Linux

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments on Faraday Technology SoCreative! IV Kit Facilitates Custom SoC Design and Software Implementation

Faraday Technology SoCreative! IV Kit Facilitates Custom SoC Design and Software Implementation

Faraday Technology has unveiled “SoCreative! IV”, a SoC development kit based on Faraday A380 SoC featuring  a dual-core ARM Cortex A9 processor, an ARMv5-compliant core developed by the company, and a high speed expansion bus for interfacing with FPGA daughtercards. A380 SoC has been designed for cloud infrastructure market, including networking, computing, and storage applications. The company has not listed the specifications, but here’s what I could derived from the picture above, and the info found on Linux Gizmos article. SoC – Farady A380 dual core Cortex A9 @ 1GHz, with ARMv5-compliant FA626TE RISC processor @ 500MHz, and 512MB L2 cache. BGA package (31x31mm), 40nm process. System Memory – 1GB DDR3-1600 RAM Storage – 4Gb NAND Flash (512MB), 128Mb of NOR flash, 64Mb of SPI flash, I2C EEPROM, and SD Card slot. Video Output – DSUB for 24-bit LCD I/F up to 1280×1280 Audio – Mic In, Audio In/Out, Audio […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments on $49 Safeplug Tor Router Let You Browse the Net Anonymously

$49 Safeplug Tor Router Let You Browse the Net Anonymously

With the recent NSA leaks, more and more people have been be aware that there’s virtually no privacy online, especially with regards to their own or foreign governments. So people have looked into using secure emails, or find way to protect themselves against eavesdropping from criminals, advertisers, and politicians. For example, instructions have been posted to convert the Raspberry Pi into a Tor router, called Onion Pi, in order to hide your IP address, and browse the web anonymously from any of your devices. If you’re not the tinkerer type, and/or would just like to get something that works out of the box cheaply, people behind the Pogoplug, have introduced the Safeplug, a Tor enabled router, that sells for just $49, plus $9 shipping to the US. It does not seem to be available for the rest of the world. There’s absolutely no information about the hardware used, but it […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments on Boston Viridis 2.0 and AAEON CRS-200S-2R ARM Based Servers Powered by Calxeda Quad core Cortex A15 SoC

Boston Viridis 2.0 and AAEON CRS-200S-2R ARM Based Servers Powered by Calxeda Quad core Cortex A15 SoC

Calxeda unveiled its new ECX-2000 Server-on-a-Chip (SoC) at ARM Techcon 2013. Calxeda new chipset features 4 cortex A15 cores, support up to 16GB RAM, and thanks to the move from Cortex A9 to Cortex A15 supports hardware virtualization. I’ve stumbled across two new servers powered by ECX-2000: Boston Viridis 2.0 and AAEON-CRS-200S-2R. Let’s have a look Boston Viridis 2.0 The successor of Boston Viridis powered by Calxeda ECX-1000 quad core Cortex A9 SoC, Viridis 2.0 features six ECX-2000 cards, with each card hosting two four-core SoCs @ 1.8GHz, and consuming as little as 6 watts of power. The server runs Ubuntu 13.10 operating systems, and OpenStack Havana platform, and would typically be used for cloud computing, distributed storage, and virtualization. Viridis 2.0 is a 4U ARM microserver that, and the company claims this can allow up to 1000+ servers in a rack, or about 1.5PB of data storage per rack. […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments on Dual Tuner “Simple.TV by SiliconDust” DVR Runs Linux on Zenverge ZN200 SoC

Dual Tuner “Simple.TV by SiliconDust” DVR Runs Linux on Zenverge ZN200 SoC

“Simple.TV by SiliconDust” is the full name of a digital video recorder (DVR) featuring two tuners, one input supporting antenna (ASTC) and over-the-air cable (ClearQAM) connections, one Ethernet, and one USB 2.0 host port for external mass storage devices. The device, called HD Homerun on SiliconDust website, is powered by Zenverge ZN200 STB SoC, and runs Linux. This is an upgrade of Simple.TV 1, and it allows you to watch a channel, while recording another, or record 2 programs thanks to the 2 tuners. An app will also be available to watch recorded TV program on Android tablets (coming soon) or iPads, and there’s also an HTML5 client to watch TV in any compatible browser. Recorded shows can be watch from any location with Internet access if you have a Premier subscription. Simple.TV 2 specifications: SoC – Zenverge ZN200 STB SoC with a quad Stream HD Transcoder, audio processing engine, […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments on Embedded Linux Conference Europe 2013 Videos and Presentation Slides

