Last year (2017), NXP announced its new applications processors, the i.MX 8 series. The i.MX 8M family of applications processors based on Arm® Cortex®-A53 and Cortex-M4 cores provide industry-leading audio, voice and video processing for applications that scale from consumer home audio to industrial building automation and mobile computers. NXP announced a select group of partners that have been engaged in the development of an ecosystem for the i.MX 8M family processor. Taiwan based Innocomm Mobile Technology was one of those selected partners among others and have announced their NXP i.MX 8M quad-core system-on-module – called WB10 with wireless and wired connectivity options.
Innocomm WB10 is a next generation Wireless System-on-Module powered by the NXP i.MX 8M SoC. It offered advanced video processing capabilities and designed for application in the areas of internet audio, home entertainment, smart speakers among many others. With inbuilt Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and Ethernet connectivity options, the WB10 can quickly find applications in the trending areas of Internet of Things (IoT) and Industrial applications.
The WB10 is a small module and measured at just 50 x 50 mm. The WB10 module comes with only 2GB LPDDR4 RAM and an 8GB eMMC flash memory. It provides onboard support for WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Ethernet controller with MIMO 2 x 2 and Bluetooth 4.2. Apart from impressive connectivity options, you also get a host of other interfaces like – USB 3.0 host, USB 2.0 device, 2x I2C, 3x UART, GPIO, PWM, SPI, and PCIe interfaces.
The WB10 has an impressive audio and video interfaces with is Media I/O expressed via three 80-pin connectors that include an HDMI 2.0a supporting 4K and HDR, as well as MIPI-DSI, 2x MIPI-CSI, SPDIF Rx/Tx, 4x SAI, and the high-end DSD512 audio interface.
The following are some of the SoM specifications:
- Processor – NXP i.MX8M Quad, Cortex-A53 x 4 + M4
- Display –
- 4K + HDR
- HDMI 2.0a
- MPI DSI
- RAM – 2GB LPDDR4
- Flash Memory – 8GB eMMC Flash
- Connectivity –
- Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
- MIMO 2×2 / BT 4.2
- Ethernet 10/100M/1Gbps
- Audio –
- SAI
- SPDiF Rx/Tx
- DSD512
- Dimension – 50 x 50 mm
- Others –
- USB 3.0/2.0 Host
- USB 2.0 Device
- i2C
- SPI
- UART
- GPIO
- CSI
- PWM
- PCIe
- 80 pins x 3, board to board connectors
Although no official software support has been provided, it is expected the SoM should support the usual Android and Linux BSPs as seen in most modules. A development carrier board is made available by the company to extend the SoM interfaces and will surely make development easier. The module connects to the carrier board through three 80-pin board-to-board connectors exposing many of the I/Os provided by the latest NXP processor.
At this point, no pricing or availability information is provided for the WB10. More information about the module can be found on the product page.
Source: INNOCOMM NXP I.MX8M SYSTEM ON MODULE – AN ADVANCED VIDEO PROCESSING SOM WITH CONNECTIVITY
