Posted on by Stephen Vicinanza - 2 Comments on Raspberry Pi 4 Digital Signage Solution Supports 4K HEVC Video and Dual Display Setups

Raspberry Pi 4 Digital Signage Solution Supports 4K HEVC Video and Dual Display Setups

4K H.265 & dual-display digital signage for Raspberry Pi 4 The Info-Beamer, the company that started as a for-fun project at a hacker conference and turned into a now growing business has developed the first Raspberry Pi 4 OS that can use the HEVC (H.265) decoding system and support dual-display setups. The latest info-beamer hosted version 11 (aka hosted 11) is designed for 4K video quality digital signs, and the two HDMI ports on the Raspberry Pi 4 can be used simultaneously for mirrored output on two displays or span two video displays on digital signs. The company has reported that this solution can work on a video wall, like the info-beamer magic video wall. Previous Info-Beamer Previously there was an info-beamer hosted 10 released in February 2019 and that version is still applicable if wanted.  All versions of Raspberry Pi are still supported but the OS 11 release focuses on Pi 4. Demo Installation Info-beamer is offering a free […]

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Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 63 Comments on Raspberry Pi 4 Benchmarks & Mini Review

Raspberry Pi 4 Benchmarks & Mini Review

Raspberry Pi 4 Review

Raspberry Pi 4 has just been released with many improvements over Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ including a faster processor, a proper Gigabit Ethernet port, USB 3.0 interfaces, and 4K video support. That’s the theory, but how does it work in practice? I can now let you know as I’ve received a Raspberry Pi 4 sample courtesy of Cytron, and ran some tests and benchmarks on the very latest boards from the Raspberry Pi foundation. System Info Before starting with the benchmarks, let’s go through some basic system info: For reference, you’ll find Raspberry Pi 4 Linux boot log here. Phoronix benchmarks Let’s go ahead and install the latest version of Phoronix benchmarks: Now let’s run the test to compare the performance of Raspberry Pi 4 model B to some other Arm Linux boards including Raspberry Pi 3 Model B. For reference, my office has an ambient temperature of around 28 to 30°C, and I’ve monitored the CPU temperature with […]

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Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments on Beelink GT1 MINI S905X2 TV Box Ships with a Voice Air Mouse

Beelink GT1 MINI S905X2 TV Box Ships with a Voice Air Mouse

Amlogic S905X2 TV Box Air Mouse

We’ve previously seen new TV boxes based on Amlogic S905X2 and S905Y2 processors, which mostly brings a more recent, but not necessarily more powerful, Mali-G31 GPU with OpenGL 3.2 support, and a USB 3.0 port not available in Amlogic S905/905X based TV boxes. S905X2 and S905Y2 are pretty much similar, and the main difference is that S905Y2 does not support Ethernet, so it’s only designed for WiFi/Bluetooth TV boxes and dongles. So far only generic OEM models were announced, but Beelink has now introduced their own S905X2 TV box with Beelink GT1 MINI featuring 2 to 4GB RAM, 16 to 64GB flash, and a voice enabled remote control / air mouse that works with Google Assistant. Beelink GT1 Mini specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905X2 quad-core Arm Cortex-A53 processor with quad-core Arm Mali-G31MP2 GPU System Memory – 2GB or 4GB DDR4 RAM Storage – 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB eMMC flash, Micro SD slot Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0a up […]

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Posted on by Ian W MORRISON (Linuxium) - 1 Comment on Beelink X45 Mini PC Review with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 16.04/18.04

Beelink X45 Mini PC Review with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 16.04/18.04

Beelink X45 Board

The Beelink X45 mini PC is now available, and Lightinthebox.com have provided a unit for review. It is very similar in style to Intel’s latest NUC Windows mini PC, the NUC7CJYSAL reviewed earlier. However it contains an Intel Celeron Processor J4105 SoC which is a quad core processor bursting up to 2.50 GHz together with the Intel UHD Graphics 600 processor that is capable of 4K support at 60Hz. It is physically small consisting of an approximately 4.5″ by 4” case about 1¾” tall with a front panel that includes the power button and a couple of USB ports and a headphone jack with the rest of the ports including two HDMI (2.0) ones at the rear: The specifications include: A key point to note is the Beelink X45 comes with 64GB eMMC with pre-installed Windows 10 Home together with 4GB DDR4 RAM (soldered and is non-expandable) with space and connectors for both an mSATA and SSD. Starting with a […]

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Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments on Arm Announces Cortex-A76 CPU with Laptop-class Performance, Mali-G76 GPU, Mali-V76 8K VPU

Arm Announces Cortex-A76 CPU with Laptop-class Performance, Mali-G76 GPU, Mali-V76 8K VPU

