Android News - Page 194 of 364 - CNX Software

August 18, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Android 6.0 Marshmallow SDK & Final M Preview Released

Google have finally announced Android 6.0 will be Marshmallow, and more importantly released the Android 6.0 SDK (the API won’t change), and the final M Developer Preview. That means developers can already work on and publish apps to the Google Play Store that are compatible with Android 6.0 API level 23. The final Android 6.0 SDK and Android Support Library v23 can be downloaded via the SDK Manager in Android Studio. The new Android Support library includes new libraries such customtabs, percent, recommendation, preference-v7, preference-v14, and preference-leanback-v17, and will help developer integrate new Android Marshallow functionalities to their app in a backward-compatible way. Android 6.0 adds new features like fingerprint scanner support and Doze power saving mode, as well as a new way to handle permissions, but the latest developer preview only brings small changes: Final Permissions User Interface – Updated permissions user interface and permissions behavior. API Change – […]

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

Meet the First Affordable 360 Degrees Cameras: Gyroptic 360Cam and IC Realtech ALLIe

Last year, I discovered one company developing and selling 360 degrees video recording solutions, and you could then watch the videos using a VR Kit like vrAse, Google Cardboard, or Oculus Rift. It was all cool, but involved a camera mount for 6 GoPro cameras with a total cost well over $2,000. This year, GoPro also unveiled their own camera array for 16 GoPro cameras, again very cool, but even less affordable to the masses. But thanks to two CES 2015 videos recently uploaded to ARMdevices.net, I found out about two interesting sub $500 cameras that can record 360 degrees videos at 1080p, which can then be optionally uploaded to YouTube 360˚, and watched with a VR Kit, using a tablet, or on a touchscreen enabled video sphere. Gyroptic 360 Camera The cool looking 360 degrees camera comes with 3 lenses, a Nike+ Fuelband like display, WiFi or Ethernet connectivity […]

August 16, 2015January 18, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 41 Comments

Beelink i68 (Rockchip RK3368) TV Box Review

Beelink i68 is one of the first 64-bit ARM Android mini PCs available on the market, and could offer an update to Rockchip RK3288 TV boxes thanks to its eight Cortex A53 cores and support for HDMI 2.0 up to 4K2K @ 60Hz. I’ve already taken a few pictures of the device and RK68 board, so today I’ll report about performance, stability, features and video playback capabilities in the full review. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions The box has three USB 2.0 host ports and a micro USB OTG port, so for once I did not have to use a USB hub to connect all my devices and cables. I’ve inserted an Ethernet cable, an HDMI cable, an optical cable to the S/PDIF output, a Class 10 micro SD card, a USB hard drive, a USB webcam, an RF dongle for Tronsmart Mars G01 wireless gamepad, and finally MeLE […]

August 15, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

Touchjet WAVE Adds Android and Touchscreen Capability to Your TV (Crowdfunding)

There are already ways to convert your TV into a smart TV running Android with touchscreen support, but you’d need to buy an Android mini PC and a infrared touch frame overlay for your TV both of which should cost several hundred dollars in total, and the larger your TV the costlier the price, and once you get the hardware, you may also need to modify your kernel source code to enable USB touchscreen… A US start-up is now working on a much cheaper and easier way to achieve this with Touchjet WAVE, a quad core Android mini PC that integrates an infrared sensor to track finger movements and taps across the screen of your existing TV. Touchjet WAVE specifications: SoC – Quad-core ARM Cortex A9 processor @ 2.0 GHz (Likely Amlogic S802 or S812) System Memory – 1GB DDR3 Storage – 8GB flash Video Output – HDMI 1.4 Touchscreen […]

August 14, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

$12 Semlamp SL-012 Lamp Controller Let You Wirelessly Control Lights with Android or iOS Devices

WiFi smart sockets have come down in price with products like Orvibo Wiwo S20 selling for $16, but if all you want to do is control your lights, there’s an even cheaper option with Semlamp SL-012 lamp controller selling for just $11.92 on DealExtreme and allowing to control two lights independently with Android or iOS mobile devices. Specifications listed for Semlamp SL-012 : Voltage – AC 220-240V Max Current – 10A Dimmable – Yes Control Range – 10 meters Dimensions – 9.5 cm x 4.5 cm x 2.4 cm Weight – 59.5 g Material – Plastic Right, not that much information, and nothing about wireless connectivity. But the description also mentions that the device does not use Bluetooth, nor WiFi. So how is that possible? The answer lies with another picture shown on the right…. A microphone is attached to that yellow cable, and they are using audio to control […]

August 13, 2015August 24, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Mygica ATV586 Quad Core Android DVB-T2 Receiver Unboxing and Teardown

Today, I received both Mygica ATV1900AC and ATV586 from Geniatech. I’ve already taken apart ATV1900AC, so it’s now the turn for Mygica’s latest Android DVB-T2 receiver powered by Amlogic S805 to get photographed and torn down. If you don’t like in a region where DVB-T2 is supported, Mygica also sells a version with an ATSC tuner. Mygica ATV586 Unboxing That’s the retail package for the receiver that shows the tuner type (DVB-T2), and that the box is based on a quad core processor supporting HEVC/H.265 video codec and running Kodi in Android 4.4. There are quite a lotf of accessories in the package including the usual HDMI cable, 5V/2A power supply, and IR remote with two AAA batteries, but there’s also a TV antenna set with an indoor antenna and mounts. I’ll try the indoor antenna, but it’s unlikely to work in my location, so I’ll probably connect the box […]

August 13, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

Zidoo X1 Android Firmware 1.0.7 Fixes Critical Kodi Playback Issues

I was quite disappointed when I wrote Zidoo X1 review, as Zidoo provided decent firmware with their Zidoo X9 recorder (albeit with some caveats), but Zidoo X1 with firmware 1.05 was a disaster while playing videos in Kodi either from the network or a USB hard drive, as even most H.264 videos could not play smoothly… I recommended prospective buyers to skip the box for now, as Kodi was not acceptable when Zidoo’s ZDCodec hardware decoding implementation was enabled. But the developers have quickly worked to fix critical bugs in Kodi, and provided a test APK that indeed fixed H.265, H.264, and MPEG2 videos, and improved greatly 4K video playback in Kodi with ZDcodec implementation. Since then, they’ve also fixed some other playback issues for video using VC1 codec, and released firmware 1.0.7 with the following changes: Kodi Fixed choppy video problems with online videos, such as YouTube Fixed choppy […]

August 13, 2015August 14, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Mygica ATV1900AC Android Lollipop TV Box Unboxing and Teardown

Geniatech sent me two samples of their latest Android devices this morning with Mygica ATV1900AC TV box powered by Amlogic S812 quad core Cortex A9 processor, and Mygica ATV586 DVB-T2 receiver powered by Amlogic S805 quad core cortex A5 processor. Beside relatively high-end specs with 802.11ac, Gigabit Ethernet, 2GB RAM, and 16GB eMMC, one of the former main selling point is the Android Lollipop firmware that is said to brings significant improvement over Android 4.4 KitKat. But today, I’ll focus on the hardware side with pictures of the devices and its internals, before writing the results of my tests in a few days. Mygica ATV1900AC Unboxing Geniatech sent me both boxes in a DHL parcel, and both are Mygica branded retail packages. Mygica ATV1900AC packages shows some of its key features like Android Lollipop support, 4K UHD, H.265, 802.11ac WiFi, voice search and so on… Most TV boxes ship with […]