| Summary: | The goal of this project was to produce a device which can provide distance
learning students with a method of learning by means of enriched study
material. This device must be able to display study material in the form of text,
pictures/graphs, sound and video. It should also be low-cost, and therefore low technology.
Study material will be sent to students by mail, on CD-ROM or DVD. The costs
connected with this, is very little with respect to the amount of study material
that is transferred. All material can be incorporated in the standard webpage
format, HTML.
A final version of the device, met all specifications. The software was
manipulated to fit on a 512Mb CF2 card, leaving 140Mb space for user files.
Linux was used to cut the total cost of the device, while still producing a fully
functional system. Linux was then also used to speed the device up. Some
problems were encountered with device drivers, but then the hardware was not
functional under Windows either. These problems were solved by replacing the
hardware.
This final system manages to display today's graphics with yesterday's
hardware speed. The Linux system is fully optimized to use MMX and SSE
functions (native to the final processor) which speeds the hardware up more
than enough to meet all set specifications.
The use of Linux in this project brought the price down by roughly 25%.
Further price cuts may be done by developing our o m custom SBC (Single
Board Computer) for use in this project. Developing our o m SBC will cut the
cost by excluding unused features such as network hardware. === Thesis (M.Ing. (Electronical Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.
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