HDMI 2.1 brings auto low latency mode (ALLM) and variable refresh rate (VRR) gaming here demonstrated on a Samsung QLED TV with a new firmware update to add that functionality support to the Microsoft Xbox One X. For more information about HDMI 2.1 features for gaming see my other video. That VRR functionality of HDMI 2.1 can be considered similar to dynamic refresh rate technologies like AMD’s FreeSync and NVIDIA’s G-Sync which are now popular for gamers buying new gaming PC monitors and new graphics cards, but the target market here for the HDMI 2.1 is also for gamers to be able to enjoy those features on the 4K TVs in the future. So expect upcoming 4K TVs to support it, if not it even being added to the firmware of existing 4K TVs on the market (like possibly as part of an evt firmware update for this Samsung QLED 4K TV), and here also updated with the firmware of gaming consoles like the Xbox One X.
Category: OS
faytech 86″ large format displays optically bonded at SID Display Week 2018
Tour of the faytech booth at the SID Display Week 2018. In this exhibition faytech focuses on their large format displays and optical bonding expertise and service. In the video you can see several faytech products, but also their partner’s products, which are optically bonded by faytech.
In the video, they show several 86” Optically bonded “blackboard” devices with PCAP Capacitive touch technology for educational or multi-media purposes. During the tour a 75” outdoor IP65, (dust- and water-proof) Multi-media PC, as well as faytech’s own 55” Open Frame (HDK) Touch Monitor with 1000+ nits of brightness can be seen. This Open Frame is the perfect solution for integrating into a machine or wall. Eventually, the 65” FlatFrog In-Glass touch device bonded by faytech is shown, which is interesting, because only faytech possesses the bonding technology to do so. Then the 46” 2500+ nits outdoor kiosk from faytech’s partner, which is perfect for in- and outdoor use is presented. And at last, faytech’s 15.6” smart mirror with Capacitive touch technology is shown, which is perfect for the bathroom.
Tianma shows Flexible OLED, Quantum Dot LCD, Full Active, Notch, No-Notch and more
Tianma shows a range of their latest displays at SID Display Week 2018. Displays include flexible OLED for phones, that can go as thin as 3mm bend radius that can do up to 10 thousand bends, active no-notch bezel-less LTPS LCD some with Notch and some without, integrated force pressure sensor, hole for camera in OLED display, cut-out for the front fingerprint sensor, Android at actual 2160×1080 (small icons), 4.2″ AMOLED that can operate at up to 85 degree centigrade, automotive displays such as side view mirror displays, single laminated direct bonded wide display, 240 local area LED dimming for better contrast, free form displays with a hole in the center for the speedometer, round OLED with haptics, Active Louver Technology for electronic privacy filter, tactile feedback by electrostatic sensations and haptic across the display. 21.3″ quantum dot LCD with 120% NTSC color 2000:1 contrast 1100nits, outdoor viewable displays transmissive with a backlight recycling film 1600nits 800:1 constrast, able to do 25% reflection ratio including a display with a front light, virbration resistant, water resistant with touchscreens working under water, extended field capacitive, 27″ 4K, 30″ 4K for radiology, a floating auto stereoscopic display.
TechNexion shows worldwide pre-certified IoT modules at Computex 2018
TechNexion shows off their new products at Computex 2018: pre-certified IoT modules, Android Things development kits, IP69K embedded systems and more. The booth tour starts with Android Things development kit PICO-PI-IMX7 live demo, based on NXP i.MX7 Dual applications processor and ARM Cortex-A7 architecture has been the go-to development kit since the official Android Things launch at Google I/O in May. The company also demonstrates PICO-IMX8M SoM based on NXP i.MX8M processor and Cortex-A53 + M4 architectures that delivers a whooping 4K UltraHD video performance with HDR and pro audio fidelity for multimedia applications. TechNexion is also launching CE, ETSI, FCC, IC, RCM and TELEC pre-certified IoT wireless communication modules and development kits: PIXI-9377 based on Qualcomm QCA9377, PIXI-6174 based on Qualcomm QCA6174 that deliver high transmission rates, low latency and improved range in noisy industrial environments. The company is showcasing a fully waterproof TWP-1010-IMX6 HMI based on NXP i.MX6 ARM Cortex-A9 processor that was specially designed to withstand extreme environments and cleaning with a jet spray. TWP series likewise includes models based on Intel Braswell architecture. TEK5-APL box PC based on Intel Atom x5-E3930, x5-E3940, x7-E3950 and Apollo Lake architecture, enclosed in a fully ruggedized enclosure for use in a vehicle.
