PicoVoice Console Custom Wake Word
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PicoVoice offline Voice AI engine gets free tier for up to 3 users

PicoVoice offline Voice AI engine has now a free tier that allows people to create custom wake words and voice commands easily for up to three users on any hardware including Raspberry Pi and Arduino boards. I first learned about PicoVoice about a year ago when the offline voice AI engine was showcased on a Raspberry Pi fitted with ReSpeaker 4-mic array to showcase the company’s Porcupine custom wake word engine, and Rhino Speech-to-Intent engine. The demo would support 9 wake words with Alexa, Bumblebee, Computer, Hey Google, Hey Siri, Jarvis, Picovoice, Porcupine, and Terminator. More importantly, the solution allows you to easily create your own custom words in minutes from a web interface by simply typing the selected wake word, with no need for hundreds of voice samples or waiting weeks to get it done. So I tried “Hey You” first, but I was told it was too short, […]

EigenComm EC616
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Eigencomm EC616/EC616S SoC supports Cat-NB2 cellular IoT

Eigencomm EC616/EC616S are Cortex-M3 microcontrollers supporting the 3GPP R13/R14 NB-IoT standard, with 3GPP R14 notably introducing the newer LTE Cat-NB2 standard allowing higher bitrates up to 127 kbps downlink, and up to 159 kbps uplink, and OTDOA and E-CID positioning methods. Both EC616 and EC616S are virtually identical, but the EC616S comes with fewer GPIOs and is designed for the lowest possible BoM cost for modules as small as 10×10 mm. Both target similar IoT applications such as wireless meter reading, smoke detection, smart street lights, smart logistics, asset tracking, smart fire monitoring, smart parking, smart home, wearable devices, industry 4.0, smart agriculture, and others. Eigencomm EC616/EC616S specifications: MCU core – Arm Cortex-M3 @ up to 204 MHz Frequency band – 663 MHz to 2200 MHz Protocol version – 3GPP R13/R14 Built-in PA output power – 23dBm Receiver sensitivity – EC616: -118 dBm, EC616S: -117 dBm Peripherals EC616 – 2x […]

Graperain Samsung, Rockchip RK3588, and Qualcomm CPU modules, SBCs, and carrier boards
Seeed XIAO BLE Sense
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Seeed XIAO BLE – A tiny nRF52840 Bluetooth 5.0 board with (optional) IMU sensor and microphone

Seeed Studio has just introduced two new members to their XIAO board family with the Seeed XIAO BLE and XIAO BLE Sense boards equipped with Nordic Semi nRF52840 Bluetooth 5.0 microcontroller, as well as an IMU sensor and microphone on the “Sense” model. Just like the earlier XIAO RP2040 board, the tiny Seed XIAO BLE board can be programmed with Arduino, MicroPython, and CircuityPython, and offers two headers with 7-pin each for GPIOs. What’s really new is the wireless connectivity, the sensors, and a battery charging circuitry. Seeed XIAO BLE specifications: Wireless MCU –  Nordic nRF52840 Arm Cortex-M4F microcontroller @ up to 64 MHz with  1 MB flash, 256 KB SRAM, Bluetooth 5.0, NFC, Zigbee connectivity Storage – 2 MB QSPI flash Expansion I/Os 2x 7-pin headers with 1x UART, 1x I2C, 1x SPI, 1x NFC, 1x SWD, 11x GPIO (PWM), 6x ADC 3.3V I/O voltage (not 5V tolerant) Sensors […]

Raspberry Pi 16MP camera autofocus
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A $25 16MP camera with autofocus for Raspberry Pi boards (Crowdfunding)

ArduCam has launched a $25 16MP camera with autofocus for Raspberry Pi boards with 40% higher resolution than the 12MP Raspberry Pi HQ camera, while keeping the compact form factor of the 8MP Raspberry Pi Camera V2. The camera is equipped with a 16MP Sony IMX519 sensor, works with any Raspberry Pi board with a MIPI CSI interface, and the company claims that with the existing camera tuning algorithms from the Raspberry Pi Foundation, the camera module beats the Raspberry Pi HQ camera’s quality in every aspect including sharpness, saturation, exposure, and more. The downside is that it lacks supports for interchangeable lenses. Arducam 16MP camera specifications: Sensor – Sony IMX519 sensor with 4656 x 3496 pixels resolution Still resolution – 16MP Video modes – 1080p30, 720p60 Optical size – Type 1/2.53″ Focal ratio – 1.75 Focal length – 4.28 mm Autofocus – Yes with range 10cm to ∞. As […]

WinnerMicro W801 wireless MCU board
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HLK-W801 board features Alibaba Xuantie XT804 based MCU with WiFi 4, Bluetooth LE 4.2

