Unboxing of Tronsmart Draco AW80 Meta mini PC Powered by AllWinner A80 Processor

GeekBuying sent me a sample of their Tronsmart Draco AW80 mini PC powered by Allwinner A80 octa core processor. I’ve received the Meta version with 2GB RAM, and 16GB eMMC, but next month Telos version will ship with 4GB RAM and 32GB eMMC instead. Today I’ll show some pictures of the product and the internal boards, and in a few days I’ll write a full version with the Android 4.4 firmware. Later, I’ll most certainly review the Ubuntu beta image that’s scheduled for released by the end of the month.

Tronsmart Draco AW80 Unboxing

I’ve received the device by DHL in the black and gold package below.

Tronsmart_Draco_AW80_PackageI was surprised by the size of the box (16.4 x 16.4 cm) which quite larger than what I’m used to with other TV boxes, and all cables and accessories are stored in little black boxes within the main package.

Draco AW80 and Accessories (Click to Enlarge)
Draco AW80 and Accessories (Click to Enlarge)

Accessories include a 12V/2A power adapter, a SATA cable, an HDMI cable, a USB 2.0 cable, an IR remote control requiring two AAA batteries (not included), and a quick start guide in English.

Draco AW80 Meta (Click to Enlarge)
Draco AW80 Meta (Click to Enlarge)

A small rounded window for the IR receiver, and a through hole for a bi-color LED can be seen on the front panel. One one side, we’ve for two USB 2.0 host ports, an SD card slot, and a SATA connector. The rear panel features the Wi-Fi antenna, an RJ45 port for Gigabit Ethernet, a USB 3.0 OTG port (full size), HDMI and AV outputs, optical S/PDIF, and the 12V DC power barrel. There’s also a “Fn” through hole on the bottom of the metallic enclosure, most probably for firmware update.

Unboxing video:

Draco AW80 Meta Board Pictures

In order to open the enclosure, I had to take out the four sticky rubber pads on the bottom, and untighten four screws. The base of the case would not come out, so I pulled it with a precision screwdriver using one of the many ventilation hole on the bottom of the enclosure.

Bottom
Bottom (Click to Enlarge)

There’s a tiny board connected to the mainboard for the IR receiver and a Blue/Red LED. Nothing much to noticed on the mainboard except SW6 switch which should be to access U-boot / FEL mode for firmware update. Four more screws need to be removed to take out the board from the case.

Tronsmart_Draco_AW80_BoardThere’s a massive heatsink, and it indeed looks exactly like the board used in Zero Devices Alice Z8C. I’ve popped out three bits with spring to take out the heatsink. There a thermal rubber pad between the heatsink and the SoC/RAM/eMMC, no thermal paste.

AW80 Board (Click to Enlarge)
AW80 Board (Click to Enlarge)

There’s a shiny sticker reading “Tronsmart Draco AW80” on the board to hide the actual board name. The Wi-Fi / Bluetooth module is AP6335 which means dual band Wi-Fi 802.11 n/g/n and 802.11ac should be supported together with Bluetooth 4.0. Four Samsung K4B4G1646D 16-bit DDR3 chips are used to get 2GB RAM, and the eMMC is model Samsung KLMAG4FE3B-0001 moviNAND (eMMC v 4.41) with maximum sequential write speed of 60MB/s, and sequential read speed of 150MB/s. Other ICs include AC100  audio codec, and  Realtek Gigabit transceiver. There’s part of the board that unpopulated, but I’m not sure what it was meant for, expect for the LED and IR parts. The UART pins for serial console can be found right below the DC jack and S/PDIF connector.

Tronsmart Draco AW80 Meta pictured in this post sells for $149 on GeekBuying, whereas the upcoming Draco AW80 Telos with 4GB RAM and 32GB flash is available for pre-order for $199, and should ship by the end of the month. You can also purchase either model on Aliexpress.

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21 Comments
oldest
newest
newbie
newbie
9 years ago

what about:
VPU and GPU hw accel in Linux?
Full 1Gbit performance?

Hoangdinh86
Hoangdinh86
9 years ago

Verry interesting..amazing devices:fastest wifi, 50k antutu, cpu no heat isues like rockchip,amlogic. Preview freaktab http://www.freaktab.com/showthread.php?19153-I-got-my-Draco-AW80-today!

matt
matt
9 years ago

GPU is Imagination : no GPU support in linux.
VPU has not 265/HEVC capability ….

Still thinking a jetson TK1 is better :
PRO: tegra K1 (way faster cpu and gpu), vpu and gpu linux support with xbmc too,
CONS: slightly higher price and no enclosure/remote

Werewolfc
Werewolfc
9 years ago

Thank you for the unboxing… waiting for the full review

newbie
newbie
9 years ago

@Hoangdinh86

are you kidding? preview like a very best PR superfast and cool product….

hoangdinh86
hoangdinh86
9 years ago

@newbei
Fineless is admin so I don’t think he PR for Tronsmart. And just waiting for full review CNX.

embedded_geek
9 years ago

Let’s wait for Jean-Luc review of the device. He is impartial and incoruptible ! 🙂

miniNodes
9 years ago

We will definitely be most interested in the Linux support. =)

onebir
onebir
9 years ago

“There’s a shiny sticker reading “Tronsmart Draco AW80″ on the board to hide the actual board name.”

No unpeeling?

devdevdev
devdevdev
9 years ago

Cnxsoft could you do a post with a comparison of recent tv boxes (rk3288, allwinner etc) showing different features and any that have hw support linux? thanks.

anon
anon
9 years ago

Ugh, again my pet peeve of cheap and awful power supplies raises its ugly head… Please someone update their 90’s wall warts into 10’s tech, pretty please?

Unpopulated parts are just for onboard IR and Red/Blue LED drivers and diodes, for other case models.

Half decent heatsink though. 🙂

Mike
Mike
9 years ago

Are you guy Happy for the Hardware or what the device can do?

Tadej
9 years ago

Thanks for that!

Eagerly waiting for review!!

abdullah
abdullah
9 years ago

i am looking for order new media player but i am not sure any one
HIMEDIA Q5 4K 3D one or RK3288 or AW80

the import for me speed of media player and if have
have 4k and 3D BD-ISO and H.265 4K support. and firmware support and update

Cowz
Cowz
9 years ago

@matt
I thought tegra k1 cu was trash compared to AW80 as far as benchmarks go

Dv
Dv
9 years ago

This looks good. But the price …I have a close attention on Firefly:http://www.t-firefly.com/en/
Will this AW80 supports both android and ubuntu ?

regx
regx
9 years ago

do you prefer AW80 or Ugoos UT3 4Gb 32g ?

Khadas VIM4 SBC