The ARGUS BOARD is a newly developed, unique microcomputer board specializing in sensing. It offers high processing capability and a mounted FPGA that will support the development efforts of everyone from researchers to students working on sensing prototypes.
At CES, THK will show prototype applications using the company’s ARGUS BOARD microcomputers for IoT and industrial applications.
ARGUS BALANCE is a sensing chair that can detect breathing and other body information; ATMOS II is a human shaped sensing object which can detect the surrounding environment; and SENSING SCAPE STUDIO transforms environmental information into media art will all be seen on the company’s stand.
The ARGUS BOARD is specialised in sensing and features high processing capability and a mounted FPGA to support the development of prototypes. The board is based on the ESP32 (from Espressif systems) which has a processing capability of 600 MIPS. It has a mounted FPGA to make microcomputer programming and processing simple. The FPGA and ESP32 processor provide advanced security features to prevent intrusion and data exploitation. All boards have a unique ID as well as an encrypted code.
The /SMARTEDGE AGILE meta-sensor, together with the Brainium Machine Learning cloud platform, form part of an ecosystem which provides a full, machine learning IoT system. The key advantages of this system are the use of Artificial Intelligence to analyse and monitor complex behaviours in motion, or of any of the other parameters for which sensor types are built into the AGILE meta-sensor. Brainium builds a complex Machine Learning model from the raw data acquired by AGILE. That model is then deployed right back to AGILE at the edge of the IoT network; now, real AI is running at the edge, where only qualified data is now sent to the Cloud, and decisions can be taken autonomously without the need for constant involvement by Cloud services.
Brainium, and the /SMARTEDGE AGILE meta-sensor’s origins lie in developments in the sports industry, where analysing motion is critically important to top sporting performance. A highly skilled software development team has built a comparatively easy to use platform, consisting of deceptively complex machine learning systems, and autonomous meta-sensors which together, deliver ease of use, and a complete configuration platform. At its heart is over four years of real machine learning. An IoT network consisting of the Brainium platform and AGILE sensors is easy to put together because of its edge-to-cloud architecture. Any gateway used by the AGILE meta-sensors to connect to the Brainium platform is completely transparent to AGILE data traffic due to its edge-to-cloud security, making deployment easy. Further, the Brainium platform itself can be consumed as a Cloud service, or it can be containerised for use within other services, or even run privately. Best in class network security has been built in from the start, with full edge-to-cloud certificate based TLS security implemented as standard, protecting you, your network, and your reputation from attack. AI at the Edge increases the immediacy of decision making, and lessens the need for high volumes of traffic, reducing the need for high bandwidth connections from Edge to Cloud. All of this means a less expensive ongoing cost of ownership. In short Brainium and the Agile meta-sensor device make AI easy to implement, and cost effective to deploy without compromising on security.
Specifications
Sensor Board
Accelerometer + Gyroscope
Magnetometer
Pressure Sensor
Temperature & Humidity
Proximity/Ambient Light Sensor
Microphone
Connectivity
BLE 5.0
USB type C
Brainium
Software included at 3 levels (device, gateway, server)
AI Studio to build models and send them to the Edge
Maximum of 6 months Microsoft Azure hosting included
SmartEdge Agile integrates nine sensors, and allows the implementation of AI at the edge through an easy-to-use, zero-code interface. SmartEdge Agile uses Bluetooth Low Energy 5.0 and is CE and FCC certified. The device is based around an 80-MHz, 32-bit Brainium STM32 chip featuring an ARM Cortex-M4. Integrated sensors include two 3D accelerometers, a 3D gyroscope, a 3D magnetometer, a pressure sensor, a humidity and temperature sensor, a microphone, an ambient light sensor and proximity sensor, all from STMicroelectronics. SmartEdge Agile also has a Secure Element for authentication, encryption and integrity of the exchanged data. The device has a modular build with a sensor board, connectivity board and a USB Type C connector to allow customization.