Embedded Linux Conference Europe 2013 Videos and Presentation Slides

I uploaded several Embedded Linux Conference Europe videos in 2011 and 2012 that were hosted by Free Electrons and/or the Linux Foundation for download, but this year, it seems the Linux Foundation has discovered a new (to them) online video service called YouTube, and created a playlist with (for now) 18 sessions of ELCE 2013. I’ve embedded the playlist below starting with the “Status of Embedded Linux (2013)“, by Tim Bird, Sony Mobile which takes place every year, and is among the most popular presentations. Most of ELCE 2013 presentation slides are already available from eLinux.org. You can also have a look at the list of ELCE 2013 talks I featured before the event took place. [Update: I’ve just watched the Status of Embedded Linux video, and I though it may be interested to list the topics (and keywords) used for what has happened in embedded linux in the last […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments on Gumstix Announces Solution Kits for their CPU Modules and Boards

Gumstix Announces Solution Kits for their CPU Modules and Boards

Gumstix has recently unveiled several solution kits featuring their Overo and DuoVero Computer-on-Modules (CoMs), Pepper single board computer, and several expansions boards, together with required accessories, and software packages, in order to help their customers getting started more easily. All these solutions are based on Texas Instruments OMAP3, OMAP4, and/or Sitara processors, and run Linux (Ubuntu or Yocto), and sometimes Android for the kits with displays. The solutions kits target 6 different types of applications and/or markets: Robotics Robotic Development Kit (Pictured above) with one Overo AirSTORM CoM (OMAP3703), and RoboVero expansion board. The kit is better suited for motor control applications. Mobile Robotic Development Kit with one Overo AirSTORM CoM, and Turtlecore expansion board to be used with iRobot Create. The kits ship with a Linaro (Ubuntu for Overo) system card and Robot Operating System (ROS) pre-installed. Handhelds 3.5″ Handheld Development Kit featuring Overo AirSTORM CoM with Alto35 cutomizable […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 10 Comments on iMX6 Rex Open Source Hardware SoM and Baseboard Designed to Teach Schematic and PCB Layout Design

iMX6 Rex Open Source Hardware SoM and Baseboard Designed to Teach Schematic and PCB Layout Design

Voipac, a Slovakian manufacturing company, has recently unveiled iMX6 Rex module and iMX6 Rex development baseboard, which have mainly been developed in order to support FEDEVEL Academy Schematic Design and Advanced PCB Layout courses, but can also be used for other purposes. The module is powered by Freescale i.MX6 Dual (Solo and Quad also available on request), and comes with 512MB RAM (upgradeable to 4GB), and up to 32MB SPI flash. The complete hardware will be released under an open source hardware license, but with some caveats as I’ll explain later. iMX6 Rex module specifications (basic configuration): SoC – Freescale iMX6 processor up to 1.2GHz / 2 cores (1 and 4 cores also available) System Memory – 512MB DDR3-1066 (533MHz), up to 4GB Storage – 2MB On board SPI Flash, up to 32MB 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet PHY 2 high speed board to board connectors (only one required) with signals for HDMI, […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments on Binwalk Utility Helps You Analyze and Reverse-Engineer Firmware Files

Binwalk Utility Helps You Analyze and Reverse-Engineer Firmware Files

Binwalk is a “firmware analysis tool designed for analyzing, reverse engineering and extracting data contained in firmware images”.  This tool written in python supports Linux, and somewhat Mac OS X, can scan firmware files for files signature, and can be useful for hacking firmware files, and finding hidden information. Let’s install binwalk first. It’s very easy in a Debian or Ubuntu machine, as you just have to download the package, and run a script for installation:

If you have another Linux ditributions, it’s just a little more complicated. You still need to download and extract the release package as above, but you’ll have to install the following package depending on the features your need: Minimal installation – python 2.6 or greater, and  python-magic To generate entropy plot graphs – python-matplotlib For automated extraction: Packages – mtd-utils zlib1g-dev liblzma-dev gzip bzip2 tar unrar arj p7zip p7zip-full openjdk-6-jdk Build and install […]

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