The open-spec “Lindenis V536” SBC runs Linux on the Cortex-A7-based Allwinner V536, a 4K camera-oriented SoC with integrated ISP and VPU. The 130 x 85mm SBC design is built in an SoM plus baseboard configuration.

Lindenis Tech Ltd., a Shenzhen, China startup staffed by former Allwinner employees, has released the Lindenis V536, an open spec, single board computer based on Allwinner’s V536 4K mobile camera SoC. In August 2018, we covered a previous camera-oriented SBC from Lindenis, the Lindenis V5 based on the Allwinner’s V5 SoC. It’s only natural that the company would now follow up with this new open-spec 130 x 85mm SBC based on the V536. The V536 SoC is a high-performance, low-power mobile camera SoC developed for the new generation of intelligent driving recorders. The Lindenis V536 board supports Linux-4.9 and its homegrown Lindenis Video OS.

Lindenis V536
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Allwinner’s V536 chip integrates dual-core Cortex-A7 CPU, supports up to 4K30 H.265/H.264 encoding and decoding, and provides various video output interfaces (MIPI/RGB/HDMI) for screen-type products. V536 integrates the Allwinner latest-generation ISP, and adopts WDR, multi-level noise reduction, and other image enhancement and correction algorithms to provide professional picture effect.

Allwinner says that the SoC’s advanced 28nm low-power process enables the V536 to support product miniaturization. The 32-bit DDR3/DDR4/LPDDR3/LPDDR4 on chip makes it well suited to high bandwidth requirements. V536 is supported by Linux SDK hardware and software reference designs.

Lindenis V536 detailed view – top (left) bottom
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Lindenis targets the board for applications including singular value decomposition (SVD), smart IPC cameras, computer-based camera systems and streaming servers. While the previous Lindenis V5 was designed as a complete SBC, the company took a different approach with Lindenis V536, building a separate SoM for much of the core functionality and a separate baseboard for interfaces and expansion.

Lindenis V536 baseboard specs:

• Storage — eMMC flash module connector, MicroSD card slot
• Wireless — Wi-Fi/BT module header using SDIO 3.0 and UART
• Networking — 10/100/1000Mbps Ethernet port
• Multimedia:
  • Video Output — HDMI 1.4 port, 4-lane MIPI-DSI + TP interfaces, SRGB LCD interface
  • Camera Input — 1x DVP connector
  • Audio – 3.5mm line in and out jacks, 1x analog microphone
• Other I/O:
  • USB – 2x USB 2.0 ports
  • 1x Micro USB port (5V/2A power)
• Flexible I/O pin headers
  • 4-pin TWI Header with 1x TWI, 1x S-TWI
  • 14-pin I2S header
  • 3-pin EINT-GPIO header
  • 3-pin ADC header
• Power — 5V/2A via micro USB port, 5V/2A via DC jack, 20-pin “Power Supply” Header, 3.7V battery header
• Dimensions — 130 x 85mm

Lindenis V536 SoM top (left) and bottom
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Lindenis V536 SoM specs:

• SoC — Allwinner V536 with 1.2GHz Dual-core Arm Cortex-A7, 4244×3168 @30fps ISP, and H.264/H.265 4K@30fps encoding/decoding VPU
• Memory — 1GB DDR3
• Storage — SPI-NOR Flash or SPI-NAND Flash, Bootable MicroSD card
• Video Out — Micro HDMI 1.4
• Video In — 1x MIPI-CSI
• Audio — 1x DMIC
• Wireless — WiFi/BT AP6255
• USB — 1x Micro USB
• Power Supply — 5V/2A Micro USB
• Dimensions — 50 x 50mm

Similar to the Lindenis V5 SBC, the company provides an SDK which includes OpenWrt with Linux 4.9, U-Boot 2014.07, an Arm GCC based cross-toolchain, and an integrated build system. As the CNX Software story that alerted us to this news points out, this SDK doesn’t mention any of the AI features of the earlier Lindenis V5 SDK, in other words there is no TensorFlow framework in the new software block diagram. The company says that its Lindenis Video OS is the recommended operating system for normal use on Lindenis V536 series boards. Lindenis Video OS is maintained by Lindenis Tech. Ltd, and an SDK for the OS is hosted on GitHub.

Lindenis Video SDK architecture
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Further information

The Lindenis V536 SoM is available for 359CNY ($52) and the Lindenis V536 complete SBC for 648CNY ($94), both from Taobao in China. More information may be found on the Lindenis V536 wiki and the Lindenis V536 shopping page on Taobao. No information is posted as yet on the Lindenis Tech. website.