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Single-Chip Linux Computer
goombah99 writes "Axis Computer has announced a single-chip Linux-based computer that integrates 2MB Flash, 8MB SDRAM and an Ethernet transceiver into a single chip with a 27mm x 27mm footprint. 'Just add power to the chip and you have a Linux computer with network connection.' It runs the Linux 2.4 kernel without any patches. The announcement says the chip is 'available' but the tech specs are labeled as preliminary, and the order form on the web site is broken, so it's hard to confirm if it is out yet or not. Some specifications in html and pdf are available at the company's web site."
Common, even my 4/86 had more memory!? And how do they expect me to compile gnome2 on this? *duh*
Life sucks.
Add some BlueTooth and you might finally have a decent platform to run all those household appliances you've been wanting to network at home. Interesting possibilities at least...
But what would the uses be? Is it meant for embedded devices? That would sound like an interesting idea, having a Linux computer in each VCR and toaster... Someone could then set up a crond job to "cat /dev/heat > /mnt/toast" every morning.
ETRAX 100LX has almost everything you need included
...
* 32 bit RISC CPU core
* 10/100 MBit Ethernet controller
* 4 asynchronous serial ports
* 2 synchronous serial ports
* 2 USB ports
* 2 Parallel ports
* 4 ATA (IDE) ports
* 2 Narrow SCSI ports (or 1 Wide)
* Support for SDRAM, Flash, EEPROM, SRAM,
this is a great technology that would probably be really usefull in laptop/notebook computers or even really small desktop (entire computer into the flatpanel display!
but really, serial ports? parallel ports? i'm not too sure that the scsi is going to win them any points either, but what the hell. they might have well integrated a video controler, an audio controler, and a 9600 baud modem to boot!
"Power dissipation (outputs open): 350mW typ., 610 mW max." At this low how does the drain of Ethernet and Bluetooth and of course the display compare?
So many complaints about the "obsolete" hardware - FUCKING DUH! It's a system-on-a-chip, running a common OS that is relatively easy to write software for, using tried-and-true peripheral technology and with enough horsepower to be used in all manner of embedded systems.
Sure, you wouldn't use it in a laptop or even a PDA, but that's not the target -- it can be used anywhere you need a simple PC to do simple tasks, but you don't want the huge and power-hungry old 386 you've got sitting in your closet/warehouse.
The thing's running Linux and is capable of networking for fuck's sake. Use your imagination.
What was posted...
"goombah99 writes "Axis Computer has announced a single chip Linux based computer that integrates 2MB Flash, 8MB SDRAM and an Ethernet transceiver into a single chip with a 27mm x 27mm footprint. 'Just add power to the chip and you have a Linux computer with network connection.' It runs the Linux 2.4 kernel without any patches. The announcement says the chip is 'available' but the tech specs are labeled as preliminary, and the order form on the web site is broken, so it's hard to confirm if it is out yet or not. Some specifications in html and pdf are available at the company's web site."
What most non-Slashdot folks see...
"yak yak yak writes "Computer blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah computer blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. The announcement says the blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah order form on the web site is broken, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah company's web site."
Reference: http://www.wonderdog.com/farside.htm
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This sounds like an excellent chip to use when building networking hardware. I want one for my toaster!
And no, it is not aimed at notebooks or desktops you imbecills!
HTTP/1.1 400
Still,given the feature set and the low power consumption this is a pretty appealing package, but I think even the embedded the applications are somewhat limited.
Roving Web-Teleoperated Robot
Lots of people have heard that the PlayStation3 will have "Cell computing", which is when they have lots of tiny cpu's clustered together each doing an extremely small part of the computing process. This will make programs using threads REALLY fast. I hope they have a cell computing device (like a cell computing PDA) made out of some of these things!
Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these things!
Sony etc. want to make a linux Media PC - well here we have a chip thats ideal for it.
Same goes for PVRs, firewalls, net Connected Storage.....
I am about to work on an FPGA single chip computer. Taking an open MIPS(ish) core and connecting it up to some peripherals.
The best thing about its is that it will be completely open.
Opencomputer will start as an FPGA but I am hoping to find a good excuse to manufacture it along with an asynchronous version and make my self a fully open PC.
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
It runs the Linux 2.4 kernel without any patches.