Earlier this month, we wrote about the 240 MHz WinnerMicro W806 Alibaba Xuantie XT804 C-Sky microcontroller with 1MB flash, 288KB SRAM found in the $2 HLK-W806 development board. But the company has a nearly identical WinnerMicro W801 microcontroller that bumps the internal flash to 2MB, and more importantly adds a 2.4 GHz radio with WiFi 4 and Bluetooth LE 4.2 connectivity, and HiLink also released the HLK-W801 board that’s nearly identical to HLK-W806, except for some extra LEDs, a USB-C port instead of a Micro USB port, and a longer form factor to make space for the PCB antenna. HLK-W801 board specifications: MCU – WinnerMicro W801 32-bit Alibaba XT804 microcontroller @ 240 MHz with 2MB Flash, 288KB RAM, FPU, DSP, crypto engine, 2.4 GHz radio Connectivity 802.11b/g/n WiFi 4 up to 150 Mbps supporting station, soft AP and station+soft AP modes, WPA2 security Bluetooth 4.2 Expansion – 2x 24-pin headers […]

Raspberry Pi HAT SDR 6 GHz
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CaribouLite RPi HAT open-source SDR Raspberry Pi HAT tunes up to 6 GHz (Crowdfunding)

CaribouLite RPi HAT is an open-source dual-channel software-defined radio (SDR) Raspberry Pi HAT – or rather uHAT – that works in the sub-GHz ISM range and optionally the 30 MHz – 6 GHz range for the full version. Developed by Israel-based CaribouLabs, the micro HAT is equipped with a Lattice Semi ICE40LP1K FPGA, a Microchip AT86RF215 RF transceiver, two SMA antenna connectors, a Pmod expansion connector, and designed for any Raspberry Pi board with a 40-pin GPIO header. CaribouLite RPi HAT specifications: FPGA – Lattice Semi ICE40LP with 1.28 kLE RF Chipset – Microchip AT86RF215 Sub-GHz / 2.4GHz transceiver Qorvo’s RFFC5072 integrated Mixer IC (for full version only) Tuning Range CH1 Full version – 30 MHz – 6 GHz ISM version – 2.4 – 2.4835 GHz CH2 – Sub-1GHz Max Sampling Rate – 4 MSPS ADC/DAC Resolution – 13-bit Max RF Bandwidth – 2.5 MHz Transmit Power – up to […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs and SoMs in 2025
VisionFive V1 RISC-V SBC
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VisionFive V1 RISC-V Linux SBC resurrects BeagleV StarFive single board computer

Last summer we reported that BeagleV StarFive RISC-V SBC would not be manufactured, but all was not lost as StarFive would collaborate with Radxa to make a new single board computer based on their JH7100 dual-core 64-bit RISC-V processor. But thanks to a report on Heise and extra photos acquired by CNX Software, we now have more details about the board that mostly comes with the same features as the BeagleV StarFive, but a completely different layout that brings all the main ports to one side of the board. VisionFive V1 specifications: SoC – StarFive JH7100 Vision SoC with: Dual-core Sifive U74 RISC-V processor @ 1.5 GHz with 2MB L2 cache Vision DSP Tensilica-VP6 for computing vision NVDLA Engine 1 core (configuration 2048 MACs @ 800MHz  – 3.5 TOPS) Neural Network Engine (1024MACs @ 500MHz – 1 TOPS) VPU – H.264/H.265 decoder up to 4Kp60, dual-stream decoding up to 4Kp30 […]

SeaBerry mini-ITX motherboard Raspberry Pi CM4
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Seaberry Mini-ITX carrier board for Raspberry Pi CM4 exposes 11 PCIe slots and sockets

The Raspberry Pi CM4 may only have a one PCIe x1 Gen 2 interface, but this has not stopped ALFTEL from designing Seaberry, a mini-ITX carrier board for the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4 with eleven slots and sockets making use of the single 5 Gbps PCIe Gen 2 interface. The board also offers two SATA ports, one Gigabit Ethernet port, one RJ45 console port, two HDMI ports, a micro SD card slot, two USB 2.0 ports, as well as the usual 40-pin GPIO expansion header, besides the PCIe x16 slot, a PCIe x1 side slot, and M.2 and mPCIe sockets. Seaberry carrier board specifications: Compatible systems-on-module Raspberry Pi CM4 module (Regular or Lite) Radxa CM3 Pine64 SoQuartz Storage – 1x MicroSD card for Raspberry Pi CM4 Lite, 1x M.2 socket for NVMe SSD (See PCIe expansion section) Video Output – 2x HDMI output ports, 1x MIPI DSI connector Camera […]

Boardcon LGA3576 Rockchip RK3576 System-on-Module designed for AI and IoT applications