GIGABYTE shows Cavium ThunderX2 ARM Server Portfolio
The R181-T90 is a 1U height dual socket general purpose ThunderX2 rack server with 8 channels RDIMM / ECC UDIMM DDR4 memory, 24 x DIMM slots, 1 x 25GbE SFP28 LAN port, 1 x 10GbE SFP+ LAN port (optional), 12 x 2.5” hot-swap HDD bays, 2 x OCP mezzanine slots (PCIe 3.0 x16), Aspeed AST2500 management controller, and 1+1 1600W 80 PLUS Platinum PSU. The R281-T91 is a 2U height dual socket general purpose ThunderX2 rack server with 8 channels RDIMM / ECC UDIMM DDR4 memory, 24 x DIMM slots, 1 x 25GbE SFP28 LAN port, 1 x 10GbE SFP+ LAN port (optional), 24 x 2.5” hot-swap HDD bays, 8 x PCIe 3.0 expansion slots, Aspeed AST2500 management controller, and 1+1 1600W 80 PLUS Platinum PSU. The R181-T90 and R281-T91 will be available to order from July 2018. The H261-T60 is a 2U height 4 node density optimized ThunderX2 server with dual ThunderX2 CN9975 sockets for each node (8 x sockets in total) and rear access to the node trays. The sockets will support a CPU up to 195W TDP. Each node supports 4 channels RDIMM / ECC UDIMM DDR4 memory, with 64 x DIMM slots for the system in total. The system contains in total 8 x SFP28 10G/25G LAN ports, 4 dedicated management ports, 12 x 3.5” SATA/SAS hot-swap HDD/SSD bays, 8 x low profile PCIe Gen3 expansion slots, 4 x OCP Gen3 mezzanine slots, and the system includes Aspeed AST2500 remote management controller and 1 + 1 2200W 80 PLUS Platinum redundant PSU. The H261-T60 will be available for shipping in late September or early October 2018. Find more information on GIGABYTE’s server products at http://b2b.gigabyte.com
Vuzix Blade Developer Kit AR Smart Glasses about to ship
Paul Travers, President and CEO at Vuzix talks about how Vuzix is about to ship the Vuzix Blade Developer Kit to developers, providing a wearable smart display with a see-through viewing experience utilizing Vuzix’s proprietary waveguide optics and Cobra II display engine, to be able to see overlaid information, indoors or out, such as patient data, mapping directions, restaurant menus, weather information, alerts and more without picking up a smartphone. Vuzix Blade (see my previous videos about the Vuzix Blade here) can also synchronize and interact with a smartphone, allowing users to keep their phone in their pockets for almost everything where fashion meets technology in the wearable display arena. Vuzix also recently announced partnership to use the new Qualcomm Snapdragon XR1 Platform and also working with Plessey microLED Microdisplay Technology.
Qualcomm Press Conference at Computex 2018
Qualcomm launches the Snapdragon 850 for Windows 10, with representatives of Microsoft and Samsung participating in the keynote too. You can see my extensive video interview about Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 for Windows 10 Laptops here.
Cavium ThunderX2 benchmarks compared with Intel and AMD
Patrick Kennedy, Editor-in-Chief at ServeTheHome.com talks about the independent benchmarks on ThunderX2 that he published at ServeTheHome.com as Cavium announced General Availability of the ThunderX2 ARM Server at their event in San Francisco last month.
