reServer multimedia NAS
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reServer 2-bay multimedia NAS is equipped with an Intel Core Tiger Lake SBC

Seeed Studio has just introduced reServer dual-bay multimedia NAS based on Intel Core i3/i5/i7 Tiger Lake 11th generation processor. The networked storage device is based on ODYSSEY X86 V2 single board computer that offers an upgrade to the ODYSSEY-X86J4105 and ODYSSEY-X86J4125 Gemini Lake SBC’s. reServer comes with up to to 64GB dual-channel memory, dual 2.5GbE, support for two 3.5-inch SATA drives, HDMI and DisplayPort video output, and some USB 3.0/2.0 ports. reServer (preliminary) specifications: SoC (one or the other) Intel Core i3-1115G4 dual-core/quad-thread processor with 48 EU Intel UHD Graphics @ 400 – 1250MHz; 28W TDP Unnamed Intel Core i5 with 80 EU Intel Iris Xe Graphics G7 @ 400-1300MHz; 28W TDP Unnamed Intel Core i7 with 96 EU Intel Iris Xe Graphics G7 @ 400-1300MHz; 28W TDP Co-processor – Microchip ATSAMD21G18 32-Bit Arm Cortex-M0+ microcontroller System Memory – Up to 64GB dual-channel DDR4-3200 SDRAM via two SO-DIMM sockets Storage […]

CNX Software Year 2021
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Year 2020 in review – Top ten posts and stats

It’s this time of the year when we look back at what happened, and what may be next. 2020 did not pan out as planned in more ways than one, but there were still some interesting developments. Based on 2019 announcements, 2020 was promising to be an exciting year for Amlogic and Rockchip with the expected launch of RK3588 and S908X high-end processors for 8K capable devices,  but we’ll have to wait for 2021 for this to happen. Instead, the most interesting processor of the year from the Allwinner, Amlogic, and Rockchip offerings was probably Amlogic S905X4 processing adding AV1 hardware decoding. As pointed out in our “RISC-V 2020 highlights” post, it was a fairly eventful year for RISC-V architecture, although there’s still a long road ahead, especially for application processors. We had seen some general-purpose and Bluetooth RISC-V MCUs in 2019, but 2020 saw the launch of the first […]

ArmSoM RK3588 AIModule7 NVIDIA Jetson Nano-compatible SOM
Notecard LTE Modem
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Notecard LTE Cat-M / NB-IoT M.2 modem sells for $49+ with 10 years of connectivity

If the IoT is ever going to take off, it needs low-cost hardware and connectivity. LoRaWAN is free, apart from the hardware costs, but for projects that need wider coverage and/or higher bitrate cellular connectivity is the way to go and we’ve seen in the past that Hologram offers a free developer SIM card for global IoT projects plus some low-cost cellular IoT plans, as well as 1CNE plans to offer a 10-year plan for 10 Euros. Blues Wireless has taken a different approach as they combine hardware and cellular connectivity with their Notecard LTE-IoT modems (LTE Cat 1/Cat M or NB-IoT) shipping for 10 years of connectivity for up to 500MB data. Notecard has four variants with the following key features and specifications: MCU – Arm Cortex-M4 MCU with 2MB flash Cellular connectivity NOTE-NBGL-500 – Narrowband Cat-M/NB-IoT/GPRS (Global) via  Quectel BG95-M3 modem NOTE-NBNA-500 – Narrowband Cat-M/NB-IoT (North America) via […]

MaixCube All-in-one K210 Development Platform
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Sipeed MaixCube is a Fully Integrated AI Development Platform Powered by Kendryte K210 RISC-V SoC

Sipeed has made several boards and kits based on Kendryte K210 RISC-V processor for low-power AI workloads such as face detection or object recognition including Maixduino board and Grove AI HAT that ship with camera and display. The company has now come up with MaixCube all-in-one development platform that houses Sipeed M1 module, a display, a camera, and a battery into a plastic case that’s somewhat similar to MStack M5StickV but with a larger display, and variations in the form factor and features. Sipeed MaixCube specifications: SoC – Kendryte K210 dual-core 64-bit RISC-V processor @ 400 MHz (overclockable to 600 MHz) with FPU, 8MB SRAM, KPU AI accelerator, APU audio processor, and FFT accelerator Storage – 128 Mbit flash, MicroSD card slot Display – 1.3″ TFT screen with 240×240 resolution Camera – OV7740 sensor (VGA camera) Audio – Built-in microphone, external speakers support; ES8374 audio codec USB – 1x USB […]

