Beagle Board has a long history of making reasonably ARM development boards. Recently they come up with interesting BeagleBone series of boards.
BeagleBone is an $89 MSRP, credit-card-sized Linux computer that connects to the Internet and runs software such as Android 4.0 and Ubuntu. The board is based on AM335x 720MHz ARM® processor.
BeagleBone Black is a $45 MSRP community-supported development platform for developers and hobbyists. Boot Linux in under 10 seconds and get started on development in less than 5 minutes with just a single USB cable. BeagleBone Black Development Board is based on ARM® Cortex™-A8 processor (1GHz Sitara™ AM335x ARM Cortex-A8). BeagleBone Black ships with the Ångström Linux distribution in onboard FLASH. The board support also for example Ubuntu, Android and Fedora. BeagleBone Black’s capabilities can be extended using plug-in boards called “capes” that can be plugged into BeagleBone Black’s two 46-pin dual-row expansion headers.
From those board BeagleBone Black looks to be more interesting because the Black is more powerful and more capable than its predecessor and it’s cheaper. The other interesting feature is Cloud9 IDE on Node.JS with Bonescript library that allows you to provides several functions useful for interacting with your hardware with web browser and JavaScript code. BoneScript is a node.js-based language specifically optimized for the Beagle family and featuring familiar Arduino function calls, exported to the browser. Performing physical computing tasks in JavaScript looks rather different than C on microcontrollers. JavaScript and the Node.JS interpreter like to do everything asynchronously using callbacks.
The Register has an interesting article Review: Beagleboard Beaglebone Black that compares BeagleBone Black to Raspberry Pi. It says that Comparing the two isn’t entirely invidious: many folk who might have been considering the Pi for use as a very tiny desktop computer or media server, may now be thinking the Black, with its more powerful processor, might not be a better bet. The AM335x is set to clock higher than the Pi’s chip can go – 1GHz compared to 700MHz – but it’s possible to manually clock the Pi up. As two variations on the same theme, the differences between Pi and Black are subtle. The Black is clearly the more suitable device for hardware projects (92 expansion pins on two banks 46-pin female connectors, six serial pins for debugging). The Pi the choice for low-cost educational computing.
The article says that you’ll probably want to try the Black if Android is your thing. There’s a working version of Jelly Bean available for the Black, provided by Texas Instruments in support of its Sitara SoCs.
BeagleBone Black looks like a very interesting product to check out some day.
92 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
BREWthinger
JavaScript Powered Brewery (aka Gas Powered Stick)
https://hackaday.io/project/654-brewthinger
Automated brewery running on NodeJS.
This is a Node.JS implementation of BrewPi project. This module is designed to connect to an Arduino with a BrewPiShield running the official BrewPi AVR/Arduino code. This is ALPHA code. See official BrewPi repos for an out of the box solution.
https://github.com/tklun/brewpi-node
Tomi Engdahl says:
Aquire Awesome Audio for BeagleBone
http://hackaday.com/2016/02/19/aquire-awesome-audio-for-beaglebone/
[Henrik Langer] put his powerful audio acquisition and output board up on Hackaday.io, and we thought we’d point it out to you. It’s one of those projects that used to be pro audio just a few years back, but is doable (and affordable) DIY today: dual stereo inputs and four(!) stereo outputs, all sampled at 24 bits and up to 192 kHz. It’s configured as a BeagleBone cape, and comes with a customized Linux distribution for the ‘Bone.
Linux-Based Low-Latency Multichannel Audio System
https://hackaday.io/project/9634-linux-based-low-latency-multichannel-audio-system
Open Source audio system based on BeagleBone Green and AD1938 audio codec by Analog Devices with 2 stereo inputs and 4 stereo outputs
Tomi Engdahl says:
SanCloud BeagleBone Enhanced
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/sancloud-beaglebone-enhanced#/
The SanCloud BeagleBone Enhanced is ready for take-off…..
SanCloud is enhancing the open source hardware BeagleBone Black design you love with more features than you thought possible! It still has a blistering 1GHz processor and just like the BeagleBone Black, has two 46-pin expansion headers, micro HDMI for audio/video output, USB ports, Ethernet and other I/O features. The SanCloud BeagleBone Enhanced is an ultra-powered embedded computer that can (still) fit in a mint tin!
