The New Pi-Top Modular Laptop includes a 14″ Display, Sliding Keyboard, and Better Cooling

Pi-Top was first launched in late 2014 via an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign, as a modular DIY laptop powered by a Raspberry Pi board. It’s equipped with a 13.3” LCD screen with 1366×768 resolution, and uses a sliding top cover placed between the display and the keyboard where you could insert your Raspberry Pi with enough space for extra hardware. This is a good week for DIY ARM laptops, as after the launch of Olimex TERES-I laptop yesterday, Pi-Top team has announced a new version of Pi-Top modular laptop with an larger 14″ display with 1920×1080 resolution, a sliding keyboard, and better cooling with a passive cooling unit for the Raspberry Pi 3 board. Pi-Top 2017 laptop specifications: Display  – 14” full HD LCD screen with 1920 x 1080 resolution, 180° screen angle range Keyboard – 105mm sliding keyboard for internal access (US layout) Touchpad – 104x75mm trackpad with Gesture Control […]

UniElec U7621-06 MediaTek MT7621 Router Supports OpenWrt, Padavan, and PandoraBox Firmware

UniElec U7621-06 is a router / gateway based on Mediatek MT7621 dual core/Quad Thread processor, and offered either as a board only or complete system with optional WiFi and/or LTE PCIe modules. While the board is said to run OpenWrt or firmware based on Mediatek Linux SDK , the company also mentions the board runs Breed bootloader that can be used to  upgrade the firmware through a web interface. UniElec claims the router supports alternative firmware such as Padavan or PandoraBox. UniElec U7621-06 specifications: SoC – Mediatek MT7621 dual-core, quad-thread MIPS1004K processor @ up to 880MHz System Memory – 256MB DDR3 (optional 512 MB) Storage – 16MB NOR Flash (optional 8/32/64MB), 1x SATA 3.0 port, 1x micro SD card slot Connectivity – 5x Gigabit Ports (4x LAN, 1x WAN) USB – 1x USB 3.0 port Expansion 2x “normal” mPCIe for 802.11ac or 802.11n WiFi module 1x mPCIe connector for LTE […]

This TTGO Board Combines ESP32, LoRa Radio, and OLED Display for just $10

Just one year ago, it would cost around $15 to $20+ to get an ESP32 board, that is if you were lucky/fast enough to order one one before it went out of stock. Since then, availability is no longer an issue, and you now can get an ESP32 development board for as low as about $7, or even around $4 during promotions. Today, I was made aware of another board sold under the “TTGO” brand, that includes not only ESP32 WiFi and Bluetooth SoC, but also a (433 MHz) LoRa radio, and an OLED display. Price? Just $10 plus shipping ($1.75 here). TTGO ESP32/LoRa board specifications: WiSoC – Espressif ESP32 Storage – 32MB on-board flash (or maybe just 16MB?) LoRa Semtech SX1278 with u.FL connector + 433MHz antenna (N.B.: Antenna must be connected during use or the Semtech chip could be damaged) Sensitivity” ~ -148dBm; output power: +20dBm Display – […]

Huawei Honor WaterPlay is a Waterproof IP67 Tablet with Kirin 659 SoC

It’s quite easy to find smartphone with some level of dust and waterproofness, with many premium smartphone coming with IP67 or IP68 ingress protection rating, and if you search for IP67 / IP68 smartphones on Aliexpress, you’ll get a long list. Now replace smartphone by tablet, you’ll get a much shorter list, and most are rugged tablets. Huawei has just unveiled Honor Waterplay, that looks more like a normal tablet, and as it’s named implied is waterproof with an IP67 rating. Huawei Honor WaterPlay “HDN-W09 (WiFi)”  & “HDN-L09 (LTE)” tablets specifications: SoC – Hisilicon/Huawei Kirin 659 octa-core  processor with 4x ARM Cortex A53 @ up to 2.36 GHz, 4x Cortex A53 @ up to 1.7 GHz, ARM Mali-T830 MP2 GPU @ 900 MHz System Memory + Storage HDN-W09 – 3 to 4GB LPDDR3 + 32 to 64 GB eMMC 5.1 flash, micro SD slot up to 256GB HDN-L09 – 4GB […]

