Allwinner A-Series Category - Page 2 of 52 - CNX Software

August 23, 2023August 23, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Banana Pi BPI-6202 industrial SBC features Allwinner A40i SoC, 24V DC input, RS485 interfaces

Banana Pi BPI-6202 “embedded single board computer” features the industrial-grade Allwinner A40i quad-core Cortex-A7 processor with industrial temperature range and long life cycle, 2GB DDR3, 8GB eMMC flash, M.2 SATA slot, and more. That’s the second Allwinner A40i board from Banana Pi since the company launched the Banana Pi BPI-M2 Ultra SBC last year, but the new embedded SBC looks to be better suited for industrial applications with features such as dual Ethernet, an RS485 + RS232 terminal block, 24V DC input, and a -40 to +60°C operating temperature range. Banana Pi BPI-6202 specifications: SoC – Allwinner A40i quad-core Arm Cortex-A7 processor @ 1.20 GHz with Arm Mali-400MP2 GPU, 1080p60 H.264, MPEG-4, MPEG-1/2 video decoder, H.264 1080p45 video encoder System Memory – 2GB DDR3 SDRAM Storage – 8GB eMMC flash, microSD card slot, M.2 Key-B 2242 socket for SATA SSD Video & audio output – HDMI 1.4 port up to […]

July 6, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Allwinner A523 octa-core Cortex-A55 processor to show up in tablets, SBCs

Allwinner A523 is an octa-core Cortex-A55 processor clocked at up to 1.4/1.8GHz in big.LITTLE (DynamIQ) configuration and mainly designed for tablets with multiple display interfaces such as two 4-lane MIPI DSPI interfaces, two MIPI CSI camera interfaces, a Mali-G57 GPU, and more. But the block diagram below also shows two Gigabit Ethernet (GMAC) interfaces and HDMI 2.0 output among other interfaces meaning it will likely be used in Smart Home products as the Allwinner R828/MR828, and possibly automotive products as the Allwinner T527. I first discovered the Allwinner A523 last March via a tweet by 柚木鉉 (GLGH_), but there was little information at that time. We now have further details about the processor and upcoming products such as the Teclast P26T, and a potential Allwinner A523 single board computer or module. Allwinner A523 preliminary specifications: CPU Application – Octa-core Arm Cortex-A55 @ in big.LITTLE configuration with four cores @ […]

June 21, 2023June 22, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Zvidar Z-GW-V01 Smart Gateway runs Home Assistant on Allwinner A133 processor

Allwinner A133 SBC Home Assistant Gateway

Shenzhen Zvidar Technologies’ Z-GW-V01, also known as the Zvidar Smart Gateway is a single board computer powered by an Allwinner A133 quad-core Cortex-A53 processor and running Ubuntu with the Home Assistant open-source automation framework. The SBC provides Gigabit Ethernet, WiFi 5, and Bluetooth connectivity by default, but also supports plenty of optional wireless modules with Z-Wave, Zigbee, Thread/Matter, LoRa, or 4G LTE connectivity that are either soldered to the board connected by a mini PCIe socket. The board also includes a few USB ports, and it’s apparently possible to connect a 7-inch display and/or audio interfaces if needed. Zvidar Smart Gateway (Z-GW-V01) specifications: SoC – Allwinner A133 quad-core Cortex-A53 processor @ up to 1.6GHz with Imagination PowerVR GE8300 GPU with support for OpenGL ES3.2, Vulkan 1.1, OpenCL 1.2 System Memory – 1GB RAM (option for 512MB, 2GB, or 4GB) Storage – 8GB eMMC flash (option for 4GB, 16GB, or 32GB), […]

May 25, 2023May 25, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Snagboot is an open-source cross-vendor recovery tool for embedded targets

