GumStix - 400 MHz Computer On A Stick O' Chewing Gum

For all you laszy readers, if you get bored of the following over excited
computer nerd jukie ravings of a description.. please skip to the end where you can view lots of fun piccys and video's of variosue cool robots and things.

Ive just found the gumstix computer, and im hooked.
I NEED ONE !!!

the gumstix itself is a small board the size and shape of a large(ish)_ stick of chewing gum (8cm long)

the board itself has......

1) 400 Mhz CPU
2) 16 megs of flash memory
3) Bluetooth
4) two expansion boards.

using the expansion boards you can add...

*) upto wired ethernet network cards
*) a MMC card reader
*) wireless ethernet
*) Usb client
*) Usb Host
*) 2 serial ports

*)a breakout board.
The breatout board is simply a cirtuit board that gives access to the main bus tracks.

the breakout board can be used to make your own addons.. OR to access more featuress of the chip..

*** THE CHIP ON THE GUMSTIKS HAS AN INBUILT TFT / LCD MONITOR CONTROLLER !!!!!!!!! ***

best of all, the expansion boards attach to each other in a sandwich design (like lots of chewing gum sticks in the packet)


And thats not the half of it...

THE BEST FEATURE....
THE FEATURE THAT ROCKS THE HARDEST....

Is the board fully 100% supported by Linux 2.6.X... ohhhh yes !

The website will not only sell you the hardware, but has a free gcc based Cross compiler.

and it has somthing called a *builtroot*

which is very very very similar to freeBSD ports and GENTOO PORTAGE !!!!!!

you built the software you want on your computer, then download the programs onto the gumstix and run them !

even program your own software and drivers.

okay... video time....

http://www.gumstix.org/

download the piccy of the fish, it acts exactly like a real fish, watch it swim.. its amasing.

Also, have a look at the first first flying webserver !!!!!

thanks to anti-hotlinking, to see the board you will need ot go here, and click the camera icon half way down the page to see the board.
http://www.gumstix.com/spexboards.html


and some sexy sexy addons....

http://www.gumstix.com/spexExpnsion.html

I just need one of these... the question is.. what to do with it ???

My First idea was to use it as an insanely low powered, always on web server.
then i kept adding to it untill i had designed a full laptop with serial / bluetooth keyboard and everything.

maybe ill read up on the robotics addon....

after i can scrape some cash together, maybe ill be posting here using a tangled ball of wires nailed to a plank of wood ???

 

 

 

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This thing looks pretty cool...Although I don't know what I would use it for either. Maybe a DIY MP3 player or something, possibly a portable game system, I'm not sure.

But what exactly is XScale? That's a processor family I've never heard of.

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I could see a lot of uses for things like this, like perhaps controlling small robots, or a tiny but fast PDA. Plus, it would just be awesome to have one! I wonder what the next generation of tiny PCs will be like, just imagine having a processor with the speed of the one in your desktop PC in your pocket...

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Oh, I'd love something like that. Definately a bit larger than a stick of gum....that processor speed would be fine. Maybe a small ahrd drive (as in, 5 gigs), a little RAM, Bluetooth, and MEPISLite Linux...I'd just need to get a Bluetooth mouse and FrogPad keyboard, and maybe a small screen..and I ahve a wearable PC!

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Have you looked at some of the cool things people do with gumstix ??



one project added the device to a wether baloon.

the gumstix was connected to a GPS , a mobile phone, and two camera's.

It was programmed to take a photo every 30 seconds, and when it langed, it sent its full locaction back to the owner in a test message !!!!!!

it traveleed 60 miles, and went 20 thousand meters high !!!!!

On some of the phtographs, it looks like you are on the verge of space, below the horizon is blue sky... above the horizon is black.. where there is little or no atmosphere to refract runlight !!!



One guy used it to make a bluTooth sniper riffle.
Allows you to access bluetooth devicees upto a mile away using a sniperrifle scope, and directional anetnna.



And one of my favorite...
Someone wired up the device to a web-cam.
and made a robotic arm holding a soft-air bb-gun
that automatically fires at anything that moves infront of it.

like a centinal gun from HalfLife.

Alot of people aso cluter them together to make high powered compiling enviromnets.

Personally, i think im going to buy 2.
One will be a web-server / portable proxy to the tor-ntwork.
so anythwhere i go, i can add the thing ot the network, set it up as a proxy, and be annonymous on any machine i find..

(cool hacker toy, lol)

 

 

 

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I NEED ONE!!! I hate you..... I was about to build a new computer but because of you I need a GumStix now.... I'll use it to make a really small laptop. But still... I need to make a new computer too, but now that you showed me this (It's So Friggen Cool) I have to purchase one of em.

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GumStix - 400 MHz Computer On A Stick O\' Chewing Gum

Can anybody point me to projects for camera's, GPS or Phones, or any kind of sencers to Gumstix's ??

I appricate you help, Thanks in advance..

Umesh.

-reply by Umesh

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