A pair of EDN Innovation winners

The "OMAP35x Application Processor" and the "Beagle Board Embedded Linux Development Board" were both winners of tonight's EDN Innovation 2008 awards for their respective categories of "Microprocessors" and "Software/Embedded Tools". It was a great evening, with several great products recognized and it was nice to have our products among those. It was a great way to follow up a successful day of hands-on classes at the Embedded Systems Conference on the BeagleBoard. Too bad Boris wasn't there to accept the honors himself. :)

Rev C available for Silicon Valley BeagleBoard User's Group meeting

Rev C2 is available now! Same part number at Digi-Key and the same price!

• Twice the RAM (256MB, instead of 128MB)
• High-speed-only dedicated-host USB port with standard A-type connector
• LCD expansion header

All of the Rev B units sold out, so all new orders will be filled with Rev C units which are already in stock. The timing worked out perfectly with the last Rev B units being sold the day after the Rev C units arrived.

All of this is just-in-time for our Silicon Valley BeagleBoard Users' Group meeting being held immediately following the Embedded Systems Conference. We'll be enjoying a few beers and discussing the BeagleBoard.org sponsored project program. The meeting will be held in room B1 in the convention center right after the show closes at 4 PM, Thursday, April 2nd. Join us in the ESC Theater an hour earlier for a chance to win a BeagleBoard and a Tektronix scope. Hope to see you there!

ESC Build Your Own Embedded System online registration deadline 3/25

IMG_1038.CR2
Originally uploaded by jadonk

ESC BYOES online registration closes on 3/25. Register & get a new Rev C for the Beagle Board labs covering Android, 3D UIs, DSP-accelerated GStreamer, adding Bluetooth, and more. Only $199 to add the BYOES sessions to your ESC registration or just $595 for a special Beagle Board Days Pass.

See http://esc-sv09.techinsightsevents.com/byoes for details and to register.

Software design contest #2 (in 3D)

Congratulations again to Antti Seppanen for his BeagleBot and Diego Dompe for his support of usbtty in the Beagle u-boot on winning Beagle Board Rev C boards in the last software design contest.

We were a bit slow setting the dates for this contest with the hope of getting some entries with 3D graphics enabled. Koen, a frequent contributor to BeagleBoard.org and maintainer of the Angstrom Distribution that includes Beagle Board support, has given us a demo to show that this is now possible for community members. In his demonstration, he's running OGRE3D, an open source graphics engine, with Wiimote control and projection on his ceiling with the TI Pico Projector development kit.



As one of the contest judges, Koen isn't eligible for the contest, but you can build upon his work by utilizing the information provided on the Beagle mailing list for configuring the 3.00.00.06 SGX drivers that are now available from TI for download.

The contest details are at http://elinux.org/BeagleBoard/contest. To try to keep us on track of a contest per month, submissions must be complete, with all instructions and software, by Friday, February 27th. Good luck!

Software design contest #1

Shall we wrap-up the year with a BeagleBoard software design contest? The prize will be a Rev C1 BeagleBoard with a working USB EHCI port a couple months before they are broadly available.

Please don't be shy. I know there are a lot of interesting projects going on and you need to enter the contest to win!

More information can be found via the announcement on the mailing list. Reply if you have any questions. We are looking forward to your entries!

Enter soon. The first give-away will be the first week in January!

Blue ribbon acquired from WikiMedia.

Crossing 1,000 mailing list subscribers

Last week was a very busy one for Beagle Boarders.

We had hundreds of people sign up for the 4 days of Beagle Board training at the Embedded Systems Conference in Boston. Class attendance for several sessions were at capacity and many of the classes were hands-on, including hands-on classes on 3D user interface creation and . Those attendees are now able to refer to the course materials for the hands-on classes on-line and all the people who signed up walked away from the event with Beagle Boards in hand. Many thanks to MontaVista, RidgeRun, Bill Gatliff, Special Computing, HY Research, Angstrom Distribution developers, and all of the others involved. It was an amazing event.


We also had great demos on the show floor, including BSquare's wireless demo running on the OMAP35x EVM, CalSoft's Flash demo running on the Beagle Board, and the Gumstix Overo running Angstrom. I also got my first chance to play with a DLP Pico Projector, which drew a nice crowd at the booth.

Additionally, those of you who have been waiting on documentation for the power management device, the technical reference manual (TRM) for the TPS65950 is now available on-line. This is a drop-in functionally equivalent replacement for the TWL4030 with some analog performance improvements, including to the on-chip USB PHY.

Almost forgot to mention that I got an article published regarding use of open source software in consumer electronics. Beyond using open source software in consumer electronics, I really believe there is a future for products like the Neuros OSD as people want more control and ownership over what their products can do.

Lastly, at the time of this writing, we are now only 10 people away from having 1,000 mailing list subscribers. Interest is overwhelming and continuing to grow. Thanks for making the Beagle Board such a success so far and helping to set the course of where it goes from here!

Beagle at IBC

Lot's of activity going on around Beagle, but I've been lax on generating blog posts. In addition to the activity going on in preparation for ESC Boston, such as getting Sugar running, giving free trainings in India, and getting a new intern to watch the IRC logs, we also have our very own Roger Monk and Koen Kooi at IBC today. Stop by (IPTV zone IP322) if you want to take a look at the Beagle in action or simply hop on IRC and chat with them today while they are at the booth and logged into IRC using the Beagle board using nickname "beagle|ibc".