AllWinner A80 Octa Core big.LITTLE Processor CPU Usage Under Various Loads in Android 4.4 (Video)

Allwinner A80 is one of the few octa core processors featuring ARM’s big.LITTLE technology currently available on the market. The processor comes with four ARM Cortex A15 (big) cores, and four ARM Cortex A7 (LITTLE) core, and tasks will be scheduled to different processor depending on the load to optimize power consumption on mobile devices. However, earlier big.LITTLE processors like Samsung Exynos 5410 has some serious limitations, as they only supported “cluster migration” meaning you could only use the Cortex A7 cluster or Cortex A15 cluster at any given time, so Exynos 5410 could only make use of four cores at most due to hardware limitations. They also used to be two software implementations: In-kernel Switching (IKS) and Global Task Scheduling (GTS). The former could only handle one type of core at the same, and the latter, which I believe is now used in all new devices, can handle any […]

ODROID-XU3 Lite Development Board – Android Setup and Benchmarks

It’s been nearly ten days since I make ODROID-XU3 Lite unboxing, and my plans to first test Linux on the board were thwarted due a problem with HDMI. Luckily, after several attempts I managed to boot the board with Android. So today, I’ll show how to install or update Android on the board, and run a few benchmarks. But since there’s always a silver lining, I’ll start buy writing a bit about the HDMI issue, as I learned a few things on the way. HDMI Output Tribulations ODROID-XU3 Lite looks like a nice and powerful kit, and it may be one of the most cost effective ARM board on the market since it comes to performance to price ratio, so I was excited to try it, but as you know if you’ve read my unboxing post I did not work quite as planned, as all I got was a black […]

MINIX NEO X6 Media Hub Review

Last week-end, I took a few pictures of MINIX NEO X6 media hub, and had a look at the company’s firmware and forum support which indeed seems to be good. Today, I’ve completed the full review of MINIX NEO X6, and I will compare it to two of its lower priced competitors: MXQ S85 and EM6Q-MXQ. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions The IR remote control works fine, including continuous up ad down pressing, but I switched to using Mele F10 Deluxe air mouse for convenience. I’ve connected an Ethernet cable, an HDMI cable, a micro SD card, a USB hard drive, and a USB hub with two RF dongles for my air mouse and gamepad, a USB flash drive, and a UVC webcam. I’ve connected the power, pressed the power button on the side of the box, but nothing happened at first… You have to press the button one […]

Tronsmart Draco AW80 Octa core Android TV Box Review

Tronsmart Draco AW80 (click for full specs) is the first octa core Android TV box / mini PC thanks to Allwinner A80 processor. Draco AW80 Meta model comes with 2GB RAM / 16GB eMMC, and the upcoming Draco AW80 Telos will feature 4GB RAM and a 32GB eMMC. Geekbuying sent me the Meta version for review, and since I’ve already posted pictures of the device and board, today I’ll post my findings after testing the unit. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions I’ve inserted two AAA batteries in the provided remote control, and it works as expect, but as usual, I’ve used Mele F10 Deluxe air mouse to control the device during my testing, since it’s impossible to use most apps with an IR remote control, XBMC/Kodi being one exception. I’ve connected an HDMI cable, a USB 3.0 hard drive to the USB 3.0 OTG port of the TV box, […]

Review of Rippl-TV Android XBMC TV Box

Rippl-TV is an Android TV box based on an update revision of Eny Techology/Shenzhen Tomato M8 (square) TV Box with an Amlogic S802 quad core processor, but featuring a different firmware with an alledgedly customized Android 4.4 OS called utilOS, and a launcher based on XBMC also called Rippl-TV. I’ve already written an unboxing post, including pictures of the board, so today I’l focus on the full review, and compare the performance to the original M8, as well as a closer look at the new user interface. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions Rippl-TV comes with an IR remote, and as long as your stay in XBMC and play videos, it’s fine, but as this type of remote is usable with most Android apps, I used Mele F10 Deluxe air mouse instead to control the device. I’ve connected an Ethernet cable, an HDMI cable, a USB hard drive, and a […]

$99 ODROID-XU3 Lite Development Board Powered by Exynos 5422 Octa Core Processor

Hardkernel is known for their low cost Exynos based ODROID boards such as the $59 ODROID U3 board based on Exynos 4412 quad core SoC, and with ODROID-XU3, they also have a more powerful Octa-core Exynos 5422 board which sells for a premium price of $179. The company has now decided to offer a cheaper version of the board, which they call “ODROID-XU3 Lite” and lacks DisplayPort, the current and voltage sensors, and uses an Exynos 5422 processor clocked at 1.8/1.3 GHz instead of 2.0+/1.4 GHz for the original board. Price? A cool $99. ODROID-XU3 Lite specifications: SoC – Samsung Exynos 5422 quad core ARM Cortex-A15 @ 1.8GHz quad core ARM Cortex-A7 @ 1.3GHz in big.LITTLE configuration with Mali-T628 MP6 GPU supporting OpenGL ES 3.0 / 2.0 / 1.1 and OpenCL 1.1 Full profile System Memory – 2GB LPDDR3 RAM PoP (933Mhz, 14.9GB/s memory bandwidth, 2x32bit bus) Storage – Micro […]

LG NUCLUN Octa-core ARM SoC Powers G3 Screen Smartphone

LG has been making mobile devices since 1997, has entered the smartphone market in 2010, and they’ve now decided to foray into mobile SoC, with their very first SoC being an octa-core Cortex A15/A7 processor called NUCLUN, and found in their latest G3 Screen smartphone running Android 4.4.4. Details about NUCLUN processor are sparse, but the company did provide some specifications for LG G3 Screen smartphone: SoC – LG NUCLUN (LG7111) Octa-Core big.LITTLE processor with four ARM Cortex A15 cores @ 1.5GHz, four ARM Cortex A7 cores @ 1.2GHz. System Memory – 2GB RAM Storage – 32GB  eMMC + MicroSD slot Display – 5.9″ Full HD IPS touchscreen Camera – 13MP OIS+ rear camera, 2.1MP front-facing camera Network – LTE-A Cat.6 for up to 225Mbps download speed. Battery – 3,000mAh Dimensions – 157.8x 81.8x 9.5mm Weight – 182g The phone,  also codenamed as LG Liger F490L, F490K or F490S (depending […]

Allwinner A80 Android TV Boxes Coming Soon, Starting with Zero Devices Z8C Alice

Allwinner A80 based tablets such as Onda V989, and development boards such as A80 OptimusBoard started to ship one to two months ago, but there was absolutly no news about Android mini PCs / media player based on the latest Allwinner processor. This is about to change as ZeroDevices twitted about their Z8C Alice TV Box, apparently designed by Sunchip, and in collaboration with a UK based digital signage company called Eclipse Digital Media. Preliminary technical specifications that we can infer from the picture above: SoC – AllWinner Ultra Core A80 4x Cortex 15, 4x Cortex A7 big.LITTLE processor with Imagination Technologies PowerVR GC6230 GPU with support for OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0/3.0, Directx 9.3 System Memory – N/A Storage – ?? GB eMMC + SD card slot + SATA port (most probably via a USB 2.0/3.0 bridge) Video  Output – HDMI + AV port Audio – HDMI, AV, and optical S/PDIF […]

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