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The Sipeed M1s DOCK is a tiny single-board computer with two USB Type-C ports, a microSD card reader, camera and display connectors, support for WiFi 4, Bluetooth 5 and Zigbee wireless communications, and a set of UART/I2C/SPI/and other pins for expansion.

Available from AliExpress for less than $11 (plus $7 to ship to the United States), the little development board is also powered by a Bouffalo Lab BL808 low-power RISC-V processor.

That’s the same chip used in the similarly-sized Pine64 Ox64 single-board computer. The chip features:

  • 1 x Alibaba T-head C906 64-bit RISC-V CPU core @ 480 Hz
  • 1 x Alibaba T-Head E907 32-bit RSIC-V CPU core @ 320 MHz
  • 1 x Alibaba T-Head E902 32-bit CPU core @ 160 MHz
  • 1 x BLAI-100 neural processing unit with 100 GOPS performance

The M1s DOCK also has 768K SRAM + 64MB UHS PSRAM, 16MB of flash storage, USB 2.0 ports, support for an optional 1.68 inch 280 x 240 pixel capacitive touchscreen display and/or a 2MP camera. Sipeed sells a bundle that includes the M1s DOCK, display and camera for just $20 + shipping.

Sipeed says the board supports RTOS and Linux-based software, although I only see download links for Linux.

The M1s DOCK measures 55.4 x 27.4mm (about 2.2″ x 1.1″), and if you’re wondering why it’s got the word “dock” in the name, that’s because the board itself houses a M1s module with just the processor and I/O connectors. Want to use that module with a different dock or carrier board? You can pick it up from the same AliExpress page for about $7.

You can find more information about the M1s module and M1s Dock at the Sipeed wiki.

via LinuxGizmos

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9 replies on “Sipeed M1s DOCK is a tiny RISC-V dev board for $11”

  1. Why would anyone want to invest in and support these T-Head Xuantie hardware in the M1s and Ox64. Alibaba does believe in the Open hardware ideals that RISC-V is supposed to represent and even states no-one can modify their cpu designs. SiFive is very open with their chips and the better platform for the community to put their effort behind.

    1. A Chinese entity might get a fair amount of manufacturer support. And Alibaba is bigger than SiFive and thus seems more relevant to begin with, and might be able to fund the production of hardware that performs better than anything SiFive can, or the production of greater quantities of it, or both, which would make it more relevant.
      The mistake you’re making here is presuming that “the community” is a relevant voice in what happens to hardware. It’s not individual people buying these things to make cool and fun projects with, it’s businesses who use them in prototypes to evaluate if the SoC on them can be used in some mass produced consumer good that the end user isn’t supposed to be messing with. There are exceptions, but that’s when an end user device manufacturer is deliberately trying to cultivate a community environment (like pine64).

      1. This.
        With the likes of Raspberry Pi and Odroid being the rare exceptions.

        With open-source projects it’s always an uphill battle through hardware, software, modules, and permissions.

        While the philosophy of open-source is neat, and they are correct on-paper/theoretically, it doesn’t really check out practically or in real-world conditions. For instance, if in 2020 we had a reset. By that imagine AndroidOS v10, the migration to ARMv9 hardware, and a brand new Software Base but it was close-source. Well it wouldn’t have any effect on the market. The big players would adapt, the niche projects would halt, and the millions of cheap electronics from China would continue using the old AndroidOS v9 software and ARMv8 hardware. And tinkerers will eventually find a way to crack into the close-source devices and get special permissions, homebrew, sideloading, and eventually Custom Firmware. Think like hacked Nintendo Wii or a Sony PSP.

    2. T-Head is one of the few chip design companies to publish their designs… That seems fairly open to me.

  2. I am surprised no one has made a cheap low power RISC V chip for the low budget handheld game market.

    1. Why would they need to? There are about a thousand low-power ARM cores out there, they all have some degree of Linux support, and they’re pretty cheap. The handheld gaming companies often don’t care that much about openness, and even in the rare case that they do, letting anyone boot any kernel they like is usually as far as they care to go. Why do they want to redesign around a different architecture when there’s nothing wrong with the one they have now? Places that have reasons to control their chips more or are afraid of possible moves by ARM have a reason, but makers of cheap hardware rarely care about either.

  3. i need dedicated screen
    power on board (steper up 1-6V)
    dedicated ethernet

    and no blobs on , only normal mainline linux

      1. think about : WHAT You would make with this dev.
        1. small computer like c.h.i.p
        * power on board, screen, keyboard, mouse, wifi/ethernet, change speed memory,cpu etc.
        working time = meybe week? on one charge
        2. small router (no screen) but eficient network
        3. I2C,SPI for robot, 3d printer etc. no need power but need host usb
        4. Lora (hat)
        5. sound (hat)
        ….
        write Your list

Comments are closed.