Adafruit has introduced a work-in-progress single-board laptop, powered by the dual-architecture quad-core Raspberry Pi RP2350B microcontroller and that includes “a ridonkulous quantity of {hardware}:” the Fruit Jam.
“We have been catching up on a latest [interview] with Eben Upton and realized some enjoyable info: resembling [that] the DVI hack for the RP2040 was impressed by a tool known as the IchigoJam,” Adafruit’s Phillip Torrone explains. “We bear in mind studying about this again when it was an LPC1114, now it makes use of an RP2040. Effectively, we’re wrapping up the Metro RP2350, and currently, we’ve been joking round that with DVI output and USB Host assist through bit-banged PIO, you can sorta construct a bit stand-alone laptop.”
Adafruit is making ready to launch a Raspberry Pi RP2350B-powered single-board laptop, tentatively titled the “Fruit Jam,” (📷: Adafruit)
Adafruit’s oblique inspiration was the IchigoJam household of units created by Japanese academic coding concern Programming Membership Community (PCN) as low-cost microcomputers for academic tasks, and most just lately upgraded to function a Raspberry Pi Pico and its dual-core RP2040 microcontroller. The place the IchigoJam wears a selected fruit on its sleeve, although, having been named for the Japanese phrase for “strawberry,” Adafruit has taken the choice method of protecting all bases with its personal “Fruit Jam” moniker as a brief placeholder which will find yourself proving standard sufficient for everlasting use.
Whereas sharing an identical credit score card-sized footprint, the Fruit Jam is not designed as a competitor for the mainstream Raspberry Pi household of single-board computer systems. As a substitute, just like the IchigoJam, it makes use of a contemporary microcontroller the place a classic microcomputer would have opted for an at-the-time cutting-edge microprocessor — benefiting from the march of technological progress to ship a digital video output, two-from-four RISC-V or Arm Cortex-M33 processor cores working at as much as 150MHz, 520kB of static RAM (SRAM) plus 8MB of pseudo-static RAM (PSRAM), 16MB of flash storage plus microSD Card enlargement, USB Host assist, give on-board NeoPixel RGB LEDs and three buttons, STEMMA QT I2C and STEMMA Traditional enlargement, EYESPI connector for TFT shows, a 16-pin general-purpose enter/output (GPIO) header, an HDMI-compatible DVI video output pushed by the RP2350B’s Excessive-Pace Transmission (HSTX) port, and even a mono speaker and stereo headphone jack.
“With the additional pins of the QFN-80 [Raspberry Pi] RP2350B [microcontroller], we’re capable of jam a ridonkulous quantity of {hardware} into this form,” Torrone explains of the spectacular function record. “The PSRAM will assist once we wish to do issues like run emulations that we have to retailer in quick RAM entry, and it’ll additionally allow us to use the primary SRAM because the DVI video buffer. After we get the PCBs again and assembled, what ought to we strive working on this {hardware}? We’re fairly certain it may possibly run [id Software’s] DOOM. Ought to that be first?”
Extra info is on the market on the Adafruit weblog; no launch date or pricing has but been introduced.
