Fusion Garage Grid 10 Dead Recovery

Grid 10 is a Nvidia Tegra II 1Ghz Dual Core based 10.1 inch Android device. It uses a clever customized Android OS called Grid OS. The base Wi-Fi-only model, with 16 GB of memory, costs $299, a full $200 less than the comparable Apple model. It gave users good experience with gesture controls. The latest firmware version is 1.00.37. Adobe Flash Player 11 can be installed and YouTube video plays very well .

When a black screen appears and likes dead, the power button has no effect. It may be due to a firmware crash. The customer support can be reached @ 1-855-822-5534 and a very good prompt help may be provided. Usually "holding reset and power button in the same time, and then restart" may solve the problem.

10 Attractive android tutorials for developers

ADMIN selected 10 Attractive android tutorials for developers who going to learn how to make applications for android:

1. OpenGL ES 2.0

This tutorial shows you how to create a simple Android application that uses the OpenGL ES 2.0 API to perform some basic graphics operations.

2. Android Development Tutorial

This tutorial describes how to create Android applications with Eclipse. This is very long tutorial, but also most detailed.

3. Android SDK Tutorial – Learn how to install Android SDK

Tutorial describes how to install the Android SDK and set up your development environment for the first time.

4. Using Facebook SDK in Android development

In this tutorial I show you an android application, which logging in to Facebook, then get the Facebook ID.

5. Drawing with Canvas in Android, Saving your drawings

This is one of tutorials from series of topics for drawing with canvas on android.

6. Android Google Maps Tutorial

In this tutorial we will see how to incorporate Google Maps into an Android app.

7. Android location service example

This tutorial will help you to start using location services (in particular: LocationManager class to get user location and Geocoder to translate location into addresses) and Google Maps on Android.

8. Working With Android Contacts

Learn to work with the Android contacts database. Basic knowledge of accessing SQLite in Android along with using Cursors is expected.

9. How to calculate the distance between two GPS coordinates?

A simple function that takes two GPS coordinates as input and outputs the distance between them in meter.

10. How To Create Android Live Wallpaper

In this article tells how to create live wallpaper from scratch. Step-by-step, we will create live wallpaper that would output TV test pattern on out home screen.

I may add one to handle images in Android:

11. Working With Images In Android

Beagleboard-XM USB ADB on Windows

The following instructions to get USB ADB working on Windows:

1. Download latest Android SDK, uncompress it in a local folder (i.e. c:\android), and add the full path to the tools\ directory to the system PATH
2. Download Android USB Driver and uncompress it in a local folder (i.e. c:\android\usb_driver).
3. Edit adb_usb.ini (or create and then edit if it doesn't already exist) file in

• Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\your_name\.android
• Windows Vista\7: C:\Users\your_name\.android
• These locations can be accessed at the command prompt by typing 'cd %USERPROFILE%'

Add echo 0x18D1 > "%USERPROFILE%\.android\adb_usb.ini"

4. Edit android_winusb.inf in C:\Android\usb_driver_r03-windows to match EVM/Beagle vendor and product ids. Under [Google.NTx86] for 32 bit machine or [Google.NTamd64] for 64 bit machine section add:

;TI EVM   

%SingleAdbInterface%        = USB_Install, USB\VID_18D1&PID_9018   

%CompositeAdbInterface%     = USB_Install, USB\VID_18D1&PID_9018&MI_01

5. Boot the board as normal and wait until shell prompt is available (micro-B USB cable must be disconnected). Then connect micro-B USB cable between board and Windows PC.

6. If the device is detected automatically, install driver that was downloaded. Otherwise go to Windows Device Manager find the Rowboat device to update the driver.

There are lots of useful ADB shell commands which can run on UART window or Windows command line by "adb shell".

