set-top box News - Page 23 of 30 - CNX Software

December 5, 2012December 5, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Diyomate A5 Dual Core Android Set-Top Box Powered by Infotmic iMAPx820 Processor

I’ve been tipped off about a new Android set-top box – Diyomate A5 Dual Core – that features Infotmic iMAPx820 dual core A5 SoC @ 1 GHz with Mali-400 GPU, 1 GB RAM & 4 GB Flash, and runs Android 4.0.3. Here are the specs of this media player: SoC – Infotmic 820 dual Cortex-A5 + dual core Mali-400 GPU System Memory – 1GB DDR3 Storage – 4GB NAND Flash + SD card socket Video Output – HDMI and composite Audio Output – HDMI and Stereo audio output Video Codecs – H.263, MPEG1/2, MPEG-ASP, MPEG-AVC(H.264), VC-1, RV, AVS, MJPEG/JPEG, VP8, MVC, VP6(FLV), ETC Audio Codecs – MP3, WMA, M4A (AAC), WAV, OGG, LPCM, FLAC, AC3 and DTS Connectivity: Ethernet – 10/100Mbps Wi-FI – 802.11 b/g/n USB – 2x USB 2.0 Host ports Power supply – 5V/2A AC Adaptor Dimension – 98*98*20 mm Weight – 160 grams Beside featuring 2 Cortex A5 cores up to […]

November 29, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

Wise Tivi Announces Three Android 4.2 Media Players based on Rockchip RK3066 Starting at $59.99

Wise Tivi is a new company that recently launched 3 Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean) products based on what appears to be Rockchip RK3066 processor: Wise Tivi Camera ($89.99) – A set-top box with a front camera that can be conveniently placed on top of the TV. Wise Tivi Portable ($79.99) – The mini PC / PC-on-an-HDMI-stick version. Wise Tivi Box ($59.99) – A standard Android set-top box with IR remote control. According to the company website, all 3 devices share the following specifications: SoC – Dual Core ARM Cortex A9 1.6Ghz with Quad-core ARM Mali-400 MP (Rockchip RK3066) System Memory – 1GB DDR3 RAM Storage – 4 GB Nand Flash (up to 16GB) and microSD card slot Connectivity – WiFi 802.11 b/g/n Video Output – HDMI 1.3 (up to 1920×1080 resolution), USB – 1 x micro USB OTG, 1x SB 2.0 HOST and 1x micro USB for power. Video – […]

November 5, 2012May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 19 Comments

$100 Mele A1000G / A2000G Android Media Players with 1GB RAM and 8GB Flash

I’ve been asked by several people when there would be a Mele with 1GB RAM, well the time is now, with the Mele A1000G and Mele A2000G. Both appear to be based on the previous Mele A1000 and Mele A2000 set-top boxes, but feature 1 GB RAM and 8 GB Flash instead of 512 MB RAM and 4 GB Flash. Here are Mele A1000G & Mele A2000G Specifications: SoC – AllWinner A10 Cortex A8 processor @ 1GHz System Memory – 1 GB DDR3 Storage: 8GB NAND Flash SD card slot (up to 32 GB) Connectivity: Wi-Fi – 802.11 b/g 10/100 MB Ethernet USB – 3 USB Host ports SATA Interface for 2.5″ HDD Video Output – HDMI, composite and VGA. Audio Output – RCA stereo output and optical out (SPDIF) Audio Formats – MP3 / WMA / WAV / OGG / FLAC / MKA Video Formats – TS / M2TS […]

November 4, 2012August 19, 2013 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 34 Comments

Rockchip RK3066/RK30xx Processors Documentation, Source Code and Tools

Rockchip RK3066 (part of RK30xx family) is a Chinese dual ARM Cortex A9 SoC targeting multimedia products such as tablets (e.g. Cube U30GT), mini PC (e.g UG802, MK808) and in theory set-top boxes, but I can’t find any products based on this Rockchip processor. It seems mini PCs/ HDMI TV sticks have taken over this market. RK3066 Processor The processor features two ARM Cortex A9 clocked at up to 1.6 Ghz with a quad core Mali-400MP GPU. It can support 1080p (3D) encoding/decoding, provides HDMI 1.4a, VGA, composite, component and LVDS video outputs (Dual display support), USB 2.0 Host and OTG ports, a MAC interface (Ethernet), and much more… Here are the key features of Rockchip RK3066 processor: Dual Core A9 + Quad Core Mali-400MP GPU 2 banks, 8/16 bit Nor flash / SRAM interface 8 banks, 8/16 bit async NAND flash, LBA NAND flash and 8-bit sync ONFI NAND […]

