CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

August 6, 2017August 6, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

RakWireless RAK831 LoRa Gateway Module is Based on Semtech SX1301 Base Band Processor

We’ve previously covered several products from RakWireless, with a Realtek WiFi IoT board, a WiFi camera board, and a Amazon Alexa compatible audio board. The company has now launched RAK831, a LoRaWAN gateway board powered by Semtech SX1301 base band processor, and working with their RAK811 LoRa node or other compatible nodes. RAK831 LoRA gateway board specifications: Connectivity Semtech SX1301 base band processor with LoRa concentrator IP Frequency bands – 433, 470, 868, or 915 MHz Sensitivity – Down to -142.5 dBm Maximum link budget – 162 dB Output power level – up to 23 dBm Emulates 49 x LoRa demodulators 12x parallel demodulation paths 1x (G)FSK demodulator 2x SX1257 Tx/Rx front-ends high frequencies 2x SX1255 Tx/Rx front-ends low frequencies Range – Up to 15 km (Line of Sight); several kilometers in urban environment GNSS – Optional GPS support Host Interface – SPI Expansion – 24-pin 2.54mm pitch “DB24” header […]

August 5, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Rockchip Sapphire is a $75 Rockchip RK3399 Development Board

While there are several Rockchip RK3399 boards on the market, I’d still recommend to use Firefly-RK3399 development board for Android and Linux based projects since they have decent documentation, and the board has been around for several months now. Price is a little high however, as it starts at $159 on Amazon US. There’s been other boards like 9Tripod RK3399 that’s a little cheaper, but mostly targeting the Chinese market, and Shenzhen Xunlong is working on their own RK3399 board and module, but it’s not available yet. Nightseas user bought another board called Rockchip Sapphire on Taobao for just 500 RMB (~$75 US), and reported his findings on Armbian forums. Rockchip SAPPHIRE board specifications: SoC – Rockhip RK3399 hexa-core big.LITTLE processor with two ARM Cortex A72 cores, four Cortex A53 cores, and an ARM Mali-T860 MP4 GPU System Memory – 4 GB LPDDR3, dual channel Storage – 8 GB eMMC […]

ArmSoM RK3588 AIModule7 NVIDIA Jetson Nano-compatible SOM

August 4, 2017August 4, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Gumstix Pi Conduit Gateway Board Leverages Raspberry Pi Compute Module, Off-the-Shelf LoRa and Cellular Modules

Gumstix has designed Pi Conduit Gateway baseboard for both the Raspberry Pi Compute Module and RisingRF RHF0M301 LoRa gateway module, in order to create a Linux based LoRa gateway that can optionally support LTE or other cellular connectivity via NimbeLink Skywire cellular modem. Conduit Pi LoRa Gateway board specifications: 200-pin SO-DIMM connector for Raspberry Pi Compute Module / Raspberry Pi 3 Compute Module (CM3 / CM3L) Headers for RisingRF RHF0M301 LoRa Module NimbeLink Skywire 2G/3G/4G cellular modem connector Low profile 10/100M Ethernet jack (implemented via USB 2.0) USB – 1x micro USB port for debugging via an FTDI USB to TTL chip Misc – User (GPIO5) and reset buttons Power Supply – 5V via power barrel The board was designed using Geppetto, which means you should be able to customize it to your needs by modifying it the original design in a web browser, and order your brand new custom […]

August 4, 2017August 4, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Intel Mini PCs Sold with Ubuntu on Aliexpress

Many low power mini PCs equipped with Intel Bay Trail, Cherry Trail, Braswell, or Apollo Lake processors have been launched over the years, but most of those come pre-loaded with Windows 10, and many readers of this blog prefer to run a Linux distribution. It’s usually possible to install Ubuntu by yourself, but not always, and when you buy a Windows 10, this increases the price by several dollars (around $20). The ideal case would be to get such low power, low cost mini PCs pre-installed with a recent version of Ubuntu, without having to worry (too much) about hardware support, nor having to pay the “Windows tax”. MeLE used to sell Ubuntu mini PCs on Aliexpress, but sadly not anymore, so I went to Aliexpress to look for those Ubuntu mini PCs, and BBen offers three operating systems options for some of their systems with “Windows 10 Activated”, “Windows […]

