Internet of Things: Artista-IoT makes displays smart

Germering (Germany) March 2, 2017 - Distec - leading German specialist for TFT flat screens and system solutions for industrial and multimedia applications, adds a new member to the proven Artista TFT controller family: the Artista-IoT for Industry 4.0 and the Internet of Things (IoT). This new TFT controller is a BaseBoard with a socket for the latest generation of the Raspberry PI Compute Module (CM3). "The Artista-IoT is only a simple TFT controller, but the perfect basis for cost-efficient IoT and Industry 4.0 applications," explained Matthias Keller, Head of Sales and Marketing at Distec GmbH. "Internet of Things is the keyword and a costly PC with a lot of peripherals is now superfluous: our solution enables us to network almost every device intelligently, without any license costs." The Artista-IoT allows the direct connection of almost all common TFT types without additional hardware. The powerful processor (BCM2837, QuadCore, 1.2 GHz) opens up many new applications at a very attractive price. Distec can provide individual solutions for: Industrial HMI, medical, aviation, digital signage, and digital whiteboard.

Projects made easy

The new controller can be easily integrated into existing Windows and Linux environments and can be adapted to suit individual needs. Distec offers a starter set consisting of BaseBoard, CM3, 10.1-inch Super Fine TFT display with PCAP Multi-Touch and all necessary cables. This kit supports developers to start their own projects in a fast and uncomplicated way. The pre-installed Raspbian ensures a quick setup and also gives access to a large community support network.

Comprehensive functionality

The Artista-IoT is based on a full-fledged scaler chip and controls almost every TFT display and modern PCAP multi-touch screens directly. The controller board allows special functions such as DICOM pre-set, gamma correction and color calibration. It supports 100Mbit Ethernet and provides a real-time clock. Available interfaces include USB, GPIOs, I²C and UART. Long-term availability is at least six years. On the basis of the Artista-IoT, Distec already offers standard solutions for a wide range of applications. From the second quarter of 2017, Distec will provide the following solutions: the Artista-IoT series, starter kits, VideoPoster-IV and Raspbian as a basis for customer-specific software developments such as mediaplayers. From the third quarter of 2017, the WebPoster and integration into the POS-Line series will be added.