Bootlin has just released the Snagboot open-source recovery tool for embedded platforms designed to work with multiple vendors, and currently STMicro STM32MP1, Microchip SAMA5, NXP i.MX6/7/8, Texas Instruments AM335x and AM62x, and Allwinner “sunxi” processors are supported. Silicon vendors usually provide firmware flashing tools, some closed-source binaries, that only work with their hardware. So if you work on STM32MP1 you’d use STM32CubeProgrammer, while SAM-BA is the tool for Microchip processors, NXP i.MX SoC relies on UUU, and if you’ve ever worked on Allwinner processors you’re probably family with sunxi-fel. Bootlin aims to replace all those with the Snagboot recovery tool. The Python tool is comprised of two parts: snagrecover using vendor-specific ROM code mechanisms to initialize external RAM and run the bootloader (typically U-Boot) without modifying any non-volatile memories. snagflash communicates with the bootloader over USB to flash system images to non-volatile memories, using either DFU, USB Mass Storage, or […]

April 24, 2023April 24, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Linux 6.3 release – Notable changes, Arm, RISC-V and MIPS architectures

Linux Torvalds has just announced the release of Linux 6.3 on the Linux Kernel Mailing List (LKML): It’s been a calm release this time around, and the last week was really no different. So here we are, right on schedule, with the 6.3 release out and ready for your enjoyment. That doesn’t mean that something nasty couldn’t have been lurking all these weeks, of course, but let’s just take things at face value and hope it all means that everything is fine, and it really was a nice controlled release cycle. It happens. This also obviously means the merge window for 6.4 will open tomorrow. I already have two dozen pull requests waiting for me to start doing my pulls, and I appreciate it. I expect I’ll have even more when I wake up tomorrow. But in the meantime, let’s enjoy (and test) the 6.3 release. As always, the shortlog […]

March 7, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

LibreELEC 11 released with Kodi 20, brings back Amlogic platforms

LibreELEC 11 lightweight media center Linux distribution based on Kodi 20 “Nexus” has just been released with various improvements on x86 and Arm platforms. Kodi 20 was released and available for download in January with AV1 hardware video decoding in Android and x86 (VAAPI) platforms with AV1-capable GPU or VPU, FFMPEG 4.4, Pipewire support in Linux, and a few others. LibreELEC 11 enables you to have a dedicated, and fast booting, HTPC based on a mini PC, a Raspberry Pi SBC, or an Arm-based TV box with all features from the latest Kodi release. LibreELEC 11 supports Raspberry Pi 2 to 4 SBCs, 64-bit x86 hardware, various Allwinner, Rockchip, and Amlogic SBCs and TV boxes with x86, Raspberry Pi, and Rockchip hardware considered more stable and feature complete. LibreELEC 10.0 did away with Amlogic TV boxes and single board computers because of driver issues, but LibreELEC 11.0 brings Amlogic back […]

March 2, 2023 by Leo Zachary - 39 Comments

GHLBD Android calculator mini review – An Allwinner A50-based Android 9.0 calculator

I found this GHLBD calculator on a platform selling second-hand electronic products. Three labels of this product appeal to me: “Calculator”, “Android 9.0” and “Allwinner A50“. If you only look at the appearance, this calculator is not much different from that of ordinary calculators, but the Android operating system is running on it and the screen tells me that it is definitely not an ordinary calculator. When I bought it, I only spent 69 RMB ($10 US). I didn’t really have a use case for it, but curiosity drove me to buy one. I decided to introduce it and disassemble it to check out the hardware design. Function demonstration of GHLBD calculator Press and hold the ON and OFF keys on the keyboard to turn on the calculator. The Allwinner A50 processor icon and Android logo show up in the boot animation. Here, you can preliminarily confirm that the promotional content […]

February 20, 2023February 20, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Linux 6.2 release – Main changes, Arm, RISC-V, and MIPS architectures

Linux 6.2 has just been released with Linus Torvalds making the announcement on LKML as usual: So here we are, right on (the extended) schedule, with 6.2 out. Nothing unexpected happened last week, with just a random selection of small fixes spread all over, with nothing really standing out. The shortlog is tiny and appended below, you can scroll through it if you’re bored. Wed have a couple of small things that Thorsten was tracking on the regression side, but I wasn’t going to apply any last-minute patches that weren’t actively pushed by maintainers, so they will have to show up for stable. Nothing seemed even remotely worth trying to delay things for. And this obviously means that the 6.3 merge window will open tomorrow, and I already have 30+ pull requests queued up, which I really appreciate. I like how people have started to take the whole “ready for […]