Just to break out the tinfoil, how do we know? I think that if I were to make Linux work on a device my company produced, I'd claim it worked without any patches, and thus only point people to a vanilla source, and not have to release any of my changes for my competitors to see. I'm no fan of the GPL (and bash it regularly), but this seems like a viable tactic. Saying that you can't get the code to work on their chip doesn't seem like much in the way of indisputable evidence that they altered the code, either.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?
You couldn't even fit the Windows bootstrap program on this thing, much less the web browser that is integral to the OS.
I want my rights back. I was actually using them when our government stole them after 9/11.
It doesnt want to say what processor it is.
All I can see is that it is a RISC (what isnt) and has 15 x 32bit registers.
Sounds like an ARM ut why dont they say so.
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
Wouldn't it be better if they cloned a penguin and then inserted the uber linux brainchip?
"A terrorist is someone who has a bomb but doesn't have an air force." -William Blum
And Dec. 27 is....?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
It is available.
The chip itself is $40. The eval board for the ETRAX 100LX is available for $299 as well as a version with bluetooth for $495.
Finally, the order page for both of these is at https://www.axis.com/shop/technology.htm.
--Tim
Take a look at another part of their site -- they're already thinking about this: http://developer.axis.com/products/devboard_bt/ind ex.html
With a name as suggestive as Axis, how long until Dubya decides to carpet bomb them?
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We'd be talking real power...
It's Christmas everyday with BitTorrent.
Folks,
This Axis announcement is GREAT news!! This isn't motherboard announcement, nor a single board computer announcement. This chip running Linux is about a square inch!! I've spoken to the product manager about this MCM (multichip module) and decided to teach a seminar in March using it. See my website for specific information on January 2nd.
Why a seminar?? OEM pricing for this chip and future generations (more flash and RAM) will be less than $50 US. Probably around $35 after production is going. When developers get the power of Linux with a simple hardware interface to the real world, there will be an explosion of embedded Linux devices. This chips makes it simple: add power, an clock and you're off. I'm teaching a seminar so that I'll become familiar with the chip and let others in on this great new product.
Where's my toaster??
Hey do you want to ski, snowboard, ice climb and learn about the power of this Axis chip? Contact me.
Craig
Dr. Craig Hollabaugh
craig@hollabaugh.com
Author of Embedded Linux, www.embeddedlinuxinterfacing.com
from the specifications page
...
ETRAX 100LX has almost everything you need included
* 32 bit 100MIPS RISC CPU core
* 10/100 MBit Ethernet controller
* 4 asynchronous serial ports
* 2 synchronous serial ports
* 2 USB ports
* 2 Parallel ports
* 4 ATA (IDE) ports
* 2 Narrow SCSI ports (or 1 Wide)
* Support for SDRAM, Flash, EEPROM, SRAM,
Just add power and and ethernet connection.
Quite an impressive package. Though in practice you would need to add more memory. But think about it, in the space of about 1/2 cubic inch you could cram memory, the chip, plus say a Microdisk. Expand that to the size of an IPOD and you could put in a lot of stuff, incuding the power supply
I'm not exactly how fast 100MIPS when comparing a RISC to say and Intel CISC that takes many clock cycles to complete on instruction. I'm assuming its probably slower than a 2 Ghz Pentium, but fast for an hand held.
<b>What Gets interesting is this: it dissipates 0.35 watts (typical)!!!!! </b>Let me say that again. It dissipates 0.3 Watts for 100MIPS. compare that to a typical Pentium Computer in the hundreds of watts range for a Gigahertz. This means you could have 600+ in a single 1U chasis dissipating the same amount of heat.
Time to really start thinking about parrallel software and computer deisgn. For easily paprlizable problems 600 of these ina 1U would destroy an entire rack of Pentiums while disspating so little power this could be just slipped under your desk, not in cooled computer room. Oh did one of the chips burn out--who cares, there's only 599 more.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
- Put a web/cgi server in your VCR/DVD/Tivo. Maybe real people can finally program these things!
- Instrument other consumer systems (plumbing, hvac, weather, kitchen, etc.) with LAN-connected controllers. httpd when a human wants to interact directly. X10 on steroids.
This chip shows where the embedded market is heading. Very low chip cost, standards based IO and OS will get us lots of interesting options.Fiat Lux.
"Ooooooohhh BABY YES! wash and blend"
I just wish I had some mod points for you, man... You made my morning....
