Rongpin DR4-S905/DR4-A311D SoM features Amlogic S905D3 or A311D processor

DR4-A311D Amlogic A311D system-on-module

Shenzhen Rongpin Electronic Technology (Rongpin) DR4-S905 and DR4-A311D are SO-DIMM system-on-modules (SoM) respectively powered by Amlogic S905D3 quad-core Cortex-A55 processor and Amlogic A311D octa-core Cortex-A73/A53 processor. The modules come with 2GB LPDDR4 and 16GB eMMC flash by default, but can be ordered with up to 4GB RAM and 128GB storage, and the company offered a feature-rich carrier board to test all interfaces provided but the system-on-modules. DR4-S905 system-on-module specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905D3 quad-core Cortex-A55 processor @ 1.9GHz with Arm Mali-G31MP2 GPU up to 800MHz supporting OpenGL ES 3.2, Vulkan 1.0 and OpenCL 2.0, real-time Cortex-M4 core for always-on processing, and 1.2 TOPS NPU System Memory – 2GB LPDDR4 by default (1GB/4GB options) Storage – 16GB eMMC 5.1 flash by default (8GB, 32GB, 64GB, 128GB options) SO-DIMM edge connector for connection to a carrier board Power management – Discrete design Dimensions – 69.6 x 30mm Temperature Range – -25℃ to […]

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

Linux 6.3 release

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 […]

Videostrong HC1 Home Care Hub for the elderly serves as Smart Speaker, Smart Home gateway, video phone

Videostrong HC1 Home Care Hub

Videostrong HC1 Home Care Hub is a Smart Home/IoT gateway designed for the elderly that also serves as a smart speaker with 10-meter far-field voice recognition, a video phone with a video built-in camera and speaker, and a 4K Android TV box. The system is based on an Amlogic S905Y4 quad-core Cortex-A35 processor coupled with up to 4GB RAM and 64GB RAM, supports Ethernet, WiFi, Bluetooth, Zigbee, and LoRa, WiFi, and Bluetooth connectivity, and offers both HDMI 2.1 video output, and HDMI 2.0 video input. HC1 specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905Y4 quad-core Arm Cortex-A35 @ 2.0GHz with Arm Mali-G31 MP2 GPU with OpenGL ES 3.2 support System Memory – 2GB or 4GB RAM Storage – 8GB, 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB eMMC flash Video Output – HDMI 2.1 port up to 4Kp60 Input Built-in 1920×1080 camera with 90° wide angle, manual cover, adjustable angle HDMI 2.0 port up to 4Kp60 Audio […]

LibreELEC 11 released with Kodi 20, brings back Amlogic platforms

LibreELEC 11

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 […]

Armbian 23.02 out with Linux 6.1, DietPi 8.14 adds experimental RISC-V support

Armbian 23.02

Two of the most popular projects providing images for Arm and RISC-V single board computers have released new updates with Armbian 23.02 adding Linux 6.1-based Debian and Ubuntu images, and DietPi 8.14 adding experimental RISC-V support for the StarFive VisionFive 2 SBC and new Arm boards. Armbian 23.02 Quoll Linux 6.1 is the latest LTS kernel, so Armbian is now providing Ubuntu 22.04 Jammy and Debian 11 Bullseye images based on Linux 6.1.y for boards that support it, as well as the first development images based on Debian 12 Bookworm and Ubuntu 23.04 Lunar. I could not find any new boards added in the changelog, but the release brings several improvements and bug fixes to some of the already supported SBCs including the Raspberry Pi 3, Orange Pi R1 Plus LTS, ROCK Pi S, ROCK Pi 4,  NanoPi R2S, NanoPi NEO3, and Banana Pi BPI-M2 Pro. The announcement also highlights […]

Amlogic S928X specifications – A penta-core Arm Cortex-A76/A55 SoC with Mali-G57 GPU, 3.2 TOPS NPU

Amlogic S928X block diagram

Amlogic S928X Cortex-A76/A55 will soon power some 8K TV boxes running Android TV from SDMC and others, and we now have detailed specifications as a “Quick Reference Manual” dropped in my inbox last night. While like most Amlogic processors, the S928X is designed for TV boxes, the penta-core SoC may end up in affordable yet powerful single board computers with features such as HDMI 2.1a, Gigabit Ethernet, PCIe 2.0 or USB 3.0. Amlogic S928X specifications: CPU sub-system 1x Arm Cortex-A76 core and 4x Arm Cortex-A55 cores in big.LITTLE configuration NEON and Crypto extensions Private L2 cache and unified system L3 cache Build-in RISC-V core for system control processing GPUs Arm Mali-G57 MC2 3D GPU with support for OpenGL ES 3.2, Vulkan 1.2, and OpenCL 2.0 2.5D graphics processor for scaling, alpha, rotation, and color space conversion operations VPU Amlogic Video Engine (AVE) with dedicated hardware decoders and encoders Decoding AV1 […]

SDMC DV9286 8K TV box runs Android 13 on Amlogic S928X processor for OTT/IPTV deployments

SDMC DV9286 Android 13 8K TV box

SDMC DV9286 is an 8K TV box for operators running Android 13 TV OS on an Amlogic S928X penta-core Cortex-A76/A55 processor with 4GB to 8GB RAM, WiFi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 connectivity, an HDMI 2.1a port, and 8K AV1, H.265, VP9 video decoding support. We had started to see 8K TV boxes based on the Amlogic S928X processor at IBC 2022 last September, but with few details. SDMC DV9286 announcement brings a few more details such as the GPU used in S928X and which version of Android will be used. SDMC DV9286 (preliminary) specifications: SoC – Amlogic S928X penta-core processor with 1x Cortex-A76 core, 4x Cortex-A55 cores, Arm Mali-G57 MC2 GPU; 12nm process System Memory – 4GB LPDDR4 (up to 8GB option) Storage – 32GB eMMC flash Video Output – HDMI 2.1a up to 8Kp60 with HDCP2.2/2.3, HDR 10, HLG, HDR10+, Dolby Vision (optional), and HDMI 2.1-specific features such as […]

Auspicious Machine modular handheld Linux PC with keyboard takes various Arm-based SoMs

Auspicious Machine

The “Auspicious Machine” may look like a Blackberry phone, but it’s actually a handheld Linux PC with a built-in QWERTY keyboard and a 3.5-inch display that can be powered by a range of system-on-modules (SoM). The computer, whose name can also be translated as the “Auspicious Phone”, can be used as a Linux terminal with GPIO control, and for gaming with Linux distributions such as Batotera or RetroBat with the D-Pad and ABXY buttons found on the device. Auspicious Machine specifications: Supported SoMs Bigtreetech CB1 with Allwinner H616 quad-core Cortex-A53 processor and 1GB DDR4 Raspberry Pi CM4 with Broadcom BCM2711 quad-core Cortex-A72 processor, up to 8GB LPDDR4, up to 32GB eMMC flash Radxa CM3 with Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Cortex-A55 processor, up to 4GB LPDDR4, up to 64GB eMMC flash Banana Pi BPI-CM4 with Amlogic A311D octa-core Cortex-A73/A55 processor with 4GB LPDDR4 and 16GB eMMC flash Storage – MicroSD card socket […]