When Geniatech announced Android TV certification for their ATV598Max set-top box with digital TV tuners compliant with DVB-T2, DVB-C, ATSC, or ISDB standards earlier this week, we noticed how few official Android TV STB there was on the market. But more may be coming, as Wetek will showcase two Android TV products at CABSAT in Dubai on January 14-16 with Wetek Hyperion Amlogic S905D 4G LTE set-top box, as well as WeTek Nix OTT box powered by Amlogic S905X processor. WeTek Hyperion Specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905D quad core ARM Cortex-A53 SoC up to 1.5 GHz, with penta-core ARM Mali-450 GPU System Memory – 2GB DDR3 RAM Storage – 16GB eMMC 5.0 flash Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0a (CEC, HDR, HDCP 1.4/2.2), mini jack analog AV output Connectivity Gigabit Ethernet Dual band 802.11 ac/b/g/n WiFi (optional 802.11ac MiMo) Bluetooth 4.0 4G LTE modem – LTE-FDD: B2/B4/B5/B12/B13/B17/B25/B26; LTE-TDD: B41; […]
Samsung Announces Exynos 9810 Octa-core Processor Optimized for AI and Multimedia Applications
Samsung Electronics has just announced the launch of Exynos 9 Series 9810 (Exynos 9810) manufactured with Samsung’s 10-nm FinFET process, featuring an eight core processor clocked up to 2.9 GHz, a gigabit (1.2 Gbps) LTE modem and deep learning-enhanced image processing. Single core performance is aud to be improved by two-fold, while multi-core performance gets a 40% improvement compared to the previous generation chip, which should be Exynos 8895. ARM Mali-G72 GPU is said to bring more realistic graphics along with 20% more performance. Samsung Exynos 9810 specifications with extra cache and memory info from Anandtech: CPU Quad core custom Exynos M3 @ up to 2.9GHz optimized for performance; 512KB L2 cache per core Quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 @ up to 1.9GHz optimized for efficiency; 128KB L2 cache per core GPU – Arm Mali-G72MP18 Memory – LPDDR4x (4x 16-bit @ 1794 MHz) Storage – UFS 2.1, SD 3.0 Display – Up […]
SRH-X5 is a Palm-sized Android TV Box based on Amlogic S905W Processor
Amlogic S905W processor is a cost down version of S905X processor limited to 1080p60 / 4K30 video output and found in low cost TV boxes such as Tanix TX3 or X96 Mini that sells for just above $20 shipped. SRH-X5 is yet another of those boxes, but the device is more compact than the ones of competitors I’ve seen, as they’ve not included interfaces such as Ethernet or optical S/PDIF, and it could fit into the palm of your hand (although it’s not meant to be). SHR-X5 TV box specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905W quad core Arm Cortex-A53 @ up to 1.5 GHz with penta-core Mali-450MP GPU System Memory – 1 GB DDR3 (2GB optional ) Storage – 8GB eMMC flash (Up to 32GB as option) + micro SD card slot up to 32GB Video Output – HDMI 1.4 output Audio – 3.5mm headphone jack with stereo output/microphone, HDMI audio output […]
BBen MN10 TV Stick Review – Windows 10, Ubuntu 17.04, Benchmarks, and Kodi
The BBEN MN10 is the second Apollo Lake device to be released in the stick form-factor and on paper looks to have a lot to offer: It features an Apollo Lake N3350 SoC, an unusual 3GB of RAM, 64GB of storage and is cooled by a ‘mute’ fan. The devices comes in a plain box with a power adapter, and a leaflet style manual. It also included a three-pin UK power adapter, as this was advertised as the ‘BBen MN10 Mini PC – UK PLUG BLACK’. Looking at the detail specifications: We can immediately see discrepancies as the device does not have a ‘RJ45 Port Speed: 1000M LAN’ port, and was not supplied with ‘1 x HDMI Cable’ nor ‘1 x Remote Control’. Powering on the device and the ‘mute’ fan is also a miss-representation as it starts immediately and is noticeably noisy. It also runs at full speed regardless […]
