Mecool KM8 P Amlogic S912 TV Box Runs Android 7.1 Nougat, Sells for $39 and Up

We’ve already written about Android 7.1 on Amlogic earlier with week with an overview of the system and SDK from a developer, and there were some issues and user interface inconsistencies. However, I’ve just seen GeekBuying is now taking order for Amlogic S912 powered Mecool KM8 P TV box running Android 7.1 for $38.99 and up.

Mecool KM8 P specifications:

  • SoC – Amlogic S912 octa-core ARM Cortex A53 processor @ up to 1.5 GHz with ARM Mali-820MP3
  • System Memory – 1 or 2GB DDR3
  • Storage – 8 or 16GB eMMC flash and micro SD slot up to 32GB
  • Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0a up to 4K @ 60Hz with CEC and HDR support, and 3.5mm AV port (composite + stereo audio)
  • Connectivity – 10/100M Ethernet, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
  • USB – 2x USB 2.0 ports
  • Misc – IR receiver, status and network LEDs
  • Power Supply – 5V/2A
  • Dimensions – 97 x 97 x 10 mm

The box ships with an IR remote control, a power adapter, a HDMI cable, and a user’s manual. It’s running Android 7.1 with Kodi 17.

I’m not convinced it will work as well as Android 6.0 right now, but OTA firmware updates may fix some of the bugs. The 1GB/8GB version is sold for $38.99, but if you prefer the system with 2GB RAM, you’ll have to spend $49.99, and for extra storage (16GB) with 2GB RAM, the price is $54.99. GeekBuying also offers bundles with  various air mice.

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22 Comments
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hex
hex
7 years ago

is it linuxable cnx?

sandbender
sandbender
6 years ago

text for the article on the front page reads 1 or 2GB DDR3 Storage instead of RAM.

geokon
geokon
6 years ago

@Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) I’m having trouble choosing between the available options. Could I get a recommendation? What’s a good place to start? I’ve been looking for an affordable ARM machine to run simple visuals and interactive displays. I’d also like to have a very simple system for playing around with writing NEON and OpenGL-ES code that I’ll later port to to Android (NDK). I don’t need anything fancy. I’m currently using a chromebook/crouton setup, but the hacked up mess that is crouton/chroot is a constant headache – so I’d like something a little simpler. The RPi and clones seem to… Read more »

sandbender
sandbender
6 years ago
GanjaBear
GanjaBear
6 years ago

Wow, so many vents!

tkaiser
tkaiser
6 years ago


Since GPU has been mentioned: some readers/contributors in ‘Armbian for Amlogic S912’ thread were very excited about S912 containing Mali T820MP3 (vs. old and boring 450MP3 on S905) since T820 also features ‘Vulcan’ and OpenCL 1.2 support. Didn’t follow closely (or at all) but I believe there the usual Mali problem is present too (no useable userspace BLOBs)

Peter
Peter
6 years ago

LibreELEC 8.0 alpha for Amlogic S912 (using libhybris): https://forum.libreelec.tv/thread-5848.html

geokon
geokon
6 years ago

@Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) Thanks for that link. Blu has an interesting setup, and in the same vein as what I’m interested in as well. I’m definitely keen on the Odroid, but I hear it takes forever to ship and it’s about 2-3x the price of the NEXBOX A95X – so I had to ask 🙂 (and I get that there is a bit of a “you get what you pay for” element going on here as well) As for the OpenGL (I’m really trying to dive deeper into shader recently) when I read things like this: http://baylibre.com/elc-2017-3d-mainline/ What are they… Read more »

geokon
geokon
6 years ago

@tkaiser
(sorry if this is a naiive question)
So is the silicon completely unusable at the moment? Or there are drivers, but they only work with Android? Or is it just used for video decoding? ( I guess I’m trying to wrap my head around why it’s there is there is no way to interact with it! 🙂 )

geokon
geokon
6 years ago

@Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) I think you’re right and I should start with a more accessible system before diving into the rabbit-hole of TV boxes 🙂 So normally the framebuffer and X11 driver are separate from OpenGL, but with libhybris people are getting the android OpenGL drivers running and then getting X11 running over GLX. And so the BayLibre guys are rewriting the binaries (or adapting the old one?) to run on mainline linux Am I correct in understanding that when you say “userspace binaries” these are what basically transform the OpenGL graphics pipeline and your GLSL into the hardware-specific assembly… Read more »

tkaiser
tkaiser
6 years ago

cnxsoft : Normally, Amlogic provided the framebuffer driver for the GPU drivers, which is useful for media players based on Linux, but can’t be used with X11 Yeah, I know. Same problem with other SoCs that rely on Mali and where only one variant is available but not the other 🙂 To be honest: I don’t care that much or at all about ‘Mali and X11’ or TV box use cases but based on my understanding Kodi/LibreELEC need ‘Mali acceleration’ here only to draw parts of the UI since video acceleration is still something differently? Anyway: I wasn’t referring to… Read more »

tkaiser
tkaiser
6 years ago

cnxsoft :
Mali-450MP4 used in S905/S905X

Hmm… I stumbled accross a rant by someone mentioning an impressive ‘GPU downgrade’ when comparing S812 with S905 (Mali-450MP6 vs. Mali-450MP3). The MP number is the count of shader cores? Mali450 seems to allow variable clockspeed and Amlogic claims 750MHz with S905, is this number confirmed (as with their CPU cores 😉 )?

armer
armer
6 years ago

According to ODROID-C2 FAQ,

ARM Mali-450MP3
In fact there are 5 GPU cores.
3 fragment(pixel) processors and 2 vertex shader(geometric) processors.
But normally we are counting the number of fragment processors only in this industry.

daneil
daneil
6 years ago

Looks cool, might get it from geekbuying.

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