1 Gigabyte DDR3 RAM – twice the amount of the normal BeagleBone Black
Gigabit Ethernet
Extra USB ports, 2 on board plus 2 via expansion header
Optional serial NOR flash for boot loader
Optional 6 axis gyro + accelerometer (we will fit 9 axis ‘+ compass’ if target is reached)
Optional barometer pressure and temperature sensor
Tomi Engdahl says:
Spark Gap and Coherer Meet Beagle Bone
http://hackaday.com/2016/03/29/spark-gap-and-coherer-meet-beagle-bone/
Getting back to basics is a great way to teach yourself about a technology. We see it all the time with computers built from NAND gates or even discrete transistors. It’s the same for radio – stripping it back to the 19th century can really let you own the technology. But if an old-school wireless setup still needs a 21st-century twist to light your fire, try this spark gap transmitter and coherer receiver with a Beagle Bone Morse decoder.
At its heart, a spark gap transmitter is just a broadband RF noise generator, and as such is pretty illegal to operate these days.
100% electromechanical transmitter is good for a couple of feet
The receiver is based on a coherer, a device that conducts electricity only when a passing radio wave disturbs it. [Ashish]’s coherer is a slug of iron filings between two bolts in a plastic tube.
He also added an optoisolator to condition the receiver’s output for an IO pin on the Beagle, and a Python script to decode the incoming Morse.
19th century radio technology meets the Beaglebone
http://ashishrd.blogspot.fi/2016/03/19th-century-radio-technology-meets_20.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
Bela: Real-Time BeagleBone Audio/Analog Cape
http://hackaday.com/2016/04/13/bela-real-time-beaglebone-audioanalog-cape/
Bela is a cape for the BeagleBone Black that’s aimed at artists and musicians. Actually, the cape is much less than half of the story — the rest is in some clever software and a real-time Linux distribution. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s talk hardware first.
First off, the cape has stereo input and output as well as two amplified speaker outs. It can do all of your audio stuff. It also has two banks of analogue inputs and outputs, each capable of handling eight signals.
All of these input and output peripherals are hooked up to the BeagleBone’s Programmable Realtime Units (PRUs) — a hardware subsystem that’s independent of the CPU but can work along with it. The PRU is interfaced with the real-time Linux core to give you sub-microsecond response in your application. This is a big deal because a lot of other audio-processing systems have latencies that get into the tens of milliseconds or worse, where it starts to be perceptible as a slight lag by humans.
Bela Platform for audio
http://bela.io/
Bela is an embedded system for real-time audio processing with ultra-low latency. Based on the BeagleBone Black single-board computer and featuring a custom hardware and software environment, Bela integrates audio processing and sensor connectivity in a single high-performance package.
Bela is an ideal platform for musicians, instrument designers, audio enthusiasts and interactive artists.
Tomi Engdahl says:
BeagleBone Pin-Toggling Torture Test
http://hackaday.com/2016/04/21/beaglebone-pin-toggling-torture-test/
Benchmarks often get criticized for their inability to perfectly model the real-world situations that we’d like them to. So take what follows in the limited scope that it’s intended, and don’t read too much into it. [Joonas Pihlajamaa]’s experiments with toggling a hardware pin as fast as possible on different single-board computers can still show us something.
The take-home result won’t surprise anyone who’s worked with a single-board computer: the higher-level interfaces are simply slow compared to direct memory-mapped GPIO access. But really slow. We’re talking around 5 kHz from Python or any of the file-based interfaces to the pins versus 3 MHz for direct access. Worse, as you’d expect when a non-realtime operating system is in the middle, there are glitches on the order of ten milliseconds with all the file-based methods.
This test only tells us so much, though, and it’s not really taking advantage of the BeagleBone Black’s ace in the hole, the PRUs — onboard hardware processors that bring real-time IO capabilities to the system. We’d like to see a re-write of the code to take advantage of libpruio, for instance. A 20 MHz square wave is a piece of cake with the PRUs.
BeagleBone Black GPIO Benchmark
http://codeandlife.com/2016/04/18/beaglebone-black-gpio-benchmark/
Library upgrade to PRU gives Fast IO on Beaglebone
http://hackaday.com/2015/02/16/library-upgrade-to-pru-gives-fast-io-on-beaglebone/
[Thomas Freiherr] is working on the libpruio project to allow PRU support on the BBB. It is “designed for easy configuration and data handling at high speed. libpruio software runs on the host (ARM) and in parallel on a Programmable Realtime Unit SubSystem (= PRUSS or just PRU) and controls the subsystems”.
libpruio-0.2 (fast and easy D/A – I/O)
Fast and easy digital input/output and analog input for Beaglebone hardware with PRU subsystem.
http://beagleboard.org/project/libpruio/
Tomi Engdahl says:
New Part Day: A BeagleBone On A Chip
http://hackaday.com/2016/05/10/new-part-day-a-beaglebone-on-a-chip/
The current crop of ARM single board computers have a lot in common. Everything from the Odroid to the Raspberry Pi are built around Systems on a Chip, a piece of silicon that has just about everything you need to build a bare minimum board. You won’t find many hardware hackers playing around with these chips, though. That would require putting some RAM on the board, and some other high-speed connectors. Until now, the only people building these ARM boards were Real Engineers™, with a salary commensurate of their skills.
