Ubuntu 18.04 Now Boots on Some Snapdragon 835 Arm Laptops

Snapdragon 835 Ubuntu Arm Laptop

The first “proper” Windows 10 Arm laptops were unveiled at the end of 2017 and beginning of 2018, all based on Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor with always-on LTE connectivity, 20+ hour battery life, a fairly expensive price tag, and somewhat underwhelming performance. Qualcomm was not interested in supporting Linux, but there was interest from the community, and now it seems Ubuntu 18.04 images are available for Lenovo Miix 630, HP Envy x2, and ASUS Novago TP370 thanks to Aarch64-laptop project currently hosted on Github. Now the prebuilt images are not really ready for end users since UFS storage and WiFi are not working on any laptop yet, the touchpad is not working on the ASUS laptop, and accelerated graphics needs to be implemented. Interestingly WiFi is related to UFS on those laptops, and Marc Gonzalez is said to be being actively worked on UFS upstream support, which should enable for […]

Nitrogen8M_Mini is the First NXP i.MX8 8M Mini SBC

Having just written about one of the first NXP i.MX 8M Mini systems-on-module, let’s stay with NXP’s latest 14-nm processor as Boundary Devices have been working on a variant of their Nitrogen8M SBC based on MXP i.MX 8M Mini processor and aptly called Nitrogen8M_Mini. The board is also known as the less human-friendly Nit8MQ_Mini_2r8e SBC, and comes with the following specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini with 4x Cortex A53 cores, 1x Cortex-M4F real-time core, Vivante GCNanoUltra 3D GPU, Vivante GC320 2D GPU System Memory –  2GB LPDDR4 (Optional 4GB version) Storage – 8GB eMMC flash, expandable up to 128GB, UHS SD card slot Display – 4-lane MIPI DSI interface up to 1080p Video Encode / Decode – 1080p H.264, VP8/1080p60 H.265, H.264, VP8, VP9 Audio – 3.5mm headphone jack, analog MIC jack, 2W audio amplifier, L&R speaker headers Camera Interface – 1x 4-lane MIPI-CSI interface Connectivity Gigabit Ethernet […]

F&S Elektronik PicoCore MX8MM System-on-Module Features NXP i.MX 8M Mini Processor

FS i.MX 8M Mini SoM

Embedded World 2019 will take place at the end of this month on February 26-28 in Nuremberg, Germany, and we can expect plenty of news related to embedded systems. It’s very likely NXP i.MX 8M Mini processor will officially be launched, and we’ll see several modules and boards announced with the lower cost 14-nm processor. F&S Elektronik Systeme has already been promoting their upcoming PicoCore MX8MM system-on-module based on NXP i.MX 8M in their newsletter ahead of Embedded World, where they’ll showcase their solutions at booth 621 in hall 2. PicoCore MX8MM specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini single, dual, quad core Arm Cortex-A53 @ 1.8 GHz processor, Cortex-M4 real-time core @ 400 MHz, 512KB L2-Cache, 2D/3D GPU System Memory – Up to 8GB LPDDR4 Storage – Up to 512MB SLC NAND flash or up to 32GB eMMC flash Video Decode – 1080p60 HEVC H.265, VP9, H.264, VP8 Connectivity 802.11ac […]

Adding Machine Learning based Image Processing to your Embedded Product

Convert model tensorflow runtime to NNEF

CNXSoft: This is a guest post by Greg Lytle, V.P. Engineering, Au-Zone Technologies. Au-Zone Technologies is part of the Toradex Partner Network. Object detection and classification on a low-power Arm SoC Machine learning techniques have proven to be very effective for a wide range of image processing and classification tasks. While many embedded IoT systems deployed to date have leveraged connected cloud-based resources for machine learning, there is a growing trend to implement this processing at the edge. Selecting the appropriate system components and tools to implement this image processing at the edge lowers the effort, time, and risk of these designs. This is illustrated with an example implementation that detects and classifies different pasta types on a moving conveyor belt. Example Use Case For this example, we will consider the problem of detecting and classifying different objects on a conveyor belt. We have selected commercial pasta as an example […]

