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May 24, 2022May 24, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Digi IX30 is a cellular router for Industry 4.0, public safety, harsh environments

Digi IX30 is a 4G LTE cellular router for industry 4.0 designed for distribution and automation, remote machines and sensor monitoring in industries such as oil and gas production, water utilities, smart cities, and outdoor signage. The Digi IX30 is a rugged device able to operate in harsh environments, and the US model supports FirstNet nationwide wireless broadband network dedicated to public safety in the event of an emergency (e.g. terrorist attack). The network is designed for first responders, city services, and infrastructure, as well as drilling and gas wells, Internet-connected irrigation systems, waste disposal, and septic tank services among others. A future version will also support the Anterix Band 8 (900 MHz) for critical infrastructure/mission-critical private LTE networks. Digi IX30 specifications: SoC, memory, storage – No information, except the processor is running Linux. Connectivity Ethernet – 2x 10/100M Fast Ethernet ports Cellular options FirstNet capable LTE Advanced Cat 7 […]

January 25, 2022January 26, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 24 Comments

SONOFF ZBMINI-L Zigbee 3.0 Smart Switch works without neutral wire

When using a wireless switch like SONOFF T2 a connection to the neutral wire is needed to power the device, but this is not always feasible/practical as many lights as cabled without a neutral wire. SONOFF ZBMINI-L Zigbee 3.0 smart switch solves this issue as it does not require a neutral wire. Simply connect the two wires for the light and you are good to go. ITEAD says its solution does not require an extra anti-flicker module and relies on an “advanced electricity extraction technique”. SONOFF ZBMINI-L specifications: Connectivity – Zigbee 3.0 via TI CC2652P, up to 50 meter range (line of sight) Input – 100-240V 50/60Hz up to 6A Output – 100-240V 50/60Hz up to 6A Max. Load Resistive – 1380W Max @ 230V, 720W Max @ 120V LED – 300W Max @ 230V, 150W Max @ 120V Dimensions – 54 x 45 x 24mm (supports 35mm DIN Rail […]

February 1, 2021February 2, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

FOSDEM 2021 Online February 6-7 – Hardware, Embedded & IoT talks

FOSDEM is an open-source developer event that takes place on the first week-end of February every year in Brussels, Belgium. Every year except this year, as due to COVID-19 restrictions, FOSDEM 2021 will take place online like most events these days. The schedule has been up for some time, and today I’ll look at some of the interesting talks mostly from the Embedded, Mobile and Automotive “virtual devroom” but also other tracks. Saturday, February 6, 2021 13:00 – 14:00 – From Reset Vector to Kernel – Navigating the ARM Matryoshka Long gone are the times of executing the OS in-place from memory-mapped flash upon reset. A modern SoC now comes with complex mask ROM firmware, with driver, filesystem, protocol and crypto support for loading… yet another bootloader. In his talk, Ahmad follows this chain of bootloaders until the kernel is started, stopping along the way for RAM setup, peripherial initialization, […]

October 23, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Intel Elkhart Lake COM’s offer up to 3x 2.5GbE, SIL2 functional safety

Since the launch of the Intel Elkhart Lake IoT Edge processor family, we’ve covered several COM Express modules based on the new low power SoCs including TQ Embedded TQMxE40C1/C2 and Congatec conga-MA7 & conga-TCA7. But despite the processor supporting 2.5GbE, all the computers-on-module we’ve covered so far would only offer Gigabit Ethernet connectivity. But Eurotech CPU-161-19 and CPU-161-20 COM Express Compact Type 6 modules support up to three 2.5 Gbps Ethernet interfaces using COM Express with proprietary expansions, and CPU-161-20 is the first module we’ve seen taking advantage of Intel Atom x6000FE parts with Functional Safety (FuSa) support making the module certifiable with SIL2 Safety Integrity Level (IEC 61508-2:2010) and/or Cat 3 PL=d (ISO 13849-1). As we may infer from the photos above and below, both modules share many of the same features, except for the added functional safety on CPU-161-20. CPU-161-19/20 specifications: SoC CPU-161-19 module Atom x6212RE dual-core processor @ […]

October 5, 2020October 8, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

UL-Certified TP-Link Kasa Smart Plug with Dual Outlet Sells for $19.99 (Promo)

