Bsquare Announces Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 Series Mobile Development Platforms

BSQUARE has recently announced the availability of its Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 Mobile Development Platform (MDP), based on Qualcomm Snapdragon 8974 (LTE), which will be released both in tablet and smartphone form factor. This development platfom has been designed for application developers and device manufacturers so that they can develop, test, optimize and showcase apps in Android 4.2.2 powered by the latest Qualcomm SoCs. Snapdragon 800 Tablet and Smartphone MDP specifications: SoC – 8974 Quad Core Krait 400 Snapdragon Processor @ 2.3GHz with Adreno 330 embedded GPU and Hexagon v5 QDSP6 Memory and Storage – N/A, apparently you don’t need to know… Display: Tablet MDP – 11.6” 1080p HD Multitouch Display Smartphone MDP – 4.3” 720p HD Multi-touch display Video Playback – UltraHD/4K video support via HDMI output Camera – 12MP rear camera w/ Flash (1080p HD @ 30fps) & 2MP front facing camera (1080p HD @ 30fps) Audio – Surround sound […]

$60 MK805 II Android STB Features AllWinner A20 SoC, HDMI and AV Outputs

Almost exactly one year ago, I wrote about MINI X (aka MINI XPlus H24, or MK805), an Android 2.3 media player powered by AllWinner A10 with 4GB flash and 512MB Flash, and it sold for $77.50. Today, I’ve come across an updated version, called MK805 II or MINI XPlus H34, with AllWinner A20 dual core SoC, 1GB RAM, 4GB Flash, and running Android 4.2.2. Here are the specifications of the device: SoC- AllWinner A20 dual core Cortex A7 processor @ 1.2GHz + Mali-400 MP2 GPU System Memory – 1GB DDR3 RAM Storage – 4GB NAND Flash + micro SD card slot Connectivity – Built-in WiFi 802.11b/g/n, and firmware is said to support external USB Ethernet and 3G dongles. Video Output – HDMI 1.3 (1080p) + AV Video Codecs – MPEG1/2/4, H.264, HD AVC, VC-1, Divx, Xvid, RealVideo8/9/10, VP6 Video Container Formats – MKV, TS, TP, M2TS, RM/RMVB, AVI, MPG, VOB, […]

G-Box Midnight MX2 Giveaway

I reviewed Matricom G-Box Midnight MX2 Android set-top box about a month ago, and I was pretty happy with the device with regards to performance, stability, and XBMC support. During my initial review, Wi-Fi was really excellent, the best, by far, I had seen in the dozen of devices I had tested, although an upgrade to my router firmware somehow changed that. This is also one the rare device that will support OTA firmware update. There were still some problems in the firmware I tested: some videos could not play, composite output did not work…, but overall I find it’s a pretty good device. The company also seems committed to fix issues, as they even have a public bug tracking system for the MX2. If you plan to use Android app, and not only XBMC, the IR remote provided may not be the ideal input device, and you’ll probably need […]

$96 Kingnovel K-R42-1 (MK888) Android Set-top Box Powered by RK3188 Processor

I’ve now got several RK3188 mini PCs, but I hadn’t found full sized set-top boxes based on Rockchip RK3188 quad core processor with Ethernet, and multiple USB ports. Thanks to a post in mini PC G+ community, we have now a nice looking quad core STB called K-R42-1 by Kingnovel, which might be the manufacturer design house behind the device, and sold for  $96 including shipping in one Aliexpress store under the model name MK888. K-R42-1 / MK888 Specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3188 quad Cortex-A9 CPU @ 1.6 GHz + Mali-400 MP4 GPU @ 500 MHz System Memory – 2GB DDR3 SDRAM Storage – 8GB Nand Flash +  MicroSD slot (Up to 32GB) Connectivity 10/100M Ethernet WiFi 802.11 b/g/n with external antenna Bluetooth EDR 2.0 Video Output – HDMI 1.3 + AV output jack Audio Output – HDMI + S/PDIF Video Codecs (Decode) – MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, H.263, H.264 (up […]

