Android News - Page 189 of 375 - CNX Software

December 22, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 19 Comments

Rockchip RK3128 TV Box Boards with 512MB RAM, 8GB Storage Sell for $15 and Up

Rockchip RK3036 dual core Cortex A7 processor was showcased by Rockchip at CES 2015 and said to enable $10 H.265 TV boxes, and yesterday I noticed some code made it to mainline Linux for Rockchip RK3036 Kylin board. While I have not been able to find any information about that board, or any other RK3036 boards or devices so far, I’ve been informed that RK3128 boards with 512MB RAM and 8GB storage were selling for $11.50 (75 CNY) for 1K orders, and around $15 (100 CNY) and up for samples. Specifications listed for the board shown above: SoC – Rockchip RK3128 quad core ARM Cortex A7 @ 1.3 GHz with ARM Mali-400MP2 GPU System Memory – 512MB to 1GB LPDDR2/DDR3 or DDR3L Storage – 4 to 8 GB NAND flash + micro SD slot Connectivity – Ethernet, and WiFi Video Output – HDMI 1.4 and composite RCA output Audio Output […]

December 22, 2015December 22, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

SMA-Q Smartwatch Mini Review and Teardown

I had great hopes for SMA-Q smartwatch, as it features an always on color e-Paper display, a built-in heart rate monitor, and promised 30-day standby battery life, as well as being 30-meter water resistant. But last week, I found out that the latter did not mean waterproof, and instead the watch was rated IP65 that’s only good enough to wash hands and a little rain, but not showering let alone swimming. In the last week, I could play with the watch, and found some serious Bluetooth connectivity issues (with Iocean M6752 smartphone), and I was recommended to upgrade the firmware of SMA-Q watch, and after that my Bluetooth issue have somewhat improve, but everything pretty much went downhill, and the watch is now out of order, and shows no sign of life. So while I was expecting to write a full review, I’ll simply report with experience with the watch […]

December 21, 2015December 21, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

GeekBox and Landingship Android Overview and Benchmarks

This week-end I checked out GeekBox TV box, and Landingship baseboard, explained how to connect the two together and install various optional accessories such as an RTC battery and a cooling fan. GeekBox comes pre-loaded with Android 5.1 + Ubuntu dual boot image, and as I’ve already reviewed other Rockchip RK3368 TV boxes, and GeekBox is also a development platform, I’ll simply run several benchmarks on GeekBox, as well as test SATA performance with an SSD connected to Landingship carrier board in Android, before checking out the Linux part a little latter. That’s no quite how you want to place the fan, but I wanted to show the USB to TTL debug board and other wires can be connected with the case closed. This allowed me to easily check whether the fan was spinning during testing, and it never did… According to one forum post, the temperature currently needs to […]

December 20, 2015December 20, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Texas Instruments Introduces Entry level Sitara AM3351 Cortex-A8 Processor

Texas Instruments Sitara AM335x processor are designed by industrial applications, and found in develompent board such as BeagleBone Black or BeagleBone Green, and the company has recently launched the new Sitara AM3351 Cortex A8 processor without 3D GPU, no PRU just like AM3352, but they’ve also canned the two CAN interfaces (sorry, I had to) in order to bring the cost lower, while keeping the processor software and pin-to-pin compatible with other AM335x processors available in 13×13 mm package. TI Sitara AM3351 CPU clock will also be limited to 300 MHz to 600 MHz with respectively AM3351BZCE30 and AM3351BZCE60 parts. It will only come with one Gigabit Ethernet port instead of up to two ports of other members of the family that are produced in 15x15mm package, and temperature range is limited to 0 to 90 C. Other features remain the same, and the processors will support TI-RTOS, Linux, Android, […]

December 19, 2015December 20, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 29 Comments

