…I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe…
…Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion…
… *and* a fully functional PC for $25! See Raspberry Pi.
I, for one, am quite excited by the prospect. Surely it could have many applications in the enthusiast’s studio!?
There are just soooo many nice electronic toys coming out in time for Christmas, this just being one of them.
Thanks for sharing such an awesome little device!
Just think of the possibilities!
The cheapest 1080p media player/centre known to man.
This will make my WDTV look like an overpriced piece of junk.
There’s just so many cool things you can do with this little guy. 
/me buys 25 now!
Aww, cute!
But, can it max out Crysis?
it should boot directly into an updated version of david braben´s elite, and only allow to escape to fedora linux, when you´ve shut down a couple of pirate cobras
Hmm, I want to integrate one of those in my next TV so that it can boot the full MAME ROM set directly from some SDXC card 
Then if it also did UAE and a decent C64 emu all the better!
Total 80’s nirvana would be if it also did a decent Juno-106 or some very plasticky Casio CZ sounds.
After reading the specs it seems that this could be the brain of a future MBHP_CORE_xxx module
Adapting MIOS32 to this platform won’t be so much effort, and there are enough IOs available to connect commonly used hardware extensions (DIN/DOUT/LCDs/AIN via SPI/AOUTs - even MIDI could be made available via the “debug console” UART)
Accordingly a migration of MBSEQ V4 is feasible.
Graphical extensions will be available for free, e.g. to visualize sequences on a huge TV screen in HD resolution (I already see Hawkeyes smiling face ;-))
In addition it seems that it has some nice interfaces for Audio, and an integrated DSP.
Best Regards, Thorsten.
Some interesting things to note: Eben Upton (the creator of Raspberry Pi) also works as a SoC ASIC architect for Broadcom.
Here’s the chip that powers the Pi:
BCM2835
It’s based on this:
ARM1176 (700 MHz)
There will be GPIO/I2C/SPI pins on the board and enough info to use those; no clue about extra connectors available directly off the CPU though, probably not that easy to get to anyway.
I think the Pi has no RTC.
The video firmware will be the usual binary blob, the drivers might be closed source too, unless Broadcom changes their mind
After reading the specs it seems that this could be the brain of a future MBHP_CORE_xxx module
Adapting MIOS32 to this platform won’t be so much effort, and there are enough IOs available to connect commonly used hardware extensions (DIN/DOUT/LCDs/AIN via SPI/AOUTs - even MIDI could be made available via the “debug console” UART)
Accordingly a migration of MBSEQ V4 is feasible.
Graphical extensions will be available for free, e.g. to visualize sequences on a huge TV screen in HD resolution (I already see Hawkeyes smiling face ;-))
In addition it seems that it has some nice interfaces for Audio, and an integrated DSP.
Best Regards, Thorsten.
I fapped. 
Imagine the possibilities!
My dream sequencer could easily become a reality.
Something like MB SEQ V4 Lite, but with 16+ real time looping channels,
with the ability to edit data on screen,
and also playback of WAV Samples i.e. a drum machine or sampler.
If the hardware proves to be the next logical step for midibox this could be a very exciting development indeed.
Graphical extensions will be available for free, e.g. to visualize sequences on a huge TV screen in HD resolution (I already see Hawkeyes smiling face ;-))
Mhhhm, maybe you´ll all hate me for that comment, but i really like the restrictions of limited ram, processing speed and display capabilities… it soo much reminds me of the good old days
Just that you have to think before you´re allocating something as small as 4kb of ram is nice… the thought alone would seem ridiculous on full-blown cpus with hundreds of megabytes of memory :).
Greets,
Peter
After reading the specs it seems that this could be the brain of a future MBHP_CORE_xxx module
Would it be worth introducing the MIDIbox platform in this subforum?
http://www.raspberrypi.org/forum?mingleforumaction=viewforum&f=4.0
Especially since the aim of the Raspberry Pi is to get young people into programming,
very cheaply.
A thread introducing an Open Source project like MIDIbox would be a breath of fresh air,
as most posts on their forum are about using the device as an everyday PC, so they could do with more programmers posting there.
If collaboration is viable, then it may enable us to get information about the chipset faster,
as well as general info.
I think the MIDIbox project would gather a positive response,
as music is a very attractive and good outlet for young people.
I am not sure if we need another core option right now. I’d suggest to explore what we have first. I also see a lot of truth in Hawkeye’s last post on the value of limitations. My personal 2 cents.
Fair point, but isn’t it worth finding out more about this chipset first?
To see if it can actually be of use as a future core for the MIDIbox platform?
And at a later point in the future a decision can be made.
Smithy: It’s a freaking ARM Cortex A11, of course it can be a core for a midibox - it’s nearly a full-blown desktop PC 
I do agree though that we should prolly establish the LPC17 core a bit more until we leap to the next level…
edit: whoopsie it’s an ARM 11 not an ARM 8
Smithy: It’s a freaking ARM Cortex A8, of course it can be a core for a midibox - it’s nearly a full-blown desktop PC
I do agree though that we should prolly establish the LPC17 core a bit more until we leap to the next level…
Unlimited POWAH!
The concern I had was if the A8 had sufficient I/O pins to interact with the MB modules,
since I have no idea how a “hobbyist” or “simpler” processor like the Microchip PICs etc…
would compare to a more powerful processor like the A8 which I guess has a far more advanced architecture.
Will the A8 require more components to interact with the modules?
Or does it have similar I/O pins to ze current uC’s we use?
Edit:
Realizing that the LPC17 is also an ARM processor, I see that the Broadcom chip would need to be sold in a similar manner,
i.e. on a 3rd party PCB that allows for decent I/O interactivity.
Still have no Idea if the Raspberry PI PCB would be sufficient enough though! ;
Probably not I’d guess!
Probably not I’d guess!
So that’s a yes then?
The 26 GPIO headers will be plenty enough to interact with the modules?
(The only reason I know now that they are GPIO headers is from the latest post on their blog)
*insert naughty word here*
The 26 GPIO headers will be plenty enough to interact with the modules?
there are enough IOs available to connect commonly used hardware extensions (DIN/DOUT/LCDs/AIN via SPI/AOUTs - even MIDI could be made available via the “debug console” UART)
Accordingly a migration of MBSEQ V4 is feasible.
Would a first step be getting FreeRTOS working on an ARM11 proc? http://www.freertos.org/index.html?http://interactive.freertos.org/entries/449231-s3c6410-using-rvds-tool-chain
Would a first step be getting FreeRTOS working on an ARM11 proc? http://www.freertos.org/index.html?http://interactive.freertos.org/entries/449231-s3c6410-using-rvds-tool-chain
Apologies for dropping the F-bomb earlier, I didn’t realize that TK already mentioned there is enough IOs.
Okay, mebbé we can haz enough I/O’s nao!
http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/411
Gert van Loo, who did most of the heavy hardware lifting on the alpha boards we sent out to developers a few months back, is a familiar name to our forum members.
He’s a friend of ours who works at Broadcom with Eben, and in his spare time (the spare time that he hasn’t been dedicating to the Raspberry Pi itself) he’s been working on an add-on GPIO expansion board. Use it to flash LEDs on and off, drive motors, run sensors and all that other fun stuff.
Beginning to see visually where this will take things.