• to copy a file or a directory recursively to emulator: adb push source destination
• to copy a file or a directory recursively from emulator: adb pull destination source

Microsoft Two Extremes of Touch Interaction: OmniTouch and PocketTouch

OmniTouch turns any surface in the user’s environment into a touch interface. OmniTouch: Wearable Multitouch Interaction Everywhere—co-authored by Chris Harrison, a Ph.D. student at Carnegie Mellon University and a former Microsoft Research intern; Benko; and Andy Wilson—is a wearable system that enables graphical, interactive, multitouch input on arbitrary, everyday surfaces.

PocketTouch: Through-Fabric Capacitive Touch Input—written by Saponas, Harrison, and Benko—describes a prototype that consists of a custom, multitouch capacitive sensor mounted on the back of a smartphone. It uses the capacitive sensors to enable eyes-free multitouch input on the device through fabric, giving users the convenience of a rich set of gesture interactions, ranging from simple touch strokes to full alphanumeric text entry, without having to remove the device from a pocket or bag.

See more in http://research.microsoft.com

The Lytro Light Field Camera First Look

See more in CNET or eda360insider.

TI Android GingerBread 2.3.4 DevKit 2.1 Product (GA) for BeagleBoard XM

This 092311 release package provides a Andorid GingerBread 2.3.4 DevKit(GA) distribution with integrated SGX (3D graphics) drivers, Adobe Flash 10 support, TI hardware abstraction for video overlay, WLAN, Bluetooth support for WL1271, PowerManagement, S-Video, Camera on Beagle XM/AM37x EVM, RowboPERF performance measurement application, NAND (UBIFS), Fastboot and standard applications from Android.

The package also includes TI Android GingerBread Source, Linux Android kernel, Toolchain, Debug and Development Tools(CCSv5, ADT, Flashing Utility, etc) and Documentation to ease development, deployment and execution of Android based systems. The product forms the basis for all Android application development on AM37x, AM35x platforms.

For detailed information on the various software components included in the release and how to build and use them, see TI-Android-GingerBread-2.3.4-DevKit-2.1 Developer Guide and TI-Android-GingerBread-2.3.4-DevKit-2.1 User Guide.

CodeSourcery tools is pre-required by Mentor Graphic's Rowboat project, but not by the TI's project.

I built the Beagleboard XM filesystem with SGX support successfully on Ubuntu 10.04 LTS, but failed on Ubuntu 11.04 and 11.10.

Apple is Giving Samsung Semiconductor A Splitting Headache

by

Ed McKernan

Published on 10-18-2011 02:00 PM

Apple started a legal process several months ago to keep Samsung Tablets out of worldwide markets because the product looked similar to the iPAD. Samsung is the only company in the world that can challenge Apple on a vertical cost basis and they have the added advantage of having corporate subsidies. Apple’s goal in the coming year is to make Samsung retreat from the consumer market and back into semiconductors or risk losing an excessive amount of money. See more in SemiWiki.

Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich Image and Video Processing

Today Google announced Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich along with Galaxy Nexus.

It provides several impressive media processing features including

• Face Unlock: One of the most ambitious is Ice Cream Sandwich’s new Face Unlock feature, which allows users to unlock their handsets just by looking into the front-facing camera.
• Camera: There’s a lot to love here. It features image stabilization, improved autofocus, and integration with other apps for sending photos or instant upload to Google+. Oh, and who could forget built-in face detection, panorama and time lapse modes, and on-the-fly photo retouching and enhancements.
• Enhanced Talk-to-Text: Voice input seems much smarter this time around, as it’s more accurate, requires less time, and even accounts for pauses.
• Live Effects is a collection of graphical transformations that add interest and fun to videos captured in the Camera app. For example, users can change the background behind them to any stock or custom image, for just the right setting when shooting video or using Google Talk video chat. Also available is Silly Faces, a set of morphing effects that use state-of-the-art face recognition and GPU filters to add great effects facial features during video capture. For example, you can use effects such as small eyes, big mouth, big nose, face squeeze, and more. Outside of the Camera app, Live Effects is available during video chat in the Google Talk app.
• Photo editor. Users can crop and rotate pictures, set levels, remove red eyes, add effects, and much more. After retouching, users can select one or multiple pictures or videos to share instantly over email, text messaging, bluetooth, social networks, or other apps.