-cheers
...and ethernet. Perfectly for building small routers (2 WANs 1 LAN, at least). I have seen routers with much more limited hardware (Motorola's QUICC, for instance, which lack a MMU)
Ever heard of anything but Red Hat? Check out: mini linux distros
Kinda like the Linux On A Floppy (LOAF) projects that were going around a couple years ago. It can be done, just kinda cut down version, good for having a portable firewall and stuff, not a whole lot of options tho. Slackware had ZIPSlack out for Zip Disk booting, I never tried that one tho...
If you want an idea of the types of products this chip could be used in, check out the company's main site.
http://www.axis.com/us/index.htm
The title is misleading. The device is a multi-chip-module, not a single chip computer. They have packaged a number of chips in a very small package, but it is not a single chip. A MCM will cost more to manufacture than a true single chip computer because it requires a ceramic substrate to be manufactured with very small trace widths connecting the chips that are placed on the substrate.
Good point, RedHat is getting pretty damn bloated, and what really gets me is I have a hard time telling what all they even crammed into it...most of its really useless junk...
Hmm.. .wonder what the RC5-72 stats on this device would be. Given the ports and taking into account space...
Have a portmaster or other multi-serial-port box handle a serial-PPP connection with each mini-server. That way, you bypass the need for a bulky USB->ETHERNET adapter.
They can all crack code, each as individual clients or started and maintained via PVM...
*DROOL*....
I could line my whole computer room wall with these. *_* Wonder how many would be needed to get an equivelant score of 2.5MKeys/sec though...
Winged Power Photography
Damned, and I always thought that Christmas was in July....
Only it would work without having to plug in modules through out the house and with much greater intelligence. Forget scanning the milk, how about the fridg lets me know when it has been standing open for 15 minutes because someone in the house can't seem to shut it. I'd also like to know when the coffee is done brewing. Just send a IM to me so I can go to the kitchen. You don't need to be rich to make use of this kind of tech, just lazy.
Wonder how many would be needed to get an equivelant score of 2.5MKeys/sec though...
If you use the RIAA definition of "equivalent"... probably about 5.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
We fit a kernel, libraries, webserver, ftp server, telnet server, shell, webpages, application servers and other goodies in those 2 MB's regularly (it's more than that in practice, because the cramfs filesystem for example use compressed pages in the flash, and binaries often compress at least 50%).
YMMV though, that module is not intended to host a complete redhat system of course...
This looks like something that could be interesting, as building Intel PCs is so easy that it is boring.
Still, even if I bought one, I have no idea how what to mount it in or how to power it. You can't just throw it into an ATX case, can you?
This is a Linux on a single chip, a socket, some wires, and a jack to plug in an ethernet cable.
The article also says that all you need is a power supply. You also will need a socket, some wires, and jacks and connectors to plug in ethernet and other ports.
Even my list might be a little thin. Take a look at the developer board PDF on their site. There's some flash memory, capacitors, resistors, and some other stuff too.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
If you look around, the board actually has 4 MB of flash, stated on the site, not in the spec sheet.
Sigs? We don't need no stinking sigs!
I've got a Bun coffee brewer, which has a hot water resevoir in it. You dump a pitcher of water into it, and it flushes the existing pre-heated water through instantly. It only takes 2 minuts to get a pot of coffee. So, first thing I do is start the coffee, then by the time my toast pops up, it's done.
I really wonder why they're so very, very silent about what architecture they're actually using for the CPU. "32bit RISC CPU" - well, fine. But what is it?
Heck, you don't even find out about this "RISC" part before you click through several other pages of information. Why do they obviously try to make it such a secret?
42. Easy. What is 32 + 8 + 2?
There is an update in the ordering info that states it actually has 4 mb of FLASH memory.
Sigs? We don't need no stinking sigs!
This is rated -1 off topic. Get a clue. If you think this is off topic, you don't know what you're talking about.
FPGA SoC prototyping is _exactly_ on topic with this discussion of the Axis chip. If you want to see RTL for an SoC you can download today, synthesize for an FPGA and run (uC)linux on, look one of these places:
www.gaisler.com (SPARC core)
www.opencores.org (OR1200 - OpenRISC)
0.3 wats (more like 0.350) is the power needed by the cpu. Every thing else on the MCM (ram, flash, PHY) brings this up a bit...
I like to build things and wire stuff together.