The ThunderX2 family includes over 40 different SKUs for both scale up and scale out applications, ranging from top bin 32 core 2.5GHz parts to 16-core 1.6GHz parts, mapping directly across Intel’s Xeon Skylake server CPUs from highest end Platinum to low end SKUs. With list prices for volume SKUs (32 core 2.2GHz and below) ranging from $1795 to $800, the ThunderX2 family offers 2-4X better performance per dollar compared to Xeon Skylake family of processors. The ThunderX2 family is fully compliant with Armv8-A architecture specifications as well as the Arm Server Base System Architecture and Arm Server Base Boot Requirements standards. The ThunderX2 SoC family is supported by a comprehensive software ecosystem, ranging from platform level systems management and firmware to commercial Operating Systems, Development Environments and Applications. Cavium has actively engaged in server industry standards groups such as UEFI and delivered numerous reference platforms to a broad array of community and corporate partners. Cavium has also demonstrated its leadership role in the Open Source software community driving upstream kernel enablement and toolchain optimization, actively contributing to Linaro’s Enterprise and Networking Groups, investing in key Linux Foundation projects such as DPDK, OpenHPC, OPNFV and Xen and sponsoring the FreeBSD Foundation’s Armv8 server implementation.
Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 for Windows 10 Laptops
35% performance upgrade compared with Snapdragon 835 Windows 10 Laptops such as the Asus Novago which I filmed here features Qualcomm Kyro 385 which is their customized Octa-core quad ARM Cortex-A75 and quad ARM Cortex-A55, going up to 2.95GHz with less throttling. Samsung announces that they will be making Windows 10 on Snapdragon 850 device. Other manufacturing partners Asus, HP and Lenovo are also going to release new devices featuring this chipset. The Snapdragon 850 features 1.2Gbit/s LTE using the X20 modem on SoC (20% faster than 835), fast Wi-Fi, 3x faster AI performance than 835, up to 25 hours of continuous usage. Qualcomm Aqstic enables virtual surround sound, native DSD support, aptX HD as well as 4K capture (possibly up to 4K video-conferencing possible). Microsoft has published this session video from their recent Build conference explaining how developers can compile, build and optimize ARMv8 versions of any Windows app, on stage they showed how to compile the Windows VLC app for the ARM64 Windows 10 platform. Working with Gemalto, Qualcomm demonstrates Integrated SIM (iSIM) on their Snapdragon 850 trusted secure hardware element, to be able to select, load Telecom packages full securely, perhaps eventually also load and store any SIM card into the device and switch between each one.
Libre Computer Development Boards S905X, RK3328, H2+/H3/H5 form-factor compatible with Raspberry Pi
Libre Computer introduces three products of their CC-series which are form-factor compatible with the Raspberry Pi boards and based on open-market hardware. Depending on the model, these single-board computers (SBCs) offer higher performance, more RAM, and/or more IO while sharing the existing aftermarket parts ecosystem. All three products were featured on crowdfunding and supported by free and open source software (FOSS) like Linux and u-boot.
AML-S905X-CC, nicknamed Le Potato, is based on the popular Amlogic S905X SoC. It offers up to 2GB of RAM, four 64-bit cores, 4K60 video playback with HDR, and built-in infrared receiver. This board is the most power-efficient platform of the three and uses less than one watt at idle. There is a large suite of available software for the S905X SoC and it is the only one that has previously passed certification for Google’s Android TV platform. Currently, video decode is missing from upstream Linux and is only available from Amlogic’s BSP with Linux 4.9. Android up to 8 Oreo is available with design contract.
ROC-RK3328-CC, nicknamed Renegade, is based on the Rockchip RK3328 SoC. It offers up to 4GB of high-speed DDR4, four 64-bit cores, 4K60 video playback with HDR, USB 3.0, Gigabit Ethernet. Perfect for IO intensive application like home media center, NAS, microservice virtualization, and more. HDMI support in upstream Linux is scheduled to be completed in Q4 2018. Ubuntu and Debian with accelerated video and 3D is available based on Rockchip’s BSP with Linux 4.4. Android up to 8 Oreo is schedule to be available in Q3 2018 with design contract.
ALL-H3-CC, nicknamed Tritium, is based on three separate Allwinner SoCs: H2+, H3, and H5. The H2+ variant offers 512MB of RAM, four 32-bit cores, and 1080P video playback. The H3 variant is the H2+ variant with 1GB of RAM and 4K30 video playback. The H5 variant offers 2GB of RAM, four 64-bit cores, and 4K30 video playback. There is a large software community behind Allwinner SoCs called linux-sunxi and they have been upstreaming Linux hardware support for almost a decade. This platform also has a crowdfunded effort for video decode Linux upstream underway by Bootlin. Android up to 7 Nougat is available.
