Reviews - Page 112 of 126 - CNX Software

November 5, 2014March 9, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 11 Comments

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 […]

November 1, 2014November 4, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Unboxing of Rippl-TV XBMC Android Media Player

Half year ago, I reviewed Shenzhen Tomato M8 / TM8 Android TV Box. It was the first hardware I received based on Amlogic S802, and although I found overall performance and video playback in XBMC was very good, the firmware was not always stable, and Wi-Fi performance was poor. Shenzhen Tomato has now sent me another model based on Amlogic S802 called Rippl-TV (click for full specs), with an hardware very similar to M8 as we’ll see below, but a completely different firmware that relies on XBMC as the Android launcher. Rippl-TV Unboxing I received the TV Box by Fedex in the following package that reads “Rippl-TV a drop of perfection brings out the best in media…” The package lists the key features of the TV with 4K UHD video playback, XBMC Rippl-TV Edition, Android 4.4 OS (called UtilOS), dual band Wi-Fi, a quad core Cortex A9 CPU coupled with […]

October 19, 2014October 20, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 21 Comments

$50 UNI-T UT61E Digital Multimeter Supports Data Logging to a Windows Computer

Since I don’t use a multimeter that often, and don’t need high precision, I bought an ultra cheap multimeter (Sunwa DT830B) locally a couple of a years ago. I normally use it for continuity testing (no beep though) for repair work / checking solder point, and some quick voltage measurement, and it works well for these simple tasks, although the lack of buzzer makes it a little inconvenient. But I discovered its limits when I tried to measure current. The 200 mA range works fine, but I started to encounter issues when switching to the 10A range, as device under tests would just start rebooting if the current draw was too high, and the manual indicates that you “cannot measure more than 15 seconds in the 10A range”. Since I did not want to spend $100+ on a Fluke multimeter, I did some research for a better multimeter, and finally […]

October 11, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

MT87 Digital Clamp Multimeter Hands On

When you want to measure power/current on electrical device, a kill-a-watt is the easiest method, but it’s not always possible for items like air conditioner, water pumps, etc… because they may simply be no plug to disconnect. Luckily, current clamps are made just for this purpose, where you simply place one of the two wires in a clamp / loop, and it magically measures the current. You can’t put both wires inside the loop or measurement will not work at all. The good news is that such devices are very inexpensive, and I bought MT87 digital clamp multimeter, which is also a multimeter adding voltage and resistance measurement capability, for just $11.33 on DealExtreme. MT87 comes with measurement leads (voltage/resistance only), and a user’s manual. The linked user’s manual is not exactly the same document, but very similar, and also refers to MT87C model which adds temperature measurement. There are […]

October 11, 2014July 7, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 143 Comments

MXQ S85 Android TV Box (Amlogic S805) Review

MXQ S85 (aka MXQ OTT TV box) and EM6Q-MXQ are two main Full HD H.265 Android media players based on Amlogic S805 currently selling on Chinese online stores. I’m lucky enough to have received both, and I’ve already completed the review for EM6Q-MXQ, so today I’ll complete MXQ S85 review and compare both devices. I’ve already taken picture of the device, accessories, and checked out the board’s components in my unboxing post, so in this post, I’ll focus on the user interface, evaluate performance, and test most hardware features of this media player. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions I’ve started by a quick test of the IR remote control, and it works as expected after inserting two AAA batteries, before switching to Mele F10 Deluxe air mouse for convenience. I’ve connected all ports of the device except the S/PDIF output: Ethernet cable, HDMI and AV cables, micro SD card, […]

October 6, 2014January 26, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 27 Comments

Can Rockchip RK3288 Android TV Boxes Play Videos at True 4K UHD / 2160p Resolution?

[Update 2: Now that I have a 4K TV, I’ve redone the test myself, and Rockchip RK3288 can play 4K videos properly. The mistake was to use Software decode in MX Player which renders to the framebuffer instead of the video buffer. Visit the post entitled 4K Output and Video Playback Capability Tested on 6 ARM based mini PCs and Boards for details.] [Update 1: The post has now been updated, after it was clear one of MX Player options was misunderstood. The conclusion remains the same] Over the last few years there have been complains about Android TV boxes decoding 1080p video, rendering them to a 720p frame buffer, and upscaling them back to 1080p resolution for video output, so you ended up playing 1080p videos at a real 720p resolution. I never investigated the issue in details, and thanks to new media players now coming with a 1080p […]

October 5, 2014 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 18 Comments

Unboxing of MXQ S85 Android Media Player Powered by Amlogic S805 Processor

Gearbest sent me MXQ S85 Android media player powered by Amlogic S805 quad core processor with 1GB RAM, 8GB internal storage, and Ethernet/Wi-Fi/Bluetooth connectivity. MXQ S85 looks very similar to EM6Q-MXQ, another Amlogic S805 based Android STB, which I reviewed last week, but these are two distinct hardware platforms. Today, I’ll take some pictures of the devices, and the board to see which components are used, and who made the board, and I’ll write a full review in a few days. MXQ S85 Pictures I’ve received the parcel via DHL in the nameless package below where they just indicate it’s and Android TV box with a quad core processor, quad core GPU, pre-loaded with XBMC, and supporting HEVC / H.265 The package contains the box, HDMI and AV cables, an OTG adapter, a 5V/2A power supply, an IR remote requiring two AAA batteries, and a user’s manual in English. The […]

October 4, 2014May 29, 2017 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

Current Performance and Stability Issues on AllWinner A80 OptimusBoard Development Board

Sine A80 OptimusBoard is the first ARM hardware that supports both USB 3.0 and Gigabit that I’ve ever owned, so I though it might be interesting to see what performance I could get with a USB 3.0 hard drive through the USB 3.0 OTG port of the board. For testing purpose, I bought a USB 3.0 OTG adapter on Ebay, but I did not look closely enough as it turned out to be only a USB 3.0 OTG to USB 2.0 female adapter capable of USB 2.0 speeds… Kind of useless item since you can plug a standard USB 2.0 OTG adapter into a USB 3.0 OTG receptacle. But I tried my hard drive anyway, and quickly realized write performance was very poor at 3 MB/s on the NTFS partition, whereas most other devices can handle at least15 MB/s, and usually over 25 MB/s. So I contacted Allwinner with this […]