This is now about to change. Octavo Systems has launched a new product that’s more or less a BeagleBone on a chip. If you can handle putting a PCB with a BGA package in a toaster oven, you too can build your own ARM single board computer running Linux.
Octavo’s new System in Package is the OSD335x family, featuring a Texas Instruments AM335x ARM Cortex A8 CPU, up to 1GB of DDR3, and peripherals that include 114 GPIOs, 6 UARTs, 2 SPIs, 2 I2Cs, 2x Gigabit Ethernet, and USB.
The chips used in commercially available single board computers like the Pi and BeagleBone have hundreds of passive components sprinkled around the board. This makes designing one of these single board computers challenging,
Octavo is baking a bunch of these resistors, capacitors, and inductors right into this chip, allowing for extremely minimal boards running Linux.
OSD335x
A New Era of Integration and Flexibility
http://octavosystems.com/octavo_products/osd335x/
Each OSD335x device incorporates a Texas Instruments AM335x Sitara™ Processor, TPS65217C Power Management IC, TL5209 LDO Voltage Regulator, a DDR3 SDRAM, and over 140 passive components. Since the OSD335x encapsulates the complicated high-speed design of the processor/DDR3 interface, the power management IC, and the complete complement of related capacitors, resistors, and inductors, the final system design is vastly simplified.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Toy Piano Gets Synth Overhaul
http://hackaday.com/2016/05/20/toy-piano-gets-synth-overhaul/
[Liam] built a polyphonic synth into a toy piano. It’s an impressive build that retains the look and feel of the piano, right down to a laser-etched top panel with knobs that match the glossy black styling.
The brains of the synthesizer is a Beaglebone Black using the Maximillian synthesis library. To capture the key presses, he used Velostat, a pressure-sensitive material that changes resistance under pressure. This is probably the only toy piano in the world with fully polyphonic velocity and aftertouch
Tomi Engdahl says:
BeagleBone Green, Now Wireless
http://hackaday.com/2016/05/21/beaglebone-green-now-wireless/
Over the past few years, the BeagleBone ecosystem has grown from the original BeagleBone White, followed two years later by the BeagleBone Black. The Black was the killer board of the BeagleBone family, and for a time wasn’t available anywhere at any price. TI has been kind to the SoC used in the BeagleBone, leading to last year’s release of the BeagleBone Green, The robotics-focused BeagleBone Blue, and the very recent announcement of a BeagleBone on a chip. All these boards have about the same capabilities, targeted towards different use cases
Wireless
WirelessAs with any single board computer with a fast ARM chip running Linux, comparisons must be made to the Raspberry Pi. Since this is the first BeagleBone released with wireless connectivity baked into the board, the most logical comparison would be against the recently released Raspberry Pi 3.
The Pi 3 includes an integrated wireless chipset for 802.11n and Bluetooth 4.1 connectivity. The BeagleBone Green Wireless has this, but also adds 802.11 b and g networks. This gives the BBGW the ability to sense when anyone is using a microwave in the vicinity – a boon for that Internet of Things thing we’ve been hearing so much about.
Unlike the Pi 3, the BBGW has connections for additional antennas in the form of two u.FL connectors.
Grove Connectors
The BeagleBone Green Wireless is a Seeed joint, and as with the original BeagleBone Green, there are Grove connectors right on the edge of the board. These connectors provide one I2C bus and one serial connection each for Seeed Studio’s custom modules.
We don’t have DE-9 connectors anymore, and a smaller, easier to use connector is appreciated, especially when the connectors are a mere $0.15/piece.
Then again, the intelligence of a Grove module is purely dependant on the operator. On the BeagleBone Green, there are two Grove connectors, one for I2C, and another for serial.
The BeagleBone Green Wireless doesn’t really do anything new. The SoC is the same, and of course the PRUs in every BeagleBone are the killer feature for really, really fast digital I/O. The addition of WiFi is nice, and the inclusion of extra antenna connectors phenomenal, but it’s nothing a USB WiFi dongle couldn’t handle.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Blindingly Fast ADC for Your BeagleBone
http://hackaday.com/2016/07/31/blindingly-fast-adc-for-your-beaglebone/
Jason Holt] wrote in to tell about of the release of his PRUDAQ project. It’s a dual-channel 10-bit ADC cape that ties into the BeagleBone’s Programmable Realtime Units (PRUs) to shuttle through up to as much as 20 megasamples per second for each channel. That’s a lot of bandwidth!
