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August 6, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 23 Comments

Inside LG 4K TV, and My (Unsuccessful) Attempt at Repairing It

Long time readers of this blog may remember that I organized a crowdfunding event aiming at raising funds to buy equipment to test 4K TV boxes and mini PCs in early 2015, and one of the items I ended up purchasing was LG 42UB820T 4K television. It worked well for over a year, but I started to notice a single vertical appear on the TV in June, or about 18 months after purchase. A few more lines appeared in the following week, and it appears to have stabilized as shown in the picture below. While I understand that in Europe a 2-year warranty period is legally required, I’m based in Asia, and all I got was a one year warranty for the TV. So I had three choices: Ignore the problem Pay for the repairs Try to repair it myself So far, I’ve selected solution 1. because that’s the easiest […]

May 19, 2016May 19, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Android Wear 2.0 Developer Preview Release

Google I/O 2016 has started, and among several announcements, Google released Android Wear 2.0 develop preview which according to the company is the “most significant update” since the launch of Android Wear two years ago. Some noticeable changes include: Standalone apps – Android Wear apps can now access the Internet directly over Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or cellular, without relying on a paired smartphone or tablet. New system UI – New notification design and app launcher, as well as a new watch face picker. Material design for wearables Keyboard and handwriting input methods added Google Fit platform – Improvements to the Google Fit platform make it easier to app developers to use fitness data and detect activity. Android N Support – Data Saver, Java 8 Lambda support, emojis, etc… A new Complication API has also been added to display small pieces of information directly on the watch face. Preview images for LGE Watch […]

February 22, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Samsung Exynos 8890 Processor with Custom Exynos M1 and ARM Cortex A53 Cores Benchmarked

When Samsung announced Exynos 8890 processor, it promised 10% lower consumption and 30% high performance compared to Exynos 7 Octa. The company also said it make its own custom ARMv8 cores for the new, but at the time details were limited. Anandtech has now published more information, and Exynos 8890 octa-core processor will make use of four Exynos M1 custom cores combined with four low power ARM Cortex A53 cores, combined with a Mali-T880MP12 GPU. Exynos 8890 key features: Low power cores – 4x ARM Cortex A53 cores @ 1.586GHz High performance cores – 2x Exynos M1 @ 2.60 GHz, 2x Exynos N1 @ 2.29 GHz; If 4 cores are running at the same time: 2.29 GHz maximum Memory – 2x 32-bit LPDDR4 @ 1794MHz; 28.7GB/s bandwidth GPU – Mali-T880MP12 @ 650 MHz Manufacturing process – Samsung 14nm LPP Now that Samsung Galaxy 7 has been announced with Exynos 8890 […]

January 17, 2016February 6, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

AsteroidOS is an Open Source Operating System for Your Android (Wear) Smartwatch

If you own an Android or Android Wear smartwatch, but would like more control over its functionality or simply prefer a truly open source operating systems for your watch, AsteroidOS could be the answer. Like alternative mobile operating systems such as Sailfish OS or Ubuntu Touch, AsteroidOS leverages existing Android drivers via libhybris library, and the user interface relies on Qt5 and QML running on top of OpenEmbedded, while Bluetooth is handled by BlueZ 5 library. There’s no company behind the project, and it is purely community driven. Currently only the LG G watch is supported, and you can give AsteroidOS a try by following the instructions. The Wiki provides information about the boot process, how to build the OS, creating an Qt5/QML app. etc.. and also explains how to port AsteroidOS to other watches, so if the project gets traction more devices will be supported. There are several ways […]

September 30, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Google Officially Unveils Nexus 5X & 6P Android 6.0 Smartphones

Google released Android 6.0 “Marshmallow” SDK and final preview last month, and the first stable Android 6.0 release is expected on the first week of October on recent Nexus devices, including the latest Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P just announced by Google. Here are the specs of the two phones: LG Nexus 5X Specifications SoC – Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 (MSM8992) dual core Cortex-A57 @ 1.82 GHz and quad core Cortex-A53 @ 1.44 GHz with Adreno 418 GPU System Memory – 2GB LPDDR3 Storage – 16 or 32GB storage, no micro SD slot Display – 5.2″ capacitive touchscreen (1920×1080 resolution), Gorilla Glass 3 with fingerprint and smudge-resistant oleophobic coating Audio – Front facing speaker, 3 microphones with noise cancellation, 3.5mm audio jack Connectivity – Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac 2×2 MIMO, Bluetooth 4.2, GPS with A-GPS and GLONASS, NFC Cellular Connectivity All versions – GSM/EDGE: 850/900/1800/1900MHz; single nano SIM card North America – […]

September 1, 2015September 2, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Study Shows Octa Core Processors Bring Little Over Quad Core Processors in Mobile Devices

Silicon vendor are now launching 8-core and even 12-core processors for mobile devices, and I can see some advantages in terms of power consumption in processors leveraging big.LITTLE processing with low power ‘LITTLE’ cores running light tasks such as audio or video playback, while performance ‘big’ cores running much demanding tasks. However, some processors, such as RK3368, feature the same eight cores, and in real-use don’t bring that extra bit of performance or lower power consumption, except in very specific cases. So the only “advantage” of this type of processor is a marketing one, with keyword like “Octa-core”, “64-bit”, etc… Last year, I found out, that more powerful cores may be more important than many cores, when I tested Allwinner A80 processor with PVRMonitor to check CPU usage per core in real-time, and in Antutu, while Browsing the web or playing games, only a few cores were used most of […]

January 25, 2015January 9, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

All HDMI 2.0 Implementations Are not Equal

One of the key changes between HDMI 1.4 and HDMI 2.0 is support for up to 4K @ 60Hz instead of just 4K @ 30Hz, and at first, I thought an HDMI 2.0 capable device would be compatible with HDMI 2.0 TV, and it did not need to look into details. I was wrong. There’s a nice table in Wikipedia that explains the main differences between HDMI 1.4 and HDMI 2.0 and older versions. Other features include YCbCr 4:2:0 (That’s the important bit), Rec. 2020 color space, 32 channel audio, 21:9 aspect ratio, and more. By the way, there’s no such thing as an HDMI 2.0 cable (Source: straight from the horse’s mouth), so if you have a cable that support 4K30, it will work with 4K60 as well. Does HDMI 2.0 require new cables? No, HDMI 2.0 features will work with existing HDMI cables. Higher bandwidth features, such as […]

January 24, 2015January 24, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 44 Comments

LG 42UB820T 4K UHD TV Review

After several people often asked me about audio pass-through, and 4K video support on mini PCs, with some suggesting adding a donation button to my website, I decided to start a crowdfunding campaign to raise funds for an AV Receiver and a 4K TV by asking for donations and selling some samples I used for review. Thanks to the great help of my readers, I managed to get enough money to buy LG 42UB820T on Lazada for 19,610 Baht including shipping (~$600) via 10% coupon I got in a newsletter, as well Onkyo TX-NR636 7.2 channel receiver in a local shop in Chiang Mai (Sahapanich). I’m still waiting for the speakers, so I’ll start by reviewing the TV. This model is sold as 42UB820V in Europe, and 42UB8200 in Hong Kong and probably other markets. I spent a lot of time studying about 4K TV and AV receiver features, and […]