[Voyage-linux] R: R: Alix1/3 VGA support (lxfb) vs. Intel Atom D945GCLF

Fri May 23 00:05:45 HKT 2008

We are developing some RF and Bluetooth sensoring system too and a good (not great) video output would be an optional to give the user the right feedback.

The low power consumption is really important to us: we are developing a rechargable-battery+photovoltaic recharge system to make our boxes able to be power-chord independant.

....but i think we are quite off-topic now :-)

________________________________

Da: mgrollman [mailto:mgrollman at cox.net] 
Inviato: giovedì 22 maggio 2008 18.00
A: Dario Finardi
Cc: voyage-linux at voyage.hk; Kim-man 'Punky' TSE
Oggetto: Re: R: Alix1/3 VGA support (lxfb) vs. Intel Atom D945GCLF

Dario,

I also am big fan of  PCEngines and Alix, and use this board for some of our mobile sensor projects.  But it has trouble keeping up with certain video efforts -- just not enough gas in the tank, sometimes.

Atom CPU at 1.6GHz will draw around 2.2watt, still very lean and mean.

I agree that mini-pci slot is lacking in D945GCLF, but I would expect to see boards out there with mini-PCI soon using ATOM.  Also, the Alix has a better power setup than this Intel board does.

 But, the combination of this very low power ATOM chip, super low price, and a native Intel chip set, it is very sexy, especially in video world.

- Michael

Dario Finardi wrote: 

	Thankyou Michael,
		we are using Geode based board for some reasons:
	- small size
	- very low power consumption (geode at 500mhz is <0.9watt and the board is <5watt) 
	- quite expandable (2 minipci slots + come gpio)
	- the producer of the board we've choosen (PCEngines) make a little modification based upon our request for a small order (100pcs).

	Thankyou again.

	dario

	-----Messaggio originale-----
	Da: mgrollman [mailto:mgrollman at cox.net] 
	Inviato: giovedì 22 maggio 2008 17.39
	A: voyage-linux at voyage.hk
	Cc: Kim-man 'Punky' TSE; Dario Finardi
	Oggetto: Alix1/3 VGA support (lxfb) vs. Intel Atom D945GCLF

	We do a lot of video encode stuff with Voyage (not so much playback), so we try and track what is out there that works well and it low cost for hardware.  It would appear that the  Intel Atom D945GCLF is shipping now, at around $80 USD qty 1, with a 1.6GHz CPU and a much more potent grahaics engine GMA 950 than Alix, as well as much better RAM upgradeable, it would seem that it could handler a video playback application like what you describe below much better than Alix could (much as it saddens me to say it) even withg frame buffer, and that a it would not take much to get Voyage to run well on this platform, since it is based on venervcal Intel 82945G (ICH7).  This board, I think, will take over many many application  niches where Via and Geode are hot today. 

	Cheers,

	- Michael

	--------------------------------
	Kim-man 'Punky' TSE wrote:

		Hi,

		If you are using XFree86, I think you may need framebuffer driver.  
		With XOrg, it will have a native geodelx video driver.  My question 
		is, if XOrg on Etch does not support geode lx, will adding framebuffer 
		support help?

		Next 0.6 release will base on lenny, and will be available at around 
		summer time.

		Regards,
		Punky

		Dario Finardi wrote:

			Yes, you're correct.

			I'm investigating about the way to use such cheap and low power 
			consumption boards (alix pcengines and soekris) to build embedded 
			devices with the ability to drive display not charging the cpu with 
			the heavy X11 infrastructure.

			About X11: I see the Geode support was introduced in X11 starting 
			from Debian 4.0 Lenny and Sid.
			Etch hasn't such a driver yet.

			Have you some roadmap timing to port Voyage from Etch to Lenny yet?

			NOTE: I tested X11 without any specific video driver. Geode is driven 
			only as a plain VGA with really poor performances and supporting few 
			resolutions/color depth.

			Regards,
			dario
			-----Messaggio originale-----
			Da: Kim-man 'Punky' TSE [mailto:punkytse at punknix.com] Inviato: 
			mercoledì 21 maggio 2008 3.37
			A: Dario Finardi
			Cc: voyage-linux at voyage.hk
			Oggetto: Re: [Voyage-linux] Alix1/3 VGA support (lxfb)

			Hi

			I am not convinced why a geode lx driver is needed.  As far as I read 
			from http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Hardware_Drivers and kernel 
			documentation, framebuffer is for provide graphical support on kernel 
			console.  Correct me if i am wrong.  Any other strong reason than that?
			Regards,
			Punky

			Dario Finardi wrote:

				I was looking for the lxfb module to have optimized support of the 
				Geode framebuffer.
				I made an hand-check, then installed module-assistant too.
				I see the lxfb module ins't available in the Voyage mainstream 
				distribution.

				Someone with a solution?

				_______________________________________________
				Voyage-linux mailing list
				Voyage-linux at list.voyage.hk
				http://list.voyage.hk/mailman/listinfo/voyage-linux

			--
			Regards,
			Punky

			Voyage Solutions (http://solution.voyage.hk)
			* Embedded Solutions and Systems
			  - Mesh Networking, Captive Portal, IP Surveillance, VoIP/PBX
			  - Network Engineering, Development Platform and Consultation

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://list.voyage.hk/pipermail/voyage-linux/attachments/20080522/823dfd1d/attachment.html>