With a bit of PRU code, the data can be shuttled out of the ADC and into the BeagleBone’s memory about as fast as you could wish.
PRUDAQ
https://github.com/google/prudaq/wiki
PRUDAQ is a fast, Free, low-cost ADC board for BeagleBone Black and BeagleBone Green. You can build the board yourself using the Eagle files in the repo, or buy one pre-built from GroupGets.
Features:
Dual-channel simultaneously-sampled 10-bit ADC
Up to 20MSPS per channel (40MSPS total) (but see below)
0-2V input voltage range (DC coupled)
4:1 analog switches in front of each channel provide a total of 8 single-ended analog inputs. (See here for differential input)
SMA jacks for direct access to the 2 ADC channels
Flexible clock options:
External input via SMA jack
Internal onboard 10MHz oscillator
Programmable clock from BeagleBone GPIO pins
The BeagleBone’s programmable real-time units (PRUs) make it possible to capture the 400Mbit/s sample stream into the BeagleBone’s 512MB of main memory.
BeagleLogic’s PRUDAQ driver provides a /dev/beaglelogic device you can pipe into a file or a python program, and their pre-built system image makes it easy to get the software working.
PRUDAQ is not an oscilloscope
If you’re looking for an oscilloscope or a hardened data acquisiton system, this board is probably not what you want:
We haven’t spent much time interfacing our board with high level tools like GNU Radio
Input signals outside the 0-2V range may damage the ADC
Inputs are DC-coupled
We provide a 1V reference for mid-scale, but it’s unbuffered
At 40MSPS the 1GHz ARMv7 only has 25 cycles per sample (and at least 25% of that is eaten by DMA overhead)
Round-robin sampling across the 8 analog inputs is tricky:
Switching latency makes it hard to sample at high rates
High sample rates also require a low source impedance (strong input signal) to overcome ~300pF switch and filter capacitance
As the previous section points out, you can buffer samples into the 512MB of main memory, but there’s no way to get the samples into storage or off the board at the full 40MSPS data rate
Tomi Engdahl says:
[Ken Shirriff] Demystifies BeagleBone I/O
http://hackaday.com/2016/08/19/ken-shirriff-demystifies-beaglebone-io/
If you have ever spent a while delving into the bare metal of talking to the I/O pins on a contemporary microprocessor or microcontroller you will know that it is not always an exercise for the faint-hearted. A host of different functions can be multiplexed behind a physical pin, and once you are looking at the hardware through the cloak of an operating system your careful timing can be derailed in an instant. For these reasons most of us will take advantage of other people’s work and use the abstraction provided by a library or a virtual filesystem path.
If you have ever been curious enough to peer under the hood of your board’s I/O then you may find [Ken Shirriff]’s latest blog post in which he explores the software stack behind the pins on a BeagleBone Black to be of interest.
The BeagleBone’s I/O pins: inside the software stack that makes them work
http://www.righto.com/2016/08/the-beaglebones-io-pins-inside-software.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
New Part Day: Wireless BeagleBones On A Chip
http://hackaday.com/2016/09/27/new-part-day-wireless-beaglebones-on-a-chip/
The BeagleBone is a very popular single board computer, best applied to real-time applications where you need to blink LEDs really, really fast. Over the years, the BeagleBone has been used for stand-alone CNC controllers, the brains behind very large LED installations, and on rare occasions has been used to drive CRTs. If you just want a small Linux board, get a Pi. If you want to do something interesting with hardware, get a BeagleBone.
The BeagleBone ecosystem has grown a lot in the last year, from the wireless and Grove connector equipped BeagleBone Green, the robotics-focused BeagleBone Blue, the Zoolander-inspired Blue Steel. Now there’s a new BeagleBone, built around a very interesting System on Module introduced earlier this year.
The new board is called the BeagleBone Black Wireless, and it brings to the table all you know and love about the BeagleBone. There’s a 1GHz ARM355x with two 32-bit 200MHz PRUs for the real-time pin toggling. RAM is set at 512MB, with 4GB of eMMC Flash and Debian pre-installed, and a microSD card for larger storage options. The new feature is wireless connectivity: a TI WiFi and Bluetooth module with provisions for 802.11s replaces the old Ethernet connector.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Beaglebone card is presented in a new version, with a large periaattellinen change has been made: Ethernet connection is replaced with a Wi-Fi radio.
Component Distributor Mouser now says it will accept a new Beaglebone Black Wireless Card for pre-orders. Octavo card template system circuit, which Found items ARM Cortex-A8-based Texas Instruments Sitara-processor, TI’s power management circuit and TL5209-regulator.
