Standing ovation! This is a decade's worth of knowledge in a single article. I'll be forwarding this one to coworkers and acquaintances when they ask about how to do this kind of stuff.
I can understand why the author focuses on cheap entry-level parts. It's cheap and it's fun. He also kind of dismisses the major SOMs for this reason so maybe there can be a more comprehensive review of those (I build almost exclusively with these), but that's probably out of his view.
Going with a mystery AllWinner part is really compelling, but I can't go into production (with a 5+ year expected run lifetime) on that.
If product lifetime is a concern, it's important to pick a vendor that guarantees product availability through a certain date. Either that, or you need to be prepared to do a lifetime buy of all of the parts you'll ever need when the EOL is announced.
It’s two-pronged. You need to find a chip line that has manufacturer guarantees for a long span, then a SOM integrator that will also guarantee a time span using that part.
I’ve been happy with NXP (Freescale) for the former, obviously being a large automotive supplier has a benefit.
For the SOM I’ve recently been using Toradex. They do a great job of making their SOMs comply to a common signal layout at the connector. I also recommend Boundary Devices. TechNexion is also interesting if you need a smaller footprint. They’re the group that also ships as WandBoard.
I can understand why the author focuses on cheap entry-level parts. It's cheap and it's fun. He also kind of dismisses the major SOMs for this reason so maybe there can be a more comprehensive review of those (I build almost exclusively with these), but that's probably out of his view.
Going with a mystery AllWinner part is really compelling, but I can't go into production (with a 5+ year expected run lifetime) on that.