TV box News - Page 6 of 107 - CNX Software

April 18, 2021December 10, 2022 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 18 Comments

Mecool KT1 4K AV1 capable Android TV STB ships with DVB-T2 tuner

Amlogic S905X4 TV boxes such as Mecool KM6 have already been available for a few months with the main selling being support for 4K AV1 video hardware decoding. But if you’d like to watch AV1 YouTube or Netflix videos, and also get free-to-air channels using older codecs, Mecool KT1 adds a DVB-T2 TV tuner that works in the EMEA region, some Asian countries, Oceania, and a few other countries that adopted the standard. Mecool KT1 specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905X4 quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor @ up to 2.0 GHz with Arm Mali-G31MP2 supporting OpenGL ES3.2, Vulkan 1.1, and OpenCL 2.0 System Memory – 2 GB RAM Storage – 16GB eMMC flash, MicroSD/SDXC card socket Video & Audio Output HDMI 2.1 up to 4K @ 60Hz with CEC, HDCP2.2, HDR AV output with composite video and analog stereo audio Video Playback Codecs AV1 up to 4K @ 60 fps H.265 HEVC […]

April 12, 2021April 15, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 7 Comments

T95 Plus Android 11 TV Box features Rockchip RK3566 AIoT processor, 8GB RAM

Last month, we wrote about the first Rockchip RK3566 TV box we had seen so far with a new version of the H96 Max TV box running Android 11 with up to 8GB RAM. While Rockchip RK3566 processor has multimedia capabilities with 4K HDR video playback and output, it has many other interfaces such as native PCIe and SATA that would not make it as cost-effective as TV Box SoC’s like Rockchip RK3328 or Amlogic S905X4. But this does not stop companies from making TV boxes with the AIoT processor, and T95 Plus TV box offers another option, again with up to 8GB RAM. T95 Plus specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Cortex-A55 processor @ 1.8 GHz with Arm Mali-G52 EE GPU, 0.8 TOPS NPU/AI accelerator System Memory – 4GB, 6GB, or 8GB RAM Storage – 32GB, 64GB, or 128GB eMMC flash, MicroSD card slot Video Output – HDMI 2.0a […]

April 6, 2021July 18, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 28 Comments

MECOOL KM2 – Netflix 4K certified, Amlogic S905X2-B TV Box runs Android TV 10

There are plenty of Amlogic TV boxes around, but unless you buy from the big players, most devices won’t support Netflix FullHD/4K because certification is hard to get for smaller companies. The Hailstorm device scaling program launched in 2018 aimed to make the process easier on Amlogic and Hisilicon processors, and HiMedia S1 TV dongle was one of the first to get approved. But now MECOOL KM2 joins the rank of Netflix 4K certified devices. The TV box is powered by an Amlogic S905X2-B processor running Android TV 10, also known as Android TV on Android 10. MECOOL KM2 specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905X2-B quad-core Cortex-A53 processor System Memory – 2GB DDR4 Storage – 8 GB eMMC flash, MicroSD card slot Video Output – HDMI 2.1 up to 4Kp60 with HDCP 2.3, HDMI-CEC support Codecs – H.264/AVC, H.265/HEVC, VP8 & VP9 HDR – HDR10+, HDR & HLG DRM – Widevine […]

March 18, 2021March 19, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

Camera equipped Android TV 10 box supports Tiktok, video calls via Google Duo

Five or six years ago we started to see Android TV boxes with a built-in camera meant to be placed on the top of TVs, and used with Skype to Google Hangout for video calls, besides the usual video streaming features of TV boxes. The concept never really took off, as few people were interested in making video calls via a big screen TV. But with the lockdowns in the last year, there may be renewed demand as more people are stuck at home, and MECOOL Now, a Google certified video calling & media streaming device aims to fill that void, and it can also be used for business needs, for example in a conference room when connected to a video projector. MECOOL Now specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905X4 quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor with Arm Mali-G31 MP2 GPU System Memory – 2GB LPDDR4 Storage – 16GB eMMC flash Video Output […]