LIVA Q2 Review – ECS Micro PC Tested with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.10

ECS LIVA Q2 Teardown

ECS (Elitegroup Computer Systems) is a Taiwanese company that has been offering mini PCs for several years now. Last year they announced their ‘pocket-sized’ model the LIVA Q. Originally featuring Apollo Lake SoCs it has now been upgraded and renamed as the LIVA Q2 and offers a choice of Gemini Lake SoCs. The distinguishing feature of the LIVA Q series however is the form-factor. Compared with Intel Compute ‘stick’ PCs and Intel NUC ‘mini’ PCs the LIVA Q2 is a ‘micro’ PC. This micro PC is like a minimalist mini PC that includes just the minimum number of useful ports namely a couple of USB ports (3.1 and 2.0) on one side, a micro SD card slot on another and finally an HDMI (2.0) and gigabit Ethernet at the rear. The resultant micro PC is beautifully small consisting of a 70mm (2.76″) square case by 33.4mm (1.31”) tall which can […]

Qihua CQH6 SoM – A Better Alternative to Raspberry Pi Compute Model 3+?

Allwinner H6 SoM

The Raspberry Pi Foundation just launched the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 3+ for $25 and up with Broadcom BCM2837B0 processor offering better thermals than BCM2837 processor. As is often the case, this post generated some insightful comments from the smart readers of CNX Software, and they pointed out some of the shortcomings of the module such as the lack of Ethernet support that would be required for cluster use cases for example. You can also add a USB to Ethernet chip to the carrier board, but that’s not ideal, and instead someone linked to Qihua CQH6 system-on-module powered by Allwinner H6 processor and sold for 158 RMB ($23.5 USD) or 199 RMB ($29.65) for respectively 512MB RAM/4GB flash and 1GB RAM/8GB flash configurations. Qihua CQH6 module specifications: SoC – Allwinner H6 quad-core Cortex A53 processor @ 1.8 GHz with Arm Mali-T720MP GPU System Memory – 512MB, 1GB or 2GB DDR3L […]

PineBook Pro Linux / BSD Rockchip RK3399 Laptop Coming Up for $200

Pinebook Pro

Pine64 announced the Pinebook laptop in 2016. The ultra cheap ($89 and up) laptop was based on Allwinner A64 quad core Cortex A53 processor coupled with 2GB RAM, 16GB storage, and a 11.6″ or 14″ display. It was never meant to be a replacement for your current laptop due to the low end specifications, but you could still use it to tinker with Arm Linux or *BSD, as a lightweight portable terminal, etc… Pine64 made several announcements in a single blog post right before FOSDEM 2019 where they’ll showcase some of their upcoming products including the Pinephone development kit that’s use to develop software for the upcoming Pinephone open source phone, PineTab *BSD/Linux-only tablet with  Allwinner A64 SoC, and an 11.6″ display like Pinebook laptop, a retro gaming case compatible with Rock64 and Rock64Pro boards, an open source IP camera based on Allwinner S3L processor,  Pine H64 Model B (Allwinner […]

AAEON AIOT-IP6801IP68 IoT Gateway Handles Rough Environments

IP68 IoT Gateway

There are plenty of IoT gateways to play with, but if your gateway needs to operate in rough environments, like outdoors or on a boat, you’d need to find one that is water and dust proof event for your environment. AAEON AIOT-IP6801 IoT gateway should meet most people requirements with IP68 ingress protection rating, an Intel Apollo Lake processor, up to 4GB memory, 32GB eMMC flash, built-in support for Ethernet, WiFi 802.11ac and Bluetooth 4.0, as well as optional support for LoRa, 3G/4G LTE, and IQRF connectivity. AAEON AIOT-IP6801 IP68 IoT gateway specifications: SoC (one or the other) Intel Atom E3940 quad-core processor clocked at 1.6 GHz / 1.8 GHz (Turbo) with a 12 EU Intel HD Graphics 500; 9.5W TDP Intel Celeron N3350 dual-core processor clocked at 1.1 GHz / 2.4 GHz (Turbo) with a 12 EU Intel HD Graphics 500; 6W TDP Memory – 2GB or 4GB LPDDR4 […]

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