Random access memory card has 512 MB of storage space and is four gigabytes. It can be grown on the SD card.
Wi-Fi connections b / g / n
Also included is Bluetooth 4.2 radio.
Physical connectors connect the USB and HDMI devices
Works with Debian operating system – also available Ubuntu and Android
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5408:suosittu-beaglebone-muuttui-langattomaksi&catid=13&Itemid=101
More:
Beaglebone Black Wireless
http://www.mouser.fi/new/beagleboardorg/beaglebone-black-wireless/?cm_mmc=PressRelease-PR-_-BeagleBone-_-Black_Wireless-_-2016-11-14
BeagleBone Black Wireless is the newest board in the BeagleBone family that replaces the 10/100 Ethernet port with onboard 802.11 b/g/n 2.4GHz Wi-Fi. The BeagleBone Black Wireless has a Texas Instruments WL1835MODGBMOCT module and is an open source board utilizing Cadsoft EAGLE.
The new BeagleBone Wireless introduces the BeagleBoard Compatible Octavo OSD3358 system-in-package (SiP). The SiP has a Texas Instruments TPS65217C PMIC, Sitara AM335x MPU, and TL5209 LDO.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Beagle Entertainment System
Turning the BeagleBone Black into a retro gaming appliance
https://hackaday.io/project/3913-beagle-entertainment-system
Tomi Engdahl says:
Pocketbone KiCAD
Smalls mint tin sized BeagleBone (KiCAD version)
https://hackaday.io/project/19495-pocketbone-kicad
Smalls mint tin sized BeagleBone (KiCAD version) using Octavo Systems OSD3358 system on package.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The BeagleBone Blue – Perfect For Robots
http://hackaday.com/2017/03/15/the-beaglebone-blue-perfect-for-robots/
There’s a new BeagleBone on the block, and it’s Blue. The BeagleBone Blue is built for robots, and it’s available right now.
A 9-axis IMU, barometer, motor driver, quad encoder sensor, servo driver, and a balancing LiPo charger are all included. The difference in this revision is the processor. That big square of epoxy in the middle of the board is the Octavo Systems OSD3358, better known as a BeagleBone on a chip. This is the first actual product we’ve seen using this neat chip, but assuredly not the last
Meet BeagleBone® Blue. Robots. Fast.
https://beagleboard.org/blog/2017-03-13-meet-beaglebone-blue
BeagleBone® Blue is the affordable and complete robotics controller built around the popular BeagleBone® open hardware computer. Linux-enabled, Blue is community-supported and fully open-source. High-performance, flexible networking capabilities are coupled with a real-time capable Linux system and a compelling set of peripherals for building mobile robots quickly and affordably. By utilizing the pre-configured WiFi access point, starting code development is as simple as connecting a battery and opening a web browser.
Tomi Engdahl says:
An Even Smaller BeagleBone
http://hackaday.com/2017/04/15/an-even-smaller-beaglebone/
The BeagleBone famously fits in an Altoids tin. Even though we now have BeagleBone Blacks, Blues, and Greens, the form factor for this curiously strong Linux board has remained unchanged, and able to fit inside a project box available at every cash register on the planet. There is another Altoids tin, though. The Altoid mini tin is just over 60×40 mm, and much too small to fit a normal size BeagleBone. [Michael Welling] has designed a new BeagleBone to fit this miniature project box. He’s calling it the Pocketbone, and it’s as small as the mints are strong.
The Pocketbone is based on the Octavo Systems OSD355x family, better known as the ‘BeagleBone on a chip’. This chip features a TI AM355x ARM Cortex A8, up to 1GB of DDR3 RAM, 114 GPIOs, 6 UARTs, 2 SPIs, 2x Gigabit Ethernet, and USB. It’s housed in a relatively large BGA package that makes routing easy,
Pocketbone KiCAD
Smalls mint tin sized BeagleBone (KiCAD version)
https://hackaday.io/project/19495-pocketbone-kicad
Tomi Engdahl says:
Music-Loving BeagleBone
http://hackaday.com/2017/06/14/music-loving-beagle/
Robotic control can get very complicated when multiple actuators need to work in coordination with each other. A simple robotic arm will require each joint to be controlled in sequence to attain a particular position. The BeagleBone Blue comes armed with motor drivers, sensor inputs, and wireless and is built for robotics.
[Andy] has prepared a musical robot called the BeagleBone Blue Electro-Mechanical Glockenspiel using the single board computer. The hardware consists of eight servo motors each with a mallet stick attached to them.
