banana pi News - Page 9 of 13 - CNX Software

April 11, 2018April 11, 2018 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Banana Pi BPI-ESP32 Board Follows Arduino UNO Form Factor, Works with Webduino and Arduino IDE

SinoVoIP has been pretty busy those days, as beside launching a BBC Micro:bit clone based on ESP32, and BPI-AI-Voice speech recognition board (also a clone or MicroSemi AcuEdge kit), the company has now started to take orders for Banana Pi BPI-ESP32 board for $10.99 plus shipping on Aliexpress. As the name implies, the based is based on ESP32 WiSoC, supports Arduino shields since it follows Arduino UNO form factor, and can be programming with web based Webduino visual programming IDE, or the Arduino IDE. BPI-ESP32 (aka BPI-UNO32) board specifications: Wireless module – ESP-WROOM-32 WiFi 802.11b/g/n, and Bluetooth 4.2 LE module; 4MB flash Expansion – Arduino headers with GPIOs, ADC, Ethernet, VP/VB, UART, I2C, Touch interface, etc… (See pinout table below) Misc – Buzzer, Tx/Rx LEDs, power LED, RGB LED, buttons Power Supply 5V/1A via micro USB 12V via 5.5mm DC jack Dimensions – 68 x 53 mm The company has […]

April 11, 2018April 11, 2018 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Banana Pi BPI-AI-Voice is a $169 Speech Recognition Development Kit based on MicroSemi ZL38063

SinoVoIP has just launched BPI-AI-Voice development platform for speech recognition on Aliexpress for $169, and excluding the different PCB color, it is a clone of the official $299 Microsemi AcuEdge Development Kit for Amazon AVS, which is based on MicroSemi ZL38063 audio processor and comes with two microphones. BPI-AI-Voice key features: Audio Processor – MicroSemi ZL38063 Storage – U2 SPI flash to store ZL38063 firmware Audio 4x on-board digital microphones (AKU441) supporting a 2 microphone configuration for 180° and 360° audio pick-up. 2x low cost class D audio amplifier (NCP2820) Expansion Headers JMMA1 audio header for digital microphone, analog out, and 3 GPIOs JM1-4 digital microphone headers for off-board microphones 40-pin P2 header to connected to Raspberry Pi 3 (I2S, SPI and 8x GPIO used) Debugging – JAIB2/2 auto tuning headers, micro USB port. Power Supply – 5V via micro USB port Dimensions – 70 mm × 66 mm Temperature […]

April 5, 2018April 5, 2018 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

$19.50 BPI:bit ESP32 Board is Inspired by BBC Micro:bit, Compatible with Webduino and Arduino IDE

BBC micro:bit board for education was first unveiled in 2015, before starting to be given away to UK students, and later sold for about $19 in 2016. The board supports Bluetooth connectivity, includes an array of 25 LEDs, as well as a specific 20-pin edge connector also featuring 5 large holes (rings) for 3 I/Os and power. So far I had not seen any clones or alternative boards inspired from the design, as we see for Arduino or Raspberry Pi boards. But SinoVoIP (Banana Pi) has changed that with their BPI:bit clearly inspired from the Micro:bit, but offering both WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity via an ESP32 module. Hardware specifications: Wireless module – ESP-WROOM-32 module with WiFi and Bluetooth LE connectivity LEDs – 25x RGB LED array Sensors – 2x light sensors, thermistor, 9-axis accelerometer / gyroscope / compass (MPU-9250) Expansion – 3 digital/analog I/O rings, 3V/GND ring, 20-pin edge connector […]

January 30, 2018 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

Linux 4.15 Release – Main Changes, Arm and MIPS Architectures

Linus Torvald has released Linux 4.15 last Sunday: After a release cycle that was unusual in so many (bad) ways, this last week was really pleasant. Quiet and small, and no last-minute panics, just small fixes for various issues. I never got a feeling that I’d need to extend things by yet another week, and 4.15 looks fine to me. Half the changes in the last week were misc driver stuff (gpu, input, networking) with the other half being a mix of networking, core kernel and arch updates (mainly x86). But all of it is tiny. So at least we had one good week. This obviously was not a pleasant release cycle, with the whole meltdown/spectre thing coming in in the middle of the cycle and not really gelling with our normal release cycle. The extra two weeks were obviously mainly due to that whole timing issue. Also, it is […]