March 4, 2021April 12, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 29 Comments

The first Rockchip RK3566 TV box is out with H96 Max running Android 11

Rockchip RK3566 is a quad-core Cortex-A55 processor with plenty of peripherals designed for AIoT and NVR applications. While it still supports features like high-dynamic range or video post-processing, it’s not really optimized for TV boxes, but this has not stopped the maker of H96 Max “8K UltraHD” TV box to launch an RK3566 model with 4GB RAM and 8GB RAM now sold for respectively $59.99 and $76.99 on Banggood. H96 Max RK3566 TV box specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Cortex-A55 processor with Arm Mali-G52 EE GPU, 0.8 TOPS NPU/AI accelerator System Memory / Storage configuration 4GB DDR3, 32GB eMMC flash, and MicroSD card 8GB DDR3, 64GB eMMC flash, and MicroSD card Video Output – HDMI 2.0a up to 4Kp60 with 3D support, Video decoding 4Kp60 H.264/H.265/VP9 VC1 up to 1920 x 1080 @ 60fps MPEG-4 up to 1920 x 1080 @ 60fps HDR10 and HLG modes Audio – Optical […]

January 26, 2021January 26, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 23 Comments

4K AV1 Android TV dongles surface with Amlogic S905Y4 Cortex-A35 processor

Amlogic S905X4 is a quad-core Cortex-A55 SoC for 4K TV boxes and set-top boxes with H.265, H.264, VP9, and AV1 hardware video decoding. The silicon vendor usually provides a lower cost version of the processor for dongles without Ethernet, but keeping most of the same features, as we’ve seen in the past with S905X2 and S905Y2 processors for instance. S905X4 has now its own cost-down version with S905Y4 for Android TV (certified) dongles relying on WiFi for connectivity, but instead of keeping Cortex-A55 cores, the processor features four low-power Cortex-A35 cores. We do not have the full details about S905Y4 processor just yet, but it has start to show in dongles from SEI Robotics and SDMC that appears idendical. SDMC DV6071Z / SEI Robotics SEI450 TV dongle specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905Y4 quad-core 64-bit Arm Cortex-A35 processor with Mali-G31 MP2 GPU System Memory – 2GB DDR (4GB optional) Storage – […]

January 21, 2021March 9, 2021 by Nico Dekerf - 27 Comments

Mecool KM6 Deluxe (Amlogic S905X4) TV Box Review

Back in September 2020, Jean-Luc wrote about the Mecool KM6 TV Box. This comes with the Amlogic S905X4 with AV1 support and preloaded with Android TV 10. Since Jean-Luc could not review the KM6, I offered to do this for him. It was already mentioned the box was delayed in the previous article published in September. After that, it was further delayed until January 2021. So last week I received the Mecool KM6 deluxe for review. It comes with a remote, a 2A/5V PSU, and an HDMI cable. My deluxe version has 4GB LPDDR4 and a 64GB eMMC flash. They also sell the KM6 Classic which comes with 2GB LPDDR4 and a 16GB eMMC flash. Under the moto, don’t turn it on, take it apart. I opened the box to see its internals. There were 4 screws to undo under its rubber feet. It comes with a metal plate on […]

December 31, 2020March 19, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Year 2020 in review – Top ten posts and stats

It’s this time of the year when we look back at what happened, and what may be next. 2020 did not pan out as planned in more ways than one, but there were still some interesting developments. Based on 2019 announcements, 2020 was promising to be an exciting year for Amlogic and Rockchip with the expected launch of RK3588 and S908X high-end processors for 8K capable devices, but we’ll have to wait for 2021 for this to happen. Instead, the most interesting processor of the year from the Allwinner, Amlogic, and Rockchip offerings was probably Amlogic S905X4 processing adding AV1 hardware decoding. As pointed out in our “RISC-V 2020 highlights” post, it was a fairly eventful year for RISC-V architecture, although there’s still a long road ahead, especially for application processors. We had seen some general-purpose and Bluetooth RISC-V MCUs in 2019, but 2020 saw the launch of the first […]