System-on-module comes quickly to life

The ARM9-based TS-7400 system-on-module can boot Linux in 1.1 secondsTechnologic Systems continues to reduce the boot time, price and size of its rugged embedded boards and systems targeting remote sensing and other power-critical applications. Its new ARM9-based TS-7400 system-on-module can boot Linux in 1.1 seconds. The TS-7400 is a small (74 x 119mm) embedded computer module that is designed to provide extreme performance for applications which demand high reliability, fast bootup/startup and connectivity at low cost and low power, such as point-of-sales (PoS), vending machines, data acquisition units and data recorder modules.

The TS-7400 ARM engine is a standard size that fits into some very inexpensive off-the-shelf extruded aluminium cases.

This board is designed with reliability in mind.

The board has a standard operating temperature range of -40 to +85C without the use of heatsinks or fans, the components are 100% soldered-on and the power required is only 5V DC at 350mA.

The TS-7400 enables more control and access to the peripherals on the EP9302 ARM9 core.

The 40-pin header provides three TTL-level serial ports, 20 bidirectional Schmitt-trigger GPIO pins, digital audio codec via the AC97/I2S interfaces, four 12bit 0-3.3V analogue input (ADC) pins and a high speed dedicated (up to 14.7MHz) SPI bus.

Also, a simple 8bit multiplexed general-purpose parallel bus implemented in the onboard CPLD is available via GPIO pins 0-13.

The 26-pin header brings out other interfaces such as JTAG, USB, and special lines for the TS-9441 and 1.8/3.3/5V power supply.

The onboard CPLD can be also used to provide custom functionality through an extra core, such as additional COM ports, quadrature channels, PWM, timers, frequency counters etc The TS-7400 system on module boots to Linux from NAND Flash using the proprietary TS- Flashboot bootup firmware residing in ROM memory.

It can also boot from an SD Card, through the TS-SDboot firmware.

The TS-7400 ultra-fast-booting solution was optimised for speed and includes kernel, initrd and file system (Busybox) tweaks.

The hardware accelerated NAND Flash controller is a unique feature implemented in the onboard CPLD that provides hardware ECC, allowing the system to skip software ECC during startup and enabling bootup to a Linux shell prompt in 1.1s.

As the TS-7400 actually boots to an initrd with a read-only mounted file system, it is possible to have something other than a shell prompt running after bootup by editing the /linuxrc shell script on the initrd.

Linux development on the TS-7400 is typically done on the board itself.

The provided SD card is pre-installed with Debian and contains compilers and everything needed for developing applications in C, C++, PERL, PHP, and SH.

Java, Basic, TCL, Python and others are possible.

One can still use cross-compilers hosted on just about any platform if there is a specific need.

Technologic systems also provides binary versions of the popular Linux 'crosstool' project to allow cross-compiling on Windows/cygwin or a Linux/i386 PC.

The TS-9441 peripheral board is needed during development in order to configure and setup the TS-7400 Flash system.

The TS-9441 has 2Kbyte EEPROM, and 2Mbyte serial Flash, so it can be used to bring-up/recover 'dead' TS-7400 boards.

Also, the TS-9441 enables regulated 5V DC power in.

Once the TS-7400 is configured and loaded, it can safely run stand-alone.

The TS-7400 is now available for next-day shipment and priced at $99, quantity 100.