Startup Red Pitaya brings Dragon Fruit test and measurement to Europe
Fans of Arduino, Raspberry Pi or Cubieboard will like this: Startup company Red Pitaya transfers the open approach of these single-board computers to the Test and Measurement arena. The company now sets its foot on European soil. As the first step, it signed an exclusive distribution agreement with RS Components.
Since its inception in mid-2013, Red Pitaya has developed an ecosystem of devices and software designed to support an open approach to measurement tasks of all kinds. The ambition is high: The platform available for less than $500 could seriously compete against multiple expensive laboratory instruments – plus, its open approach fosters the development of innovative applications for segments where hitherto no custom offering exists in the market.
The entire Red Pitaya ecosystem is centred on a single board, reconfigurable, open instrument platform not much bigger than a credit card. The processing power is provided by an Xilinx Zynq SoC which combines an ARM Cortex-A9 microcontroller with the flexibility of an FPGA. The board offers a total of six analogue I/O ports of which two are suited for RF signals. 16 general-purpose I/Os, an Ethernet port and a Micro SD slot ensure connectivity and expandability. In terms of software, a cloud marketplace named Bazaar offers a set of open-source measurement applications including an oscilloscope, a spectrum analyser and an arbitrary waveform generator. Measurement results can be displayed on a PC or tablet computer running a web browser. A repository of corresponding open-source code and tools enables designers to share and collaborate in developing applications.
The software is based in the GNU/Linux operating system; the environment supports a variety of software interfaces and languages including C/C++, scripting languages and HTML-based web interfaces. First commercial products can be expected later thus year, RS Components says.
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