Happy New Year 2020
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Year 2019 in Review – Top 10 Posts and Stats

2019 is closing to an end, or you may already be into 2020 while reading this post. In any case, that means it’s time to look back at 2019 and look forward to the events and new products to take place next year. While 2018 was a boring year for new processors, 2019 brought us some interesting new chips such as Amlogic S922X / A311D, or the first Arm Cortex-A55 only processors such as Amlogic S905X3. Rockchip RK3399Pro was promising when it was announced last year, but it never really took off. It was a pretty quiet year for Allwinner as well. RISC-V architecture has been ramping up with the first general-purpose RISC-V MCU: GD32V, WCH CH572 Bluetooth LE MCU, the launch of more SiFive RISC-V cores, and Kendryte K210 RISC-V AI processor announced last year has found its way into more and more boards. There have also been the […]

FOSDEM 2020 Schedule
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Some Interesting Talks from FOSDEM 2020 Schedule

We wrote about IoT devroom call for proposals for FOSDEM 2020 a little while ago, and as the free open-source developer meetup is getting closer, FOSDEM 2020 organizers released the schedule. So I’ll look at some of the talks in the relevant devrooms such as the Internet of Things, hardware enablement, Embedded, Mobile and Automotive, as well as RISC-V and others to compose my own little virtual schedule for the 2-day event. Saturday, February 1 10:30 – 10:50 – How lowRISC made its Ibex RISC-V CPU core faster – Using open source tools to improve an open-source core – by Greg Chadwick Ibex implements RISC-V 32-bit I/E MC M-Mode, U-Mode, and PMP. It uses an in-order 2 stage pipe and is best suited for area and power-sensitive rather than high-performance applications. However, there is scope for meaningful performance gains without major impact to power or area. This talk describes work […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs and SoMs in 2025
Z-Wave Open Standard
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Z-Wave Open Standard to Enable Third-Party Z-Wave Silicon and Stack Suppliers

Roughly one year ago, Silicon Labs released a publicly available Z-Wave SDK and a Raspberry Pi 3 Image to make it easier to work with the wireless protocol targetting home automation. But Z-Wave specifications were still closed, which meant Z-Wave chips could only be purchased from Silicon Labs, a bit like LoRa chip can only be purchased from Semtech. The advantage of being closed is that you’re the only supplier, but this will limit market adoption, and customers may be wary of relying on a single partner for their long term plans. That must be why The Z-Wave Alliance and Silicon Labs have now decided to open Z-Wave specifications to Silicon and Stack suppliers. That paves the way to third-party software platforms and Z-Wave radios from some of the 700+ companies which are members of the Z-Wave Alliance. The Z-Wave specification release is scheduled for H2 2020, and will include […]

Ken Yu, RAK Wireless CEO
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LPWAN Market Update – An Interview with RAK Wireless CEO

CNX Software interviews Ken Yu, RAK Wireless’  founder & CEO, to learn  more about the company and the current & future state of the LPWAN (Low Power WAN) market especially with regards to NB-IoT and LoRaWAN. CNXSoft: We’ve already covered several products from RAK Wireless on CNX Software, starting with WiFi IoT boards several years ago, and more recently LPWAN products based on NB-IoT or LoRa. But for readers who may not be familiar with RAK Wireless yet, could you provide a short description of what the company does? Ken Yu: RAKwireless was founded in 2014. The core founder team consists of professionals coming from established leaders in the Networking industry as Qualcomm, H3C, etc. Because our engineers have more than 10 years of experience designing Wi-Fi solutions, this was the core of our business in the beginning. RAKwireless is working towards a vision of a connected world and In […]

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