Setup Confirmation: ZED Carrier Mini with Dual Cameras (Headless Orin Nano)

Hi,

I hope all is well.

We are planning to use the ZED Carrier Mini board with an NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Production Module that we already have. Before making the investment, we would like to confirm that our setup makes sense and that everything we intend to do is fully supported (we’d like to avoid any unexpected issues like we had with other carrier boards).

We want to connect a ZED X Mini and a ZED X One to the GMSL interfaces of the ZED Carrier Mini. Our system will be headless, so we will likely use a dummy HDMI plug, as recommended here:
https://support.stereolabs.com/hc/en-us/articles/5986197793943-Can-I-use-the-ZED-Box-without-an-HDMI-display

From the documentation, it looks like we need to follow this flashing guide:
https://www.stereolabs.com/docs/get-started-with-zed-box-mini/reset-update

We would connect:

  • ZED X One → GMSL2 port #1
  • ZED X Mini → GMSL2 port #2

Then install the ZED SDK.

We’d like to confirm:

  • That this setup supports both cameras connected and running simultaneously, and that we’ll be able to use all relevant ZED SDK features for both (e.g. SLAM, stereo depth) in our headless system by connecting a dummy plug.
  • That there are no known issues with dual GMSL camera streaming on this board, assuming the port mapping is correct.
  • That the included 2-pin power connector comes with any pre-crimped cables, or whether it’s just the bare plug.

Thank you.

Hi @zonit
Welcome to the StereoLabs community.

Yes, you can use this setup with no hardware limitation. The Dummy plug is indeed required for headless setups.

The configuration is fully supported. Read more here.
Please note that the ZED SDK does not provide Localization support for the monocular cameras. Read more concerning the sl::CameraOne capabilities on the documentation.

We provide a power supply with a ready connector and a screwed spare connector to be used with custom power solutions.

Hi @Myzhar,

Thanks for the detailed response.

We just had one additional question regarding the GPIO header on the ZED Carrier Mini. In the documentation, it’s mentioned that the GPIO connector is “mainly used for debug and testing purposes”. We wanted to check:

Can this GPIO header be safely used for simple runtime operations, such as toggling a pin to switch between RS422-connected probes, while the ZED SDK is running?

We want to ensure there are no limitations or restrictions that would prevent runtime access to these pins during normal operation.

Thanks again for the support.

Myzhar replied via email:

Hi zonit,
Thank you for reaching out to us.

The GPIO pins are directly connected to the Jetson module GPIO pins, so you can use them normally as you would with any Jetson device.
Information concerning the pinout is available in the documentation.

The ZED SDK is not affected by the behaviors of the GPIO port, unless you are using a ZED X camera and you try to change the Device Tree configuration.