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Nathan Collins
26 September 2024
Choosing the right hardware for an embedded Linux device is so much more important than your software choices. Making the wrong decision can lead to significant costs and disruptions if you have to change hardware mid-development. Read this blog first before you solidify your choice.
Choosing between a custom or commercially available embedded board centers around the system-on-chip (SoC). The SoC, while obviously essential, is also a major cost and risk factor in your design. If this is your first project on a particular SoC, start with a commercial board from an experienced vendor. It may cost more initially but it allows your hardware and software teams to gain valuable experience with the chipset. Only after your team is proficient with that SoC should you consider moving to a custom board.
Choosing the right silicon vendor for your project is crucial. Thankfully, most embedded hardware vendors like AMD, Intel, Nvidia, NXP, and Renesas offer evaluation boards that allow you to thoroughly assess their chips' capabilities. These eval boards are often comprehensive, showcasing the full potential of the silicon. However, whether you should use a vendor’s board in your final product depends on factors such as cost, support, and the board's longevity. Eval boards are typically not intended for mass production and that’s reflected in their higher costs and limited distribution. Vendor support, including engineering advice and board support packages (BSP), also plays a crucial role. This support should include driver and OS updates; vendors need to release BSP updates on a regular basis, and if they don’t that can keep you trapped on earlier versions of software. It’s important to consult with your silicon vendor’s sales representative to understand whether an eval board is suitable for production or if there are other more appropriate solutions
A handful of trusted and reliable companies build up single-board computers from a chip set. What do you look for when choosing your board vendor? Here are a few factors we recommend.
There’s a lot to consider when picking your hardware. We address the topics in this blog in more detail in our best practice whitepaper series on Designing Your First Embedded Linux Device, Part 2: Choosing Your Hardware.
About KDAB
The KDAB Group is a globally recognized provider for software consulting, development and training, specializing in embedded devices and complex cross-platform desktop applications. In addition to being leading experts in Qt, C++ and 3D technologies for over two decades, KDAB provides deep expertise across the stack, including Linux, Rust and modern UI frameworks. With 100+ employees from 20 countries and offices in Sweden, Germany, USA, France and UK, we serve clients around the world.