This board uses 3 x WS2811 IC to control the segments of the segmented display. This means they can be daisy chained and controlled with just a single data line. by Sean Hodgins on github.com
For all those entertainment lovers who would like to watch their videos on a large screen, portable projectors such as the DeepLee DP300 mini projector and APEMAN mini portable projector were created. However, most of these existing projectors have some common issues such as the use of long cables or an inability to connect to Wi-Fi, but all those belong to the past.
The Pico Projector team which has been into the entertainment industry for a very long time decided to create a mini projector without those issues. The idea came in November 2017, and the team has worked hard to create PIQO – A Mini HD Pocket-Friendly Projector.
PIQO – A Mini HD Pocket-Friendly Projector.
PIQO is a 2.25-inch cubed projector which can be carried around because of its size. It only requires a cable when it is being charged. The mini projector can be used to watch movies and videos for a maximum of 5 hours. It also has 50 hours music playback battery life. The projector comes with Hi-Fi speakers which gives amazing sound effects when listening to music or watching videos.
The 210 grams projector is powered by Android Nougat (Android 7) and is able to connect with most of the devices out there, whether you are using Android, Windows, Linux, or iOS, PIQO gets you covered. One great feature of this pocket projector is the fact that it is compatible with over 3 million applications and even supports Google play-store. It comes with its own 16GB offline storage for video storage that have been downloaded.
PIQO Specs
PIQO has a 64-bit quad-core CPU and gives 200 lumens output, whether it’s day or night, you’ll enjoy an HD viewing experience in stunning clarity. It supports video format of up to 1080p HD. It has great gravity sensors which make it to automatically adjust its angle once the projector is moved when in use. It has HDMI and USB ports and an audio jack port. The projector charges super fast, and you can use it for an hour if it has been charged for at least 15 minutes; when compared to other portable projectors, this is a significant improvement.
The projector is not just a smaller version of the other portable projectors, and it comes with better features. It is touch sensitive and has easy control interface. It comes with Bluetooth 5.0. Once connected, PIQO can cast from any device and project onto any surface.
The team had the idea in November 2017, by November 2018 the product was complete and a campaign was launched on Indiegogo. Right now, the product has 2522 backers and has already raised over $871,600. The early bird price is now $349 because of a discount made by Indiegogo. Want to get on the PIQO wagon, check out their campaign page.
Maxim MAXM17552 Compact Step-Down Power Modules are part of the Himalaya series of voltage regulator ICs that offer cooler, smaller, and simpler power-supply solutions. The high efficiency, synchronous, step-down MAXM17552 DC-DC power module consists of an integrated controller, MOSFETs, compensation components, and inductor.
The device operates over a wide input voltage range of 4V to 60V and delivers up to 100mA output current. This is over a programmable output voltage from 0.9V to 5.5V. With a true “plug and play” power supply solution, the MAXM17552 significantly reduces design complexity and manufacturing risks, decreasing the time-to-market. A peak-current-mode control architecture is enabled on the module, as well as a soft-start feature including the default soft-start time of 5.1ms. The MAXM17552 features ±1.75% feedback-voltage accuracy, and a fixed-frequency PWM in a low profile 10-pin 2.6mm x 3mm x 1.5mm µSLIC™ package.
MAXM17552 Typical Application Circuit
Features
Ease-of-Use
Wide 4V to 60V Input
Adjustable 0.9V to 5.5V Output
±1.75% Feedback-Voltage Accuracy
Up to 100mA Output Current Capability
Internally Compensated
All Ceramic Capacitors
High Efficiency
Fixed-Frequency PWM
Pulse Frequency Modulation (PFM) Mode to Enhance Light-Load Efficiency
Shutdown Current as Low as 1.2µA (typ)
Flexible Design
Programmable Soft-Start and Prebias Startup
Open-Drain Power Good Output (Active-Low RESET Pin)
Programmable EN/UVLO Threshold
Robust Operation
Hiccup Overcurrent Protection
Overtemperature Protection
-40°C to +125°C Ambient OperatingTemperature/ -40°C to +150°C Junction Temperature
Rugged
Complies with CISPR22 (EN55022) Class B Conducted and Radiated Emissions
Cypress CYBLE-022001-00 EZ-BLE PRoC Module is a programmable, SMT ready, full certified small form factor BLE Module with integrated crystals and an on board chip antenna. The CYBLE-022001-00 is a turnkey solution that eliminates RF hardware design and reduces investment by eliminating the certification process. Its programmable architecture supports a number of peripheral functions (ADC, timers, counters, PWM) and serial communication protocols (I2C, UART, SPI).
