Several tablets based on AllWinner A31 quad core processor have been announced this week, such as Onda V972, but we did not really have full details on the processor. We now know more since AllWinner added product pages for two new (sun6i architecture. [Edit: A20 is actually sun7i…]) processors: AllWinner A31 and AllWinner A20.
AllWinner A31 Specifications
AllWinner A31 is a quad core Cortex A7 processor with PowerVR SGX544MP2 GPU (8 shader engines).
- CPU – ARM Cortex-A7 Quad-Core with 256KB L1-Cache/1MB L2-Cache
- GPU – POWER VR SGX 544 with Eight logic cores. Open GL ES2.0, Open CL1.x and DX 9_3 compliant.
- Memory – Dual-Channel LPDDR2/DDR3/DDR3L Controller, Dual-Channel NAND FLASH Controller and 64-bit ECC
- Video
- UHD H.264 4K ×2K @30fps video decoding
- Full HD video decoding
- BD Directory, BD ISO and BD m2ts video decoding
- H.264 High Profile 1080P@60fps encoding
- 3840×1080@30fps 3D decoding
- Complies with RTSP, HTTP, HLS, RTMP, MMS streaming media protocol
- Display
- Dual-Channel LVDS 1080@60fps
- 4-lane MIPI DSI 1920 × 1200@ 60fps
- Dual-Channel RGB/CPU 2048 ×1536@60fps
- Integrated HDMI 1.4 4K ×2K@ 30fps
- Camera
- Integrated Parallel & MIPI I/F sensor
- Integrated Powerful ISP, supporting Raw Data CMOS sensor
- 5M/8M/12M CMOS Sensor supported
- 8/10/12-bit RGB Bayer sensor supported
- PMIC – PMIC AXP221 designed for A31. 21-CH power output and 2.2A Flash charging. Complies with USB 3.0 power supply standard
- Audio – Integrated HI-FI 100dB Audio Codec, and Three MIC including one MIC with Noise cancellation
The platform supports Android 4.2 and Microsoft Windows RT, but there’s no word about Linux. More on that at the end of the post.
AllWinner A20 Specifications
AllWinner A20 is a dual core Cortex A7 processor with a dual core Mali-400 GPU.
- CPU – ARM Cortex-A7 Dual Core with 512MB L2-Cache*/128KB L1-Cache (* As per AllWinner A20 page, but this should most definitely read as “512KB L2-Cache”)
- GPU – ARM Mali400 MP2
- Memory – LPDDR2/DDR3/DDR3L controller, NAND Flash controller and 64-bit ECC
- Video
- HD H.264 2160P video decoding
- Full HD video decoding
- BD Directory, BD ISO and BD m2ts video decoding
- H.264 High Profile 1080P@30fps encoding
- 3840×1080@30fps 3D decoding
- Complies with RTSP, HTTP,HLS,RTMP,MMS streaming media protocol
- Display
- Support multi-channel HD display
- Integrated HDMI 1.4
- CPU/RGB/LVDS LCD interface 1920×1080 resolution
- CVBS/YPbPr/VGA support
- Integrated TV decoder
- Camera
- Integrated parallel 8-bit I/F YUV sensor
- Integrated 24-bit parallel YUV 444 I/F
- 5M/8M CMOS sensor support
- Dual-sensor support
- Audio
- Integrated HI-FI 100dB Audio Codec
- Dual MIC noise cancellation
AllWinner A20 supports Android 4.2 or above. AllWinner A20 is also pin-compatible with AllWinner A10, so existing products may soon be available for this low cost version. I still could not find any CPU clock details for either processor.
AllWinner A31 is clearly destined at higher products with both Android and Windows RT, whereas AllWinner A20 is a low cost version for Android tablets and set-top boxes.
Linux is not mentioned for any of sun6i processors, as AllWinner does not appear have Linux SDK, and Alejandro Mery – one of the main developers at sunxi-linux.org – said the community does not have any source for sun6i at the moment. Proper Linux support would be difficult for A31 due to the Power VR GPU, and it’s more likely work could be done on AllWinner A20, if GPL sources are made available.
Via: Thinkteletronics and AllWinnerTech
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
Support CNX Software! Donate via cryptocurrencies, become a Patron on Patreon, or purchase goods on Amazon or Aliexpress
Good start, bad paсe. Only linux support may save them.
Interesting that WinRT is mentioned, did they reveal something before they were supposed to as Microsoft has only certified something like only 3 or 4 SoC’s to run WinRT.
Hello CNX, “8 core Power VR SGX544 GPU” is depicted incorrectly
it should be “8 core of shader engine”, which is equal to dual core of sgx544 (mp2) or 1 single sgx544mp2
@Derek
OK, I’ll rephrase that a bit.
In PowerVR SGX 5XT Product brief, it seems they can support up to 16 cores:
“Members of the PowerVR SGX Series5XT family offer Multi-Processor (MP) support for 2 to 16 cores (SGX543, SGX544and SGX554),”
I’m a big confused by the terminology used. MP2 = 2 GPU core, but 4×2 = 8 shader engines?
Sata support? And RGB video in the two models… no?
As can be seen from article, there’s no SATA interface: neither on A31, nor on A20. Good night, sweet Mele A1000 – no chance for reincarnation with dual or quad core CPU 🙁 🙁 🙁
It looks like the A20 page was not supposed to be public just yet… They removed it.
512MB L2-Cache for AllWinner A20 seems a little bit much, doesn’t it?
@Gabe
hmmm, and they wrote 512MB L2-Cache in the description and block diagram… You don’t even need RAM anymore :p
I’ll update the post to indicate this is most probably an error.
This page [1] seems to suggest that the A20 has SATA, and the A31 does not have SATA, unless they are referring to SATA via USB.
[1] http://www.allwinnertech.com/en/apply/home.html#android-box
Hi,
Looking on the A31 specification I wonder if it will be able to encode 4K video ? Or encoding profile will forbid that because it’s only 1080P? How it is with those profiles? They say only about ‘live’ encoding or generally that over 1080 resolution it will not encode ?
@Tom
The way I understand it, the decoder supports up to 4K, but the encoder supports H.264 @ 1080P@60fps max.
So it’s just the hardware encoder only supports up to 1080p.