November 13, 2017November 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Linux 4.14 Release – Main Changes, ARM & MIPS Architecture

Linus Torvalds has announced the release of Linux 4.14: No surprises this week, although it is probably worth pointing out how the 0day robot has been getting even better (it was very useful before, but Fengguang has been working on making it even better, and reporting the problems it has found). Sure, some of the new reports turned out to be just 0day doing things that just don’t work (ie KASAN with old gcc versions, but also doing things like loading old ISA drivers in situations that just don’t make sense – remember when you couldn’t even ask if the hardware existed or not, and just had to know), but even then it’s been all good. The appended shortlog is obviously only for the (small) haul since rc8, and it really is tiny. Not very many commits, and they are small. The biggest thing that stands out in the diffstat […]

November 6, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

RetrOrangePi 4.0 Released

RetrOrangePi is a retro gaming & media center firmware based on Armbian Debian image and working on Allwinner H3/H2+ based Orange Pi boards, Banana Pi M2+, and NanoPi M1, as well as Beelink X2 TV Box. Right at the end of last year, I reviewed RetrOrangePi 3.0 on Orange Pi One board to which I connected Mars G01 gamepad, and I could play some games like Wolfenstein 3D and Quake, and watch videos on OpenELEC/Kodi 16. The firmware also comes with various emulators, but you’d have to load the ROMs yourself due to intellectual property / license issues. The developers have now released RetrOrangePi 4.0. RetrOrangePi 4.0 changelog: Latest Armbian v5.32 (Debian Jessie kernel 3.4.113) RetroPie-Setup v4.3.3 (unofficial fork, upgradeable) New RetrOrangePi repository for easy updates and fixes EmulationStation v2.6.5 with video and game collection support, Desktop/OpenELEC shorcuts from main menu New ROPi “Attract-Mode”-like theme (based on Cosmos theme) Retroarch […]

October 30, 2017October 30, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 31 Comments

$15 Banana Pi M2 Zero Board is a Raspberry Pi Zero W Clone with a Quad Core Processor

Many development boards have followed Raspberry Pi 2/3 form factor in recent years, including Hardkernel ODROID-C2 and Pine64 ROCK64, but so far I had not seen any boards leveraging Raspberry Pi Zero (W) form factor. SinoVoIP will change that, as they’ve just launched Banana Pi M2 Zero (aka BPI-Zero) board powered by Allwinner H2+ quad core processor, leveraging Raspberry Pi Zero W form factor, and now selling on Aliexpress for $15 plus shipping. Banana Pi M2 Zero specifications: SoC – Allwinner H2+ quad core Cortex A7 processor @ up to 1 GHz with Mali 400MP2 System Memory – 512 MB DDR3 Storage – micro SD card slot up to 64GB Video/Audio Output – mini HDMI Connectivity – 802.11 b/g/n WiFi and Bluetooth LE (AP6212 module with options for AP6181, AP6335) Camera – 1x MIPI CSI connector supporting 8-bit YUV422 CMOS sensor, CCIR656 protocol for NTSC and PAL, 5MP camera, 1080p […]

October 20, 2017October 30, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Banana Pi M2 Magic Board Now Sold with Allwinner A33 Processor for $23

Banana Pi M2 Magic development board was first unveiled in February of this year with an Allwinner R16 SoC, 512 MB RAM, and 8GB eMMC flash, and its main selling points were support for MIPI DSI LCD displays, CSI cameras, and 3.7V LiPo batteries. AFAIK SinoVoIP never sold that version of the board, at least on Aliexpress. Possibly due to the intricacies of Allwinner business units, the company has now officially launched Banana Pi M2 Magic (aka BPI M2M), but replaced Allwinner R16 by the similar Allwinner A33 processor, and removed the 8GB eMMC flash to bring the price down to $23 plus shipping. The “old” Allwinner R16 based Banana Pi M2 Magic board will apparently be sold as M2 Magic Plus soon. Banana Pi BPI-M2 Magic (A33) specifications: SoC – Allwinner A33 quad core ARM Cortex-A7 processor with ARM Mali 400 MP2 GPU System Memory – 512MB DDR3 Storage […]