CubieTruck (CubieBoard 3) unboxing

The CubieTruck (or so called Cubieboard 3) is the third board of CubieTeam. It is a new PCB-Version with a Allwinner A20 Chip, which has also been used in the CubieBoard 2. But now there is more RAM (2GB) and onBoard VGA-graphics Controller, onBoard Wifi (!) and BLuetooth. There are some more features mentioned below, but for my project the main advantages are: more processing power (2 stronger cores), lower power consumption (500mAh at 5V), lots of GPIOs (2mm!) and flash memory.

So I unboxed one today:

It came with an android os flashed. So after some reading and kinda confusing tutorials I managed to get the correct version 13.04 of lubuntu server running on a sd card, installed ROS on it and was faced with some kind of paradies of ros hydro armhf packages!
Something I was really missing at the [amazon &title=Raspberry Pi&text=Raspberry Pi].

So after the first day of CubieBoard I am really looking forward to get this little fellow beeing the heart of my ROS Robot.

Features:

  • Allwinner Tech A20 SOC
  • SATA supported
  • 54 extended pins
  • Built-in HDMI/ VGA display interface
  • Built-in WIFI+BT module
  • 2GB DDR3 RAM
  • Built-in IR receiver
  • SPDIF audio interface

Specifications:

  • Allwinner Tech SOC A20 ARM® Cortex™-A7 Dual-Core ARM® Mali400 MP2 Complies with OpenGL ES 2.0/1.1
  • 2GB DDR3@480MHz
  • HDMI&VGA 1080P display output on-board
  • 10M/100M/1G Ethernet
  • WIFI + BT wireless connection with antenna on-board
  • SATA 2.0 interface support 2.5’ HDD (for 3.5’ HDD, only need another 12V power input)
  • Storage solution NAND + MicroSD
  • 2 x USB HOST, 1 x OTG, 1 x SPDIF, 1 x IR, 4 x LEDs, 1 x Headphone, 3 x Keys
  • Power DC5V@2.5A with HDD support Li-battery & RTC
  • 54 extended pins including I2S, I2C, SPI, CVBS, LRADC x2,UART, PS2, PWM x2, TS/CSI, IRDA, LINEIN&FMIN&MICIN, TVIN x4 with 2.0 pitch connectors
  • PCB size 11cm *8cm*1.4mm