audio News - Page 12 of 22 - CNX Software

December 17, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Qualcomm unveils QCC305x/QCC3056 TrueWireless, Bluetooth LE Audio-ready SoC for earbuds

Qualcomm QCC305x TrueWireless Bluetooth LE Audio SoC

Qualcomm has some SoC families specifically designed for Bluetooth headphones, headsets, & earbuds, and we very recently covered the cute Qualcomm QCC5141 Earbud reference design made to help manufacturers design and launch earbuds with support for TrueWireless Mirroring and Hybrid ANC. The company has now introduced another family with the QCC305x SoC series aiming to “bring premium True Wireless earbud features to a broad range of tiers” such as Qualcomm Adaptive Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) and wake word activated voice assistant, as well as support for the upcoming Bluetooth LE audio standard. The first and only member of QCC305x family at this time is QCC3056 with the following key features and specifications: CPU – 32-bit programmable application core clocked at up to 80 MHz DSP – 2x Qualcomm Kalimba DSP @ 120 MHz with 112kB program RAM, 448kB data RAM Storage – External flash Connectivity Bluetooth 5.2 qualified BR, EDR, […]

December 2, 2020December 2, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 16 Comments

Khadas Tone 2 Pro mini desktop Hi-Fi system supports MQA decoding, balanced RCA outputs

Khadas Tone high-resolution audio board was introduced in 2018 for audiophiles wanting to design their own DIY HiFi system using Khadas VIM/VIM2 SBC, or connect it the USB version of the board to other single board computers. The company is now about to launch Khadas Tone 2 Pro mini desktop Hi-Fi system based on the same ESS ES9038Q2M DAC, but a faster XMOS XU216 capable of handling MQA decoding, and equipped with balanced RCA outputs, as well as an I2S USB-C port. Khadas Tone 2 Pro key features and specifications: Multicore MCU – XMOS XU216 with 16 real-time logical cores on 2x xCORE tiles; up to 1000 MIPS DAC – ES9038Q2M 32-bit stereo mobile audio DAC Amplifiers – 4x OPA1612 operational amplifiers, 3x buffer amplifiers Seamless hardware MQA decoding Native DSD512 decoding, PCM decoding up to 32Bit/384kHz. Left and right balanced RCA jacks for transmitting a balanced analog signal via […]

November 16, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Qualcomm QCC5141 Earbud reference design supports TrueWireless Mirroring and Hybrid ANC

Qualcomm has recently unveiled an earbud reference design based on the company’s QCC5141 low-power premium-tier Bluetooth SoC that supports TrueWireless Mirroring and Hybrid Active Noise Cancellation (ANC). What are TrueWireless Mirroring and Hybrid ANC? Qualcomm TrueWireless Mirroring technology relies on only one earbud to maintain the Bluetooth connection with the smartphone, while the secondary bud mirrors the connected bud. If the connected earbud is removed, the secondary earbud assumes the connection with zero interruption. The technology enables both a better, more stable connection and lower power consumption Hybrid Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) is designed to provide high-quality immersive experiences and enable natural leak-through of noise to allow for awareness of surroundings. Qualcomm ANC is fully integrated into this QCC5141 chip to reduce the complexity, cost, and PCB space of adding ANC to earbuds and hearables. QCC5141 Earburd Reference Design Key features and specifications: WiSoC – Qualcomm QCC5141 single-chip Bluetooth SoC […]

October 9, 2020October 9, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

$16 Banana Pi BPI-EAI80 Cortex-M4F Board Embeds AI Accelerator, WiFi Module

Banana Pi BPI-EAI80 AI MCU Development Board

Last April, we wrote about Edgeless EAI-Series dual Arm Cortex-M4 MCU equipped with a 300 GOPS CNN-NPU for AI at the very edge as we had discovered the chip in an upcoming Banana Pi board. It turns out Banana Pi BPI-EAI80 development board powered by Edgeless EAI80 AI microcontroller has just launched for $16 on Aliexpress, or you could get a complete kit with a touchscreen display, a camera, and a USB power supply for $80. Banana Pi BPI-EAI80 development board specifications: System-in-Package – Edgeless EIA80 dual-core Cortex-M4F microcontroller @ 200MHz with 300GOPS AI accelerator (CNN-NPU), 384KB of SRAM including 256KB for CNN-NPU, and 8MB SDRAM Storage – SPI flash Display I/F – LCD connector up to 1024×768 Camera I/F – 1x DVP camera interface Audio – 2x onboard microphones Connectivity – 2.4GHz 802.11b/g/n WiFI 4 using ESP8266 module USB – 1x USB 2.0 Type-C port Expansion 40-pin GPIO header […]

