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Giveaway Week – Zidoo X6 Pro Android TV Box

Time for another giveaway week that will take place on November 2 – 8, with one device or board given away per day. The first device is Zidoo X6 Pro TV box powered by Rockchip RK3368 octa core SoC with 2GB RAM and 16GB Flash. Zidoo X6 Pro review showed a capable device, and pretty good, although not perfect yet, Kodi 15.1 implementation, however the device tends to overheat pretty quickly leading to very poor performance at times. So the company will have to work on improving thermal management in their firmware, beside fixing a few other bugs. I received two Zidoo X6 Pro samples due to miscommunication: one from Zidoo directly which I used for the review, one from GeekBuying which I’m giving away today, and is basically new, although I’ve quickly tried it to make sure it boots. You can find more pictures on Zidoo X6 Pro unboxing […]

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Rockchip Light Biz OS Improves Android’s Desktop Experience

Android is great for consuming content, but if you’ve ever tried to use it to create content, it can be an hassle, as copy / paste is hard to use, shortcuts aren’t available, and overall the operating system and apps are not designed to work well with a mouse and keyboard. Remix OS is one of the solutions, and Rockchip has been working on improving Android as a desktop replacement for while, starting with multi-window support, and recently they showcased “Light Work OS“. But yesterday Charbax, of ARMDevices.net, uploaded two new videos showing Rockchip Light Biz OS in action, probably renamed from Light Work OS shown a few months ago. The first video is the “official” Light Biz OS video released by Rockchip, which shows the main features including: Based on Android 5.1 with CTS certification Light Biz OS features can be enabled/disabled in Android settings using the Multi-window option […]

ArmSoM RK3588 AIModule7 NVIDIA Jetson Nano-compatible SOM
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Compulab Unveils CL-SOM-iMX6UL Freescale i.MX 6UltraLite System-On-Module and SBC-iMX6UL SBC

Compulab has launched a CL-SOM-iMX6UL system-on-module based on Freescale i.MX 6UltraLite ARM Cortex A7 processor with up to 1GB DDR3 and 32GB eMMC flash. The module can be coupled with SB-SOM-iMX6UL carrier board to form SBC-iMX6UL single board computer targeting industrial and embedded applications. CL-SOM-iMX6UL specifications: SoC – Freescale i.MX6 UltraLite Cortex-A7 processor @ 528MHz System Memory – Up to 1GB DDR3 Storage – Up to 32GB on-board eMMC, Up to 1GB on-board SLC NAND, SPI flash, I2C EEPROM Connectivity – Dual-band, dual-antenna 2×2 802.11a/b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.1 BLE (Ti WiLink 8), 10/100M Ethernet PHY (with optional bypass) Audio – WM8731 audio codec with stereo line-out, line-in, mic, S/PDIF input/output Other I/Os via 204-pin SODIMM edge connector Display Parallel 24-bit display interface up to 1366 x 768 Touchscreen 4/5/8-wire resistive touch-screen support Capacitive touch-screen support through SPI interface USB – 1x USB2.0 OTG + 4x USB2.0 host ports Up to […]

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Element14 and Raspberry Pi Trading Launch a Raspberry Pi Customization Service

While the Raspberry Pi Foundation is the main face of the Raspberry Pi board, it only mainly promotes children’s education, and a subsidiary called Raspberry Pi Trading, funded in 2013, handles design, manufacturing and distribution of the Raspberry Pi boards, and puts profits back into the charity. Raspberry Pi Trading has now partnered with Element14 to offer customization services for the Raspberry Pi board. That means you’ll be able to remove or add interfaces and headers, replace the micro SD by a more reliable eMMC flash, add new functionalities to the board, and even re-design the layout in order to better match your project’s requirements. The companies “expect order quantities to start in the region of between 3,000 and 5,000 depending upon the nature of the customization”, so the service does not seem to be available , or cost effective, for smaller orders for a few hundred units. Element14 has […]

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ESP-14 WiFi Module Combines ESP8266 with STM8S MCU

