Firefly Technology's RK3562J Packs a Wealth of Isolated Connectivity for Industrial Projects
System-on-module and carrier board bundle includes isolated digital inputs and outputs alongside RS232, RS485, CAN bus, and more.
Embedded electronics specialist Firefly Technology has announced a new system-on-module, built around the Rockchip RK3562J system-on-chip and targeting industrial workloads — complete with a wide operating temperature range and a carrier board that provides isolated inputs and outputs.
"AIO-3562JQ is powered by the Rockchip RK3562J, a high-performance, low-power, quad-core 64-bit industrial-grade processor with up to 8GB of RAM," Firefly writes of its latest creation. "The core board is equipped with the BTB [Board To Board] interface, providing more powerful transmission. With an array of interfaces, it supports various video output options, multiple cameras, gigabit Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and 4G LTE expansion."
The system-on-module at the heart of the machine, which was brought to our attention by CNX Software, is based on the Rockchip RK3562J, giving it four Arm Cortex-A53 cores running at up to 1.2GHz, an Arm Mali G52-2EE graphics processor, a video processing unit with 4k30 H.264/H.265/HVP9 decoding and 1080p60 H.264 encoding, and a 13-megapixel image signal processor (ISP) with high dynamic range (HDR) support. To this, Firefly has added a choice of 2GB, 4GB, or 8GB of LPDDR4/LPDDR4x memory and an optional 16-64GB eMMC.
The carrier board, meanwhile, brings out a range of features including a single gigabit Ethernet port and a second Fast Ethernet port, which offer wired connectivity alongside IEEE 802.11ac dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, and optional 4G cellular via a mini-PCI Express (mPCIe) card, two two-lane MIPI Camera Serial Interfaces (CSIs) that can be combined into a single four-lane CSI, a MIPI Display Serial Interface (DSI) supporting 2048×1080p panels at 60Hz, a microphone input, a speaker output, a USB 3.0 On-The-Go (OTG) port, one USB 2.0 port, and two USB 2.0 ports on a wafer connector.
For more connectivity the carrier board includes a 24-pin Pheonix connector carrying two opto-isolated digital inputs, two relay-isolated digital outputs, two isolated RS485 serial ports, two isolated RS232 serial ports, one isolated CAN bus, and one isolated UART serial bus — alongside a separate connector for an I2C bus, which is not isolated. In addition to this, the whole assembly is rated at a wider-than-usual operating temperature of -40°C to 85°C (-40°F to 185°F) — something Firefly hopes will endear the design to industrial users.
The AIO-3562JQ is available to order on the Firefly store now at $129 for a version with 1GB of RAM and an 8GB eMMC or $149 for one with 2GB of RAM and the same 8GB eMMC; pricing and availability for the higher-RAM models has not yet been announced.