The Axis MCM has built in flash. Part is setup as a read only file system (ROMFS).
BTW: The Axis CPU can program a totaly empty flash by using some built in microcode and the CPU's cache RAM.
I like to build things and wire stuff together.
For a project I worked on at Keio Univ. in Japan, we ordered some of the Axis web cams, which use an older
version of the same chip, as well as some of the developer boards.
The system works as advertised; developing software and
deploying it is very easy, you just do a "make" in the source directory on your host, and it builds the flash rom image, and you download it via ethernet with a single command. You can ftp over to the board to upload binaries or other files, and there's a telnet client.
The only problems I had with the dev board were that it doesn't really have much useful I/O on it.
It has three serial ports and 16 bit parallel port, which can be used as an IDE drive or USB port, but at the time we got the system, you had to kind of roll your own interface. And at the time the drivers for the parallel port weren't
shipping standard so I had to write my own kernel
driver for it.
This is not to say that the designation means much any more... people have discovered how to make the most horrendous instruction sets (read: x86) go fast with only a million (!) extra transistors or so. This CPU doesn't have those, but what matters is that it's fast enough.
Still, it's amusing because half the complexity of the instruction set (and a substantial parcel of the chip) will never be exercised by any compiler. It's there as a sort of homage or shrine to machines from the days when programs were written in assembly language, and machines were marketed on how fancy the instruction set was, regardless of how it slowed the machine down.
The CDC machines were exceptional: Seymour Cray really understood. Also, in the '60s, some people at IBM built the 801, which evolved into the PowerPC. The rest of the industry didn't catch on until the Stanford RISC people made their big splash.
Perhaps a new breed of WiFi 'hackers' will be born who instead of obtaining sensitive information from computers simply delete the firmware of every fridge in the neigbourhood.
Right so. 2MB should be enough for anybody! ;-)
Red Hat should take notice, but still it's importatn that Red Hat is just as Linux as this tiny system is. And, there is a point in Linux being able to downsize into less than 2MB. Although Desktop Linux is not and does not allow for the same applications as embedded linux, there is a real virtue in sharing the codebase between these two. (Or desktop and webserver, cluster or grid server for that matter.) Although developers may not always agree on the direction the developments should take, together they provide for an open environment that is scaleble, and in escense is very lean. This is something Microsoft can never touch upon with Windows CE/PocketPC/whatever.
That's why I think this one-die embedded linux system is indeed a a-good-thing (tm).
This is the chip that I have been looking at for the last year and trying to get several systems built around it. Skip all the extra stuff.
All should have Power Over Ethernet (POE) and skip the different connectors.
All Systems: POE, CPU, Ram. 1'st System: 2 Compact Fash slots. This allows for either 2 disk drives or different devices. Howabout a CF ethernet so that it can become a firewall. Or a CF modem, so that it becomes a Fax Server, ppp server, or simply an interface to POTS. Or add the convertors for CF to IDE and run 2 2.5" HD (it will all fit inside the required 15 watts) or with extra power use it for network CD or DVD player.
2'nd system: provide a USB or Firewire interface. Skip the serial connectors. By providing 4-8 USB ports (with plugin power), this becomes a convertor of USB to TCP. This also allows for network Print serving, etc.
3'rd system: provide a small LCD screen, video chip and possibly Touch Screen input. Can be used for display Pixs, or small input around the house. Combine with the above, it can be used for irrigation, House temp controller, etc.
There are a number of interesting things that this chip can be used for. This is just a few.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Order form says you need "a mounting machine capable of soldering this type of component."
So where do I get my hands on one of those? Forty buck chip, I'll start putting them in everything . . .
Have a portmaster or other multi-serial-port box handle a serial-PPP connection with each mini-server. That way, you bypass the need for a bulky USB->ETHERNET adapter.
It has an embeded 100MbpsFdplx Ethernet interface. Why would you use either solution? My main concern would be finding a switch I could use to interconnect a bunch of them that wouldn't be larger than the collection of devices being interconnected.
Even with a Portmaster, 24 of these, along with a power supply to support them, would take up less space than the Portmaster required to interconnect them.
Another idea would be to interconnect via their own serial ports and build a mesh of devices. I have seen various reports of both two and three serial ports. Assuming three, you could fully mesh four devices, or partially mesh 5 or more devices. Using some learning software, you could then build up a physical nural net with each of these clusters communicating with other clusters via one, two, or more ethernet connections. Switching could be eliminated by using crossover connections between clusters. One device acts as a gateway in and out of the collection of clusters.