Arm Cortex A75 based processors are only found in a few SoCs and devices, but Arm keeps on innovating, and they’ve now announced a new suite of of IP with Cortex-A76 CPU enabling 35 percent more performance, and Mali-G76 GPU with ML support and 30 percent higher efficiency and performance. SoC based on those new CPU and GPU IP will provide “laptop-class” performance, and the company also announced Arm Mali-V76 VPU with support for 8K video decoding and encoding. Arm Cortex A76 After Cortex A75, the Arm Cortex-A76 CPU is the second high performance processor core based on DynamIQ technology, and beside the 35 percent  performance gain mentioned in the introduction, it also offers 40 percent improved efficiency, as well as delivers 4x compute performance improvements for AI/ML at the edge. Highlights of Cortex A76: Architecture – Armv8-A (Harvard) with  Armv8.1, Armv8.2, Armv8.3 (LDAPR instructions only),  cryptography and RAS extensions ISA support – A64; A32 and T32 (at the EL0 […]

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Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments on ULEWELL Z28 MINI is a $40 RK3328 TV Stick with 2GB RAM, 16GB Storage, and a USB 3.0 Port

ULEWELL Z28 MINI is a $40 RK3328 TV Stick with 2GB RAM, 16GB Storage, and a USB 3.0 Port

ULEWELL-Z69-TV-Stick

While we’ve already covered many Rockchip RK3328 TV boxes and development boards, if you want a TV stick form factor the choice becomes much more limited. So far I was only aware of Rikomagic RKM V3 , but today I’ve come across  ULEWELL Z28 MINI, selling for about $40 on Aliexpress with 2GB RAM, 16 GB storage, HDMI 2.0a, and a USB 3.0 port. ULEWELL Z28 MINI TV stick specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3328 quad core Cortex A53 processor @ 1.5 GHz with Mali-450MP2 GPU System Memory – 2 GB RAM Storage – 16 GB eMMC flash Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0a up to 4K @ 60 Hz with HDR10 and HLG support Video Codec – 4K VP9, H.265 and H.264. 1080p VC-1, MPEG-1/2/4, VP6/8 Connectivity – 802.11 b/g/n WiFi (2.4 GHz), Bluetooth 4.0 USB – 1x USB 3.0 port Misc – Power button and LED Power Supply – 5V/2A via micro USB port Dimensions – 94 x […]

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Posted on by Ian W MORRISON (Linuxium) - 13 Comments on Vorke V5 Plus Kaby Lake Mini PC Review with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04

Vorke V5 Plus Kaby Lake Mini PC Review with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04

The Vorke V5​ Plus​​ mini PC​ just goes to show how initial impressions can be very misleading. Arriving in a plain manila-coloured box with the protection film on the top of the ​device starting to peal​-​off the minimalist contents ​only ​included a round-pin (European?) power supply and a small B&W ‘user’ manual. The mini PC ​has an Intel Celeron Processor 3865U from the Kaby Lake mobile range which is a dual-core (dual-thread) non-turbo 1.8GHz processor. However this SoC also includes an Intel HD Graphics 610 processor capable of 4K support at 60Hz through DisplayPort, ​although only [email protected] on HDMI (1.4). Additionally ​the SoC​ supports DDR4 RAM in dual-channel configuration. The V5 Plus ​model ​which​ comes with ​both ​​memory and storage although it is sold without them as a ​barebones V5 model. Physically the V5 looks similar to a NUC and the pre-populated V5 Plus ​included a single SODIMM stick of Samsung DDR4 Synchronous 2400 MHz memory and a HOODISK 64GB […]

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Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments on Hikey 970 Development Board is Now Up for Pre-order for $299.99

Hikey 970 Development Board is Now Up for Pre-order for $299.99

Four A.I. development boards compliant with 96Boards specifications were announced at Linaro Connect HK 2018 last month: HiKey 970, Ultra96, as well as ROCK960 PRO & Enterprise Edition. So for we only knew pricing for Ultra96 ($249), but I’ve now noticed Hikey 970 “Super Edge AI Computing Platform”  is now up for pre-order for $299.99 on Lenovator website, with shipping planned for the end of April. [Update: Also found on Seeed Studio for the same price] Hikey 970 specifications: SoC – Huawei/Hisilicon Kirin 970 with 4x Cortex A73 @ 2.36GHz,  4x Cortex A53 @ 1.8GHz, Arm Mali G72-MP12 GPU, NPU (Neural Processing Unit) with 256MAC/cycle @ 960MHz System Memory – 6GB 1866MHz, 4 Channel LPDDR4x Storage – 64GB UFS storage, micro SD card slot, PCIe Gen3 on M.2 M key connector Video Output – HDMI 1.4 type A up to 1080p60 (TBC), 1x 4-lane MIPI DSI (via HS expansion connector) Video – MPEG2 @ 80 Mbps, MPEG4 @ 50 Mbps, […]

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