CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

August 12, 2019August 13, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 16 Comments

Teensy 4.0 Launched for $20 with a Much Faster NXP i.MX RT1062 Arm Cortex-M7 Processor

We last wrote about Teensy boards in 2016 for the launch of Teensy 3.5 & 3.6 boards powered by NXP Kinetis K64/K66 Arm Cortex-M4 microcontroller, and a longer form factor. Paul Stoffregen has now upped the ante with Teensy 4.0 featuring a much more powerful NXP i.MX RT1062 Cortex-M7 cross-over processor clocked at 600 MHz, and going back to the original, and more compact, form factor of earlier Teensy boards such as Teensy 3.2. Teensy 4.0 hardware specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX RT1062 Arm Cortex-M7processor at 600 MHz with 1024KB RAM (512KB is tightly coupled), 2048KB Flash (64KB reserved for recovery & EEPROM emulation) USB – 1x micro USB port for power and programming Expansion via through-holes and pads USB – 2x USB ports, both 480 MBit/sec Storage – 1x SDIO (4 bit) native SD Audio – 2x I2S Digital Audio, 1x S/PDIF Digital Audio Serial – 7x Serial, all with 4 byte FIFO; 3x CAN Bus (1x with CAN …

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August 12, 2019August 12, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Linaro Connect San Diego 2019 Schedule – IoT, AI, Optimizations, Compilers and More

Linaro has recently released the full schedule of Linaro Connect San Diego 2019 that will take place on September 23-27. Even if you can’t attend, it’s always interested to check out the schedule to find out what interesting work is done on Arm Linux, Zephyr OS, and so on. So I’ve created my own virtual schedule with some of the most relevant and interesting sessions of the five-day event. Monday, September 23 14:00 – 14:25 – SAN19-101 Thermal Governors: How to pick the right one by Keerthy Jagadeesh, Software Engineer, Texas Instruments With higher Gigahertz and multiple cores packed in a SoC the need for thermal management for Arm based SoCs gets more and more critical. Thermal governors that define the policy for thermal management play a pivotal role in ensuring thermal safety of the device. Choosing the right one ensures the device performs optimally with in the thermal budget. In this presentation Keerthy Jagadeesh, co-maintainer of TI BANDGAP AND …

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August 12, 2019August 11, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

MINIX NEO S2 USB-C SSD Hub Review in Ubuntu 18.04 with Khadas Edge

MINIX NEO S1 & S2 are USB-C hubs with the usual HDMI and USB outputs, but also a built-in 120 GB & 240 GB SSD respectively. The company has sent me a sample of each, and in order to test the platform, I decided to do on a Khadas board running Ubuntu 18.04 with LXDE desktop environment (aka Lubuntu). I’ll start by checking out the packages’ content, before going through my experience with the MINIX NEO S2 USB-C hub in Ubuntu 18.04 with LXDE desktop environment. MINIX NEO S1 & S2 Unboxing Both packages are basically identical except for the different color, and one shows 120GB SSD capacity, while the other has 240GB The back side has some more details about the USB-C hub. I’ll focus on the 240GB model since it’s just the same, but around $13 to $20 more expensive, and it offers double the capacity, as well as slightly higher performance. The USB-C hub ships with a …

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August 11, 2019August 10, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Reading ID Card Data in Ubuntu with EZ100PU Smart Card Reader (Thai ID Edition)

I was asked help with configuring a smart card reader on a government computer running Windows 7, but this made me wonder what would happen if I connected the card reader to my Ubuntu laptop and whether I’d be able to read content from a Thai ID card. EZ100PU Smart Card Reader Let’s have a look at the card reader itself first. It’s a FAST ID EZ100PU smart card reader compliant with ISO7816 standard. That’s the product page of the specific model, but a search for EZ100PU only reveals the manufacturer may be InfoThink Technology based on Taiwan. The USB smart card reader comes with a CD that includes drivers for Windows, Linux, Mac OS, and Android, as well as an SDK with a demo program and sample code in C++, Visual Basic .NET, and C#. As we’ll see further below, the Linux driver is not needed as it works out of the box. The design of the board (RX-N99B-2) …

