[tech] [awiggins@cse.unsw.EDU.AU: Taking Orders Now - Photon v1]

[Nick Bannon]

I thought I'd forward this on... PLEB is the Portable Linux Embedded Box
project from the Uni of NSW. They've designed and built a small computer
based on the StrongARM 1100 chip. The first fruit of this is the MiniPLEB,
and they're about to do a production run of 36.

http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~pleb/minipleb.html
http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~philp/pictures/pleb/PIC00003.jpg

It does serial, fast IrDA, talks to LCDs, all in a credit card sized
package, and packs considerably more grunt than a Dragonball 68000. ::-)
(enough for MP3 decoding or speech recognition, for example)

Does it pique anyone's interest? or should we look again next year when
there might be generation 2 hardware?

Nick.

----- Forwarded message from Adam 'WeirdArms' Wiggins <awiggins at cse.unsw.EDU.AU> -----

Delivered-To: nick-pleb at rcpt.to
From: Adam 'WeirdArms' Wiggins <awiggins at cse.unsw.EDU.AU>
To: "utility account for group.pleb " <pleb at cse.unsw.EDU.AU>
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 17:02:37 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Taking Orders Now - Photon v1

	Hey all, over the next few months we are manufacturing 36 MiniPLEB
boards (aka Photon version 1). The description is on the web page. Each
unit consists of a SA-1100 cpu board and a memory daughter card with
either 16/32MB of 60ns EDO DRAM. These boards are mainly intended for
experimentation to develop software and possible hardware based around the
SA-1100 and the PLEB Project.
	Only 36 boards will be manufactured half of the memory boards will
be 16MB, half 32MB. All come with 4MB flash. Not all boards will be
distributed externally. The price is looking between $800-$1000 Australian
so approx $500 US including a JTAG programmer for the 32MB model. It might
cost less but I've not done the sums yet.
	Right now I'm taking orders, I may mail some of you again
personally who have shown interest in the past. Those interested should
mail me personally (awiggins at cse.unsw.edu.au) with "Photon Order" in the
subject field and the following info in the body:
	* Your name and contact details
	* The institute making the purcase (Uni, Company or private)
	* prefered number of units 
	* memory size preference (16MB or 32MB)
	* Project brief, ie what you intend to do with it (just a summery
nothing more then a page please.

	If there are more orders then boards I'll select them with some of
the other group members. I'll let people know by mid december who gets
what and the boards will ship early next year. 
	Please note we only plan to make 36 of these boards and make the
design (Schematics/PCB public domain), Supplied will be a user manual, the
unit and a JTAG programmer unit (for firmware upgrades). 
	During summer a new board (Photon version 2) based on the SA-1110
with SDRAM and FLASH on the CPU board will be done, this design is being
funded by these sales. For this reason only hardware/software developers
should order these boards, others should wait for the new board. Anyone
interested in manufacturing more of the Photon version 1 boards should let
me know in a seperate mail.

	Please mail me the orders before december. I'll stop taking orders
at the end of november. Once all orders are in the pricing details will be
settled as well as shipping dates and who gets what.

	Cheers Adam 


----- End forwarded message -----

-- 
  Nick Bannon  | "I made this letter longer than usual because
nick at it.net.au | I lack the time to make it shorter." - Pascal