usually cost closer to $150. That’s because contrary to the Windows 8.1 with Bing on small tablets that comes free and with a one-year subscription to office 365, Windows 8.1 with Bing on mini PCs adds about $30 to the price, and it does not even include a one-year subscription. So using a tablet as a mini PC should be cheaper, even with the extra touchscreen display and battery. And as I checked out Liliputing’s list of cheap Windows tablets, Winbook TW700 stood out as it sells for just $60 on Micro-center (US only) or $70 on Amazon US, and features a mini HDMI port, a full-sized USB […]

February 4, 2015May 1, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Gateworks GW5520 Single Board Computer Features Dual Gigabit Ethernet Ports, Two mini PCIe Slots

If you need industrial grade ARM Linux boards with lots of Ethernet ports and several mini PCIe slots, you may want to check out Gateworks Ventana boards. The company has now released a smaller member of Ventana family with GW5520 SBC powered by Freescale i.MX6 dual, with two Gigabit Ethernet port, two mini PCIe slots, and support for PoE. Gateworks Ventana GW5520 SBC specifications: SoC- Freescale i.MX6 Dual Cortex A9 processor @ 800MHz with Vivante Vivante GC2000 / GC355 / GC320 GPUs. Option: i.MX6 Quad System Memory – 512 MB DDR3-800 SDRAM (Up to 2GB RAM as option) Storage – 256 MB Flash (Up to 2GB as option), serial configuration EEPROM Video and Audio Output – HDMI 1.4 Connectivity – 2x Gigabit Ethernet ports. USB – 2x USB 2.0 host ports Expansion 2x Mini-PCIe sockets Optional mini-PCIe socket to supports a mSATA disk drive (i.MX6 Quad only) I/Os Serial – […]

February 4, 2015May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Latest Ubuntu 14.10 Image for Tronsmart Draco AW80 Supports Hardware Video Decoding

Tronsmart Draco AW80 is one of the most powerful ARM mini PC on the market thanks to Allwinner A80 octa core processor, and the company also released an early Linux (Ubuntu) image at the end of last year. However, this firmware could not support hardware video decoding nor 2D/3D graphics acceleration. Since then progress has been made, and Tronsmart has just released an image with hardware video decoding. There’s still some work to be done as 4K and H.265 are not supported, and support for Kodi also needs to be implemented. At least for now you should be able to play 1080p video with VLC without issues, and the company also claims online video will play without lags. If you’d like to give it a try, download and extract Draco_AW80_Ubuntu_20150204.zip. Then follow Allwinner A80 firmware upgrade instructions with PhoenixSuit (Windows) or LiveSuit (Linux) firmware tool to complete the process. You […]

February 4, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Beelink Introduces TV Sticks and Mini PCs powered by Intel Atom Z3735F Processor

Beelink has announced three new devices based on Intel Atom Z3735F processor: Pocket P1 slim PC, Pocket P2 HDMI stick, and a mini PC simply called “Mini PC” with an internal slot for 2.5″ hard drives. All three mini computers come with 2GB RAM, 16 to 32GB eMMC, and run Windows 8.1 like most other Z3735F devices, but they’re also providing dual band Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0, USB 3.0 ports, and for the mini PC a Gigabit Ethernet port. Preliminary specifications for the three models: SoC – Intel Atom Z3735F “Bay Trail” quad core processor @ 1.33 GHz (Bust freq: 1.83 GHz) with Intel HD graphics Gen 7 (2W TDP) System Memory – 2 GB RAM Storage Mini PC – 16 GB eMMC + 2.5″ SATA bay (under the device) + SD card slot up P1 and P2 – 32 GB eMMC + micro SD card slot Video & Audio […]

February 4, 2015May 22, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

ARM Unveils Cortex A72 Processor and Mali-T880 GPU

ARM has just announced their new Cortex A72 ARMv8 core with 3.5 times the performance of Cortex A15 ARMv7 cores, together with Mali-T880 GPU delivering 1.8 times the performance of Mali-T760, and CoreLink CCI-500 Cache Coherent Interconnect to link the new CPU, GPU and I/Os together. ARM Cortex A72 Some of the key features of the new core include: Architecture – ARMv8-A Multicore – 1-4x SMP within a single processor cluster, and multiple coherent SMP processor clusters through AMBA 5 CHI or AMBA 4 ACE technology ISA Support AArch32 for full backward compatibility with ARMv7 AArch64 for 64-bit support and new architectural features TrustZone security technology NEON Advanced SIMD DSP & SIMD extensions VFPv4 Floating point Hardware virtualization support Cache – 48KB I-cache, 32KB D-cache, and 512 KB to 2MB L2 cache with ECC Debug & Trace – CoreSight DK-A57 Process – 16nm FinFET A cluster can support up to […]

February 3, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Vidonn X6 Activity Tracker Promises Up to 15 days Battery Life

I reviewed Vidonn X5 fitness tracker last yet, and I found many issues or letdowns: battery life is too short (2 days), the digits are much smaller than advertized, the screen cannot be read under direct sunlight, a button must be pressed to check the time, the smartband is not as waterproof as advertized, and the Android app is a disaster. Despite all these issues, I still wear it everyday, as it helps me walk or run a bit more if I have not reached my daily target. The company has now release a new model Vidoon X6 that I discovered today on DealExtreme for $33.90. Vidonn X6 specifications: MCU/Memory – Unknown Display – 0.88″ OLED display (vs 0.49″ for X5) Connectivity – Bluetooth 4.0 LE and micro USB Battery – 45 mAh Li-battery (vs 40 mAh) good for 15 days in standby mode. IP Rating – IP65 (Dust-proof and […]

February 3, 2015February 3, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

OpenMV is an Open Source Hardware VGA Camera Controllable with Python Scripts (Crowdfunding)

Recently I’ve seen some activity about tiny cameras for makers, including Linux based SinoVoIP BPI-D1 recording up to 720p30 videos, and an upcoming mini camera for VoCore Wi-Fi module. There’s now another project called OpenMV, and open source camera for machine vision applications based on STMicro STM32, recording up to VGA resolution at 20 fps, and controlled using Micro Python scripts. OpemMV camera specifications: MCU – STM32F427, 180MHz, 225 DMIPS, 256K SRAM, 2M Flash, DMA/FPU/DSP/DCMI/SDIO/2D Acceleration Camera – 2MP OV2640 sensor with interchangeable M12 lens, 2x IR LEDS Storage – uSD interface: SDIO (4-bit mode) Expansions – 2x headers with USART, SPI, I2C, PWM, ADC/DAC, GPIOs, PWM and power signals USB – micro USB 2.0 Full Speed port Power Supply – 5V via USB; Current draw is approximately 140mA, steady state Dimensions – 4.57 x 3.56 cm The camera can be controlled using (Micro) Python scripts. with the project’s OpenMV […]