NetBSD 9.0 Released with Aarch64 Support, Arm ServerReady Compatibility

NetBSD 9.0

Yesterday, we wrote about Raspberry Pi 4 getting UEFI+ACPI firmware for Arm SSBR compliance allowing the board to run operating systems designed for “Arm ServerReady” servers out of the box. NetBSD 9.0 was just released on February 14, 2020, with support for Aarch64 (64-bit Arm) which had been in the works for a few years, and includes support for “Arm ServerReady” compliant machines (SBBR+SBSA). NetBSD 9.0 main changes related to hardware support: Support for AArch64 (64-bit Armv8-A) machines Compatibility with “Arm ServerReady” compliant machines (SBBR+SBSA) using ACPI. Tested on Amazon Graviton and Graviton2 (including bare metal instances), AMD Opteron A1100, Ampere eMAG 8180, Cavium ThunderX, Marvell ARMADA 8040, QEMU w/ Tianocore EDK2 Symmetric and asymmetrical multiprocessing support (big.LITTLE) Support for running 32-bit binaries via COMPAT_NETBSD32 on CPUs that support it Single GENERIC64 kernel supports ACPI and device tree based booting Supported SoCs Allwinner A64, H5, H6 Amlogic S905, S805X, S905D, […]

Amlogic A113L Dual-Core Cortex-A35 Processor Targets Smart Audio and IoT Applications

Amlogic A113L Meson A1

Over two years ago, we reported about Amlogic A111, A112, A113 processors designed for audio applications such as smart speakers. A111 features four Cortex-A5 32-bit core, while A112 and A113D/A113X processors come with four Cortex-A53 cores instead. We have not heard much about those since then, but all those processors are still listed on Amlogic website, A112 is supposedly used in Xiaomi AI smart speaker, and Amlogic A113X1 Far-Field Dev Kit is still listed on Amazon’s list of devkits for Alexa voice service, but currently out of stock. Amlogic has been working on a more cost-efficient processor for smart audio and IoT applications with Amlogic A113L dual-core Cortex-A35 processor shown as Meson A1 in the Linux source code. It was just added in Linux 5.5. We don’t have much information about it, but it’s interesting as it’s the first Cortex-A35 processor from the company, and it targets the same smart […]

CNX Software is 10 Years Old – Top 10 Posts of the Last Decade

CNX Software Anniversary

Around 10 years ago, I decided it might be a good idea to have an online presence. At the time, I just thought I would write from time to time, and I had no idea it would eventually become my main activity. My very first post was on February 14, 2010 about software development tools such as CVS and Bugzilla. That means today is the 10th anniversary of CNX Software website! So I thought it might be fun to look at the most popular posts of the last ten years. I only installed Google Analytics sometimes in 2011, but it should not affect the results since I did not have many readers at the time, and the post that really started to bring more visitors, and made me switch from a $1 monthly hosting plan to a VPS, was “74 USD AllWinner A10 Android 4.0 Mini PC” published in May […]

Ugoos AM6 Plus Android TV Box is Powered by Amlogic S922X-J Processor

UGOOS AM6B Plus 2021 Dolby Vision TV Box

When I wrote about the official launch of MINIX NEO U22-XJ media hub yesterday, I mentioned it was the first Amlogic S922XJ that I knew of and the first Amlogic TV box to support Dolby Vision and Dolby Audio. But it was rightly pointed out to me that Amazon Fire TV Cube TV box already supported Dolby Vision with Amlogic S922Z processor that looks to be about the same as Amlogic S922XJ. Ugoos is now offering another Dolby Vision/Audio option with an upgrade to their existing Ugoos AM6 TV box replacing Amlogic S922X processor with S922X-J and increasing the memory and storage capacity. Ugoos AM6 Plus specifications: SoC – Amlogic S922X-J hexa-core processor with 4x Arm Cortex-A73 cores @ up to 2.2 GHz, 2x ARM Cortex-A53 cores, and an Arm Mali G52 MP6 GPU System Memory – 4GB LPDDR4 Storage – 32GB eMMC flash, MicroSD card slot up to 32GB […]

