Intel's take on the cheap SBC, the Minnowboard.Max
Heater.
Posts: 21,230
Get your Minnow board now. More expensive that a raspberry Pi but more capable also.
Yet another toy to play with...
http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/03/intel-releases-99-minnowboard-max-an-open-source-single-board-computer/
http://www.minnowboard.org/meet-minnowboard-max/
Yet another toy to play with...
http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/03/intel-releases-99-minnowboard-max-an-open-source-single-board-computer/
http://www.minnowboard.org/meet-minnowboard-max/
Comments
@Coley just go directly to www.cubieboard.org and buy a Cubie Truck. Life will be good to you.
Heater has a 'toy store' mentality ... buy one of everything.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/7724/it-begins-amd-announces-its-first-arm-based-server-soc-64bit8core-opteron-a1100
minnowboard.org
Yep, it's going to be interesting to watch this unfold as ARM grows up and Intel tries to scale down.
Also yep, I like to get hold of shiny new toys. If they are interesting sometimes I get more than one. If they fit a project at the time perhaps that ends up involving thousand of units. This has been going on since the days of the 8085, Z80, 6800 etc.
[h=3]Hallelujah[/h]
P.S. Check your P.Ms.
Unless you mean "I'm not using it because, bla, bla, take my advice if your requirements are similar and bla bla may be an issue."
I'm pretty open about what get's used around here and why.
Who is Heather and what has she got to do with this?
Was just trying to bring some lightheartedness to the discussion ;-)
I really have no idea if the Minnow will be anything wonderful, but Intel today has had very high prices and no supported Linux. And Microsoft hasn't grasped SBC in any real sense.
Pretty much every Linux distro has an Intel version and pretty much any Intel computer can run Linux. Intel has been shaking free of MS for ages. They support a lot of open source and Linux development. Even the graphics drivers for the Minnow are open source. Unlike pretty much all ARM SoCs. I dob't forsee any problems with Linux on the Minnow boards.
No body cares what Microsoft thinks about our little SBCs.
Depending on your need a Cubietruck might look silly sitting next to a RasPi and $55 or 2 RasPi's and $20. As always, horses for courses.
There is also a Minnow Board MAX coming, so you might want to pause a little ?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/01/intel_announces_minnowboard_max/
["The new single-board computer – named MinnowBoard Max in a stunningly inventive bit of nomenclature – is powered by a 64-bit Atom processor, a step up from the 32-bit Atom E640 in the original $199 MinnowBoard released last July.
Two models will be available when the MinnowBoard Max ships, estimated to be this June: a version with a single-core 1.46GHz Atom E3815 with 1GB of DDR3 RAM will run $99, and a dual-core 1.33GHz Atom E3825 version with 2GB will cost you $129 (other configurations may also be made available). Both are 22nm parts formerly code-named "Bay Trail", and both have Intel HD graphics on the die, with the E3815's clocked at 400MHz and the E3825's at 533MHz.
Just by way of comparison, you can pick up a Raspberry Pi Model B with 512MB of RAM for around forty or fifty bucks, give or take. The Pi's system-on-chip, on the other hand, contains an aging 32-bit 700MHz ARM1176JZFS (ARMv6) core and a Videocore 4 GPU, so you pays yer money and you takes yer choice."]
Actually that is the board I'm talking about. Except, brains here, forgot to add the links to the first post. I added them now including the minnowboard.org page. So thanks for the heads up on that.
It sounds like a very nice board, smaller and cheaper than the previous Minnow and packs a lot of horse power. We certainly have uses for such a board around here. I'm hoping my boss has snagged one from Intel at the EELive show has he was in San Jose last week.
If he did, let us know how it works.
Shoulda named it aggressively, like the Piranha. But too late for that.
How would you feel when you have to tell your bosses that your Minnow crashed and you can't fix it?
or
My Minnow Max is minced, manager.
You could do the same with a $35 RSI or a Olimex 10-OLinuXino-LIME.
The only motivation to use this platform is for x86 software compatibility. In short if you need to run Windows or DOS on it. Other than that there's no need for it.Look the specs of the board and chips are straight out of a Wintel motherboard. It tells me they haven't a clue as how to approach this market segment.
And at a $100 price point, they won't sell too many.
Or course, if it just a few i/o pins required and an ADC, a PIC will win the day. Those pesky 8pin DIP devices are as handy as bandaids to a bumbling butcher. But the tasking is minimal.
The real GPIO fun is an asynch serial interface to the Propeller that is loaded with Forth. You can revise programs without have to use an IDE to load the Propeller, and you can use the same port to have real time control. Those tiny PICs can do Forth as Forth needs all of 32Kb in Ram for a good dictionary.
