Introduction#

BeagleV-Ahead is a high-performance open-source RISC-V single board computer (SBC) built around the Alibaba TH1520 SoC. It has the same P8 & P9 cape header pins as BeagleBone Black allowing you to stack your favourite BeagleBone cape on top to expand its capability. Featuring a powerful quad-core RISC-V processor BeagleV-Ahead is designed as an affordable RISC-V enabled pocket-size computer for anybody who wants to dive deep into the new RISC-V ISA.

Warning

Security Notice: GhostWrite Vulnerability

The BeagleV-Ahead platform, like many RISC-V systems based on the XuanTie C910 and C920 processors, are affected by the “GhostWrite” vulnerability (CVE-2023-4966), which allows for potential privilege escalation or unauthorized memory access. As this vulnerabiity is due to the faulty instructions in the vector extension of this core, there is no patch fix available for this. Only one way to mitigate this is to disable the vector extension but this will drastically reduce the performance of the board.

For a hands-on demonstration, see GhostWrite Exploit (CVE-2023-4966) in the demos and tutorials section.

For more details on this vulnerability please refer to the following links:

Pinout Diagrams#

Choose the cape header to see respective pinout diagram.

P8 cape header

P9 cape header

Detailed overview#

BeagleV-Ahead is built around T-Head TH1520 RISC-V SoC with quad-core Xuantie C910 processor clocked at 1.85GHz with a 4 TOPS NPU, support for 64-bit DDR, and audio processing using a single core C906.

Todo

remove “<To-Do>” items in the table below.

Table 97 BeagleV-Ahead features#
Feature	Description
Processor	T-Head TH1520 (quad-core Xuantie C910 processor)
PMIC	DA9063
Memory	4GB LPDDR4
Storage	16GB eMMC
WiFi/Bluetooth	PHY: AP6203BM Antennas: 2.4GHz & 5GHz
Ethernet	PHY: Realtek RTL8211F-VD-CG Gigabit Ethernet phy Connector: integrated magnetics RJ-45
microUSB 3.0	Connectivity: USB OTG, Flash support Power: Input: 5V @ <To-Do>, Output: 5V @ <To-Do>
HDMI	Transmitter: TH1520 Video out system Connector: Mini HDMI
Other connectors	microSD mikroBUS shuttle connector (I2C/UART/SPI/ADC/PWM/GPIO) 2 x CSI connector compatible with BeagleBone AI-64, Raspberry Pi Zero / CM4 (22-pin) DSI connector

Board components location#

This section describes the key components on the board, their location and function.

Front components location#

Table 98 BeagleV-Ahead board front components location#
Feature	Description
Power LED	Power (Board ON) indicator
JTAG (TH1520)	TH1520 SoC JTAG debug port
Barrel jack	Power input
GigaBit Ethernet	1Gb/s Wired internet connectivity
User LEDs	Five user LEDs, Power and boot section provides more details. These LEDs are connect to the TH1520 SoC
Reset button	Press to reset BeagleV-Ahead board (TH1520 SoC)
Power button	Press to shut-down (OFF), hold down to boot (ON)
P8 & P9 cape header	Expansion headers for BeagleBone capes.
UART debug header	6 pin UART debug header
USB boot button	Hold and reset board (power cycle) to flash eMMC via USB port
SD boot button	Hold and reset board (power cycle) to boot from SD Card
mikroBUS shuttle	16pin mikroBUS shuttle connector for interfacing mikroE click boards
16GB eMMC	Flash storage
RTL8211F	Gigabit IEEE 802.11 Ethernet PHY

Back components location#

Table 99 BeagleV-Ahead board back components location#
Feature	Description
DA9063	Dialog semi Power Management Integrated Circuit (PMIC)
microUSB 3.0	Power & USB connectivity as client or Host (OTG)
Antenna connector	2.4GHz/5GHz uFL connector
AP6203BM	Ampak WiFi & BlueTooth combo
DSI	MIPI Display connector
CSI0 & CSI1	MIPI Camera connectors
TH1520	T-Head quad-core C910 RISC-V SoC
Mini HDMI	HDMI connector
microSD	Micro SD card holder
4GB RAM	2 x 2GB LPDDR4 RAM

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