Posted on - 9 Comments on $100 GLIGO E-Ink Smartwatch Promises “2-Year Battery Life” (Crowdfunding)

$100 GLIGO E-Ink Smartwatch Promises “2-Year Battery Life” (Crowdfunding)

Wearables are useful little devices, but many of them suffer from short battery life, and in my case at least, I forget to charge mine from time to time. So when I saw GLIGO E-Ink smartwatch promising 2-year battery life on a charge, it caught my eyes. But then looking into the details, it looks like battery life is really 6 months unless you don’t plan on using the display: We adopted an energy-efficient dual-core design:the quartz core has a battery life of up to two years, e-ink screen has a battery life of up to 180 days. Six months is not that bad either, so let’s still have a look. GLIGO E-Ink smartwatch specifications: MCU – Unamed Arm Cortex M3 microcontroller with 128KB memory Display – E-ink segmented display Japanese Watch Movement Connectivity – Bluetooth 4.2 LE Sensors – Green light heart rate sensor (HRM), 3D G-sensor, 3-axis accelerometer Misc – 15,000 rpm vibrator Battery – 100 mAh charged …

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Posted on - No Comments on Exen Proto Arduino Compatible Board is based on Microchip SAMD21 MCU (Crowdfunding)

Exen Proto Arduino Compatible Board is based on Microchip SAMD21 MCU (Crowdfunding)

Nerdonic launched Exen Mini last year as the world’s smallest 32-bit Arduino compatible board, and getting the smallest board possible is very good for some projects, but so not much for other as Exen Mini is limited to just 8 I/O pins. So the company made another larger board called Exen Proto based on the same Microchip SAMD21 Cortex M0+ microcontroller, but offering more I/Os. Exen Proto specifications with difference against Exen Mini highlighted in bold: MCU – Microchip SAMD21 Cortex M0+ MCU @ 48 MHz with 256KB flash, 32KB SRAM I/Os via 2x 12-pin 2.54mm pitch headers Up to 20x digital I/O Up to 19x PWM Up to 11x analog (ADC) up to 12-bit resolution 2x UART Up to 5x I2C 1x reset Limits – 3.3V, 7mA USB – 1x micro USB port Programming – Via micro USB port or SWD header Misc – Power LED, user LED, button Power Supply 3.3-20V (regulated to 3.3v) via power Pin 1 …

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Posted on - 7 Comments on GPD Pocket 2 is a Mini Laptop Running Windows 10 (Crowdfunding)

GPD Pocket 2 is a Mini Laptop Running Windows 10 (Crowdfunding)

GPD Pocket 2 UMPC

Last year, GPD introduced GPD Pocket, a portable computer with a 7″ display powered by an Atom x7-Z8750 Cherry Trail processor and offered with either Windows 10 or Ubuntu 16.04. The company is now back with GPD Pocket 2 model with various improvements including a significantly faster Intel Core m3-7y30 Kaby Lake processor, and offered only with Windows 10 64-bit this time around. GPD Pocket 2 specifications: SoC – Intel Core m3-7y30 dual core / quad thread Kaby Lake processor @ 1.00 GHz / 2.60 GHz (Turbo) with 4MB cache, 24EU Intel HD graphics 615 @ 300 MHz / 900 MHz (Turbo); 4.5W TDP System Memory – 4 or 8GB LPDDR3 Storage – 128GB internal storage, micro SDXC slot Display – 7″ 1920×1200 IPS panel with touchscreen, Gorilla Glass 4; 16:10 aspect ratio Audio – Built-in speakers and microphone, 3.5mm headphone & mic jack Connectivity – Dual band 802.11 a/ac/b/g/n WiFi up to 867 Mbps, Bluetooth 4.1 USB – 2x …

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Posted on - 18 Comments on Mi Mini PC is a $150 Pocket-Sized Windows 10 Mobile PC with a 5″ Touchscreen Display (Crowdfunding)

Mi Mini PC is a $150 Pocket-Sized Windows 10 Mobile PC with a 5″ Touchscreen Display (Crowdfunding)

Mi-Mini-PC

Around 2 years ago, I reviewed GOLE1 mini PC running Windows 10 and Android 5.1, powered by an Intel Atom x5-Z8300 Cherry Trail processor with 4GB RAM and 64GB SSD. It also came with a 5″ 1280×720 display and a battery, so you could use it on the go. I discovered several issues related to WiFi, USB 3.0, Windows 10 on a 5″ display, among others, but still found it was an interesting concept. Mi Mini PC – unrelated to Xiaomi Mi products – looks very similar to GOLE1, but comes with better specifications including an Atom x7 processor, 8GB RAM, and a 128GB SSD. Mi Mini PC specifications: SoC – Intel Atom x7-Z8750 quad core Cherry Trail processor @ 1.60 / 2.56 GHz with 16EU Intel HD Graphics; 2W SDP System Memory – 8 GB RAM Storage – 128 GB SSD (upgradeable to 256 or 512 GB) + micro SD card slot Display – 5″ touchscreen display with 1280×720 …