Critical Link MityARM-5CSX CoM Powered by Altera Cyclone V SoC

Earlier this week, I wrote about EnSilica eSi-ZM1, a system-on-module based on Xilinx Zynq7000 Extensible Processing Platform that comes with a dual core ARM Cortex A9 and FPGA fabric. It turns out Xilinx is not the only game in town, and Altera’s Cyclone V SoC, announced last December, also includes a dual core ARM Cortex A9 processor with Altera FPGA logic, and Critical Linux recently announced MityARM-5CSX computer-on-module based on this platform. Target applications include machine vision, scientific imaging, motor control, medical imaging and instrumentation, test and measurement, industrial instrumentation, as well as a military & aerospace. MityARM-5CSX specifications: SoC – Altera Cyclone V SX-U672 with FPGA logic and dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 up to 800MHz System Memory – 1GB DDR3 RAM, and 256MB DDR3 FPGA RAM (optional) Storage – 32MB QPSI NOR flash FPGA I/O fabric: PCIe  hard core Up to 145 user-programmable I/O lines (including several 875MHz SerDes lanes) […]

$25 Texas Instruments SensorTag is a Bluetooth LE Devkit with 6 Sensors

Yesterday, I wrote about Wimoto Motes, tiny Bluetooth LE devices with several sensors that can be controlled and monitored via an iOS app, and soon by an Android app, as well as Linux devices. Each mote costs $39 plus shipping, and one commenter mentioned the price may be a bit too high. A Google search for “bluetooth sensor” immediately brings TI SensorTag, which looks somewhat similar, except it is a Bluetooth LE development kit, includes 6 sensors (but no light sensor), and only costs $25 including shipping. SensorTag Specifications: Bluetooth 4.0 low energy (CC2541) SoC 6 sensors connected via I2C: IR Temperature sensor (TI TMP006) Humidity sensor (Sensirion SHT21) Pressure sensor (Epcos T5400) Accelerometer (Kionix KXTJ9) Gyroscope (InvenSense IMU-3000) Magnetometer (Freescale MAG3110) Power – Single cell coin cell battery (CR2032), quiescent current consumption of 8uA, allowing years of battery life. FCC, IC and ETSI certified solution Dimension – 71.2x36x15.5 mm, […]

$32 iPush Wi-Fi DLNA / Miracast Adapter for Android

Last time I wrote about Miracast / DLNA dongles, the price was about $55, but today I’ve found a new device closer to my target price ($25) with IPUSH Miracast adapter that sells for $31.90 on DealExtreme. [Update: Several users report it’s only a DLNA dongle, and it does not support Miracast yet] Here are the specifications according to DealExtreme: SoC – Allwinner A10s Cortex A8 + Mali-400 GPU Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n USB – 1x micro USB port for power Video Output – HDMI 1.4 Supports DLNA and Miracast mode Power – 5V / 0.5A The device comes with an HDMI cable and a micro USB cable used to connect the device to your TV HDMI and USB ports, or if your TV lacks USB, a USB power adapter. However, I’ve done a little more research, and it turns out iPush is also a product designed by Action Semi, that just […]

Linaro 13.05 Release With Linux Kernel 3.10, Android 4.2.2, and Ubuntu Raring Ringtail

Linaro 13.05 has just been released with Linux Kernel 3.10-rc2 and Android 4.2.2. This is the first release with Ubuntu 13.04 (Raring Ringtail) images. There’s also Linux Linaro Stable (LSK) preview based on kernel 3.9.4. BeagleBone Black support has been added and preliminary hwpack and images are available, an Android Arndale image with virtual framebuffer is also available. You can now get a desktop environment (XFCE) on Aarch64 / ARMv8. Hardware packs with Real-time Linux kernel (PREEMPT_RT) can be downloaded for Pandaboard and Arndale. More work has gone into Aarch64, big.LITTLE HMP, and ARM virtualization (KVM). Finally an UEFI is available not only for Vexpress boards, but also Samsung Origen and Arndale boards, as well as Texas Instruments Pandabord and Beagleboard. Here are the highlights of this release: LAVA First prototype production run of LAVA Lmp completed, tested functional. Beaglebone Black is now running in LAVA. TC2s is now running […]