Arduino boards are small, inexpensive devices that let you build things with sensors (to control anything from a robot to a home automation system). The Raspberry Pi is a small, single board computer that can run Linux-based software.

But what if you want a board that can do both of those things? That’s where the UDOO comes in. It’s a single-board Arduino-compatible computer which has a faster processor than the Raspberry Pi, support for Android or Linux.

UDOO

The developers launched a Kickstarter campaign to help fund the project a few days ago, and have already blown well past their goal. That means the first UDOO units could hit the streets as early as Sepetember, if all goes according to plan.

The UDOO is powered by a Freescale i.MX6 ARM Cortex-A9 processor and features 1GB of RAM, a microSD card slot for storage, gigabit Ethernet and WiFi, 2 USB ports, 2 mini USB ports, HDMI, and audio ports.

It also has the same SAM3X8E ARM Cortex-M3 chip as the Arduino Due, and support for any shields that will work with the Arduino Due.

udoo_02

Not only is the whole project kind of cool, but the makers of the UDOO board have put together one of the best videos I’ve ever seen showing what you might actually want to do with an Arduino board — especially one that also has its own on-board computer.

Examples shown in the video include a video game system that receives input from homemade controllers (like foot-pads for a racing game), a motion sensor that you can wave your hands in front of to control music playback, or a remote control robot that lets you follow your dog around with a camera while streaming the video over the internet to a tablet.

There will be two models of the UDOO board. The UDOO DUAL has a i.MX6 dual-core processor and a $109 price (although early bird Kickstarter backers can snag it for $99), while the UDOO QUAD has an i.MX6 quad-core processor and a SATA connector. That model will sell for $129, but early backers can reserve one for a pledge of $119.

Since Freescale offers plenty of documentation for its i.MX6 chips, these systems should be pretty hacker-friendly, and the developers say they’ll support Android and Linux.

via CNX-Software

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9 replies on “UDOO: $109 single-board computer is like an Arduino crossed with a Raspberry Pi”

  1. Hummingboard i4 pro if your gonna make anything, or cubox i4 pro if your just using it for tv and not making anything; from solid-run.com i also bought raspberry b+ and Beagleboard black rev c, and now im in the process of looking at banana pi, pcduino3, cubietruck3, udoo quad, odroid-xu-e, rk3188. Also looking at using old raspberry a or b as surveillance kit so ppl dont steal the best raspberry.dont think any of the cheap sbc have that possibility as far as i have been reading about them. Most ppl i have asked recommend udoo quad or pcduino3 regarding best hardware.

  2. (1) Dump the Arduino “fifth-wheel” and break out more i.MX6 GPIO pins. (2) Provide some ready-to-go drivers for GPIO, I2C, SPI (to name a few). The Arduino is a crutch.

  3. Looks like an ODroid X2 combined with an Arduino. Interesting board !

  4. Are there any cheap ARM boards that have 2 Gigabit Ethernet ports? Thanks.

    1. Many of the cheap gigabit-present ARM boards don’t seem to have the CPU power to actually achieve full gigabit speeds (see: Pogoplug, GoFlex). The most recent ARM processors are probably a bit better at this, though they are not yet cheap. I’ve yet to see the intersection of >=1 * full gigabit, cheap and ARM. PowerPC might be a good candidate, though (see: WD My Book Live), but they don’t have dual gigabit. Your best bet, in terms of intersecting low power, cost, size with high performance and feature set would probably be an Intel Atom, AMD Sempron, VIA Nano or AMD-G machine. There are many cheap thin clients floating around eBay with ~60w psu + 1 * gigabit + 1 * pci-e x4.

      Edit: I’m pretty impressed with the UDOO presentation, feature set and price points. Let’s hope it quickly becomes a reality (and then maybe an even cheaper reality).

    2. Hummingboard i4 pro if your gonna make anything, or cubox i4 pro if your just using it for tv and not making anything; from solid-run.com i also bought raspberry b+ and Beagleboard black rev c, and now im in the process of looking at banana pi, pcduino3, cubietruck3, udoo quad, odroid-xu-e, rk3188. Also looking at using old raspberry a or b as surveillance kit so ppl dont steal the best raspberry.dont think any of the cheap sbc have that possibility as far as i have been reading about them. Most ppl i have asked recommend udoo quad or pcduino3 regarding best hardware.

  5. Comparing the UDOO to a RaspberryPi is not exactly fair, especially
    when one looks at the price difference. Having said that, the
    RaspberryPi is in a bit of a different Category. The RaspberryPi is
    probably more comparable to the PCDuino or the Beaglebone.

    The UDOO is more comparable to a combination of the beagleboard XM / Pandaboard ES + Arduino Due or the Wandboard + Arduino Due

    The 1/1.2GHZ IMX.6 dual/quad core proessor with vivante GPU + 1GB of
    RAM provides at least 2X the processing power of the 700MHz ARM11 on
    the raspberry Pi. It really is a different class of CPU.

    Compared to its competition

    Beagleboard XM + Arduino Due = 130+ 50 = 180

    Wandboard Duo + Arduino Due = 100 + 50 = 150

    Pandaboard ES + Arduino Due = 160 + 50 = 210.

    So $109/129 for the UDOO is not a bad ideal, especially that it has
    things like a SATA connector. It would’ve been nice if the board brought
    out some of the IMX6 I/O pins in addition to the Arduino Due IO, but I
    doubt this will happen.

  6. Looks like a fairly complete set of connectos. And not suffering from the usual hedgehog mentality of putting connector on every available edge, that are so common for smaller boards in general.

  7. IMO; at the price with its capabilities, that it will sell out very quickly. I think it is really cool, combining two and making something better than each one individually.

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