MojoKid writes:
The tiny single-board PC movement that's leading the Internet of Things (IoT) market is largely dominated by ARM-based processors, and for good reason — they're cheap, low power and capable. However, what if you prefer to work with the x86 architecture? JaguarBoard looks strikingly similar to Raspberry Pi, which is arguably the most popular single-board mini PC. But unlike Raspberry Pi, JaguarBoard allows users to develop for x86, courtesy of its Intel Atom Z3735G (Bay Trail) foundation. The chip is a quad-core part clocked at 1.33GHz to 1.83GHz with 2MB of L2 cache, offering a fair amount of horsepower for IoT applications. In addition to an Atom processor, JaguarBoard also boasts 1GB of DDR3L memory, 16GB of eMMC storage, three USB 2.0 ports, 10/100M LAN port, HDMI 1.4 output, SDIO 3.0 socket, two COM ports, four GPIO pins, and audio ports. It's an interesting device that you could use strictly as a mini PC for general purpose computing, as an embedded system, a learning or research tool, or for whatever DIY projects you can conjure up. It's not the only hobbyist-appropriate x86 board, but those specs are pretty good for $45.
The RPi's "secret weapon"
By petes_PoV
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2016-Jan-24 12:41
• Score: 5, Informative
• Thread
Is its following, community and wide range of available software.
Without something comparable, all the SBCs in the world amount to very little. For example, consider the Orange Pi. It's based on a different architecture, it uses a different boot-up process. Sure, it runs Linux, it's probably hardware compatible up to a point, it's cheaper: $15 compared to what? $30 for a RPi (I'm not up to date on US dollar prices). Has it taken the world by storm? No. Can you buy it without sending your money to China and waiting 1 - 2 months? Definitely not.
What it, and all the other SBCs, lack is the ease of use. The wide range of almost-working software. The examples to create your own almost-working software. The documentation about what almost works and the "experts" (those people who can make TWO LEDs flash) who can and will answer questions - preferable with correct answers.
NanoPi2 does more for less
By Okian Warrior
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2016-Jan-24 12:51
• Score: 3
• Thread
I just got a couple of NanoPi 2's, they're 1.4 GHz, and have embedded wireless on the board.
For $32, you don't need an octopus of wires to power your wifi USB dongle through a USB hub, both of which you need for the Raspberry PI. A NanoPi2, a $6 USB power supply, a 16GB memory card, and you're ready to go.
Of course, feel free to develop for the X86, because it's *such* an elegant architecture...
The client wanted a system to log (plastic injection molding) machine cycles, so I wrote a script to read the GPIO and make entries to a remote MySQL database. Everything except the glue script was off the shelf and open source. He can use any open source DB viewer and make whatever data views he needs.
You can make an IoT device in an afternoon with one of these.
Re:The RPi's "secret weapon"
By goombah99
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2016-Jan-24 12:56
• Score: 4, Informative
• Thread
Yep. I wasted $20 on an Orange Pi PC. Official distro would not boot, eventually found an unofficial on that would boot linux. Only ran on one of it's CPUs it looks like. And not much support for GPIO modes like SPI. it would not work with any of the bog standard monitors I owned. Did get it to work on an HDMI TV but only in certain modes. Problems with KEy boards. Would not recognize some SIM cards despite their meeting specs.
Sure I could make it work, but would I develop for it? no because if I came back a year later I'd probably fiund anything I created would not work on their unsupported releases and there would be a newer board out. With Rpi I can be productive imediately and know I have path forward for anything I make.
Re:Not a Raspberry pi competitor.
By LarryRiedel
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2016-Jan-24 13:36
• Score: 4, Insightful
• Thread
I don't know of a $45 Amazon tablet that can be a standalone off the shelf x86 Ubuntu system with performance comparable to a netbook which can host VMs running Ubuntu Snappy Core for IoT applications. Since the JaguarBoard also has I2C, COM and GPIO ports, it can in some cases be a replacement for an RPi, depending on the number of units to be deployed in production, and the profit margin and TCO of the target solution.
Power?
By stabiesoft
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2016-Jan-24 13:52
• Score: 3
• Thread
No mention of power consumption. And as a guy who just dd a pool controller than used 7 GPIO + 4 analog ins, it would not fit the bill. And as a guy about to do an irrigation controller that needs 8 GPIO, again, no dice. I've been settling on beagleboard greens for my projects lately. Low power (2.5W) lots of GPIO, and analog in that is good enough. Raspberry would have worked for irrigation, but price is close, and had an extra beaglebone from initial order in case I blew one up when building the pool controller.