Android 4.0 is a major platform release that adds a variety of new features for users and app developers. Android 4.0 related SDK, Platform, SDK Tools r14, ADT 14.0.0, Support Package 4.0, etc., are provided in Android development website.

hgfs Problem with ubuntu 11.04

Recently I has been a little annoyed by my hgfs problem with Ubuntu 11.04 since the share function is often out of control. Thanks to new releases Ubuntu 11.10 and Vmware 8.0, I haven't seen the problem again when playing with Ubuntu 11.10 and Vmware 8.0.

MX Video Player for Tegra 2 Android Device

It seems MX Video Player is one of the best video player for NVIDIA Tegra 2 based Android devices, such as Viewsonic G-Tablet, Grid 10, etc., since it supports multi-core decoding. According to test results on dual-core devices, it shows up to 70% performance improvement over single-core decoding. It is free on Android Market. For Tegra 2, ARMv7 CPU's codec should be used. If Android Market can not be accessed, it can be also download at

Player:
http://www.easy-share.com/196F1F8EE5...layer_v1.3.apk
http://www.filesonic.com/file/211005...layer_v1.3.apk
http://www.wupload.com/file/20055696...layer_v1.3.apk

Codecs:

http://www.easy-share.com/196996AEE5...RMv7__v1.3.apk
http://www.filesonic.com/file/211005...RMv7__v1.3.apk
http://www.wupload.com/file/20055675...RMv7__v1.3.apk

Viewsonic G Tablet Firmware 1.2 Restore

Bishop of Technology's GTab computing website provides very useful information for Viewsonic G Tablet, including some of the ROMS. I tried 1.2-4349 based image updated on 6/17/2011, and did not have a luck, but I was successful with nvflash4349rev4.zip. This 1.2-4349 ROM also comes with

• Windows APX-specific USB driver
• NVFlash tool taken from SDK
• Clockworkmod v3.0.2.8

which are very convenient. The steps are described in the included "Windows Readme First":

1. Install the Windows APX driver. When connect the GTab to the PC, the PC immediately tries to load a driver -- but since it doesn't know where the USB driver files are it will fail. Click through Start/Control Panel/Device Manager and find "APX" listed in the devices with a yellow "!" (exclamation point) on the icon. Select the APX item and find the "Update Driver" button and click it. When it asks where to search, choose the local computer manual selection choice and tell it to Browse. Point the Browse at the "USB" directory under the "Flash USB driver" folder. When pointed at the "USB" directory, the driver installed.
2. ake sure your BATTERY IS FULLY CHARGED. Connect your USB cable to the gTab and then to USB port on your PC. Push/Hold Power button and Volume- (down) keys at same time. The screen should go blank and you should hear an audible connection sound on PC if successful. Go to your Control Panel, and then System, and then Device Manager. You should see the Android device registered without exclamation mark.
3. Open the folder created from the zip extraction and find the file 'NVFlash_gTablet.bat' and double-click. Watch the new command window to follow the NVFlash process. If everything completes as designed, you may then continue and Shut-Down gTab by holding power button and disconnect USB cable from gTab and PC.
4. Start up tablet by holding power key and volume+ keys and enter Clockworkmod 3.0.2.8 rev 5. Run all of the wipe functions that are listed and then go into advanced section. Clear dalvik cache and then repartition sdcard to 4096 and 0 and then again 2048 and 0. Finish off with the 'fix permissions' step.
5. Now, while still in ClockworkMod, go to Mounts and storage, re-connect gTab to PC with USB cable and 'Mount USB storage'. Now go to PC and open My Computer to see the new drive letter it created (different on some systems). Copy the 1.2 ROM update.zip file from the ROM you want to install onto that drive letter. When copying is complete, 'Unmount USB storage' in ClockworkMod and disconnect gTab from PC.
6. Use the return/back key in ClockworkMod to go back to the main menu and select update from update.zip and keep an eye on the text output. If all goes well, then select 'reboot sytem now' with home button.

