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March 9, 2019April 13, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Nitrogen8M_Mini Single Board Computer Launched for $135 and Up

Last month we write about Nitrogen8M_Mini, the First NXP i.MX8 8M Mini SBC, but at the time, it was not available for purchase just yet. Boundary Devices has now announced the official release of the board and is taking orders / pre-orders for $135 and up. Nitrogen8M_Mini SBC Two versions are being offered either with the board only, or as part of a devkit with a 5V power supply, an 8GB microSD card with Linux OS, a battery, and serial console cable: Nit8MQ_Mini_2r8eWB with WiFi and Bluetooth, currently in stock, and sold for $155 (board only), or $175 (devkit) Nit8MQ_Mini_2r8e without wireless module, to ship in a few weeks, and sold for $135 (board only), or $155 (devkit) Nitrogen8M_Mini specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini with 4x Cortex A53 cores @ 1.5 to 2.0 GHz max, 1x Cortex-M4F real-time core, Vivante GCNanoUltra 3D GPU, Vivante GC320 2D GPU System […]

March 6, 2019April 13, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

balenaFin Developer Kit Review – Part 1: Unboxing and Assembly Instructions

Balena launched balenaFin 1.1 at the end of last month. The board is a professional carrier board for Raspberry Pi Compute Module 3 / 3+ Lite that includes support for variable voltage power input, optional PoE, industrial eMMC flash storage, a real-time Arm Cortex-M4 core via Artik-020 module, and more. Somehow a balenaFin 1.1 developer kit ended up in my home, and I’ll play with it in several weeks, but in the first part of the review, I’ll just check out the content of the package, and show how to assemble the kit. BalenaFin 1.1 Developer Kit Unboxing The local courier brought a largish balena Fin package. which contained a smaller balenaFin package, and the actual developer kit. Everything is nicely packaged in the box with the part related to power supply in a white box, a small opening for smaller accessories and Raspberry Pi Compute Module 3, as well […]

March 1, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Oxalis 96Boards Enterprise Edition Board Targets Low Power IoT and Networking Applications

Most 96Boards on the market follow 96Boards Consumer Edition (CE) specification, and while 96Board Enterprise Edition (EE) specification was first announced in 2015 we had yet to have a board available for purchase after previous failed attempts with AMD Opteron (Arm Cortex-A57) powered Cello board. But there’s finally a 96Board Enterprise Edition available today thanks to Systart Oxalis board powered by NXP LayerScape LS1202 Cortex-A53 processor with a packet accelerator, designed for low power IoT and networking applications, and following 96Boards EE “standard” form factor. Systart Oxalis key features and specifications: SoC – NXP Layerscape LS1012A single core Arm Cortex-A53 processor with hardware packet forwarding engine System Memory – Up to 3GB RAM Storage – 64MB SPI Flash for bootloader and RCW, MicroSD Card slot, 1x mSATA connector Networking – 2x Gigabit Ethernet ports (RJ45) USB – 2x USB 3.0 ports Expansion 40-pin low speed (LS) expansion connector with +1.8V, […]

March 1, 2019March 1, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

TechNexion AXON and FLEX SoM Families Feature i.MX 8M Mini SoC, FPGA Fabric

Taiwan based Technexion has introduced several new products at Embedded World 2019 including two new SoM families: AXON and FLEX. AXON is a product family of small form factor (58 x 37 mm) modules designed for specialized embedded applications requiring extra I/O flexibility, while FLEX series is a low-cost family making use of the standard LPDDR4 SO-DIMM connector. Specifically, the company launched new AXON and FLEX modules powered by NXP i.MX 8M Mini processor with AXON-IMX8M-MINI featuring AXON Fabric programmable logic, a specialized IC that provides additional functions including nearly infinite pinmuxing, and FLEX-IMX8M-MINI that offers HD multimedia streaming and integrated 3D graphics for cost sensitive applications. AXON-IMX8M-MINI SoM AXON-IMX8M-MINI SoM specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini Solo, Dual or Quad Arm Cortex-A53+M4 processor FPGA – “Axon Fabric” making use of a Lattice MachXO3LF FPGA with 2100 LUTs (LookUp Tables) System Memory – Up to 4GB LPDDR4 RAM Storage […]