For communicating across the serial interface, a cell style protocol would probably work better as you are realy only sending data between two peer devices. The peer you send data to decides by the content of the data what to do next. Hand the data to someone else, send a response back to the original sender, modify the data and store it for comparison later, compare it against data from another source, whatever.
You could build a multiple input, multiple output banyan, or a matrix processing device. with arrays of input and output interfaces.
-Rusty
You never know...
Every specification for every semi-conductor device I've seen has always been marked "Preliminary". My HW co-workers told me, this is to protect the vendor and allow them to make any changes they see fit in the future.
One old crusty HW guy told me:
"They remove the prelminary mark when they obsolete the device"
=Shreak
Good point about the portmaster size. And about the cell computing as well.
Along that vein, what about the serial lines handling message passing and using the built-in 100TX as a communication bus. Since each device can have an arbitrary number of ethernet address identities, but only one can be active at any one time, one cell can take over for another cell by taking on its identity when the cell "dies".
If these are assembled on "pluggable" modules, then a module which is "dead" can be pulled out and replaced while the system is running.
Multi processing as well as redundancey?
Winged Power Photography
Look at the complex addressing modes and variable-length instructions: hallmarks of a CISC. To quote chapter 2 of the documentation,
I'd feel a lot better using this chip if it also supported, say, NetBSD and/or OpenBSD (both of which are portable enough to be moved to it rather easily).
All in all, it's a pretty cute little system, although you'll definitely need to plan to interface it with other bits and pieces. The place I was working at was mostly dealing with Voice over IP (VoIP) applications, and so interfaced it with some telephony-style audio chips via one of the synchronous serial interfaces.
proof, n. A demonstration that a conclusion is implied by certain premises and axioms.
check out 2diskxwin I thinmk they are developing sumthing like this
embedded linux
For communicating across the serial interface, a cell style protocol would probably work better as you are really only sending data between two peer devices. The peer you send data to decides by the content of the data what to do next. Hand the data to someone else, send a response back to the original sender, modify the data and store it for comparison later, compare it against data from another source, whatever.
What is wrong with setting up some high-speed LEDs and fiber in/out connections? This would give you your maximum speed at a low price and plug-n-play setup. That seems the best way to make a multi-chip Linux array with minimal heat increase across the motherboard. Sure there would be the spaghetti syndrome between the parallel array, but the bonus would be minimal complexity in secondary information transfer.
"Face it, a nation that maintains a 72% approval rating on George W. Bush is a nation with a very loose grip on reality.
I would think that using LEDs to communicate would generate more heat than a copper trace. I could be wrong.
-Rusty
You never know...
LED's and Fiber in/out connections would consume more power than say direct serial links. The serial links would also be less bulky since you would not need to have conversion modules.
There would be no speed advantage since you would still have the serial links hooked up to the LED's or have 100TX network connections routed through a fiber module. Your MAX available throughput/bandwidth would still be limited.
A serial-to-serial setup would allow you to basically make a metal/copper matrix grid to plug in each module into to provide power/signal lines/network hub/control lines/remote terminal matrix.
That way, you would be able to have the modules almost side/by/side on a tray. The tray itself being a power/data bus matrix for the modules.
Winged Power Photography
Just so you know, X-10.COM is not the only place that sells X10 devices. Radio Shack and Leviton both make their own X10 devices and don't employ the same advertising campaign.
err.... no, wait, Christmas is in December!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Very few things actually get manufactured these days, because in an
infinitely large Universe, such as the one in which we live, most things one
could possibly imagine, and a lot of things one would rather not, grow
somewhere. A forest was discovered recently in which most of the trees grew
ratchet screwdrivers as fruit. The life cycle of the ratchet screwdriver is
quite interesting. Once picked it needs a dark dusty drawer in which it can
lie undisturbed for years. Then one night it suddenly hatches, discards its
outer skin that crumbles into dust, and emerges as a totally unidentifiable
little metal object with flanges at both ends and a sort of ridge and a hole
for a screw. This, when found, will get thrown away. No one knows what the
screwdriver is supposed to gain from this. Nature, in her infinite wisdom,
is presumably working on it.
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