The CYBLE-022001-00 is a complete solution and an ideal fit for applications requiring BLE wireless connectivity.
Specifications
Module size: 10.0 mm ×10.0 mm × 1.80 mm (with shield)
Bluetooth 4.1 single-mode module
Industrial temperature range: –40 °C to +85 °C
32-bit processor (0.9 DMIPS/MHz) with single-cycle 32-bit multiply, operating at up to 48 MHz
128-KB flash memory
16-KB SRAM memory
Watchdog timer with dedicated internal low-speed oscillator (ILO)
Two-pin SWD for programming
Up to 16 GPIOs configurable as open drain high/low, pull-up/pull-down, HI-Z analog, HI-Z digital, or strong output
Certified to FCC, CE, MIC, KC, and ISED regulations. Refer to KBA97094 for RF certification test reports.
ESP-EYE is an upcoming AI development board from Espressif Systems with the hope of getting a grab of the already saturating machine learning ecosystem which is mostly optimized for ARM-based architectures. The ESP-EYE board which initially appeared on CNX Software doesn’t seem to be readily available for purchase.
ESP EYE AI Development Board
At the core of the board is the ESP32 dual core Tensilica LX6 processor, 8 MB PSRAM and a 4MB flash. The ESP EYE integrates a digital microphone as well as provides an external 2-million-pixel camera making it capable of AI features such as face detection, face recognition, speech recognition, and voice wake-up which are all supported out of the box. The board can also support image transmission over Wi-Fi and debugging using the Micro USB port, which enables user’s development of advanced AI solutions.
The board shares similar traits with the ESP32-CAM camera board which includes a micro camera, only that it adds a microphone, it’s an “official” Espressif product which will translate to more software support, and it is smaller than the CAM board as well.
The software stack that will power the ESP-EYE is their own ESP-WHO framework. The voice wake-up command for the ESP EYE is “Hi Lexin,” and the board will successfully wake itself up by switching on the Red LED while the white LED goes off.
Below are some of the specifications of the ESP-EYE development board:
WiSoC- ESP32 dual core Tensilica LX6 processor with WiFi and Bluetooth
Memory – 8MB PSRAM
Storage – 4MB flash
Camera – 2MP OV2640 camera
Audio – Microphone
USB – 1x micro USB port for power and programming
Misc – Reset, boot and function buttons, 2x LEDs
Dimensions – 41 x 21 mm
The illustration below shows working procedure of the ESP-EYE:
ESP-EYE supports firmware downloading with a PC loaded with Linux, MacOs or Windows operating systems. For now, users must set up toolchain in the development environment before starting the software development.
As raised on Reddit by some users, whether “Face detection is done on board or images are streamed to open CV somewhere,” ESP-EYE definitely do the face detection on board. The ESP-EYE is going to open up new applications for newer and existing projects in the areas of computer vision, imagine what you can do with hacking an Arduino to work together with the ESP-EYE. You can create a low-cost AI project. I need to get my hands on one now!
More information is available on the getting started page on Github, which is super straightforward on how to get it running.
Worldwide provider of measurement solutions Tektronix Inc has launched a new Initial State data streaming and visualization service for individuals. The cloud-based data service includes unlimited data streaming and beautiful visualizations. It is priced at $9.99 per month or $99 per year and is free for students. It enables users’ access, analyze, and transform data in a web browser or from a smartphone. The data streaming and visualization platform were acquired by Tektronix with its acquisition of Initial State Technologies (Nashville, TN).
The Initial State platform enables a highly secure centralized depository for time-series data and untethers analysis from installed software. All visualization and analysis applications are accessible through a web browser. Initial State employs AWS infrastructure and enterprise-grade best practices for encryption, data and access management, and provides high uptime and full data prolixity. The platform boasts of processing over 100 billion data points in the last year with zero downtime. Initial State founder and CEO Jamie Bailey said the data streaming visualization service was designed to give engineers, technologists, scientists, and students a powerful, reliable and flexible set of data tools they can afford.
