If you’re getting tired of seeing companies launch products after products based on Intel Atom Z3735F with 32GB eMMC and 2GB RAM, and mainly changing the casing, Tronsmart Ara x5 provides some changes, as the upcoming mini PC will feature an Intel Atom x5-Z8300 “Cherry Trail” processor instead of the ubiquitous Atom Z3735F “Bay Trail-T” processor.
Preliminary specifications for Tronsmart Ara x5:
- SoC – Intel Atom x5-Z8300 “Cherry Trail” quad core processor @ 1.44 GHz (Bust freq: 1.84 GHz) with Intel Gen8 HD graphics (2W SDP)
- System Memory – 2 GB
- Storage – 32 GB eMMC + micro SD slot
- Video Output – HDMI
- Audio I/O – HDMI, 3.5mm microphone jack
- Connectivity – Ethernet, dual band 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0 (TBC)
- USB – 2x USB 2.0 host ports, 1x USB 3.0 port
- Misc – Power button, LED on top of device
- Power Supply – TBD
- Dimensions – N/A
- Weight – N/A
The fanless box will run Windows 10 by default, and is scheduled for shipping sometimes in August. Price has not been revealed yet.If you look at the comparison between Atom Z3735F and Atom x5-Z8300 both processor are pretty similar with four cores clocked at about the same base and burst frequencies, 2MB L2 cache, a maximum of 2GB RAM supported, a 171x17mm package supporting UTFCBGA592 sockets, and a similar “recommended customer price” ($17 vs $20). However the Cherry Trail brings some improvement, including a likely faster Gen8 GPU, USB 3.0 support, PCIe support, support for faster RAM (1600 MHZ vs 1333 MHz), 14nm process technology, and support for AES New Instructions (AES-NI) to enable faster data encryption and decryption.
I could not find benchmarks for x5-Z8300, but the CPU performance is likely to be similar to Z3735F based on the comparison above. However, USB 3.0 and PCIe interface – which could be used for WiFi, Gigabit Ethernet, or SATA – will certainly provide faster I/Os on the hardware platforms that leverage these.
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
hevc decode in hardware would, alone, be worth the upgrade
@matt but remeber, no Main10 / 10bit!
in my opinion the only cherry trail worth spending silicon and pcb is
http://ark.intel.com/products/85475/Intel-Atom-x7-Z8700-Processor-2M-Cache-up-to-2_40-GHz
and still intel chip without hdmi 2.0 don’t worth a fuss.
@ovidiu
That one is indeed nice http://ark.intel.com/compare/85475,80274,87383
Up to 8GB RAM, faster GPU, 2 PCie Lanes, and not that much more expensive than the other two.
Different socket though, so they’d have to design a completely new PCB.
Ara X5 is selling for $149.99
http://www.geekbuying.com/item/Tronsmart-Ara-X5-Windows-10-TV-Box-Cherry-Trail-Z8300-Quad-Core-1-8G-Gen-8-Graphics-2G-32G-2-4Ghz-5Ghz-351938.html
They also have a promotion with some coupons @ http://promotion.geekbuying.com/promotion/tronsmart_ara_x5
After using the X5 for a few days I am finding it hard to go back to using any of my Android boxes as this one just does everything that it is touted to do and which I generally use.
Sure there will be some limitations of the SOC such as no 10 bit video support and no full 4K@60fps support but within the specifications that it does support, it does so almost flawlessly and for video playback I cannot fault it at all.
When I think about all the failures of Android boxes and the need for custom ROM’s that resolve some but not all issues, the extra you pay for a Windows box pays for itself on the basis that you spend very little time having to mess around with things to get to do what the marketing said that it would.
I suspect that Linux on this would fly.