BeagleBone Blue Music Player
http://workshopshed.com/2017/04/beaglebone-blue-music-player/
Tomi Engdahl says:
TI Brings DLP Pico Projectors to the Masses
DMD chip priced under $20
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1332100&
Texas Instruments’ micro-opto-electromechanical-system-based Digital Light Processor (DLP), with millions of micromirrors per digital micromirror device (DMD) MOEMS chip, revolutionized digital cinema, earning the technology’s inventor an Oscar in 2015. After the 87th Academy Awards ceremony, TI began downsizing its technology for consumers. Today, TI is releasing the 0.2-inch, quarter-million-mirror DLP2000 at a price of less than $20, with an evaluation module (EVM) priced at less than $100, making it the most cost-effective pico-projector enabler to date, according to analysts. Competing units for the consumer market use as few as two raster-scanning mirrors.
“The new TI DLP LightCrafter Display 2000 is a breakthrough, since it brings the price down to a point that any developer can consider it for their applications,”
TI is the leading supplier of pico-projector chips, having shipped more than 1 million units in the first half of this year, Abowd said. Most of those units shipped to China, but the devices “are also increasingly popular in the U.S., such as in the ultra-thin pico projector Moto Mod, which snaps on to the Moto Z2 Force Edition smartphone,” she said.
The DLP solution released today offers “a $19.99 DMD chip plus matching controller, power management, and driver chips,”
The chip undercuts the price of the previous TI generation’s least expensive model by three times and should enable consumer applications to break the $100 price barrier by Christmas 2017.
TI DLP® LightCrafter™ Display2000 EVM User’s Guide
http://www.ti.com/lit/ug/dlpu049/dlpu049.pdf
Tomi Engdahl says:
Anaren IoT Group Launches Atmosphere 2.1 and BeagleBone Black Support
https://www.eeweb.com/blog/eeweb/anaren-iot-group-launches-atmosphere-2.1-and-beaglebone-black-support
Anaren IoT Group announced the release of version 2.1 of its innovative Anaren Atmosphere online development platform. Atmosphere affords embedded, mobile, and cloud developers a quick way to create IoT applications with an easy-to-use IoT development environment. The latest version of Atmosphere 2.1 now offers support for the BeagleBone Black Embedded Linux Development Kit, and a new cloud-only project type that allows users to build libraries for C#/.Net, C/C++, and Python to enable connections to their own embedded solutions in Atmosphere Cloud.
“Since the initial launch of Atmosphere late last year, we now have over 3,500 unique registered users creating and deploying a wide variety of IoT solutions into the market,” said Jeff Liebl, president of Anaren IoT Group. “The BeagleBone Black support should be of special interest to the large embedded Linux community of developers.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mouser – Tiny yet complete open source USB-key-fob computer provides extensive flexibility (BeagleBoard by GHI PocketBeagle-SC-569)
https://www.electropages.com/2017/10/mouser-tiny-complete-open-source-usb-key-fob-computer-extensive-flexibility/?utm_campaign=2017-10-05-Electropages&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=article&utm_content=Mouser+-+Tiny+yet+complete+open+source+USB-key-fob+computer+provides+…
Mouser is now shipping the highly anticipated BeagleBoard PocketBeagle. This minuscule yet complete open source USB-key-fob computer from BeagleBoard.org provides extensive flexibility, enabling makers and designers to add only the peripherals they need.
The device is based on the power-packed 1GHz Octavo OSD3358-SM, the smallest SiP device in the OSD335x family. The 21mm × 21mm SiP includes 512mb of DDR3 RAM. Prioritizing ease-of-use, this affordable Linux computer features a simple, intuitive design that offers tremendous expansibility. The device, bolstered by two 32-bit PRUs with single-cycle input/output (I/O) latency, enables rapid prototyping for 3D printing, robotics, and education. Also included in the ultra-tiny board is an SGX530 graphics accelerator.
The device has 72 expansion pin headers with power and battery I/Os, eight analog inputs, 44 digital I/Os, high-speed USB, and numerous digital interface peripherals.
Tomi Engdahl says:
WiFi and USB for pocketbeagle
https://hackaday.io/project/27600-wifi-and-usb-for-pocketbeagle
no wifi – 4 stars … RTL8188 module and small usb hub with usual suspects
Tomi Engdahl says:
BeagleLogic Standalone
https://hackaday.io/project/25745-beaglelogic-standalone
BeagleLogic, now as a turnkey and standalone 16-channel Logic Analyzer
Three years ago, the BeagleLogic project showed how to use a BeagleBone as a 100MSa/s, 14-channel logic analyzer.