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August 10, 2019August 10, 2019 by Stephen Vicinanza - No Comments

Aviat WTM 4800 5G Multi-band Radio Targets Transport Applications

Aviat Networks has released the WTM 4800, an eBand and Multi-Band Radio focused on 5G transport applications such as autonomous vehicles, remote healthcare, and industrial machine-to-machine communications, while still being able to work with the 4G network. The radio is structured to work with eBand and Multi-Band, all in one unit, and only needing an antenna to function contrary to the usual 2 or 3 radio unit systems. This is the industry’s first and only single box design for a multi-band 5G transport application solution. The unit is said to reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO) significantly. The WTM 4800 does not need an indoor interface for the user as with other solutions, which need to be configured, maintained and installed in a complex series of steps. The WTM is less complicated, easily configured over the cloud and scalable for nearly any type of transportation application needing radio connection. The entire system is geared towards the advent of 5G …

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August 9, 2019August 15, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 56 Comments

How Do You Handle Backups in Linux? Hardware, Software, Configuration, etc…

Linux EXT-4 File System Corruption & Attempted Recovery There’s a file system corruption bug related to EXT-4 in Linux, and it happened to me a few times in Ubuntu 18.04. You are using your computer normally, then suddenly you can’t write anything to the drive, as the root partition has switched to read-only. Why? Here are some error messages: What then happens is that you restart your PC, and get to the command where you are asked to run: Change /dev/sda2 to whatever your drive is, and manually review errors. You can take note of the file modified, as you’ll likely have to fix your Ubuntu installation later on. Usually the fix consists of various package re-installations: It happened to me two or three times in the past, and it’s a pain, but I eventually recovered. But this time, I was not so lucky. The system would not boot, but I could still SSH to it. I fixed a few …

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August 9, 2019August 9, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Somu Tiny Open Source FIDO2 Security Key Enables Passwordless Login & Two-factor Authentication (Crowdfunding)

Tomu is a tiny, open source USB connector-sized board powered by a Silicon Labs Happy Gecko Cortex-M0+ MCU that adds two keys to your computer and can work as a Universal 2nd Factor (U2F) token to support two-factor authentication (2FA). But the board is not secure enough for FIDO2 support, and Tomu’s developer worked on a secure USB key called Solokey, and shrank it to Tomu form factor. Meet Somu open-source and secure key with FIDO2 support for compatibility with your Google, Twitter, and GitHub accounts for two-factor authentication, or your Microsoft account passwordless login. Somu hardware specifications: Secure MCU – STMicro STM32L432KC Arm Cortex-M4 microcontroller with TRNG, security isolation for keys, two levels of locked flash Crypto Algorithms – ECC P256 (as per FIDO2 standard) Supported Protocols – FIDO2, U2F Host Interface – USB type-A port Misc – Two touch buttons ( in FIDO2 firmware the two buttons behave as a single one), RGB LED Dimensions – 13 x …

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August 8, 2019August 8, 2019 by Ayo Ayibiowu - 6 Comments

MDP-XP is A Modular DC Power Supply Kit For Your Next Project

My love for modular power supply design can not be denied. I find it cool, how you can increase the functionality of relative less powerful device just by adding another device on top or connected to it. With the explosion of the Arduino shields, the Raspberry Pi HaTs, I must say hardware modular design will surely be here for a long time. An interesting modular product discovered on SeeedStudio is the MDP-XP Smart Digital Power Supply Kit. This product is a new product carried by Seeedstudio as it can be seen on the front page, and it is an interesting product indeed. The MDP-XP known as Mini Digital Power System is a system of programmable linear DC power supply inheriting the modular design concept where you can enhance the basic functionality of the device. It is a cost-effective DC power supply, featuring indicators, stability, reliability and distinct user interface comparable with professional power supplies Its modular design allows it to …

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