MINIX NEO U22-XJ Media Hub with Dolby Vision & Audio Support Launched for $170

Buy MINIX NEO U22-XJ Media Hub

MINIX NEO U22-XJ Android 9.0 media hub was first unveiled at IFA 2019 last September. It is the first TV box that I know of equipped with Amlogic S922XJ processor that adds Dolby Vision and Dolby Audio licenses to the more common Amlogic S922X processor. The company has now announced the device will launch on Monday, March 2nd 2020 but without providing any price information. As usual, we know need to wait until the official launch date to find out as MINIX NEO U22-XJ can already be purchased on “MINIX Official Store” in Aliexpress for $169.90 including shipping. MINIX NEO U22-XJ main specifications haven’t changed since the initial announcement, but we do have a few more details:: SoC – Amlogic S922XJ hexa-core processor with four Arm Cortex-A73 cores, two Arm Cortex-A53 cores, Arm Mali-G52MP4 GPU System Memory – 4GB DDR4 Storage –  32GB eMMC 5.1 flash, microSD card slot Video […]

Google ADT-3 Developer Kit is Now Available for Purchase for $79

Google ADT-3 Android TV 10 Developer-Kit

Google released Android TV on Android 10 last month while announcing the Google ADT-3 developer kit to help developers make sure their TV apps are ready for the latest version of the operating system. The developer kit, that’s basically a TV box, was not available at the time, and we had limited information, but Google ADT-3 can now be purchased for $79 on Askey, an ASUS Computers subsidiary. We also know the full specifications for Google ADT-3: SoC – Amlogic S905Y2 quad-core Arm Cortex-A53 processor @ 1.8 GHz with an Arm Mali-G31 MP2 GPU System Memory – 2GB RAM Storage – 8GB eMMC flash Video Output – HDMI 2.1 port up to 4K Ultra HD resolution @ 60 Hz Connectivity – 802.11ac (2.4GHz / 5GHz) 2T2R WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 4.2 classic+LE USB – 1x Micro USB port Misc – Bluetooth Pairing / Recovery Button, red/green status indicator Power Supply […]

Linux 5.5 Release – Main Changes, Arm, MIPS and RISC-V Architectures

Linux 5.5 Changelog

Linux 5.5 has just been released by Linus Torvalds: So this last week was pretty quiet, and while we had a late network update with some (mainly iwl wireless) network driver and netfilter module loading fixes, David didn’t think that warranted another -rc. And outside of that, it’s really been very quiet indeed – there’s a panfrost driver update too, but again it didn’t really seem to make sense to delay the final release by another week. Outside of those, it’s all really tiny, even if some of those tiny changes touched some core files. So despite the slight worry that the holidays might have affected the schedule, 5.5 ended up with the regular rc cadence and is out now. That means that the merge window for 5.6 will open tomorrow, and I already have a couple of pull requests pending. The timing for this next merge window isn’t optimal […]

Mecool M8S Plus W TV Box Sells for Less than $15 (Promo)

Mecool M8S Plus W

Mecool M8S Plus W is just another Amlogic S905W based Android 7.1 TV box fitted with 1GB RAM, and 8GB eMMC flash. I would certainly not recommend this device for the best user experience, but if you’d just like to play some videos or tinker with the box, the price is hard to beat as the TV box currently goes for $14.96 plus shipping (around $1 extra here) Mecool M8S Plus W specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905W quad-core Cortex A53 processor with Mali-450MP GPU System Memory – 1GB DDR3 Storage – 8GB eMMC flash, no MicroSD card slot Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0 output, AV port with composite video and stereo audio Video Decoding – H.265, H.264, and VP9 up to 4K @ 30 fps Connectivity – 2.4GHz 802.11b/g/n WiFi 4, no Bluetooth, no Ethernet USB – 2x USB 2.0 port Misc – Power LED, IR receiver Power […]

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