Be advised that the intial boot of any new rom will take a lot longer than subsequent boots.

Altera Introduces SoC FPGAs: Integrating ARM Processor System and FPGA into 28-nm Single-Chip Solution

Altera just announced its SoC FPGA.

Altera's Cyclone V and Arria V SoC FPGAs feature a processor system with a dual-core 800 MHz ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore processor, NEON media processing engine, single/double-precision floating point unit, L1 and L2 caches, ECC-protected memory controllers, ECC-protected scratchpad memory and a wide range of commonly used peripherals. The processor system can deliver 4,000 DMIPS peak performance for less than 1.8 watts. The processor system and FPGA fabric are powered independently and can be configured and booted in any order. Once in operation, the FPGA portion can be powered down as needed to conserve system power.

The ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore processor system and FPGA are interconnected by high throughput data paths, providing over 125-Gbps peak bandwidth with integrated data coherency. This level of performance is not possible in two-chip solutions. An integrated single-chip SoC FPGA allows board designers to eliminate the external I/O paths between a processor and an FPGA, providing significant system power savings.

Altera’s SoC FPGA pricing starts at less than $15 in high volumes.

See more in its website.

Qualcomm's New Snapdragon S4: MSM8960 & Krait Architecture

Qualcomm reveals its new processor Snapdragon S4 on its white paper. Here’s a block diagram of the chip from the Qualcomm White Paper:

It claims that this aSMP (asynchronous Symmetric Multi-Processor) approach delivers a 25 to 40% improvement in operating power for a given performance, as you can see in the following graph:

Brian Klug & Anand Lal Shimpi compared the Snapdragon S4 with other chips:

2011/2012 SoC Comparison
SoC	Process Node	CPU	GPU	Memory Bus	Release
Apple A5	45nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ 1GHz	PowerVR SGX 543MP2	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	Now
NVIDIA Tegra 2	40nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 @ 1GHz	GeForce	1 x 32-bit LPDDR2	Now
NVIDIA Tegra 3/Kal-El	40nm	4 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ ~1.3GHz	GeForce++	1 x 32-bit LPDDR2	Q4 2011
Samsung Exynos 4210	45nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ 1.2GHz	ARM Mali-400 MP4	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	Now
Samsung Exynos 4212	32nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ 1.5GHz	ARM Mali-400 MP4	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	2012
TI OMAP 4430	45nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ 1.2GHz	PowerVR SGX 540	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	Now
TI OMAP 4460	45nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ 1.5GHz	PowerVR SGX 540	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	Q4 11 - 1H 12
TI OMAP 4470	45nm	2 x ARM Cortex A9 w/ MPE @ 1.8GHz	PowerVR SGX 544	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	1H 2012
TI OMAP 5	28nm	2 x ARM Cortex A15 @ 2GHz	PowerVR SGX 544MPx	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	2H 2012
Qualcomm MSM8x60	45nm	2 x Scorpion @ 1.5GHz	Adreno 220	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2*	Now
Qualcomm MSM8960	28nm	2 x Krait @ 1.5GHz	Adreno 225	2 x 32-bit LPDDR2	1H 2012

They pointed out "Other than TI's OMAP 5 in the second half of 2012 and Qualcomm's Krait, no one else has announced plans to release a new microarchitecture in the near term. Furthermore, if we only look at the first half of next year, Qualcomm is the only company that's focused on significantly improving per-core performance through a new architecture. Everyone else is either scaling up in core count (NVIDIA) or clock speeds. As we've seen in the PC industry however, generational performance gaps are hard to overcome - even with more cores or frequency."

The performance is expected a big improvement over previous architectures.