There is tremendous development in the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) market due to the wide variety of applications they can serve. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, also known as drones, can be found in surveillance applications for farming and agriculture, mapping and surveying, military and dozens other commercial uses. Highly suitable for dangerous and harmful environments while also very capable, there seems to be no end to the new uses for UAVs.
Penguin Edge recently announced the
Inforce 6503, a Snapdragon 660 based compact compute module in a LGA package. The SoM’s features include octal CPU cores, 2x2 802.11ac Wi-Fi with DBS, Bluetooth 5.x, Haptics, a full featured USB-C interface with UltraHD display capability and ample internal memory for seamless 4K encode/decode. Optional SKUs of the SoM support extended operating temperature range and EMI shielding for better RF noise protection, while also doubling up as a medium for heat spreading.
UAVs need a rugged, deployable solution and the Inforce 6503 SoM in its compact form factor of 40mm x 35mm and low vertical profile can provide a powerful and versatile central controller for these vehicles. With support for dual simultaneous 4K capable MIPI-CSI cameras, visual use-cases for motion, sensing and surveillance can be enabled without heavy external circuitry. AI and Edge processing algorithms, which can be integral to a UAV mission for vision processing and decision making, can run smoothly on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon SOCs through the SNPE SDK. Using the Qualcomm neural processing engine for AI applications on a Snapdragon is a straightforward process, and support is available to help bring new neural network-powered devices to market, reducing the uncertainty of designing a new device from scratch.
Penguin Edge provides an Android BSP in source and pre-loaded on the 6503 SoM with long-lifetime support. For creators of UAVs, the Inforce 6503 is the perfect starting point!
Healthcare or diagnostic domains are other areas that necessitate powerful processor cores that can drive rugged portable gear. Outdoors or indoors, technician or clinician, portable equipment is an absolute requirement in today's demanding diagnostic applications. And as products get smaller, many can operate from batteries, so the addition of Wi-Fi and BT connectivity can completely free the user from all cable connections. These products may get rougher physical treatment due to their size and portability, so a reliable, solid design becomes even more important.
An example of the advantage of portability is in an automotive shop, where a mechanic can move freely among his vehicles and use a Penguin Edge-based diagnostic computer to discern and display engine faults. After reading the fault code and downloading repair instructions, he is able to get a motorist back on the road quickly. Another example is in a medical office, where a doctor can show an expecting family the good news from a sonogram analysis on his high-resolution display screen embedded in a Penguin Edge-based clinical appliance.
Portable gear such as these would benefit from Inforce 6503 SoM’s optimized performance achieved by utilizing the unique capabilities and features of its CPUs, GPU, DSP,
AI Engine, Camera ISP and multimedia cores seamlessly through heterogeneous compute capabilities. The SoM’s high reliability Land Grid Array (LGA) package delivers superior physical connection to withstand real world bumps and bruises and as a central building block for product development, it allows an OEM to focus on adding features specific to their market, and to focus their engineers on specialty software and higher-level applications.
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INFORCE 6503
