2015 - Page 105 of 105 - CNX Software

January 2, 2015May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Linux Benchmarks – Rockchip RK3288 vs Exynos 5422 vs AllWinner A80 vs Intel Atom Z3735F

With all these Intel Atom Z3735F been released right now at a price similar to ARM based mini PCs, many people, including myself, are wondering about the performance of the low cost Intel processor against their ARM competitors. Ian Morrison just published some results from Phoronix Test Suite comparing the performance of Firefly-RK3288 (Rockchip RK3288), ODROID-XU3 Lite (Samsung Exynos 5422 BIN2), and A80 OptimusBoard (Allwinner A80) in Linux (Ununtu 12.04.5), against the performance of MeegoPad T01 (Intel Atom Z3735F) running Linux from a Live CD on a USB drive. Some of the benchmarks failed because Phoronix Test Suite got apparently confused with the file systems located on a USB drive, but at least we’ve got a comparison point, and the results are a bit confusing, as they’re no clear winner. In some tests like FFmpeg, the Intel SoC really crushed the ARM competition being at least twice as fast as […]

January 2, 2015January 4, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 26 Comments

Pipo X7 Intel Atom Z3736 based Mini PC Sells for $90

Pipo X7 is yet another mini PC powered by Intel Atom Z3735 / Z3736 quad core processor running Windows 8.1 with Bing, and since it’s now pretty clear all these device should run Ubuntu or other Linux desktop distributions with full GPU support, they’ll gather more interest from Linux users, especially given this mini PC with 2GB and 32GB storage can be pre-ordered for $89.98 on GearBest with PX7CN or PipoX7LM coupon, making it more interesting price-wise than MeegoPad T01, especially since it comes with an Ethernet port, and (probably) an Intel Atom Z3736 processor with a higher burst frequency (2.16 GHz vs 1.83 GHz) Since GearBest has done a pretty poor job at listing the specs for this item, I got the full technical details from GeekBuying, with some errors as well, but still better: SoC – Intel Atom Bay Trail Z3736F up to 2.16 GHz with Intel HD graphics […]

January 2, 2015January 2, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Fernvale Open Source Hardware IoT Board Based on Mediatek MT6260 SoC with GSM Connectivity

Andrew Huang (Bunnie), an hardware engineer, known for hacking the original XBOX, and more recently for Novena open source laptop, has decided it could be interesting to reverse-engineer Mediatek MT6260 processor, as in China, it’s difficult to get documentation, SDK, and tools if you don’t commit to purchase X chips, where X is a rather large number. He and others also checked whether their work could be open sourced legally, and assert their “fair use” rights to reverse-engineer hardware and firmware. And so Fernvale project was born both as a technical challenge and to make a point. MT6260 is a $3 ARM7EJ-S processor clocked at 364 MHz with 8MB built-in RAM, interfaces such as I2C, SPI, PWM, UART, as well as LCD and touchscheen controller, and audio codec, battery charger, USB, Bluetooth, and GSM support, which make the $6 Atmel MCU used in Arduino board look expensive. The main differences […]

January 2, 2015May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 11 Comments

3D Graphics Acceleration in Linux on Allwinner A80 based Cubieboard4

Allwinner A80 is a powerful octa-core processor found in development boards and TV boxes such as Cubieboard4 or Tronsmart Draco AW80. Some early Ubuntu images and instructions had already been released for A80 Optimusboard and Draco AW80, but none of these featured GPU drivers for 3D acceleration, which to be honest, has limited advantages in Linux desktop distributions since desktop environments and most apps require full OpenGL support, i.e. not only OpenGL ES, and the only ARM SoC that can provide OpenGL support without external graphics card is Nvidia Tegra K1 SoC. Having said that GPU drivers would pave the way for smooth OpenELEC / Kodi user interface support in Allwinner A80 Linux distributions. That’s only one part of the puzzle, since the GPU normally handles the user interface, while the VPU takes care of video decoding. The good news is that CubieTech release updates images for their Cubieboard4 (CC-A80) […]