Ugoos AM9 is an Android 14 TV box powered by an Amlogic S905X5 quad-core (Armv9) Cortex-A510 SoC, which supports features such as H.266 and AV1 hardware video decoding and AI Super Resolution (AI-SR) through the built-in 4 TOPS NPU.
We first noted the Amlogic S905X5 SoC in an upcoming SEI Robotics TV box about two years ago. Details were sparse at the time, and in the meantime, Amlogic introduced the similarly named S905X5M, which is still a “regular” Armv8 SoC with four Cortex-A55 cores, and found in products such as ODROID-C5 SBC and Ugoos X5M Pro. However, I had not heard anything about the more powerful S905X5 SoC until I came across the Ugoos AM9 TV box this morning.
Ugoos AM9 specifications:
- SoC – Amlogic S905X5
- CPU – Quad-core Cortex-A510 Armv9 processor delivering 40K+ DMIPS
- GPU – Arm Mali-G310 V5 GPU clocked at 1 GHz for 4K HDR user interfaces
- VPU – Up to 2x 4Kp60 10-bit H.266/VCC and AV1 video codecs, and the usual VP9, AVS3, H.265/HEVC, H.264
- AI accelerator – 2 to 4 TOPS Neural network accelerator (NNA) with Tensor programmable engine (TPU) architecture; supports Tensorflow, Tensorflow Lite, ONNX, Pytorch, Darknet, MxNet, and Caffe 4
- Process – “Second generation” 6 nm process
- System Memory – 4GB LPDDR4x
- Storage
- 64GB eMMC flash
- MicroSD card slot
- Video Output – HDMI 2.1b up to 4Kp60 with HDCP 2.2/2.3, CEC, eARC (enhanced audio return channel), VRR (Variable Refresh Rate), QMS (Quick Media Switching), ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode), and more
- Audio
- Optical S/PDIF port
- Digital audio via HDMI
- Networking
- Gigabit Ethernet RJ45 port
- WiFi 6 2×2 MIMO up to 1201 Mbps and Bluetooth 5.2
- Optional 4G LTE module or SSD (for OEM orders only)
- USB – 3x USB 3.0 Type-A ports, 1x USB 2.0 Type-C port
- Power Supply – 12V/1.67A via USB-C port
- Dimensions – 11.6 x 11.6 x 2.8 cm
- Certifications – CE, FCC
The box runs Android 14 with Google Play, supports APK installation, and integrates Ugoos Settings for features such as SAMBA server, NFS & CIFS clients, superuser/root access through Magisk, a remote server to use your smartphone as a remote control, HDMI CEC, USB controls (debugging, sleep), and more. The firmware can be found in the Downloads section of the product page, and the latest release was released a few days ago (August 26) with several fixes. In most cases, you would not need to manually download and install an update, since OTA is supported.
The Ugoos AM9 ships with a Bluetooth remote control with Voice+Gyro (i.e., a Bluetooth air mouse), a 12V power adapter with a USB-C cable, an HDMI cable, and a user guide. It’s available on AliExpress for about $140 and up including shipping, although I’m seeing a lot of “Welcome deals”, so the actual price might be higher. It’s also sold on Amazon for $159.99. That means it’s about the price of an Intel Alder Lake-N or Twin Lake mini PC, which might be a tough sell even if it’s a new generation Armv9 SoC. Since Ugoos mainly focuses on the B2B market, and they don’t compete on price alone for samples, I attempted to find other Amlogic S905X5 TV boxes, but I failed to find any at this stage.
The video below provides an overview of the TV box, walks through the interface, showcases some of the features (AI-SR, automatic frame rate switching, etc..) test AV1 video playback, gaming, online video streaming, and reports some benchmark results (e.g. Antutu 10: 234,789 points).
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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How fast is Cortex-A510 in the real world? I think I remember AnandTech (Rest In Power) complaining about the performance/efficiency claims years ago.
I hope we get AV2 news within the next… year.
Does anything use H.266?
According to Wikipedia, Brazil is adopting H.266 and LCEVC for their “TV 3.0” broadcast standard, and the more widely used DVB is supporting it, although I don’t know how that works.
ATSC 3.0 broadcast TV is said to use H.265, but a Nokia blog post, “The Future of Video Compression: Is VVC Ready for Prime Time?”, says “the ATSC just recently approved VVC for implementation within the ATSC 3.0 framework”. That is completely new to me. Maybe the ultra slow rollout of compatible tuners has allowed them to update the standard before it’s widely adopted?
Another fun article I found: Report: New industry codec, likely H.267, could be standardised by end of the decade
I’d love this device, but I can’t handle that pricing. Especially after CAD conversion, it’s just not worth it
Hasn’t this been out for a little bit now? weeks/month+ ?
Acer have a better box but only in South Africa T moment with a faster CPU and only 90 dollars
Everytime I read Ugoos I scroll down to the price first, because I know they love to overprice everything. So I don’t have to waste time on reading anything from them
Decent specs but that price is up there. The Acer box has similar specs for half the price.
That’s because there’s been some confusion. Contrary to the initial announcement, the Acer box is based on S905X5M and comes with 2GB RAM.
So despite what the headline trys to make it seem.
It is NOT an android or Google TV box and almost certainly does not have required certification to do the bare basics you’d expect from a TV box like run 4k Netflix etc