Samsung's Linux-based Diskless Camcorder

An anonymous reader writes "LinuxDevices has a story about the Samsung Miniket, a digital camcorder the size of a pack of cards that also works as a portable MP3 player, webcam, voice recorder, storage device, and more. The Miniket (annoying Flash and sound) will be available in February or March in the US, for $600-$700, with a rugged 'sports' model to follow. The device runs Linux, boots in under a second, and is the first of several products from Samsung that will run a new variation of Linux called 'ARM-no-MMU.' LinuxDevices also has a whitepaper about Samsung research that shows the new Linux variant to be faster than normal Linux."

Comments

For those not in the know

[Anonymous Coward]

MMU stands for memory management unit. It is a component used to protect parts of memory from being accidently overwritten, for example.

Re:Request for clarification on Diskless technolog

[greechneb]

The Miniket boots from 128KB of NOR Flash, and includes 16MB of SDRAM. As noted above, various models offer different amounts of user file storage, which is based on a single internal NAND Flash chip. The 128KB NOR Flash is only used for bootloader functions; all other system software, including the kernel, is stored within the much larger NAND Flash.

I think diskless means no CD/DVD/floppy

I am still not converged!!!

[TheNarrator]

camcorder the size of a pack of cards that also works as a portable MP3 player, webcam, voice recorder, storage device, and more

Now if only this thing was a phone, a GPS and a PDA with 802.11 and GPRS internet access. Then maybe I'd consider buying it.

Re:ARM-no-MMU the same as uClinux?

[soramimicake]

The 'white paper written by Samsung' mentioned in the submission is titled 'Context Switching and IPC Performance Comparison between uClinux and Linux on the ARM9 based Processor'. So it is indeed uClinux.

Poor choice for memory card

[DigitalDragon]

Memory Stick! Bleh.

I wonder what made them make such a poor choice. The right choice would have been to go with Compact Flash or SD, if you want smaller.
Memory stick is still a Sony bound product (I know that now there are other manufacturers) and underperforms other cards, since there's no such fierce competition.

I see this as a big minus.