HaneSOM: A Coin-Sized 128MB and ARM Cortex A5 Linux Platform

With the vocore.io page getting popular earlier this week, I decided to look up more mainstream SiP, Modules, and so forth. I knew there would be other small Linux machines around though I admit I'm not very familiar with this product category.

This particular HaneSOM platform is based on the Microchip SAMA5D2 SiP. Microchip packages this SAMA5 in multiple says, this one is DDR2, but LPDDR2 and DDR3 are also available. DDR2 seems preferred for simplicity as all components would run at 1.8V. Though LPDDR2 and DDR3 would be lower power if you were aiming at battery constrained operations.

What was most surprising to me was the incredible amount of documentation and resources available for Microchip's SAMA5D2: http://linux4sam.com/ in particular.

This SAMA5D2 chip coincides with Atmel's AT91-Linux project, but it seems that this modern group has mainlined all of those contributions to the Linux kernel proper. The linux4SAM page includes 6.1.x kernels and build instructions. Microchip's documentation looks quite comprehensive as well, with a whole slew of application notes, processor manuals and PMIC manuals.

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For those unfamiliar with the concept of a SiP: the 15mm x 15mm package is actually a printed circuit board connecting the CPU-core with DRAM. This has two advantages:

1. Simplicity, as DDR routing requires complex trace / impedance matching. By having the SiP handle this detail, the customer's PCB will be easier.

2. Size. SiP consistently make for smaller final PCBs.

HaneSOM further adds the PMIC MIC2800 (power supply) and a lot of capacitors allowing for consistent bootup. As well as the Flash chip for the bootloader, allowing for a comprehensive Linux-based solution.

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HaneSOM documentation states that this idles at 3.3V and 160mA. There are multiple sleep modes available but the power consumption is seemingly undocumented. The final size of HaneSOM is 20mm x 20mm.

I really really wish Atmel/Microchip had any follow through on this >10 year old chip. It was a really really good chip. Really great. Incredibly low power, great peripherals. But like so much else in ARM world, everything is dead & doing nothing, zero progress, nearly no improvements.

This chip is the sama5d2, a slightly revised version of the sama5d3 announced in February 2013: https://www.cnx-software.com/2013/02/05/atmel-introduces-sam...