H.265 / HEVC License Pricing Updated for Low Cost Devices
Most video codecs such as H.264, H265/HEVC, MPEG-2, MPEG-4… requires the manufacturer to pay a license fee. The fees are then added to the final product, but the actual codec fees are usually unknown to the end user. One of the exceptions are VC-1 and MPEG-2 license fees for Raspberry pi boards which are sold separately for respectively £1.20 ($1.58 US) and £2.40 ($3.16 US). So I assumed that licenses pricing was mostly private and negotiated based on volume. But a recent article stated that HEVC Advance, independent licensing administrator, revised the royalties for lower-price devices (<$40) with the price table below providing a good insight into pricing for different device types, unit prices and regions. The new discounted royalty rate category applied to consumer and commercial products selling for less than $40 including set-top boxes, surveillance cameras, game console and others. A simplified Patent License Agreement (PPL) was also announced in order […]
Amlogic T962E SoC Powers $55 Alfawise H96 Mini TV Box with HDMI Input, HDMI Output
HDMI input can be a useful addition to Android TV boxes, or media centers, as they allow for functions such as PiP (Picture in Picture), PVR/DVR (Personal / Digital Video Recording), and potentially video broadcasting with the box taking input from your set-top box (or other HDMI device), and broadcasting the video over your network in order to make it accessible to other computer or mobile devices on your home network, or the Internet. We started to see HDMI input on devices powered by Mstar MSO9810 processor a few years, and more recently Realtek RTD1295 processor has become more popular with products such as Zidoo X9S, Beelink SEA I, or EWEAT R9 Plus. Amlogic appears to have joined the fray with Amlogic T962E processor, a family normally used for TVs instead of TV boxes, found in Alfawise H96 mini 4K TV box with HDMI In and Out, 2GB RAM, and […]
Zidoo H6 Pro (Allwinner H6) TV Box Review – Part 1: Unboxing & Teardown
Allwinner H6 is a quad core Cortex A53 processor designed for 4K HDR set-top boxes and TV boxes that also comes with high speed interfaces like USB 3.0 and PCIe. While at least one other company is working on an Allwinner H6 development board, Zidoo is the only company that I can find whose made a TV box based on the processor: Zidoo H6 Pro. They’ve just send me a sample from their local supplier for review, and as usual, I’ll start by checking out the hardware inside out, before testing the firmware and multimedia capabilities in the second part of the review in a few weeks. Zidoo H6 Pro Unboxing The company has slightly changed the design of their retail package. It also shows some icons with the main features like 4K, 3D, H.265, 2GB DDR4, Android 7.0 with ZIUI, etc… The box ships with a HDMI cable, a […]
$69.99 Amazon Fire TV 2017 TV Box Supports 4K HDR-10 Video Playback
Amazon has just announced a new Fire TV TV box with support for 4K Ultra HD and HDR (High Dynamic Range), and a cheaper price, as it is selling for $69.99 on Amazon US with delivery scheduled to start on October 25, 2017. Amazon Fire TV 2017 specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905Z quad core ARM Cortex-A53 processor @ 1.5 GHz with penta-core Mali-450MP3 GPU System Memory – 2GB RAM Storage – 8GB flash Video & Audio Output – HDMI 2.0a up to 4K 60 Hz with HDCP 2.2, Doby Atmos support Video – HDR-10. H.265, H.264 Connectivity – Dual band 802.11 b/g/n/ac WiFi + Bluetooth 4.1 LE USB – 1x micro USB port for power (and optional USB Ethernet adapter) Dimensions – 65 x 65 x 15 mm Weight – 87 grams Amazon just mentions “Amlogic Quad-core 1.5GHz | ARM 4xCA53” for Fire TV processor, so it first assumed it could […]