Since Shenzhen Shiningworth MXQ Plus M12N is my first TV box powered by Amlogic S912 octa-core processor, I’ve decided to write a separate post to show system information with CPU-Z, and benchmark results with Antutu 6.x, Vellamo 3.x, and 3Dmark Ice Storm Extreme. Please note that it may not be representative of all Amlogic S912 boards, as mentioned in the teardown post, there are some concerns about the thermal design of M12N TV box.
M12N / Amlogic S912 System Info
I’ve merged CPU-Z’ SOC, DEVICE and SYSTEM data into a single table.
The app correctly detects an 8 core Cortex A53 processor @ 100 MHz to 2.02 GHz with an ARM Mali-T820 GPU. The brand for this particurlar device is MXQ, and Model m12n. Frame buffer resolution is 1920×1080, and memory and storage data are both OK for a box with 2GB and 16GB flash. The device runs Android 6.0.1 on top of Linux 3.14.29.
M12N / Amlogic S912 Benchmarks
With 8 cores and a faster GPU, I was expecting a much higher Antutu 6.x score with Amlogic S912.
The box however only achieved 41,303 points in Antutu 6.2, which compared to 38,032 points on Amlogic S905 based MINIX NEO U1 running Android 5.1 with the same Android 6.x benchmark. The 3D score is naturally higher because of the fast GPU, and also begin the MaliT-820MP3 GPU also supports OpenGL ES 3.1, which was skipped on Amlogic S905. UX, CPU and RAM scores are about the same, or slightly lower in Amlogic S912. So there’s a problem here either because of thermal design, or Android 6.0 Amlogic SDK still needs some work. I launched the benchmark again another day, and got 38,798 points.. 3D was a little higher (9,353), UX and CPU slightly lower (14,088 + 12,414), but RAM test collapse d to 2,943 points.
Vellamo 3.2 offers some more perspective, and one of the Multicore tests failed (see yellow “warning” triangle) because of a “Sysbench issue with Finepar: Invalid CPU mode”.
For reference, MINIX NEO U1, one of the fastest and most stable Amlogic S905 TV boxes, got respectively 1,587, 1,235, and 2,157 points for Multicore, Metal, and Browser scores. Again, that’s not a pretty picture for Amlogic S912 or M12N TV box.
3Dmark Ice Storm Extreme provides a slightly more positive picture.
M12N achieved 5,752 points, against only 4,327 points for MINIX NEO U1. You’ll also note the CPU frequency appears to maxes out at 1.5 or 1.6 GHz instead of the claimed 2.02 GHz. M12N score is quite lower than the 7,512 points achieved in Rockchip RK3288 (ARM Mali-764 GPU) based Tronsmart Orion R28 running Android 4.4, and released in 2014.
Results are quite lower than what I would have expected, so there could be a problem with cooling (despite the rather short Android benchmarks), and/or Android 6.0 Amlogic SDK or M12N firmware might need some more work.
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.
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