GeekBox TV Box Unboxing and Development Kit Assembly Guide

GeekBox is both an Android TV box based on Rockchip RK3368 octa-core processor, and a Linux development kit thanks to the CPU module inside the device, a baseboard and various accessories. The company has sent me a review sample, as well as the accessories currently available. So today, I’ll have a look at the box, and show how to connect everything together. GeekBox TV Box Unboxing I’ve received two carton boxes via DHL, one with GeekBox itself, and the other with some accessories. You could use GeeBox has a TV box, and forget about its development attributes, as the device comes with the usual accessories include a case, an HDMI cable, an infrared remote control, and a 5V/2A power supply. I was really surprised by how small it was compared to other 64-bit ARM TV boxes recently launched on the market, and looks very much like a small router with […]

December 17, 2015July 31, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

Amlogic S905X and S912 Processors To Support 4K VP9, HDMI 2.0a, Built-in DAC and More

I had heard some news that Amlogic S912 was delayed, and even possibly canceled, while talks about a new S908 processor surfaced recently with support for VP9 up to 4K resolution. We now have some more details as I’ve received some more information about Amlogic product roadmap, and S908 should be renamed S905M [Update: The name will apparently be changed to S905X now, the saga continues…] Amlogic S905 Amlogic S908 / S905M / S905X Amlogic S912 CPU Quad core Cortex A53 @ up to 2.0 GHz Quad core Cortex A53 @ up to 1.5/2.0 GHz Octa core Cortex A53 @ up to 2.0 GHz GPU Penta-core Mali-450 up to 750 MHz High perf gaming GPU Memory 16/32-bit DDR3, LPDDR2/3 Up to 2GB, DDR2133 16/32-bit DDR3/4, LPDDR2/3 Up to 2GB, DDR2400 Storage NAND Flash@BCH60 eMMC 5.0, SD, Nor Flash Video Decoding 4Kp60 10-bit HEVC, 4Kp30 H.264 4Kp60 10-bit HEVC, VP9 4Kp30 […]

December 17, 2015December 17, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Intrinsyc Introduces Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 Cortex-A72-Class Development Board, SoM and MDPs

While there’s already an healthy choice of ARMv8 development board such as LeMaker Hikey, or Qualcomm DragonBoard 410c, all those platforms are based on the lower end Cortex A53 64-bit ARM core, and ARM Cortex A57, let alone Cortex A72, boards are much more difficult to find, as they are much pricier and/or have limited availability. Intrinsyc may have released the first (somewhat) affordable and accessible Cortex-A72-class development board with Open-Q 820 development kit comprised of a SoM and a baseboard, as well as smartphone and tablet mobile development platforms (MDPs) based on Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 quad core Kryo processor. While Kryo is a custom ARMv8 designed by Qualcomm, and not exactly a Cortex A72 core, both have similar performance, as shown in Snapdragon 820 Antutu and Kirin 950 Antutu results. Open-Q 820 board specifications: SoC – Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 quad core Kryo cores with 2x cores @ up to […]

December 17, 2015May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

ADBoard 3G/4G Digital Signage Board is Powered by Allwinner A83T Octa-Core Processor

MQMaker officially launched their WiTi router board earlier this week, but the company has also introduced ADBoard, an octa-core board specifically designed for digital signage with a connector for LVDS display including backlight, an RTC with backup battery, and a mini PCIe connector for 3G/4G connectivity combined with a SIM card slot. ADBoard specifications: SoC – Allwinner A83T octa-core ARM Cortex-A7 @ 2.0 GHz with PowerVR SGX544MP GPU @ 700 MHz supporting OpenGL ES 2.0/1.1, OpenCL 1.1, and DX 9.3. System Memory – 1 GB DDR3 Storage – 16 GB eMMC + micro SD slot Display Interfaces / Video Output HDMI up to 1080p60 with HDCP 1.2 and CEC support connector LVDS connector, LCD backlight control header and capacitive touch panel header Audio – HDMI, 3.5mm audio output, speaker connector, microphone connector Connectivity – Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0 USB – 1x USB 2.0 host port, 1x […]