WiFi smart sockets to control home appliances have been around for a few years, and one of my favorite companies is Sonoff as they offer a variety of affordable smart plugs pre-loaded with eWelink firmware and compatible with open-source firmware like Tasmota and ESPurna. The company is also attentive to safety. communicate issues with customers, and recently wrote a post entitled “Safety is our responsibility” where they detail all steps taken to make sure their mains connected device sare safe to use. Sadly that does not include safety certifications like UL/ETL, or TUV which may have implications for your home insurance depending on where you live, and for peace of mind, it’s always good to have a third verify your design for safety. Which brings me to the main point of this point, as a UL-certified dual-outlet smart socket, namely TP-Link Kasa Smart Plug, is currently on sale for $19.99 […]

September 30, 2020November 3, 2020 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Arm Announces Cortex-A78AE CPU, Mali-G78AE GPU & Mali-C71AE ISP for autonomous automotive & industrial applications

Arm has announced new CPU, GPU, and ISP specifically designed for autonomous automotive and industrial applications with respectively Cortex-A78AE CPU, Arm Mali-G78AE GPU, and Arm Mali-C71AE ISP. Arm Cortex-A78AE CPU Key features and specifications: Architecture – Armv8.2-A (AArch32 at ELO only) Extensions – Armv8.1, Armv8.2, and Armv8.3 extensions (LDAPR instructions only), RAS extensions, Armv8.4 Dot Product, Cryptography extensions, RAS extensions Microarchitecture Up to 4x CPU cores per cluster Out of order pipeline Neon / Floating Point Unit included with INT8 Dot Product and IEEE FP16 Optional Cryptography Unit 48-bit Physical Addressing (PA) Memory system and external interfaces 32kB to 64kB L1 I-Cache / D-Cache 256kB to 512kB L2 Cache Optional 512kB to 4MB L3 Cache ECC Support LPAE Bus interfaces – AMBA ACE or CHI Optional ACP, peripheral port Functional Safety Support – ASIL D Systematic1 and ASIL D Diagnostic2 Security – TrustZone Interrupts – External GICv4 Generic timer – […]

August 24, 2020August 24, 2020 by Sponsored Post - Comments Off

Review of FamiSafe Phone Tracking & Parental Control App (Sponsored)

CNXSoft here. I’ve been tasked with reviewing Famisafe parental control app for Android and iOS acting both as a parental control app and phone tracker app and designed for parents who want to track their kids’ location and better control when to use the phone and what content they may access. The first thing to get started is to download the free trial on either Android or iOS. I actually downloaded both versions for FamiSafe for this review, since I used Huawei Y9 Prime 2019 (Android 10) as the “parent” smartphone, and an iPhone 6 as the “kid” phone. Famisafe Initial Configuration We’ll have to start with the “parent” phone. After a welcome screen explaining some of the main features including offensive content detection, device & app usage rules, web filter, etc.. you’ll be asked to select whether it’s the parent or kid device. Once we select “Parent” we’ll be […]

December 19, 2018 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Arm Cortex-A65AE Targets Safety-Critical Automotive, Aviation, and Industrial Automation Applications

Arm introduced their first “Automotive Enhanced” processor with Cortex-A76AE last September. The processor targets autonomous driving applications, and comes with extra safety features such Dual Core Lock-Step (DCLS) running the same code on two different cores to continuously check the execution result is the same on both. The company has now unveiled a second AE core with Cortex-A65AE, which Arm claims is the first multithreaded Automotive Enhanced Cortex-A CPU technology to deliver the highest safety levels with Dual Core Lock-Step (DCLS). Arm Cortex-A65AE specifications: Architecture – Armv8-A (Harvard) Extensions – Armv8.1, Armv8.2, Cryptography, RAS, and Armv8.3 (LDAPR instructions only) ISA support – A64 Microarchitecture Out-of-order Pipeline Superscalar NEON/Floating Point Unit Optional Cryptography Unit Max number of CPUs in cluster – Eight Physical Addressing (PA) – 44-bit Dual Core Lock-Step Memory system and external interfaces L1 I-Cache / D-Cache – 16KB to 64KB L2 Cache – 64KB to 256KB L3 Cache […]