[gta02-core] Openmoko Beagle Hybrid

[Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller]

Am 11.05.2010 um 17:50 schrieb Michael Trimarchi:

> Hi,
>
> RANJAN wrote:
>> A  really good idea.Looking forward to its release.
>>
>> R.Sriranjan
>>
>> On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 1:26 PM, Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller
>> <hns at computer.org>wrote:
>>
>>
> I don't know why it's usefull, sorry for the question. If you can  
> give me a board that replace
> the gta02 board and I can reuse battery and display and keyboard,  
> that's can be great but other type
> of solution change openmoko on a developement board

You are completely right in your expectation that we share. We would  
be happier if we could offer a motherboard replacement for the  
Freerunner. With OMAP and UMTS. But as Werner has already found out in  
the GTA02-core project this is still very far from becoming reality.  
The complexity is balancing circuit design with availability and cost  
of chips, and pcb layout with production processes.

Nevertheless, the great open source mobile phone software developed by  
this community (SHR, QtMoko, FSO etc.) needs to have modern open and  
documented hardware to keep pace with pretededly-open platforms like  
iPhone, WebOS, etc. Therefore, this Openmoko Beagle Hybrid board gives  
us a tool to develop mobile applications with state of the art  
performance (except form factor).

We, a small team of hardware developers, will continue to work on  
integrating everything better - but this is a long way to go. I am  
sure we will finally succeed because we have decided to do so, but I  
don't know when.

So it is better to have something suboptimal than nothing...

Nikolaus

>
> Michael
>>> There is now a new Wiki page for the project:
>>>
>>>       http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Openmoko_Beagle_Hybrid
>>>
>>> I have received some questions why we did not put all this into a  
>>> nice
>>> design. The main reason is that we can't redesign the Beagleboard  
>>> (it
>>> has fixed dimensions) and we can't afford to build plastic injection
>>> moulds (if someone has an idea how to reduce cost this is very
>>> welcome). So the easiest solution was to combine what we have: a  
>>> given
>>> Beagleboard and the Freerunner case.
>>>
>>> Other questions were what one could do with this. Here some ideas  
>>> (not
>>> assuming it is complete - you may have more and it is a platform for
>>> your creativity):
>>>
>>>       • experimenting with touchscreen and new user interfaces on
>>> Beagleboard
>>>       • learn how the OMAP3530 CPU works
>>>       • make it a truly open mobile application development  
>>> platform by
>>> adding a battery pack and a UMTS usb stick
>>>       • investigate how an Openmoko with UMTS and OMAP3530 feels  
>>> (not from
>>> haptics but screen operation and UMTS speed)
>>>       • porting SHR, QtMoko, Android, etc. to ARM-Cortex A8
>>>
>>> And here some feature list:
>>>
>>>       • PCB that fits into Freerunner case (top cover and middle  
>>> part
>>> after
>>> cutting a hole)
>>>       • works also without such a case (except speakers and earset)
>>>       • Toppoly LCM interface (same display as used in the  
>>> Freerunner -
>>> otherwise it would not fit into the case)
>>>       • TSC2007 touch screen controller
>>>       • Microphone
>>>       • Earset and Speaker connector (for those sitting in the  
>>> Freerunner
>>> case)
>>>       • 2 buttons (AUX and Power)
>>>       • 2 dual color LEDs (in the AUX and Power buttons)
>>>       • vibracall driver
>>>       • headset jack to connect microphone, earset and speaker
>>>
>>> For the software, we have to rearrange the code on our server a  
>>> little
>>> and then it will be made public.
>>>
>>> Finally, here you can do preorders:
>>>
>>>       http://www.handheld-linux.com/wiki.php?page=Openmoko%20Beagle
>>>
>>> Nikolaus
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> gta02-core mailing list
>>> gta02-core at lists.openmoko.org
>>> https://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/gta02-core
>>>
>>>
>>
>>   
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>