August 4, 2017August 4, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Mediatek MT2625 NB-IoT SoC is Designed for Cellular IoT Devices working Worldwide

Mediatek has recently unveiled MT2625 SoC based on an ARM Cortex-M core, equipped with an NB-IoT “WorldMode” modem allowing for a single design worldwide, and supporting the latest 3GPP Release 14 (LTE Cat NB2) specification. Mediatek MT2625 specifications: CPU – ARM Cortex-M @ up to 104 MHz with FPU Embedded Memory – 4MB PSRAM Storage – 4MB NOR Flash Connectivity NB-IoT compatible with 3GPP Release 14 Full frequency band (450MHz to 2.1GHz) of 3GPP R13 (NB1) and R14 (NB2) standards Integrated baseband, RF, and modem DSP Peripherals – I2C, I2S, PCM, SDIO, UART Power Supply – Integrated PMU The solution will be found in products for worldwide transportation, municipal use, and consumer products, with a much longer battery life compared to existing devices relying on other 2G/3G/4G standards. According to the press release, one of the first module based on MT2625 has been designed in collaboration with China Mobile, integrates […]

August 3, 2017December 8, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Unistorm AK1 Intel Celeron J3455 mini PC Sells for $158

Last month, I wrote about MeLE PCG35 Apo mini PC based on Intel Celeron J3455 “Apollo Lake” processor. It has started to sell for $179 this week, but there’s now a cheaper option with similar specifications thanks to Unistorm AK1 mini PC going for $158.30 instead. Unistorm AK1 mini PC specifications with highlights in bold or stricken-through showing differences with PCG35 Apo: SoC – Intel Celeron J3455 quad core “Apollo Lake” processor @ 1.50 / 2.30 GHz with a 12 EU Intel HD Graphics 500 @ 250/750 MHz (10W TDP) System Memory – 4GB LPDDR3 Storage – 32GB eMMC flash, 1x 2.5″ SATA HDD slot, 1x mSATA SSD slot, 1x micro SD slot Video Output – HDMI 1.4 up to 4K @ 30 Hz, and VGA Audio – Via HDMI, 3.5mm headphone jack Connectivity – Gigabit Ethernet, dual band 802.11b/g/n/ac WiFi & Bluetooth 4.0 USB – 2x USB 3.0 ports, […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs and SoMs in 2025

August 3, 2017August 3, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 27 Comments

Rockchip Has Setup an Official Open Source Website with Software & Hardware Documentation, Source Code

As a young engineer, I first understood the importance of good documentation thanks to an incomplete Holtek MCU datasheet that made us waste weeks of development, and the value open source software thanks to Sigma Designs’ SDK that was full of binary blobs with our applications often crashing inside those, leading to software development delays, especially since we had access to limited support. More recently, if you ever worked with the most popular Chinese processors found in ARM Linux development board, usually made by Allwinner, Amlogic, or Rockchip, you must have gone through roadblocks due to a lack of documentation and software support. So far, Allwinner is purely relying on linux-sunxi community and “leaks” of their documentation and SDKs, while Amlogic has had their “open linux” microsite for several years, but you won’t find complete documentation like technical reference manual, schematics, and part of the source code requires you to […]

August 3, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

DLP LightCrafter Display 2000 EVM Adds a Pico Projector to BeagleBone Black for $99

Back in 2012, Texas Instruments introduced DLP LightCrafter pico projector evaluation module powered by a TMS320DM365 ARM9 processor @ 300 MHz running embedded Linux, and selling for $599. Since then, we have seen many products including projectors based on DLP technology such as standalone tiny projectors, Windows mini PCs, Android TV boxes, tablets, an even light bulbs. However, so far I can’t remember seeing any easy way to easily integrate DLP projector with the cheap ARM Linux development boards available today. Texas Instruments has now filled that void with DLP LightCrafter Display 2000 EVM that adds a pico-projector to BeagleBone Black (or Green) based on the new 0.2″ DLP2000 DMD (Digital Mirror Device) chip. The board is comprised of two subsystems: Light engine (top) with the optics, red, green, and blue LEDs, and the 640 × 360 (nHD) DLP2000 DMD configured to deliver around 20 lumens by default (this can […]

Boardcon CM3588 Rockchip RK3588 System-on-Module designed for AI and IoT applications