June 24, 2020June 24, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Up2stream Mini & Pro v3 Audio Boards Add Bluetooth 5.0, USB Sound Card Mode and More

Rakoit launched Up2stream WiFi audio board in 2018, followed by Up2stream Pro board in 2019 with additional Bluetooth, Ethernet, and USB interfaces. Those boards are designed to bring network connectivity to speakers for audio streaming. The company has now launched updates with the launch of Up2stream Mini v3 and Up2stream Pro v3 connected audio boards. Both Up2Stream Mini v3 and Pro v3 have gotten similar updates with the ability to use the board as a micro USB sound card so you can directly plug it into a PC to make it work as a USB DAC. The boards also added SPDIF out, an ADC KEY input for external buttons, two I/O for extensions such as volume knobs. Up2stream Mini v3 now includes both WiFi and Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity. Shared key features and specifications of the boards are as follows: Audio Output – 3.5mm audio jack and header (shared), I2S & […]

June 8, 2020June 8, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Beelink GS-King X Android TV Box, Dual HDD NAS & HiFi Audio System Launched for $250

Beelink GS-King X is an Android 9.0 TV box and a NAS with two 3.5″ SATA bays powered by Amlogic S922X-H processor combined with 4GB RAM and 64GB eMMC flash that was unveiled last month with some blurry renders. We now have for the details about the device, which has started to sell for $249.99 plus shipping on GeekBuying when using a “Fixed Priced” coupon, in my case 4ATAOTO6. Updated Beelink GS-King X specifications: SoC – Amlogic S922X-H hexa-core big.LITTLE processor with 4x Arm Cortex A73 cores @ up to 2.2 GHz, 2x Arm Cortex A53 cores @ 1.8 GHz, Arm Mali-G52MP4 GPU @ 846MHz; 12nm process System Memory – 4GB LPDDR4 RAM Storage – 64GB eMMC flash, microSD card slot, 2x 3.5″ SATA HDD drive bay for up to 32TB storage in total Video Output – HDMI 2.1 up to 4K @ 60 Hz with HDCP 2.2 Video – […]

June 5, 2020November 3, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

M5Stack Atom Echo Coin-Sized Bluetooth Speaker is Powered by ESP32-PICO-D4 SiP

M5Stack has just launched Atom Echo, a coin-sized programmable Bluetooth speaker based on Espressif Systems ESP32-PICO-D4 system-on-package. The company sent me an early sample to play with before launch… but let’s have a look at the specification before checking the device further. Specifications: SiP – Espressif Systems ESP32-PICO-D4 system-in-package with ESP32 dual-core processor @ 240MHz Wi-Fi, BLE 4.0 and 4MB flash Audio 0.5W/NS4168 I2S speaker SPM1423 PDM microphone Expansion 5-pin + 4-pin headers with 6x GPIOs, UART, 5V, 3.3V, GND 4-pin digital Grove header with 2 I/Os, 5V and GND Misc – RGB LED (SK6812), Function (Top – G39 pin) and reset buttons (side), IR LED Power Supply – 5V/500mA via USB-C port Dimensions – 24 x 24 x 17mm (plastic material) Weight – 10 grams The Bluetooth speaker is really small, but you may think CNXSoft has big hands and fat fingers so it makes the speaker smaller than […]

May 25, 2020May 25, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

$13 RPI_AC108 Audio Board Ships with a 4-Mic Array for Raspberry Pi

X-Powers is a subsidiary of Allwinner, better known for its PMIC chips for Allwinner Cortex-A processors., but we also discovered X-Powers AC108 quad-channel ADC chip for microphone arrays in 2017. Soon after, Seeed Studio launched ReSpeaker 4-Mic Array for Raspberry Pi, but I had completely forgotten about the audio chip since then. That’s until this morning when I came across RPI_AC108 audio board also coming with four microphones and several LEDs. RPI_AC108 specifications: Audio X-Powers AC108 quad-channel ADC with I2S/TDM output transition 4x MEMS microphones Expansion 2x Grove interfaces (1x I2C, 1x GPIO port using pins 12 & 13) 40-pin Raspberry Pi compatible header working with Raspberry Pi Zero / Zero W / 2B / 3B / 3B + / 4 and other compatible development boards Misc – 12x LEDs (APA102) connected over SPI, GPIO5 enables power Dimensions – 65mm x 65mm x 9mm The board gets its power (3.3V and 5V) from the […]