The reality is that Intel SBC boards with GPIO and daughter boards have been around for ages -- just generally didn't supported a Linux distribution... had to have Windows of some sort. But I have been corrected. The Minnow will take Debian Linux, but you have to go to Yocto to gain specifics.,
This one has declared a distribution of Linux that I have never heard of, Yocto. Is there $$$ involved, or a special proprietary BIOS that requires a non-disclosure agreement? The first AsusEEE was loaded with Xantos Linux and they tried really hard to make you buy upgrades rather than load another distro.
Good morning. I have this idea. Instead of spending time posting factually incorrect statements it would take you less time to hit Google and get things straight. Then you would have a more correct picture of the world and your readers would be less confused. More efficient and effective for everyone.
Odd that, all the Intel boards I have used over the years have run Linux. They have declared Debian and Yocto. From the Yocto home page:
"The Yocto Project is an open source collaboration project that provides templates, tools and methods to help you create custom Linux-based systems for embedded products regardless of the hardware architecture."
Yes there is money involved the collaborators here are hardware companies. They want to sell hardware. Like Parallax. They have realized that they don't want to waste time and money each building and maintaining their own OS. Or paying MS for one. No, it's better they all work together and build opensource operating systems and tools.
From the Minnowboard Max specifications:
"Operating system Debian GNU/Linux"
http://www.minnowboard.org/meet-minnowboard-max/
But I did heavily shop at one time for Intel SBCs and the vendors were just pushing Windows. At that time a good SBC system with add-on daughter boards cost more than a new PC. So it was a premium for getting small, not a discount. I think those were not SOCs, but I am not sure.
The Intel Atom has worked fine with my AsusEEE pcs for years now... no problem there.
I fear that Intel still desires a premium for small SBCs. Having to go to Yocto to find out you don't need Yocto and that you may use Debian is one of those darn 'clever' things that assures Intel that some will just get Yocto as there is a tacit endorsement by Intel.
I just have a lot of contempt for being manipulated like that. It is an advertising trick... read the book "Thinking fast/thinking slow" for a good discussion on what Intel expects to gain.
I will correct my mis-information in the above.
It does have a SATA port and it is about the same as a CubieTruck in cost. Haven't had time to compare all the specs between the two.
But CubieTruck actually has arrived and is even selling chassis to make a complete unit. HOT stuff.
In contrast, the Minnow is 64 bit. But even though I have a Intel Core Two Quad 64bit, I still have been running 32bit Linux and Vista on it as there were questions about available drivers in 64bit.
With only 2 Gbyte ram tops, I can't seem to see why 64bit is an advantage. Isn't video graphics all 32bit of which 24bits are color and 8 bits are transparency? I don't even need the transparency.
You are right, those Intel SBC and other boards we have used were not cheap. They were so not cheap that the companies I worked for were designing and building their own ARM SoC based boards already 6 or 7 years ago. Then it was a great relief when we could get industrial strength, credit card sized ARM boards. Like this one: https://www.isee.biz/products/igep-processor-boards/igepv2-dm3730
Then came the Raspi and the Cubie and a million others. Getting better and cheaper all the time. Life is good.
Then there is Intel, now trying to grab a slice of this action...
P.S. You did not have to go to Yocto to find out you don't need Yocto. Debian is there boldly displayed in the specs on the minnowboard.org page.
Thing is there are still a lot of industrial users who will not want to use Debian and do everything themselves, they want to be able to get a support contract, pay money, and have someone sort it out for them. Hence the business of RedHat and MontaVista and Linaro and perhaps Yocto.
Parallax does NOT make SOC, nor does it make any form of mainstream computer. Years ago, I purchased quite a few books about RTOS and deterministic programing.
Why so? Deterministic programing is Parallax's long suit and that is what I wanted to learn, also with RTOS.
I also acquired quite a few Linux books for an non-Windows, non-Apple OS. Unlike others that work in the industry, I have never recaptured the expenses that I have laid out for this hobby. So I desire to economize and spend money with a purpose.
Unix systems and the deterivatives are not really ideal for deterministic control and only work in special forms of RTOS that are beyond the scale that a hobbyist might pursue.
IMHO, Credit card sized SOC is just too small to properly populate a SOC motherboard. (I have said that before) and doubt that power distribution or heat removal is appropriate for real use (Intel rates its device at 6 amps. Apply 5 volts that could be a 30 watt sizzler).
So anyway, I got carried away with mocking Intel's latest. I wil stop here and now. I guess I missed Debian. You told me I had to go to Yocto to find it. I alread said I missed quite a bit. So.... ?
This thread is all yours. I won't post any more.
Seriously??
"Dear Car and Driver, I've purchased what will be my last car and I'm satisfied, please stop talking about new cars."