Avnet Silica NB-IoT Sensor Shield Works with mbed OS 5, STM32 Nucleo Board

If for some reasons, none of the many NB-IoT boards launched recently suit your needs, there’s yet another option with Avnet Silica NB-IoT sensor shield, that supports – despite the name – also supports LTE Cat M1 (eMTC) beside NB-IoT (LTE Cat NB1), and comes with Arduino headers, as well as a Pmod connector. The board relies on Quectel BG96 module, and can be controlled with Arm mbed OS 5 when connected to STM32 Nucleo board. NB-IoT Sensor Shield specifications: Cellular Module – Quectel BG96 LPWA Module Multi Modes: Cat.M1, Cat.NB1, EGPRS Global bands Cat M1/NB1: B1 B2 B3 B4 B5 B8 B12 B13 B18 B19 B20 B26 B28 B39 (B39 for Cat M1 only) EGPRS: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz Voice Over LTE support (M1 only) – PCM digital audio interface SIM card holder (also optional embedded SIM) Optional GNSS – GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou/Compass, Galileo, QZSS Expansion – Arduino headers, Pmod connector […]

UltraZed-EG SoM and Starter Kit Feature Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ ZU3EG MPSoC

Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ Arm Cortex A53 + FPGA MPSoCs were announced in 2015, with actual products launched in early 2017 such as AXIOM development board or Trenz Electronic TE0808 UltraSOM+ system-on-module which are based on the ZU9EG model, and cost several thousand dollars. Recently, I wrote about Mycroft Mark II smart speaker based on a “quad core Xilinx processor”, and initially I assumed it was an Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoCs since those are the only Xilinx “quad core processors” I know of, but now I think it must be an unannounced part, since the company can’t provide the exact part number, and the price would be too low. Nevertheless, this lead me to check out if there was any lower cost boards based Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC with four Arm Cortex A53 cores, and ZU2EG is the entry-level part that matches this description. I could not find a ZU2EG development board, […]

Avnet Introduces Zynq Based MicroZed Industry 4.0 / IIoT Ethernet Kit

There’s a lot of buzz around IoT, and the industrial sector is also trying to build smarter factories using protocols or standards part of Industry 4.0 or Industrial IoT (IIoT) depending on the country or group you belong too. Avnet has just launched MicroZed Industry 4.0 Ethernet Kit (I4EK) based on Xilinx Zynq-7000 ARM & FPGA SoC to address this market with support for the most common industrial protocols such as EtherCAT, Powerlink, PROFINET RT/IRT, EtherNet/IP, and Modbus-TCP. The “brain” of the development board is MicroZed module powered by Zilinx Zynq-7020 dual core Cortex A9 processor with FPGA fabric, and coupled with 1GB RAM, 128 MB SQPI flash, a Gigabit Ethernet port, and various I/Os. The module is connected to MicroZed FMC Carrier board with the following features: 2x 100-pin board-to-board MicroHeaders Xilinx PC4 header for download/debug – Accesses PL JTAG 5x Digilent Pmod compatible interfaces 39 user I/O 1x […]

Wind River Introduces Free Cloud-based Operating Systems for IoT Applications

After Google Brillo operating system was officially launched last week, another company has announced free operating systems for IoT. What’s peculiar is that the company is Wind River a vendor of commercial operating systems whose typical business model is to sell licenses for their operating systems and fees for their development services. Nevertheless, the company has now introduced Wind River Rocket real-time operating system, and Wind River Pulsar Linux operating system.  Both OSes will interface with the company’s Helix Cloud software-as-a-service (SaaS) products, which is probably how the company intends to monetize their work, on top of customization services. Wind River Helix App Cloud is currently made of three products: Helix App Cloud cloud-based development environment for building IoT applications Helix Lab Cloud cloud-based virtual hardware lab for simulating and testing IoT devices and complex systems. Helix Device Cloud cloud-based platform for managing deployed IoT devices and their data. Some […]

PicoZed SDR (Software Defined Radio) System-on-Module Supports 70 MHz to 6.0 GHz Frequency Bands

