BeagleBoard for Android

I wanted to learn more about Android internals without risking my phone. At first, I briefly considered the $399 dev phone offered by Google, but decided it would be more fun to have an evaluation board/kit rather than a complete device.

There were several candidates but I quickly settled on the BeagleBoard-XM as sold by DigiKey for USD 149. (LiquidWare had a booth at the San Mateo Maker Faire, and I was sorely tempted to purchase a Beagle embedded starter kit. Perhaps later...)

The BeagleBoard site is a great resource and there is not much I can add beyond my personal anecdotes.

What you get for $149 is a anti-static bag containing a small (approx 3 inch x 3 inch) PCB and a microSD card. There are no cables supplied.

You can get a quick test of the board w/a RS-232, a USB cable and your trusty PC.

First, install the microSD card which came w/the BeagleBoard.

Second, the USB cable provides power, use the OTG ("On The Go") connector on the BeagleBoard. You should immediately see some LED's light up.

Third, connect the RS-232 cable between the BeagleBoard and your PC. I am using Ubuntu 10.04 LTS w/MiniCom as a console. This step might take some experimentation, but it is working for me at 115200 8N1.

There are two buttons on the PCB next to the USB sockets. (There is a BeagleBoard manual available as a PDF which illustrates the components). Press "reset" to stimulate console activity.

Here is a screen shot of the TI X-Loader starting to boot...

Now that you have at least some interaction w/the BeagleBoard you can start adding additional devices.

I purchased a HDMI cable in order to connect an old monitor to my BeagleBoard. I also use USB keyboard and USB mouse to interact w/the BeagleBoard.

The BeagleBoard readily supports a variety of platforms, right now I am most interested in TI arowboat Android distribution (I expect to describe building arowboat in my next post).