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Posted on - 17 Comments on RasPad is a Tablet Kit for Raspberry Pi 3 B+ and Other Development Boards (Crowdfunding)

RasPad is a Tablet Kit for Raspberry Pi 3 B+ and Other Development Boards (Crowdfunding)

RasPad-Raspberry-Pi-Tablet

Many people interesting in coding and working on projects with the Raspberry Pi  just likely connect the board to a monitor, USB keyboard and mouse, and to a power adapter, but if you are interested in having some more compact and portable RasPad tablet kit may be for you. The kit is compatible with Raspberry Pi boards, including the latest Raspberry Pi 3 B+, as well as other Arm/x86 Linux development boards including Tinker Board, LattePanda or BeagleBone Black. [Update: The design likely only works with RPi form factor, so if you use other boards with HDMI output, you may have to leave them out of the housing] RasPad key features: Display – 10.1″ IPS touch screen Video – HDMI port Audio – 2W speaker, audio jack Misc – 3 buttons (volume/brightness +, volume/brightness -, power), micro “USB touch” port Battery – Good for about 3 hours Power Supply – Via DC barrel jack Supported boards – Raspberry Pi B+/2/3/3 …

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Posted on - 9 Comments on Turris MOX is a Modular Router with WiFi, SSD, LTE Modem, Ethernet, and SFP (Fiber) Modules (Crowdfunding)

Turris MOX is a Modular Router with WiFi, SSD, LTE Modem, Ethernet, and SFP (Fiber) Modules (Crowdfunding)

Turris-MOX-Modular-Router

The makers of Turris Omnia router – powered by a Marvell ARMADA 385 processor and running Turris OS based on OpenWrt – have been working a new product: Turris MOX modular router which can be extended with mPCIe add-on cards for LTE, SFP cage, M.2 SSD, and so on. They will soon launch an Indiegogo campaign for it,  but in the meantimes, CZ.NIC association has a pre-campaign for a $69 MOX access point with dual band WiFI card, and intended for Turris Omnia users. The full details are not available, although we can find out a little more through root.cz and the video embedded below. The system is comprised of a basic MOX A module powered by a dual-core Armada 3720 processor coupled with 512 MB RAM, as well as USB 3.0, Gigabit Ethernet, and an I/O expansion header with GPIO, SDIO, UART and I2C.  There’s also an mPCIe port that can currently be used by one to three modules …

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Posted on - 6 Comments on LTE Cat M and NB-IoT Shield for Arduino Features SIMCom SIM7000-Series Module (Crowdfunding)

LTE Cat M and NB-IoT Shield for Arduino Features SIMCom SIM7000-Series Module (Crowdfunding)

We’ve already covered several NB-IoT (and/or LTE Cat M1) Arduino shields with products like RAK Wireless WisLTE, Sixfab Arduino NB-IoT shield, or AIS NB-IoT shield, which all happen to come with Quectel modules. A young self-taught engineer has decided to make his own Arduino eMTC/NB-IoT shield, but based on a SIMCom SIM7000-series module instead of a Quectel one found in the other aforementioned products. Board specifications: Cellular Module (one of the list depending on your location) SIM7000A LTE Cat M1 & NB-IoT module certified for AT&T and Verizon in the US SIM7000C Cat M1/NB-IoT module with 2G/2.5G fallback for the Chinese maket SIM7000E Cat M1/NB-IoT module with 2G/2.5G fallback for the European market Note: The developer is also looking into SIM7000G module which should work globally, but the option is not available for now Micro SIM card holder GNSS – GPS/GLONASS with 2.5m accuracy supported by SIMCom modules Antenna – 2x u.FL connectors for LTE and GPS USB – Micro …

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Posted on - No Comments on BigClown is a Battery Powered Modular Wireless IoT Kit for Makers (Crowdfunding)

BigClown is a Battery Powered Modular Wireless IoT Kit for Makers (Crowdfunding)

BigClown IoT Kit is designed to be as easy to use as building a castle from LEGO bricks or an IKEA cabinet. The open source kit is comprised of a coreboard module with STMicro STM32L0 Cortex M0+ micro-controller, and a sub GHZ (868/915MHz) radio for wireless communication, that accepts one or more compatible modules (currently ~30 different options), and communicate to a gateway such as Raspberry Pi or Turris Omnia where you’d connect BigClown RF USB dongle, although it’s also possible to include a Sigfox module for communication, and , LoRa & NB-IoT module appear to be planned. That’s for the hardware…The kit then connects to your chosen gateway via MQTT, which in turns accesses cloud services such as Ubidots, Microsoft Azure IoT, AWS, IFTTT, etc… , and you can monitor the data or control the kit through a web based dashboard or your own application. Core Module specifications: MCU – STMicro STM32L083CZ Arm Cortex M0+ MCU with 192KB flash, …

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