Snowball Board

This seems to be a (better?) alternative to the panda board. Also with dual-core Cortex-A9 and 1GB RAM but with 4 or 8GB eMMC on board, better Ethernet (same SMSC Chip as on the IGEPv2), with Mali400 GPU and a RTC battery backup is also on board. And for fun a lot of sensors for mobil devices (3-axis accelerometer/3D magnetometer, 3-axis gyrometer, pressure sensor).

More Infos at: http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/Calao-Systems-Snowball/ and http://igloocommunity.org/

The board will be available in the 2nd quarder 2011. Prices 169€+VAT (4GB) and 244€+VAT (8GB).

But till now there seems to be no technical documentation available for the board and the CPU.

The price difference is stated on the pre-oder site as being due to:

"SDK vs PDK = no expansion connectors, no battery backup for RTC and only serial over USB port (for Linux console)"

[Edit: And here are a few (currently not the complete set, I hope) datasheets.]

[Edit2: If anyone’s going to the Alps soon, note that CALAO Systems are based near Grenoble.]

The price difference is stated on the pre-oder site as being due to:

“SDK vs PDK = no expansion connectors, no battery backup for RTC and only serial over USB port (for Linux console)”

Yes, but here is the only difference the memory. Ok, but at the order page there are now also differences at the connectors and so.

In the meantime a little more information about the board startup can be found here and here
I think this still would make it possible to (port and) use this board with RISC OS. But I am waiting for the missing documents for the all the ST-Ericsson chips (especially the CPU A9500). I fear they will not be public available.

Since some weeks the Snowballboard could be ordered (with the usual long shipping times for these kind of boards).
They have add some lite versions (without WLAN/BT/GPS) of the board with shorter shipping times (I had seen 4-8 instead of 8-12 week for the normal SDK or PDK version)
And there are now more datasheets available, since tuesday this week there is also a refence manual for the CPU! It tells it permits the low-level programming of the AP9500 but for me it seems there is enough for our needs.
The Display controller even has a RGB/BGR switch!

Still missing the manuals for the AB8500 (PMU, USB, Audio) and AV8100 (HDMI Transmitter).

Regarding the unfounded hopes of a Snowball-based tablet, I bumped into the chap I know who works at ST in the park on the weekend. Apparently they’re moving away from doing a lot with this kind of platform.

He does know the person in Grenoble doing the boards though, so if anyone has any questions (more intelligent than the ones I was able to ask), I can pass them on. I did ask about technical manuals and understand people are working from the Linux sources. Perhaps this one’s no longer worth pursuing (which would explain the almost-10-month-old status of this thread).

Apparently they’re moving away from doing a lot with this kind of platform.

Maybe this is releated with ‘sony bought sony-ericsson’.
But the snowboard mailing list is full of traffic and there is support from the snowball project manager, from linaro, ST and others. And on the Igloo Community site are since some time all the public documentation, sources and support for linux and Android.
So it doesn’t seems to be ‘dead’.
Apparently they sell a higher number of boards although this board is not so well know as beagle or panda board. At calao systems they offer scaled prices for 100pieces and up to 1000pieces. Unfortunately they increased the price of the board significant (I paid for my PDK about 240€ and now the price is 322€).

I am still would like to see RISC OS running on the snowball board (faster Ethernet, on board RTC, on board eMMC Memory with better access times – no USB bottle-neck).
Most of the documentation is public but like at the Raspberry Pi for USB nothing is documented in public. So if you would like you could ask him about documentation about this or in generell if it is possible to sign a NDA to get more detailed technical information if necessary.

I still haven’t start with a port of several reasons.
First I will code something that will be usable by all RISC OS users and not only by the two or three people with a snowball board ;-)
I hope I am ready to start (and finish :-) a port in some time in the future.

sony bought sony-ericsson

Ah yes, I remember him mentioning that now. I’ll check about docs too and report back.

At the moment there is a discount for 500 snowball SDK boards. The price for these is now 144.84€.

I’ve just had a quick look at the USB controller to see if it’s the same as the Raspberry Pi. It isn’t, but Linux appears to use a Mentor driver (musb). With a bit of luck it might be the same as in the BeagleBoard, in which case job done (maybe!).

[…] Mentor driver (musb). With a bit of luck it might be the same as in the BeagleBoard […]

Nothing to do with the FT232R, then? In any case, I can’t see any reference to that in the BB SRM or BOM. Ah, I think I see.

for USB nothing is documented in public

So, with reference to the Porting prerequisites (and for the moment ignoring the first and last on that list, along with deciphering the NOVA A9500 docs themselves) it’s probably just the detailed USB docs which are missing? I’ll ask.

[Edit: There seem to be some binary blobs and also may still be some limitations in the MUSB driver.]

Does anyone think it’d be too far fetched to add RISC OS to their Community projects?

Yes, I think it is to early to add RISC OS now. There should at least the kernel running on the board.

I think this is the Mentor USB IP Any such driver would also need to deal with the AB8500 PHY (and other kitchen sink) chip (but that shouldn’t be too complex)

As the snowball programm is unfortunately closing now (The igloo-communtity site will be closed by end of this month) there is a buy out at the calao-systems shop
You could get now a snowball board for only about 100€!

I think the snowball board is a great board for RISC OS and I am still interested to see RISC OS ported to it. But as I don’t have the time to do it myself and don’t have the time to get the necessary know how to do it myself I will spend a snowball-board and some additonal money to someone who is able to and are willing to do a RISC OS port to the snowball board.
If you are interested into doing this please contact me either here at the forum or at MatthiasF at gmx dot net.

The benefit of the snowball board compared to the pandaboard would be the onboard eMMC Memory (should be much faster than getting something via USB), faster Ethernet (not via USB), smaller board… (for more info see my first message in this threat.)

Just a short update. The snowball boards are now down to only 50€/75€ !!! (SDK, 400 in Stock/PDK, 600 in Stock). Thats really cheap for a dual core cortex A9 board with 4/8GB e-MMC.

Now down to 35€. Did they try to beat the PI?

You have to buy at least 10.

I’d be interested in one or two, anyone else?

Also, where does it say you have to buy 10? – Never mind, it’s when you enter a number for Add to Basket.

I’d be interested in one or two, anyone else?

I’d take one too!

I take it that its the all singing all dancing version that folk are interested in (PDK), if so I would be interested in 2 or 3.

I would take one.

I take that the intention is for using it with linux, as I dont think there is any RISC OS support for mali 400? Another Mali machine of interest has a true SATA port, which to me would be a step in the right direction for a serious computer. (Mele A2000 etc)

The snowball community has gone offline and support has also dwindled to nil.
If people do buy this board, beware that it has some quirks which will surprise you. I have had a horrible experience with unstable USB2 ports etc.
However, at such low prices, for either a server or other simple implementation it might be just the right thing.

I hope it’s not too crippled, Jan, I just bought ten. Just under 412 pounds, at today’s exchange rate.

Or 13 pounds more than a 1982 BBC B. For ten of them.

Simon, congrates on your purchase. Are you selling any on or are they all spoken for? We seem to be struggling to reach the min order level.