IDS now offers new driver software to connect its USB and GigE industrial cameras with the latest single-board computer, Raspberry Pi 2. When combined with simple board-level cameras, this budget-priced option is suitable for embedded vision solutions, such as process monitoring, kiosk systems or ITS. The Linux driver is available for free and can be found in the download section on the website of IDS.
Raspberry Pi 2 was introduced in February 2015 as the revised successor of the Raspberry Pi 1. With a more powerful CPU, 900MHz quad-core instead of 700MHz single-core processor, and twice the amount of memory, developers have significantly more power for imaging applications. The Arm Cortex-A7 quad-core CPU can take control of an application and support machine vision tasks – for example, the use of Halcon machine vision software in combination with IDS cameras and Raspberry Pi 2 is suitable for identifying fonts or barcodes.
The entire range of USB 2.0 industrial cameras and GigE cameras from IDS can be operated on Raspberry Pi 2 with the new driver. The company's UVC board-level cameras can be used on the Raspberry Pi 2 without the need of a driver. The Universal Video Class compliant industrial cameras are simply connected to the USB port of the single-board computer, and then the images can be viewed with VLC player for Linux or GUVCView.