Full Comparison of Board Features
Libre Computer platforms are radio-less, FCC and CE certified, long-term-supported (LTS 5Y+) single-board computers. Libre Computer offers hardware customization on all supported SoC platforms. Standard boards with components added/removed can be ordered with 1K MOQ. Small effort customization/mezzanine design contract can be requested with 5K MOQ. Full custom design contracts are available for orders with 20K MOQ. Industrial design, software, project management resources are available as part of design contract.
$1299 Nvidia Jetson Xavier dev kit, 8-core ARMv8, 512-core Volta GPU for AI Robotics
Nvidia launes Jetson Xavier with 20x the performance of Jetson TX2 and 10x the energy efficiency with 512-core Volta GPU with Tensor Cores in an embedded module with more than 9 billion transistors it runs at under 30W, with multiple operating modes at 10W, 15W, and 30W. The Jetson Xavier ARM SoC has 6 kinds of high-performance processors on its SoC, a Volta Tensor Core GPU, an eight-core ARM64 CPU, dual NVDLA deep learning accelerators, an image processor, a vision processor and a video processor. Jetson Xavier has a peak performance of up to 30 TOPS (trillion operations per second) of mixed-precision FP32/FP16/INT8 performance. It can encode dual 4K60 H265 and decode dual 4K60 H265 at up to 12bit. Comes with 16GB LPDDR4x RAM with 137GB/s memory bandwidth, 32GB eMMC storage. It also has a dual NVDLA DL/ML Accelerator Engines which are open source available at http://nvdla.org and a 7-way VLIW Vision Accelerator. Nvidia Jetson Xavier runs using the Nvidia Isaac platform, a toolbox for the simulation, training, verification and deployment of Jetson Xavier. This robotics software consists of: Isaac SDK, APIs and tools to develop robotics algorithm software and runtime framework with fully accelerated libraries, Isaac IMX (Intelligent Machine Acceleration) applications, a collection of NVIDIA-developed robotics algorithm software, Isaac Sim, a highly realistic virtual simulation environment for developers to train autonomous machines and perform hardware-in-the-loop testing with Jetson Xavier. The Nvidia Jetson Xavier developer kit, which includes the Isaac robotics software, will be priced at $1,299, with early access starting in August from distributors worldwide.
Honor 10, Notch, Kirin970 without PC Mode, glimmering back
Huawei’s Honor group launches the new Honor 10 Smartphone at $399, it comes with a Notch (which I don’t understand why, except for copying Apple’s mistake), it runs on the ultra fast Hisilicon Kirin 970 processor but they did not include the PC Mode in this one, that PC Mode is only available in Huawei Mate 10 and P20. The very glimmering back side of the phone is a fingerprint magnet, not sure if the effect looks as good if a transparent back case is used. They use an ultrasonic based front side finderprint reader, though I prefer when fingerprint readers are on the back.
Aiptek APEX and i70 pico projectors
Aiptek is a leading Chinse manufacturer of Projectors ranging in prices from $50 to $1000. One interesting device from Aiptek is the APEX projector with a built in Windows PC that is modular and detachable. The Aiptek i70 is the world’s smallest wireless projector.
Onyx Boox with PadMu Music e-reader, new e-readers Boox Ligo, Nova, Poke, Note S and more to come
Sandro Casiraghi presents https://www.padformusician.com/en/ based on the awesome Onyx Boox Max2 for a single or dual 97% of full A4 “like A4 paper” digital music notes reading experience, with a synchronized Bluetooth page turning pedal and Smartphone app. There are more than 1 million professional musicians in the world who potentially could benefit from this technology. This is made possible due to Onyx’s Android solution on their Boox E Ink e-reader platform, as this is enabled through Android. The two readers connect via Wi-Fi direct and the master reader connects with the pedal and Smartphone using Bluetooth. Thus far they have been reaching out to professional and amateur musicians to get their feedback. Onyx is bringing their whole E Ink e-reader range up to their new Quad-core 1.6Ghz ARM platform with smoother and faster page turns, faster and better Android support. Onyx shows some of their new 6″ e-reader designs including Boox Ligo, Boox Nova, Boox Poke that will come before the end of the year. While the 10.3″ Boox Note is awesome, it is probably not a large enough screen for the music reading market. The Boox 9.7″ Note S is newer and thinner and lighter too on their new faster platform too.
