HiKey 960 Android Development Board Gets a 4GB RAM Version for $250

Hikey 960 development board is one of the most powerful Arm boards on the market thanks to Huawei/Hisilicon Kirin 960 octa-core processor with four ARM Cortex A73 cores, four Cortex A53 cores, and a Mali-G71 MP8 GPU, fast storage with 32GB UFS 2.1 flash, and 3GB LPDDR3 memory. Like the earlier Hikey (620) board, the board is also an official reference board for AOSP, so you should be able to run the latest Android version, and also play with sensors using Neonkey SensorHub 96Boards mezzanine board. If you are somehow limited by the 3GB RAM on the board, you can rejoice as Seeed Studio has just launched a 4GB RAM version selling for $249, or about $10 extra. Note that shipping is only scheduled for February 2, 2018, so those are pre-orders. The rest of the specifications for Hikey 960 4GB RAM version are unchanged: SoC – Huawei Kirin 960 […]

Top 5 Most Powerful Arm SBCs & Development Boards in 2017 / Early 2018

Raspberry Pi, Orange Pi, and NanoPi boards among others are all great and inexpensive Arm Linux development boards that do good enough job for many tasks, but they may not cut it if you have higher requirements either in terms of CPU power, GPU capabilities and performance, I/O bandwidth, and in some cases software and support. So I’ve decided to make a list of 5 single board computers or development boards that I consider to be the most powerful in 2017, early 2018. I have limited the price to $1,000 maximum, the board must be easy to purchase for most people (e.g. you don’t need to be a tier-1 automotive supplier, or operate your own datacenter), and in case the board is not quite available yet, the likeliness of actual launch must be reasonably high. Those criteria for example exclude Intrinsyc Open-Q 835 development kit since it costs $1.149 and […]

Rock960 Board is a 96Boards Compliant Board Powered by Rockchip RK3399 SoC

So it looks like Rockchip is soon going to join 96Boards family with Rock960 board. Developed by a Guangzhou based startup called Varms, the board will be powered by Rockchip RK3399 hexa-core SoC, and comply with 96Boards CE specifications. Rock960 board preliminary specifications: SoC – Rochchip RK3399 hexa-core big.LITTLE processor with two ARM Cortex A72 cores up to 1.8/2.0 GHz, four Cortex A53 cores @ 1.4 GHz, and  ARM Mali-T860 MP4 GPU with OpenGL ES 1.1 to 3.2 support, OpenVG1.1, OpenCL 1.2 and DX 11 support System Memory – 2 or 4GB RAM Storage – 16 or 32GB eMMC flash + micro SD card Video Output – 1x HDMI 2.0 up to 4K@60 Hz with CEC and HDCP Connectivity – WiFi 802.11ac 2×2 MIMO up to 867 Mbps, and Bluetooth 4.1 LE (AP6356S module) with two on-board antennas, two u.FL antenna connectors USB – 1x USB 2.0 host port, 1x […]

Android 8.0 Oreo Launched, OS Images, and AOSP Source Code Released

Google has now formally announced Android O version and name: Android 8.0 Oreo. We already had seen the new Features in Android O-reo during the first preview release with picture-in-picture support, autofill APIs, adaptive icons and so on. There’s also a new Android Oreo character… If you want to run the latest Android 8.0 on your device, you can do so on Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus Player, Pixel C, Pixel, and Pixel XL by getting the firmware in the download page, unless you are enrolled in Android Beta Program in which case you should receive it automatically. What I did not see (yet) is a joint announcement for a new Android 8.0 phone like last year LG V20 smartphone with Android 7.0, and Google simply said that “by the end of this year, hardware makers including Essential, General Mobile, HMD Global Home of Nokia Phones, Huawei, HTC, Kyocera, LG, […]

Getting Started with MediaTek X20 Android Development Board

Thanks to CNX for helping me get a hand on the 96Boards compliant Mediatek X20 board that was generously donated by Seeed Studio. In this article, I will walk through the steps to get the board up and running and also compile Android from the source code. The current Android is version 6. Unboxing the Beast First Boot Up The board boots up from the eMMC, and the first time you boot up you will get Android screen as shown in Figure-9. This is the default Android image from the factory, which surprisingly looks like it was setup for a phone screen mode, which is not sufficient for a HDMI monitor. It would be better to install the images that are made available at Linaro website or build your own. See the other section to flash the board with different images. Switching to Fastboot Mode Flashing image files are done […]

96Boards Compliant HiKey 960 ARM Cortex A73 Development Board is Now Available for $239

The most powerful 96boards development board – HiKey 960 – has finally been launched, and can be purchased for $239 on Aliexpress, Amazon US, Switch Sense (Japan), Seeed Studio, or All Net (Germany). HiKey 960 specifications have not changed much since we found out about the board: SoC – Kirin 960 octa-core big.LITTLE processor with 4x ARM Cortex A73 cores @ up to 2.4 GHz, 4x Cortex A53 cores @ up to 1.8 GHz, and a Mali-G71 MP8 GPU System Memory – 3GB LPDDR4 SDRAM (PoP) Storage – 32GB UFS 2.1 flash storage + micro SD card slot Video Output / Display Interface – 1 x HDMI 1.2a up to 1080p, 1x 4-lane MIPI DSI connector Connectivity – Dual band 802.11 b/g/n/ac WiFi and Bluetooth 4.1 with on-board antennas USB – 2x USB 3.0 type A host ports, 1x USB 2.0 type C OTG port Camera – 1x 4-lane MIPI […]

HiKey 960 Development Board Powered by Hisilicon Kirin 960 Cortex A73/A53 Processor To Sell for $239

LeMaker is about to launch a successor to Hikey board with a new 96Boards compliant development board with HiKey 960 featuring the powerful Hisilicon Kirin 960 processor found in Huawei Mate 9 smartphone, as well as 3GB LPDDR4 memory, 32GB UFS storage, HDMI, USB 3.0 ports and so on. Hikey 960 board specifications: SoC – Kirin 960 octa-core big.LITTLE processor with 4x ARM Cortex A73 cores @ up to 2.4 GHz, 4x Cortex A53 cores @ up to 1.8 GHz, and a Mali-G71 MP8 GPU System Memory – 3GB LPDDR4 SDRAM Storage – 32GB UFS flash storage + micro SD card slot Video Output / Display Interface – 1 x HDMI 1.4 up to 1080p, 1x 4-lane MIPI DSI connector Connectivity – Dual band 802.11 b/g/n/ac? WiFi and Bluetooth 4.1 with two antennas USB – 2 x USB 3.0 type A host ports, 1x USB 2.0 type C OTG port […]

Linaro Home Group Releases “AOSP” Android TV for Hikey Board

The Linaro Home Group (LHG) was setup to work on “open source software for ARM-based set top boxes, smart TVs, media boxes, TV dongles and home gateway products”, and after having worked on OP-TEE (Open Portable Trusted Environment Execution) firmware as one of their first endeavors, they’ve now ported Android Open Source Project (AOSP) Android TV to 96Boards compliant Hikey board. Android TV is based on Android, but adds the TV Input Framework and the Lean Back APIs with the user interface designed for larger displays. LHG has not changed the apps and higher level software from AOSP, but they’ve made sure it could work on Hikey board by working on the Linux drivers and Android user space stack to make sure the Live TV App and Android TV Channel Service implemented in AOSP can work properly on the hardware. If you want to try it on your own Hikey […]