Olimex TERES-I DIY OSHW Laptop Now Up for Sale for 240 Euros

Olimex has been working on their open source hardware TERES-I DIY laptop since last year. The laptop is supposed to come in kit form, so that you can build it yourself. Every board and most parts are open source to let your easily repair it, or improve it by adapting the part to your own needs. The company has now launched the laptop kit for 240 Euros in black or white. Olimex TERES-I laptop updated specifications: SoC – Allwinner A64 quad core ARM Cortex-A53 processor @ 1.2 GHz with Mali-400MP2 GPU System Memory – 2GB DDR3L Storage – 16 GB eMMC Flash, micro SD slot Display – 11.6″ LCD display with 1366×768 resolution Video Output – 1x HDMI 1.4 port Audio – Via mini HDMI, 3.5mm audio jack, 2x speakers, microphone Connectivity – 802.11 b/g/n WiFi up to 150Mbps, Bluetooth 4.0 LE USB – 2x USB port ports Front camera […]

Zidoo H6 Pro (Allwinner H6) TV Box Review – Part 1: Unboxing & Teardown

Allwinner H6 is a quad core Cortex A53 processor designed for 4K HDR set-top boxes and TV boxes that also comes with high speed interfaces like USB 3.0 and PCIe. While at least one other company is working on an Allwinner H6 development board, Zidoo is the only company that I can find whose made a TV box based on the processor: Zidoo H6 Pro. They’ve just send me a sample from their local supplier for review, and as usual, I’ll start by checking out the hardware inside out, before testing the firmware and multimedia capabilities in the second part of the review in a few weeks. Zidoo H6 Pro Unboxing The company has slightly changed the design of their retail package. It also shows some icons with the main features like 4K, 3D,  H.265, 2GB DDR4, Android 7.0 with ZIUI, etc… The box ships with a HDMI cable, a […]

GNUBee Personal Cloud 2 is a DIY NAS Supporting up to Six 3.5″ SATA Drives (Crowdfunding)

GNUBee Personal Cloud 1 is a DIY NAS powered by Mediatek MT7621A MIPS processor that supports up to 2.5″ SATA drives, and runs free and open source software. It was first introduced in March of this year through a CrowdSupply campaign. The developers are now back with GNUBee Personal Cloud 2 (GB-PC2) with pretty much the same features, but instead of being designed for 2.5″ drives, it supports up to six 3.5″ drive that should offer either more capacity, or a lower total price for an equivalent capacity. GB-PC2 NAS specifications: Processor – MediaTek MT7621A dual core, quad thread MIPS processor @ 880 MHz, overclockable to 1.2 GHz System Memory – 512 MB DDR3 (max supported by MT7621) Storage – SD card slot tested up to 64 GB, 6x 3.5” SATA HDD or SSD (recommended RAID 0 or 1 under LVM, MD, or Linux MD RAID 10) Connectivity – 3x […]

Oculus Rift Virtual Reality Development Kit 2 Becomes Open Source Hardware

Oculus Rift DK2 virtual reality headset and development kit started to ship in summer 2014. The DK2 is kind of VR headset that is connected to a more powerful computer via USB and HDMI, includes hardware for positional tracking, a 5″ display ,and two lenses for each eye. Since then the company has been purchased by Facebook, and they’ve now decided to make the headset fully open source hardware.   The release includes schematics, board layout, mechanical CAD, artwork, and specifications under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license, as well as firmware under “BSD+PATENT” licenses which you’ll all find on Github. The release is divided into four main folders: Documentation with high-level specifications for the DK2 headset, sensor, and firmware. Cable with schematics and high level specifications for the cables. Custom assembly that would be hard to recreate from source. Allegedly the most complex part of the design Sensor with […]

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