PicoZed SoM based on Xilinx Zynq-7000 series SoCs was introduced in 2014  by Avnet. The company has now introduced a new version specifically designed for software designed radios which combines Zynq-7035 SoC with Analog Devices AD9361 RF transceiver supporting 70 MHz to 6.0 GHz frequency bands. Target applications include portable agile wireless communications, P25 public safety Radio, point-to-point communication, femtocell & picocell base stations and portable instrumentation. PicoZed SDR SoM specifications: SoC – Xilinx Zynq XC7Z035-2L FBG676I AP SoC with a dual core Cortex A9 processor @ 800 MHz and Kintex-7 FPGA with 275K logic cells System Memory – 1GB DDR3L SDRAM Storage – 256Mb QSPI Flash, microSD Card Interface Network Connectivity – 10/100/1000 Ethernet PHY USB – USB 2.0 OTG ULPI PHY I/Os – 205+ User I/O + 4 GTX channels Radio Transceiver – Analog Devices AD9361-BBCZ integrated RF Agile Transceiver with: 2 × 2 RF transceiver with integrated […]

PicoZed System-on-Modules are Powered by Xilinx Zynq-7000 ARM + FPGA SoC

After the Zedboard, and the Microzed, here comes PicoZed, a family of system-on-modules (SoM) based on Xilinx Zynq-7000 SoCs featuring a dual core Cortex A9 processor and FPGA fabric. The module also comes with 1GB RAM, 4GB eMMC, Gigabit Ethernet PHY, various user I/O, and more. Target applications include embedded vision, test & measurement, motor control, software-defined radio, and industrial automation. Four modules are available with support for commercial or industrial temperature ranges, all sharing the following specifications: SoC (depending on module) Xilinx Zynq-7010 with two Cortex-A9 cores @  866MHz, FPGA with 28K Logic Cells Xilinx Zynq-7015 with two Cortex-A9 cores @  866MHz, FPGA with 74K Logic Cells, 4 transceivers @ 6.25 Gb/s Xilinx Zynq-7020 with two Cortex-A9 cores @  866MHz, FPGA with 85K Logic Cells Xilinx Zynq-7030 with two Cortex-A9 cores @  1GHz, FPGA with 125K Logic Cells, up to 4 transceivers @ 12.5 Gb/s System Memory – 1GB […]

Xilinx Zynq-7000 All Programmable SoC Mini-ITX Development Board

Avnet has recently introduced Xilinx Zynq-7000 All Programmable SoC Mini-ITX Development Board powered by the top of the range Xilinx Zynq-7045 or Zynq-7100 dual ARM Cortex A9 + FPGA SoC with 2 GB DDR3 SDRAM, PCIe Gen2 x16 Root Complex slot (x4 electrical), SATA-III interface, 10/100/1000 Ethernet PHY, and more. Target applications include PCI Express, embedded controllers, general-purpose prototyping, networking and communications, storage and servers and video applications. Here are the motherboard specifications: SoC – Xilinx XC7Z045/XC7Z100-2FFG900 dual core ARM Cortex A9 @ 800 MHz + Kintex-7 FPGA with respectively 350K Logic Cells (~5.2M gates) and 444K Logic Cells (~6.6M gates). System Memory – 1 GB PS DDR3 SDRAM, 1 GB PL DDR3 SDRAM Storage – 32 MB of QSPI Flash, 8 KB of I2C EEPROM, SATA-III Interface, and microSD Card Interface Real-Time Clock Connectivity – 10/100/1000 Ethernet Interface Video – LVDS Touch Panel Interface, HDMI Interface Audio – Audio input […]

$199 MicroZed is a Low Cost Version of Zedboard ARM+FPGA Linux Development Board

ZedBoard is a low cost development board based on Xilinx Zynq-7020 SoC featuring two Cortex A9 cores and FPGA fabric, together with lots of ports and expansion I/Os, and running Linux. The problem is that “low cost” for this type of board still means $395 (or around $300 for academia), and you only get to this price because it’s been subsidized, and the normal price is actually $495… That’s why Avnet has just come with a new version of the evaluation kit called microZed that sells for $199 and targets applications such as general Zynq-7000 AP SoC evaluation and prototyping, embedded system-on-module (SOM) applications, embedded vision, test & measurement, motor control and software-defined radio. MicroZed technical specifications: SoC – Xilinx XC7Z010-1CLG400C (Zynq-7010) System Memory – 1 GB of DDR3 SDRAM Storage – 128 Mb of QSPI Flash + Micro SD card interface Connectivity 10/100/1000M Ethernet USB 2.0 USB-UART User I/O […]