Interested distributors of the PadMu and potential e-Music reading customers can contact and read more about PadMu here:
sandro@outeringdigital.com
https://www.facebook.com/padformusician/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9X6m6ctJ6PPGYMlngEbNvA
$300 Sunchip All-in-one AR on RK3288 (like Hololens), $7 Wi-Fi power plug
Sunchip shows some of their latest products including their all-in-one AR system based on Rockchip RK3288, RK3399 board for digital signage. $58 Amlogic S912 TV box, $26 RK3126 HDMI Stick, $200 Apollo Lake Box. 360 panoramic camera. $7 single Smart Wi-Fi Plug, $11 for dual Wi-Fi plug.
Actions S900 in Cubiedboard9 dev board, ATB1103/ATB1109 ARM Cortex-M0
Actions S900 is a Quad-core ARM Cortex-A53, the Actions S500 is a Quad-core Cortex-A9. Actions also shows some other products for video smart speaker, smart door bell, smart kids robots, Actions also provides their MIPS based chipset for Bluetooth speakers, here also they are launching their new ATB1103/ATB1109 ARM Cortex-M0 system for their upcoming Bluetooth and perhaps also low cost smart speakers platform.
Allwinner VR9 (hopefully Daydream All-in-one ready) launched, VR-optimized quad-core ARM Cortex-A53
The new Allwinner VR9 is quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 processor with an independent 32KB L1 I-cache + 32KB L1 D-cache, shared 512KB L2 cache, with MaliT760 GPU and support for OpenGLES 3.2 and OpenCL 1.1. Allwinner VR9 is the first SoC optimized for VR, with as low as dedicated 20ms low latency acceleration module portal, dual-engine direct drive dual-screen system, panoramic 6K visual effects with support for expansive camera positioning, up to 6K30 H265 and 4K60 HEVC/VP9 video decode. Allwinner’s hope is that this SoC can be compatible with the Google Daydream platform for All-in-one VR device usage.
EmdoorVR Allwinner VR9 design house
Emdoor is one of the largest design houses in Shenzhen, here they talk about their support for the new Allwinner VR9 quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 processor with an independent single core 32KB L1 I-cache + 32KB L1 D-cache, shared 512KB L2 cache, with MaliT760 GPU and support for OpenGLES 3.2 and OpenCL 1.1. Allwinner VR9 is the first SoC optimized for VR, with as low as dedicated 20ms low latency acceleration module portal, dual-engine direct drive dual-screen system, panoramic 6K visual effects with support for expansive camera positioning, up to 6K30 H265 and 4K60 HEVC/VP9 video decode.
Allwinner A63, A50, A33G
Allwinner releases their new ARM SoCs for 64bit and 32bit cost effective tablets, featuring their new Allwinner A63 Quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 with Mali-T760MP2 GPU. This video was filmed at the Allwinner press conference event in Shenzhen where they had a lot of their industry partners, design houses, factories, OEMs, software partners, to see and to hear about the latest of what Allwinner has been working to do for them. The new Allwinner A50 is Allwinner’s mid-range Quad-core ARM Cortex-A7 with Mali-400 GPU with support for DDR4 and LPDDR4 RAM, better TLC based Flash memory. For the very entry level Tablet market, Allwinner presents their new Allwinner A33G which is limited at a lower 1.35Ghz clock-speed with a lower resolution display support. While these 3 new ARM Processors by Allwinner are presented as their newest Tablet processors, they are also compatible with all sorts of other devices which could be Robots, interactive Smart Speakers with displays, Smart Rearview Mirrors, Smart Mirrors, Laptops, Desktops, and more. Allwinner also talks about their participation in the Open AI Labs which I also filmed here.
Bero shows AOSP TV 8.1, Gemini PDA, Android with newer kernels at Linaro LMG/LHG hacking room
Bero (Bernhard Rosenkränzer) and his colleagues from the Linaro Mobile Group (Android) and the Linaro Home Group (TV Boxes) are working in the hacking room at Linaro Connect to prepare some demos for Demo Friday including AOSP TV on 8.1 (while most Android TV runs on 7.1), updating the Linux kernel on Android phones to some newer kernel version, and Bero also gives his opinions on the multi-Linux booting Gemini PDA amazing keyboard phone which he has purchased (see my video on Gemini PDA Linux support here)