ESP8266 WiFi modules can be purchased for less than $3, while some STM8S 8-bit MCUs board sell for just above $1. A.I. Thinker decided to combine both by adding an STMicro STM8S003 micro-controller to ESP-12E module and called that ESP-14. ESP-14 specifications: WiSoC – Expressif ESP8266-EX WiSoC MCU – STMicro STM8S003F3P6 8-bit MCU @ 16 MHz with 1KB RAM, 8KB flash, and 128 bytes EEPROM Connectivity – 802.11 b/g/n WiFi I/Os – STM8: 15 GPIOs also supporting I2C, SPI, UART, and up to 5 10-bit ADC ESP8266: E_GPIO0 to select operating mode (running or download) Power Supply – 3.3V Power Consumption – System Standby mode 70 mA; 0.5 μA shutdown @3.3V Dimensions – 24 x 16 mm STM8S controls ESP8266 by AT commands, and all but one of the I/Os are directly connected to STM8S. I can see at least two advantages: 5 ADC inputs are available, and for battery […]

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Beelink X2 4K TV Box Powered by Allwinner H3 is Now Selling for $32

Allwinner launched Allwinner H3 in December 2014 for Android TV boxes supporting 4K resolution selling for $35 to $50, but the first devices that started showing up in January sold for about $80. As the year passed, prices became more reasonable such as the $59 Zidoo X1 TV Box or $35 Tronsmart Draco H3 TV stick , and when Orange Pi PC development board launched for $15 + shipping, it was clear Allwinner H3 was a dirt cheap processor.  The good thing is that you can now buy a 4K Android media player for just $31.99 shipped with Beelink X2 sold on GearBest. Beelink X2 specifications: SoC – Allwinner H3 quad core ARM Cortex A7 @ 1.2GHz with quad core Mali-400MP2 System Memory – 1 GB RAM Storage – 8 GB NAND flash + micro SD slot up to 32GB Connectivity – 10/100M Ethernet, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi Video Output – […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs and SoMs in 2025
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Kingnovel R8 Android TV Box Review (VLC Edition)

Kingnovel R8 is one of the many Rockchip RK3368 based TV boxes on the market, and since I’ve already provided the specs, as well as pictures of the device and board, I’ll carry on with the review today. While I’m usually testing video playback in Kodi, I’ve only spent a short time with Kodi 15.2 on this box, and instead switched to VLC (aka VideoLAN), an another open source media player, and my favorite program to watch videos in my Ubuntu computer. Of course, I’ve also tested most hardware features and performance of the device. First Boot, and First Impressions Since I like to test worst case scenarios, I also make sure I use all the ports of the devices, and connected a USB hard drive, USB RF dongles, USB webcam, and relevant cables to the device before powering it up. Once you connect the power, I recommend you have […]

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giggleBits Hackable ARM & FPGA Router Comes with an SFP Cage and 5 Gigabit Ethernet Ports (Crowdfunding)

Remember Snickerdoodle board? If you don’t, the board is one of the cheapest Xilinx Zynq available on the market, and the project is currently on CrowdSupply, and 75% funded with 28 days left. They’ve just posted an update about a new daughterboard that I found interesting: giggleBits which provides 5 Gigabit Ethernet and an SFP cage on top of WiFi 802.11 b/g/n and Bluetooth connectivity already found on Snickerdoodle board. giggleBits + snickerdoodle specifications: SoC/Memory/Storage/WiFi via Snickerdoodle board: SoC Xilinx Zynq-7010 dual core Cortex A9 processor @ 667 MHz + FPGA with 430K gates or Xilinx Zynq-7020 dual core Cortex A9 processor @ 866 MHz + FPGA with 1.3million gates (~430K ASIC gates) System Memory – 512MB or 1GB LPDDR2-800 Storage – micro SD card slot, 16MB boot flash Ti Wilink 8 –  single or dual band 802.11 b/g/n WiFi + Bluetooth 4.0 Expansion – 4x 40-pin TFM headers for access […]

Boardcon CM3588 Rockchip RK3588 System-on-Module designed for AI and IoT applications