October 31, 2012October 31, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 22 Comments

Crowdfunding Initiative to Open AMLogic AML8726-M3 STB Source Code

J1nx (Peter Steenbergen) has spend a lot of time together with XBMC developers to try to bring XBMC (Linux) to ARM based set-top boxes, and initially AllWinner A10 processor seemed like a good candidate, unfortunately due to the lack of proper video engine libraries for Linux, progress on this SoC has been extremely slow. Then when Pivos and XBMC announced Pivos Xios DS set-top box based on AMLogic aml8726-M(1) would support XBMC natively, and the kernel and bootlooader (u-boot) source code was made available both on Pivos github account and AMLogic open source website, AML8726 series of processors appeared to be an ideal solution for this purpose. Instead of AML8726-M (aka AML8726-M1) which is limited to 512 MB, it was decided instead to use a faster processor AML8726-M3 that supports 1 GB RAM. The STB of choice is based on “MBX – f16ref” which should be some kind of development […]

August 27, 2012August 29, 2012 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

$86 ZAP-A10 Android 4.0 Set-Top Box Powered by AMLogic AML8726-M3

You may already know that XBMC has been working on the Pivox XIOS DS set-top box based on AMLogic AML8726-M3. Pivosgroup has sponsored the development of XBMC for Android and Linux on their new media player, and it costs about $115 on sites like Amazon, but it’s not available worldwide right now. If you’re looking for an alternative AMLogic AML8726-M3 device, and are a bit adventurous, you may have a look at the ZAP-A10, an Android 4.0 networked media player featuring AML8726-M3 Cortex A9 processor, with 1GB RAM and 4 GB Flash. Here are the specs of this set-top box: SoC – Single core Cortex A9 @ 1GHz (AML8726-M3) with Mali-400 GPU System Memory – 1 GB RAM Storage – 4GB Flash & SD card slot Connectivity 10/100M Ethernet Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n USB – 4x USB Host port Video Output – HDMI and component (YPbPr) Video Containers – M2TS / […]

August 10, 2012May 25, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 19 Comments

5 Must Have Applications for Android mini-PCs and Set-Top Boxes

There are now many cheap Android mini PCs and media players running Android. The hardware is usually OK, the firmware is good enough most of the time, but I find the software lacking. Here are 5 Android apps that should improve your Android TV experience. ES File Explorer File Manager Android media devices often come with a custom file manager, but I found it lacking features (e.g. SAMBA/CIFS, directory copy…), or something features are present but not really working. ES File Explorer File Manager is a free app that can help you exchange files between your internal storage, SD card, USB mass storage devices, a Network Attached Storage, Bluetooth Devices, FTP servers and even Cloud based services such as Google Drive or Dropbox. I mainly use this app to play videos from a Windows share (SAMBA/CIFS) in a PC or a NAS. MX Player mini PCs (aka HDMI TV Sticks) […]

July 31, 2012May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 11 Comments

$77 Mini Xplus Media Player with Android 4.0 and 1GB RAM

I previously wrote about Mini X media player, an Android mini Media Player powered by AllWinner A10 with 512 MB RAM that runs Android 2.3. Its price has been reduced by about $10 to $67.60, and it now has a big brother called Mini Xplus that looks exactly the same except it runs Android 4.0 and comes with 1GB RAM according to Deal Extreme. Here are the device specifications based on Deal Extreme overview: CPU – AllWinner A10 (Cortex A8) with Mali-400 GPU @ 1.2 GHz Memory – 1GB DDR3 RAM Storage – 4GB NAND Flash, microSD slot Video Output – HDMI 1.3 and Composite USB – 2x USB 2.0 host Connectivity – WiFi 802.11 b/g/n Video Formats – MKV, TS, TP, M2TS, RM/RMVB, BD-ISO, AVI, MPG, VOB, DAT, ASF, TRP, FLV etc Video Codecs – MPEG1/2/4, H.264, VC-1, Divx, Xvid, RM8/9/10, VP6 Subtitle – SRT, SUB, IDX, SSA, SMI […]