News
Jan 2009 Balloon3 v 3.33 boards available. USB host moved to topside of board so it still works on single-sided variant
Dec 2008 Kernel 2.6.27 and 2.6.28 ported
Sept 2008 Emdebian rootfs image for balloon boots. Kernel 2.6.26.5 port working for everything except TCL minpug display
Feb 2008 Full SmartPDF schematics and gerbers for Balloon 3 v0.21 boards uploaded.
September 2007 Test-v0.3 software released. Allows full build of buildroot rootfs, debian rootfs, and kernel. Kernel patches forward-ported to 2.6.22, and libertas CF wireless driver backported and integrated by Paul Fidler. First batch of 20 Balloons with IO boards built for CUED.
May 2007 Kernel 2.6.21 port done by Nick Bane. Buildroot-based installer for balloon created, USB serial gadget interface working for automagic conection to host PC.
April 2007 Debian-rootfs for balloon created.
March 2007 - 100 E1 Balloon3's built for CUED.
Feb 2007 Wookey joins Balloonz Ltd (2days/week nominally) to work on software stuff.
1st August 2006 - rsync access to balloon files added. rsync balloonboard.org:: will show you the modules.
25th July 2006 - Bugzilla set up. http://balloonboard.org/cgi-bin/bugzilla/index.cgi
5th July 2006 - Balloon3 FPGA support added to bootldr
13th June 2006 - kernel support for Balloon 2 and 3 merged in 2.6.15.5.
6 June 2006 - Balloon Developers Meeting held (Minutes).
May 2006 - 2K NAND support work completed in kernel 2.4.25
May 2006 - MDP project produces add-on boards - a general purpose/PSU board and an I2C board
3 March 2006 - First Balloon 3 prototype images.
5 Jan 2006 - A major update to the web site and some information on Balloon 3.
13 May 2004 - Custom Monochrome LCD working on Balloon.
March 2004 - Work starts on Balloon 3.0 (Xscale pxa) version. Better USB host chip board being built to enable testing before committing to it.
February 2004 - Hydra variant boards being produced by Itechnic.co.uk.
January 2004 - Aleph One makes balloon boards available for purchase by developers.
31st December 2003- Proper Licence on website, along with more details on build options.
December 2003- Toby Churchill Ltd ship first commercial product using Balloon 2.05 (Lightwriter).
26th November 2003- Mailing list and archive set up
September/October 2003- More Guralp boards, more TCL boards, more details on website - JTAG info, 2.05g clickable images, utilities to make board setup easier written.
10th September 2003- First 2 boards of 2.05g ("Guralp") variant build delivered and tested. Everything worked first time once we turned the serial chip the right way up. Some of these boards will be available to developers after mid-september.
14th August 2003- Clickable board map on website, coutesy of James McKenzie. More pictures added too.
8th August 2003 - 2.05 design review/debugiung session (at TCL). Deep sleep mode using far too much current - 90mA. Various software bugs were fixed to get the current down to 77mA - still about 76mA too high. Transpired that the audio is still powered by the SYSCLK line from the CPLD. CPLD changes got it down to the correct 5mA. Also kernel 2.6 boots on ballon due to sterling work by Nick Bane.
5th August 2003 - Balloonboard.org website set up, with project description, hardware info. wiki and mailing list.
July 2003 - 2.05 TCL board failed EMC tests. 2.06 has a number of changes - 1mm ground ring round board edge, EMC-improving resistors. However it looks like a tin box round the PCB will be necessary for EMC compliance if the board is used inside a plastic box. This does not affect the use of the board as a component or development system.
24th June 2003 - Balloon is one of a number of ARM-based boards on the Debian stand, showing off how Debian-arm is just the same as Debian-x86
20th June 2003 - Updated bootldr for version 2.05 of the board uploaded and ipkg server put online.
24th April 2003 - Bootldr with YAFFS and early USB support uploaded.
December 2002 - TCL's kernel port and distro go online
10th October 2002 - Balloon gets its first outing at Linux Expo, Olympia, London. To show it off, we demonstrated text-to-speech from a wide range of companies in a wide variety of languages using a (standard usb to ethernet adaptor). It even got a mention in Linuxuser's write-up (where they got Nick's name wrong
Late 2002 - Balloon 2.01 built as prototypes.
Sometime in 2000 - Steve Wiseman starts original Balloon design, inspired by the LART project.