We are thrilled to be part of the Tektronix family and look forward to bringing our data streaming and visualization service to a much broader audience on a global basis.
.. says Jamie Bailey.
The platform integrates a host of tools that make it an important part of the toolbox for a wide range of applications like home/office monitoring, IoT device performance dashboards, GPS trackers, manufacturing line data collection, education, and energy use tracking. The $9.99 per month price is inclusive a web-based dashboard builder, up to 180 API calls (1,800 events) per minute data streaming, email and SMS triggering and private or public sharing of data and dashboards.
A common application for Initial State is the Internet of Things (IoT) data stream analysis. eleven-x, a LoRaWAN network operator and IoT solutions provider, makes use of Initial State to monitor and analyze real-time sensor data from devices installed in wells for water levels and temperature. Another application for Initial State is availing affordable data streaming potentials to hobbyists and educational projects. Due to this, Initial State has partnered with the Raspberry Pi Foundation to enable students worldwide to build their own weather analysis for the Raspberry Pi Oracle Weather Station project.
The Initial State platform is available now. Following the free 14-day trial, pricing for Initial State is $9.99 per month or $99 per year. For more information, visit www.initialstate.com
When I was a lad back in 1975, I worked as a student engineer testing military aircraft computer memory modules. Looking back now, they probably represented the ultimate development of Ferromagnetic ring core technology. Each module measured about 18 x 10 x 6cm, and contained nearly 600,000 ferrite ring cores providing 32K x 18bit words of Non-Volatile Random-Access Memory or NVRAM. Each core was about 0.033mm in diameter and three wires had to be fed through the hole in its centre. No machine had the precision to weave this metallic fabric, so people with very steady hands and incredible eyesight were employed to make it by hand! That and the full military specification accounted for the price tag of £25,000 each – in 1975 money. Core memory exploits the Hysteresis property of ferromagnetic materials whereby they remain magnetised after the magnetising force is removed. If the core is magnetised in one direction, this could represent a logic 1. Reverse the force and the core is flipped to the opposite polarity – a logic 0. Unfortunately, the method used to read the data destroys it, so a read cycle has to be followed by a write-back of the original state.
MYIR launches a 7-inch HMI display panel with capacitive touch screen, the MYD-Y6ULX-CHMI, which runs Linux on NXP’s i.MX6 ULL ARM Cortex-A7 processor, is specially designed for HMI system like POS, Intelligent access control and more other applications.
The MYD-Y6ULX-CHMI Display Panel consists of an MYD-Y6ULX-HMI Development Board and a 7-inch capacitive LCD mounting on its top. The MYD-Y6ULX-HMI is built around MYIR’s MYC-Y6ULX CPU Module with 528MHz i.MX6 ULL SoC, 256MB DDR3 and 256MB Nand Flash. Many peripheral interfaces are available from the base board including RS232, RS485, Ethernet, USB Host/Device, LCD, Camera, TF card slot and etc. The 7-inch capacitive LCD offers 800×480 pixels display resolution.
MYD-Y6ULX-HMI Development BoardMEasyHMI QT Demo Display on 7-inch LCD
Apart from the hardware, MYIR also provides software resources to help with customers’ development. The MYD-Y6ULX-CHMI is preloaded with Linux OS. MYIR provides plenty of resources including kernel and drivers in source code, application examples and an MEasyHMI QT demo for developers to start their development rapidly.
The MYD-Y6ULX-HMI development board has two 2.0mm pitch 2*20-pin male headers for IO extension. User can customize their own IO boards to connect with the MYD-Y6ULX-HMI to further explore more functions. MYIR offers an IO board MYB-Y6ULX-HMI-4GEXP as an option for users which has extended WiFi & BT, USB based 4G LTE Module interface, Audio and GPIOs. Thus, making the MYD-Y6ULX-CHMI Display Panel a complete solution for HMI applications.
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