Gadgeter vs Beaglebone/board comparison

Hi, I know I’m asking to compare oranges vs apples. Actually I dont want a comparison but an opinion from who actually had used both boards.

I have a project where I need to receive some data over Serial and get some images from a camera along a day (Over 100 or 200 per day) and sent them via network. Those data would be accessed and download in one of 2 ways (To be defined) over a web page or periodically send them over a socket.

I like the beagle because of its price and it has everything I need. But I’m getting used to .NETMF and like it much (Using Fez Panda).

What do you guys honestly think about it ? The equipment has to work every single day of the year and it would be pretty difficult to have access to it.

Thanks in advance.

It would take you 10 minutes and 10 lines if code to use serial port. How much time you need to do the same on Linux? :slight_smile:
You get am exceptional support from GHI on any issues that may come. If there is a bug in beagle board, who is going to help you?

On the other hand beagle board can play video but our devices can’t, yet! :slight_smile:

Gus,

I know that using Gadgeter or even Cobra It would be much easier to be done.

What actually made me think its the following:

1 - Price u$s 149.50 Cobra vs u$s 89 BeagleBone
2 - Reliability

I know GHI products are high quality i dont know about beagle.

Consider this scenario, Device on for a year buffering data and writing it on SD and send them periodically over network. Its .NETMF really reliable under this conditions ? What about eLinux ?

I will not trust a PC enviroment using Windows to perform well over years without rebooting.
Can I trust .NETMF to perform well over years ?
Is Cobra going to be in stock over the years to come ? I know beagle surely will.

I need maybe 100 equipments in the short term and then 10 more per year . Expect 5 years to use the equipment without modifications.

Is netmf reliabls? We have thousands of devices in hundreds of product around the world that have been running for years :slight_smile:

That was what I wanted to know Gus.

I dont know if I ever told you but you guys are the best. Your support is better than any other companies I know.

By the way Is it comming any upgrades to your product line in the short term comming that fullfil my requeriments ? If so can I know the price range ? I need to do a presentation to customer next week to let them decide what to use.

I mean it because I expect years of availability and prefer to use the newest product I can for this.

Spider or hydra will do it. All our devices support network and fold system.

$79 Hydra

Is there really anything left to discuss?

I didn’t want to say this now but Hydra can play video :slight_smile: I will get to it in near future.

Ian,

I need ethernet, sd, usb host and these modules increases the cost.

FEZ Cerberus then?

When are we getting more details on the Cerebus?

Gus, thanks again, that’s what I wanted to know, so I’ll propose my customer the .Netmf devices and let them know that there will be some new device in a near future that could be in the price range needed but development cost would be greatly reduced compared to elinux.

Remember that the board cost is not the only cost. Time to market, development time, quality of end products. All these play a very important role.

I am not saying FEZ is perfect fro every need but I am saying take it all under consideration.

Prefix: I’m hardly an expert in this field

If this needs to work day in and day out, then cost isn’t nearly as important (since it’s not 89 vs 1,000 here) as a factor as reliability and support.

I’ve never had a problem with my FEZ products that was their fault :-[ and from reading this board you’ll see that their support is second to none. Even so far as them calling individuals - not companies but hobby folks - to walk them through a what may seem to be a hardware issue.

Gus, my customer and I prefer to have a reliable platform with support over the unsupported beagleboard.

We need to have prototypes running by march. Should I wait for Cerberus or go directly for Panda II + FezConnect ?

Feel free to contact to my email if you don’t want to post it over the forum. We have still a few weeks left to start with it and at first we are going to need a bunch of 50 maybe 100 devices.

Thanks again as usual.

Even if we announce FEZ Cerberus, it will take time to have full complete and ready fro production. Panda is well established and is good to go as far as production. So, it all comes back to your schedule.

I don’t care about development process as it is the same whatever I use. Lets get started with Panda and change to a new boards when we reach the production.

EXACTLY :slight_smile: Welcome to the world of FEZ.

We prototyped a research project at the university using a Domino and then made a custom board based on the Panda II. It took less than 15 to port over the code as 99.9% of it needed no changes thanks to NETMF.