Open Hardware and Linux-Friendly Devices

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Mar 14, 2023,
updated Mar 14, 2023

• Meet VEEB, aka makers Vanessa and Martin

  After a few years of working in IT for big corporations, they then made another change to photography, with a side of making to go with it.

  “We’ve always been early-adopters and interested in getting stuff to do new things that are a touch outside of the originally intended use-case,” the two tell us. “We also benefited from open-source tools when we were using Linux wa(aaaaa)y back in the 1990s, so we are keen to share what we do in case anyone finds it useful.”

• FreeBSD and NetBSD laptop feedback: the Framework

  Overwhelmingly the recommendation was the Framework, which I’ve looked at before but completely forgot. Their website doesn’t make it easy to find the display resolution, but other sites report it as 2256×1504, which is excellent.

• This beautiful clock features circuit sculpture faux Nixie tubes

  Each of the “Nixie tubes” used in this project is actually made entirely with 1206 SMD (surface-mount device) LEDs. But instead of soldering those onto PCBs, 4Dcircuitry attached them to formed 0.8mm brass rods to create tiny circuit sculptures. Those plug into custom PCBs which arrange the circuit sculptures, each a single segment, in a horizontal stack. Glass tubes cover each stack, making them look like Nixie tubes when viewed from the front.

• A Stranded Motorist Tied His Phone to a Drone and Got Rescued

  The man was traveling with an aerial drone. The following day, he tied his cellphone to the drone and typed out a text message to a friend that explained his ordeal and location. The man then flew the drone several hundred feet into the air with the phone attached.

  “The increased elevation allowed his phone to connect to a tower and send the message, which resulted in our teams being deployed and assisting him out of his situation,” the report said.

• the door close button

  But perhaps I am being too pedantic. Elevator control systems are complex and highly configurable. Whether or not the door close button is "hooked up" or not is mostly irrelevant if the controller is configured to ignore the button, and it's possible that some of these articles are actually referring to a configuration issue. So what can we find about the way elevators are configured?

• Toradex Verdin SoM integrates TI Sitara AM62x processors

  Toradex new System-on-Modules are built around the Texas Instruments TI AM62x processor for commercial and industrial applications. The Verdin AM62x is equipped with 4GB eMMC, up to 1GB LPDDR4, two displays, one MIPI CSI and many other peripherals.

• Firefly announces AI mainboard with 2x GbE and Dual Band Wi-Fi connectivity

  Firefly announced today a single board computer based on the BM1684X Octa-core processor. The AIO-1684XJD4 can be configured with up to 16GB RAM, 128GB eMMC and it includes multiple storage interfaces.

• ASRock Jupiter 600 Series compatible with Alder Lake/Raptor Lake processors

  Last week, ASRock launched their newest Mini-PCs featuring a LGA1700 socket for Intel 13th/12th Gen CPUs. The Jupiter H610/B660 supports up to 64GB of DDR4 RAM, 2x DisplayPort, 1x HDMI port and multiple USB interfaces.