BeagleLogic Standalone is the next step in the evolution of BeagleLogic from just an add-on to the BeagleBone to a standalone logic analyzer in itself. It is based on the OSD3358 System-In-Package (SiP) from Octavo Systems and increases the specifications to 16-channels @100MSa/s and adds Gigabit Ethernet vs. 100Mbps on the BeagleBone(s).
BeagleLogic standalone is alive and booting! Check out the project logs for more information
Alex says:
Could anyone help me out ? I want to configure Beagle Bone for my OCR project !
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://octavosystems.com/octavo_products/osd3358-sm-red/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Introducing the new CTAG FACE and BEAST multichannel audio system
https://blog.bela.io/2018/05/08/CTAG-multichannel-audio-cape/
Developed by Henrik Langer and Robert Manzke of CTAG Audio in collaboration with Bela, the FACE is a cape for the BeagleBone Black with 4 audio input channels and 8 audio output channels.
The BEAST, created by stacking two FACE capes on top of each other, doubles the amount of available audio I/O to an impressive 8 input channels and 16 output channels.
The CTAG capes are fully compatible with Bela, and can take advantage of Bela’s unrivalled sub-millisecond latency, along with Bela’s streamlined workflow and development tools.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Building hearing aids with a Linux-based open hardware board
https://opensource.com/article/18/7/open-hearing-aid-platform?sc_cid=7016000000127ECAAY
Open source platform for improving hearing aids uses a BeagleBone Black for its next iteration.
Tomi Engdahl says:
10 Great BeagleBone Development Board Capes
https://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1334221
In this roundup we’ll take a look at some of the more exciting Capes on the market for the BeagleBone platform and what they bring to the table. Bear in mind that some Capes will only work with the original BeagleBone, while most others are strictly for the Black or Green edition (these will be denoted for each entry).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Low-cost design: When best practice is too expensive
https://www.edn.com/design/test-and-measurement/4461787/Low-cost-design–When-best-practice-is-too-expensive?utm_content=buffer0b884&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
Tomi Engdahl says:
#Signalintegrity analysis of a #BeagleBone Black reveals how designers could violate #design rules to cut costs & still produce a working #board #DDR3 #microcontroller #engineering #maker https://buff.ly/2PWZjsJ
Tomi Engdahl says:
Built around a BeagleBone Green, with a shift to a custom board with Octavo SIP in the works, Agricoltura ticks a lot of boxes.
Agricoltura, an RS485 and Wireless Sense and Control System for Agriculture, Farming, and More
https://www.hackster.io/news/agricoltura-an-rs485-and-wireless-sense-and-control-system-for-agriculture-farming-and-more-17ddaf05299f
Built around a BeagleBone Green, with a shift to a custom board with Octavo SIP in the works, Agricoltura ticks a lot of boxes.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Open design requires no software to operate and boasts two channels, 100MHz of bandwidth, and full cross-platform compatibility.
Electronics FUN’s BeagleBone Black-Based Oscilloscope Puts Diagnostics in Your Browser
https://www.hackster.io/news/electronics-fun-s-beaglebone-black-based-oscilloscope-puts-diagnostics-in-your-browser-b2a2018b62a1
Open design requires no software to operate and boasts two channels, 100MHz of bandwidth, and full cross-platform compatibility.
Belgium-based Electronics FUN is looking to make oscilloscopes more accessible with an Ethernet- or Wi-Fi-connected, smartphone-friendly design built around the open-hardware BeagleBone Black single-board computer (SBC).
“The core of the scope is a real-time Ethernet-based digital storage oscilloscope (DSO),” the company explains of the project. “It can have an extended function of equivalent-time sampling by hooking up an additional up to 1 GHz sampling head. This perfect collaboration not only allows the scope to trace an input signal in real-time but also offers users an opportunity to catch repetitive high frequency signals.”
“The DSO part features 8 bits, 250 MS/s, 100 MHz bandwidth, dual channels, external trigger, no troublesome software installation (only web browser needed), software control panel and Wi-Fi-range connectivity. Design files and software code of the DSO part can be shared together with the product. You can easily learn how to DIY your own oscilloscope and upgrade it for the final product.”
Full documentation for the project, including schematics and the source code which runs on the BeagleBone Black’s PRUs, can be found on the project’s Hackaday.io page; assembled boards are available for $130, excluding the BeagleBone Black, from the Electronics FUN Tindie store.
