Carrier Board Design
The Modalix SoM carries the Modalix SoC, LPDDR5 memory, and power on a module with board-to-board connectors. The SoM plugs into a carrier board, which has the connectors, power input, and interfaces your product needs. You can buy a carrier board or design your own.
If you want to place the SoC directly on your own board instead, see Chip-Down Design.
What the SoM Provides
These parts are on the Modalix SoM and work on any carrier board that follows the 260-pin connector assignment:
- MLSoC Modalix
- LPDDR5 memory
- eMMC and SPI flash storage
- USB controller, Gigabit Ethernet PHY, and HDMI video processor
- Real-time clock
What the Carrier Board Provides
- Connector mapping between the SoM and your interfaces
- Power delivery to the SoM
- Interfaces such as Ethernet, PCIe, USB, MIPI cameras, and low-speed I/O
- Serial access for debugging and recovery
- Cooling
Choose or Design a Carrier Board
You can buy a carrier board or design your own:
- To buy one, compare boards in Third-Party Carrier Boards. The Modalix DevKit uses the Waveshare carrier board, which is the reference carrier board.
- To design your own, use the collateral and the design steps below.
Collateral
These documents are in Reference Documents.
| Document | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Modalix SoM Carrier Board Hardware Reference | Connector pinouts, interface mapping, power delivery, and reference connections. Read this first. |
| Modalix SoM Datasheet | Electrical, mechanical, and thermal specifications of the SoM |
| Carrier Board SoM Bring-Up Guide | Powering and validating a new carrier board |
| Modalix SoM Thermal Design Guide | Thermal budgets and cooling design, available from your SiMa.ai representative |
Design Steps
- Read the Modalix SoM Carrier Board Hardware Reference and the Modalix SoM Datasheet.
- Plan connector mapping, power, and interfaces using Carrier Board Bring-up, which covers the connector interfaces, what changes from the reference carrier board, and camera overlays.
- Check low-speed pin assignments in Low-Speed I/O.
- After the board is built, follow the Carrier Board SoM Bring-Up Guide for first power-on.
- Adapt the device tree for your carrier with Build the BSP from Source.
Next Steps
- Carrier Board Bring-up: the reference carrier board, and what needs software adaptation.
- Third-Party Carrier Boards: off-the-shelf boards with the same form factor, compared by interface.
- Factory Build and Test: programming and testing boards in production.