New embedded miniature PC board for KHR robot

[limor]

We've been in touch with a Taiwanese company called DMP Electronics who are promoting a new embedded CPU chip called Vortex86dx.

Thanks to iPhone, most chip makers have launched a system-on-chip recently to cater the new phone/PC market. But what's special about these guys is that they use a humanoid robot to demonstrate the chip's capabilities.

Their board called RB-100 has 24 servo connections and many of the robotic standard I/O interfaces such as i2c and a2d. The servo interfaces are compatible with Kondo and Hitec servos in that they can also read back the position of the servo using the ICS protocol. This means that you can take your humanoid robot and replace the microcontroler board with full blown PC as a brain. It can run off any battery supplying 6V to 24V at 2W. (thats 0.3Amp at 6V .. less than a servo)



The board can run Windows XP Embedded, Linux or DOS.

Very impressive indeed at about 250$ retail !!

phpBB [media]

The above video of KHR2HV fitted with the board was running a program under the good old DOS operating system.

Having had experience with Gumstix, here's what i'd like to see from this board:
- The board should be provided with a free operating system
- Working out-of-the-box booting from an SD card
- Free Development environment and libraries+drivers source code. toolchain for compiling custom version of O/S with custom drivers (in external windows/linux and transfering the o/s over USB+bootloader).
- o/s comes with default driver for TCP over USB for talking with the board with ftp/telnet/web/x-windows to install new applications at runtime without having to re-install operating system
- bonus - being able to compile programs or run interpreted scripts on the board - allowing fast prototyping and easy interfacing with i/o peripherals

[PedroR]

hi limor

just fyi, if you run windows on it, as long as it supports tcp/ip you can run RDP (remote Desktop protocol) to work directly on the computer /processor/board.
besides, if you use COM DLL libraries to encapsulate the protocol you can do rapid prototyping using Windows Scripting Host (VBScript / JavaScript).

Also, does it come with a COM port (RS232) and/or TTL? This would make it a nice board for Robobuilder and Bioloid.
Neural networks projects on the way maybe?

I had found these http://www.compactpc.com.tw/ a few days ago but yours seems to draw a lot less power.

[PedroR]

i didn't really understand a couple of things:

- It seems the UARTs can only go up to 460.8K (not 1 mbit for full speed on the bioloid bus or robobuilder).
- There seem to be ethernet drivers available for normal windows 98 and windows 2000, although there is no VGA or IDE driver. I don't know what this means in terms of support.
- For windows XP it requires the "Embedded" edition. Do you know why doesn't it support regular windows XP (professional/home) but doeas support regular windows 98 and windows 2000?

windows 2000 may be a good ccandidate for windows based projects. It's fast (almost as fast as win 98), it's based on NT so it's very reliable and it supports most modern technologies such as rdp, windows scripting host, .net (although I am not sure if MS is still maintaining it), ....

From the picture it also suggests it supports TTL (although I could not find it on the specs yet) so it's actually quite cool.
You can attach the board to the robot and actually access the full Robot system using RDP.

Waaayyy coooll.

[lucrece_lu]

Pedro,

let me reply your question,

1. www.compactpc.com.tw is same as our company but with different model makret, compactpc is more like computer product
2. you are right the UART currently is 460K, but we have modify and will release soon to have full speed to support bioloid.
3. windows XP can support for Pro or Home or Embedded edition
4. it can support Windows 98 and 2000 (and due to special IDE interface require for install Win2K will have small problem, suggest use ghost method back)
5. the board suuport TTL

[PedroR]

hi lucrece

I didn't really understand your explanation about windows 98 and windows 2000. You mean that to install these you need to have an IDE drive? It will not work with CF card?

Other questions:
1 How do you connect LAN to the board?
2 For windows xp pro does it come with graphics driver? Does it support Rmote Desktop Protocol? (that is connecting to the computer board using mstsc.exe, a tool to view the remote desktop?)

thank you
pedro

[lucrece_lu]

Hi

1. yes, to install the Win 98 you need a IDE driver (downlaod from wwebsite), and it it no need to wkr in CF card, run under Micro SD card is fine.
2. Near the CPU have LAN connector and with shipment bundle the LAN cable
3. okay, the main Robaord does not have display chip. but can plus order the Graphics card, the display chipset can support XP pro and ofcause can suport RDP, ICA or XDMPCP for any terminal service depends on what O/S and protocal you preload.

Anthony

[PedroR]

YAY

Anthony will be sending us a demo board for evaluation and development.
I look forward to receive it and I will be posting back the results as I go

Pedro

[RKM83]

Hey Pedro-

Any updates on the RB-100 board?