Web-based oscilloscope DIY using beaglebone black
https://hackaday.io/project/171379-web-based-oscilloscope-diy-using-beaglebone-black
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.tindie.com/products/adlab/wifi-based-oscilloscope-dso-two-channels-250-msps/
Tomi Engdahl says:
PocketBeagle-Based PocketGlitcher Automates Voltage Glitch Testing, and Fits in Your Pocket
Designed to completely automated voltage-glitch testing, the PocketGlitcher is a compact solution to a thorny problem.
https://www.hackster.io/news/pocketbeagle-based-pocketglitcher-automates-voltage-glitch-testing-and-fits-in-your-pocket-1e77f03bbef7
“This PocketGlitcher is a glitching mod-device. It uses the Texas Instruments PRU [Programmable Real-time Unit] to create deterministic signals (5ns precision, not so bad), associated with determined configs. An analog PCB Cape is then plugged to the PocketBeagle to provide a sufficient glitching effect, once connected to the VDD target. As a result, it is now possible to reactivate the nRF52 debug with a low-cost plug-and-play solution. And the most important, the system fits in a pocket.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Designed to adapt HATs to the BeagleBone Cape format, this low-cost board swaps a hard-to-find part out for one in ready supply.
Sequent Microsystems’ Beagle-Pi “Raspberry Pi Emulator” Offers a Stopgap for Shortages
https://www.hackster.io/news/sequent-microsystems-beagle-pi-raspberry-pi-emulator-offers-a-stopgap-for-shortages-eb0c4d48b8d2
Designed to adapt HATs to the BeagleBone Cape format, this low-cost board swaps a hard-to-find part out for one in ready supply.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.cnx-software.com/2022/02/27/beagle-pi-emulator-raspberry-pi-hat-adapter-beaglebone-black/
Tomi Engdahl says:
BeagleBoard.org Launches the “Adaptable, Open Source” BeaglePlay and Low-Cost BeagleConnect Freedom
Aiming to make development more fun, the BeaglePlay boasts the broadest array of connectivity options yet seen on a BeagleBoard.org design.
https://www.hackster.io/news/beagleboard-org-launches-the-adaptable-open-source-beagleplay-and-low-cost-beagleconnect-freedom-4901528a0049
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2023/05/04/beaglestamp-makes-soldering-linux-into-your-projects-easier/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://docs.beagleboard.org/latest/boards/beagleplay/04-expansion.html
Expansion¶
Note
This chapter is a work in progress and will include information on building expansion hardware for BeaglePlay.
mikroBUS¶
The mikroBUS header provides several GPIO pins as well as UART, I2C, SPI, PWM and an Analog Input.
By default, the port is controlled by a mikroBUS driver that helps with auto-detecting MikroE Click Board that feature [ClickID](https://www.mikroe.com/clickid). This does however mean that if you want to manually control the port, you may need to first disable the driver.
To disable the driver, do the following – TODO
Grove¶
The Grove port on BeaglePlay exposes one of the SoC I2C Ports as well as an analog input.
It maps directly in linux as /dev/I2C-TODO or as the following alias /dev/play/grove
QWIIC¶
The QWIIC port on BeaglePlay exposes one of the SoC I2C Ports.
It maps directly in linux as /dev/I2C-2 or as the following alias /dev/play/qwiic
CSI¶
The AM62x SoC (and by extension BeaglePlay) does not feature on-board ISP (Image Signal Processor) hardware, and as such, Raw-Bayer CSI Sensors must be pre-processed into normal images by the A53 cores.
To avoid performance penalties related to the approach above, it is recommended to use a sensor with a built-in ISP, such as the OV5640 which is supported out of box.
The PCam5C from Digilent is one CSI camera that features this sensor.
OLDI¶
BeaglePlay brings out two OLDI (LVDS) channels, each with up to four data lanes and one clock lane to support 21/28-bit serialized RGB pixel data and synchronization transmissions. The first port, OLDI0, consists of OLDI0_A0-3/CLK0 and corresponds to odd pixels, while the second port, OLDI1, consists of OLDI0_A4-7/CLK1 and corresponds to even pixels.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://github.com/jadonk/beagleconnect
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://etn.fi/index.php/13-news/16036-uusi-beagle-kortti-ymmaertaeae-tekoaelyae
Beagle on BeagleBoard-yhteisön kehittämä yhden kortin tietokone, joka on monen kehittäjän suosiossa. Nyt kortteihin ollaan tuomassa uutena version BeagleY-AI, joka sopii tekoälyä hyödyntävien sovellusten kehittämiseen. Uutuuskortteja voi ennakkotilata Farnellilta.
Beagle-korttitietokoneet käyttävät avoimen lähdekoodin ohjelmistoja ja käyttöjärjestelmiä, kuten Linuxia, mikä tekee niistä joustavia kehitysympäristöjä monenlaisiin sovelluksiin. Ne tukevat myös erilaisia ohjelmointikieliä, kuten Pythonia, C:tä ja JavaScriptiä, mikä helpottaa monenlaisten projektien toteuttamista.