February 28, 2019February 28, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Qualcomm Robotics RB3 Development Platform is Powered by Snapdragon 845 SoC

[Update: The board is now known as “Qualcomm Robotics RB3 Development Platform” instead of DragonBoard 845c”, the rest of the article is unchanged] Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 is one of the fastest Arm processors found in consumer devices, and if you ever wanted a development platform with access to various I/Os, you’d have to go with fairly expensive kits (>$1,000) such as Intrinsyc Open-Q 845 HDK. The good news is that there’s now a cheaper Snapdragon 845 development board, compliant with 96Boards CE specifications, thanks to Thundercomm’s Robotics DragonBoard 845c that combines with processor with 4GB RAM, 64GB UFS storage, and the usual 96boards ports and expansion headers. Robotics DragonBoard 845c specifications: SoC – Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 with 8x custom 64-bit ARMv8 CPUs up to 2.8 GHz Adreno 630 GPU with support for OpenGL ES 3.2 + AEP, DX next, Vulkan 2, OpenCL 2.0 full profile, and RenderScript Hexagon 685 DSP […]

February 26, 2019March 1, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Systems-on-Module Market Update – An Interview with Toradex CMO

I’ve been interviewing Daniel Lang, Toradex Chief Marketing Officer (CMO), over email just before Embedded World 2019, to learn a bit more about the system-on-module market, and what’s ahead. CNXSoft: We’ve already covered several Toradex systems-on-module and development kits on CNX Software, but for readers who may not know Toradex yet, could you provide a short description of what the company does in the embedded systems space? Daniel Lang: Thanks for having me. Toradex builds high reliable Arm-based System on Modules. Our focus is to make the life of developers easier and to reduce the complexity and time-to-market. We sell hardware, but most of our engineering resources focus on Software and Support. Our products are used in areas such as Industrial Automation, Medical, Transportation, Test and Measurement, Building Automation and many more. CNXSoft: Could you explain why / what type of customers go the SoM route instead of designing for […]

February 23, 2019February 23, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Avenger96 96Boards CE Extended Board Features an STMicro STM32MP1 SoM

STMicro unveiled the first STM32 microprocessor – as opposed to microcontroller – earlier this week with STM32MP1 adding one or two Cortex-A7 cores running Linux to the Cortex-M4F core usually found in STM32 microcontrollers. The company also announced their own evaluation kits and discovery kits but promised a 96boards compliant board and system-on-module would be showcased at Embedded World 2019. But Arrow Electronics has already released some limited information about a 96boards CE extended compliant STM32MP1 powered SBC called Avenger96 and that happens to be designed with a baseboard and an STM32MP157 system-on-module. Avenger96 preliminary specifications: SoC – STMicro STM32MP157 dual Arm Cortex-A7 processor @ 650MHz, Arm Cortex-M4 @ 209MHz, 3D GPU Vivante @ 533MHz with OpenGL ES 2.0 support System Memory – 1GB DRAM DDR3L @ 533MHz Storage – 8GB eMMC flash, 2MB flash, micro SD socket Video Output – HDMI 1.4 (Analog ADV7513 transceiver) Networking – Gigabit Ethernet, […]

February 20, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

CompuLab UCM-iMX8M-Mini is a Stamp Size i.MX 8M Mini SoM

We’ve recently written about several new hardware platforms based on the latest NXP i.MX 8M Mini processor family including Nitrogen8M_Mini SBC and F&S Elektronik PicoCore MX8MM SoM. Thanks to a new 14-nm process, the new family has the advantage of consuming less power, and the Cortex-A53 cores can run at a higher frequency. They should cost less as well thanks to cost-saving measures like the adoption of a 1080p video decoder instead of a 4K decoder found in the older NXP i.MX 8M family. CompuLab has now launched their own NXP i.MX 8M Mini SoM with UCM-iMX8M-Mini module that’s about the size of a largish stamp (38 x 28 mm) suitable for portable and space constrained applications such as professional handheld devices, wearable healthcare monitors and medical devices, autonomous drones with visual object recognition, or portable instrumentation equipment with advanced HMI. CompuLab UCM-iMX8M-Mini SoM specifications: SoC (one or the other) […]