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April 20, 2016April 20, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 25 Comments

Android and Linux Benchmarks on MiQi Development Board

MiQi is an upcoming low cost development board powered by Rockchip RK3288 SoC that will sell for $35 with 1GB RAM and 8GB storage, and $69 for the version with a 2GB / 32GB combination. Since Rockchip RK3288 was launched in 2014, most available benchmarks were made on Android 4.4, and since MiQi is the first low cost board based on the processor, other RK3288 based board such as FireFly have not been that popular. So I’ve decided to run updated benchmarks in MiQi both in Android 5.1 and Linux (Lubuntu 14.04), which was easy since a dual boot image is pre-installed. But since I received an early sample without heatsink, I found a spare heatsink added some thermal paste and placed it on top of the processor and partially on RAM and eMMC flash. MiQi Board Android 5.1 Benchmarks I ran Antutu both using 1080p60 and 2160p30 video output, […]

April 12, 2016April 14, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 41 Comments

Xiaomi Mi Box 3 Enhanced / Pro (Mediatek MT8693) Benchmarks and System Info

Xiaomi Mi Box 3 Enhanced is the first TV Box I’ve tested with a processor featuring ARM Cortex A72 cores, so I’m very eager to see how its performs, and I’m expecting it to be quite faster than Rockchip RK3288, but still not quite matching Nvidia Tegra X1 processor found in Nvidia Shield Android TV box. But first let’s check the system information with CPU-Z app. First, it looks like CPU-Z does not detect big.LITTLE processor very well, as it detect a six core ARM Cortex-A72, instead of a six core processor with two Cortex A72, and four Cortex A53 cores. The clock speed ranges between 507 MHz and 1.57 GHz, but that’s likely the number for the Cortex A53 core, as the marketing materials report the Cortex A53 cores run at up to 1.6 GHz, and the Cortex A72 cores up to 2.0 GHz. Antutu info reports the frequency […]

April 11, 2016April 11, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

Zidoo X1 II 4K Android TV Box (Rockchip RK3229) Review

After skipping MXQ-4K TV box review due to severe issues with video playback, Zidoo X1 II is actually the first device powered by Rockchip RK3229 processor that I’ve fully tested. I’ve already taken pictures of the box, and opened it up to check the board in Zidoo X1 II unboxing and teardown post, and confirmed 4K videos could play pretty well from my USB hard drive using Zidoo Media Center after disabling Media Scanner process. So today, I’ll review other parts of the firmware, as well as video playback with ZDMC 16.0, Zidoo’s fork of Kodi 16.0. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions The device only has two USB ports, and I used one for a USB hard drive, and the other for RF dongles for MINIX NEO A2 Lite air mouse, a USB keyboard, and the RF dongle for Tronsmart Mars G01 gamepad via a USB hub. I also […]

April 5, 2016April 5, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 9 Comments

Review of U4 Quad Hybrid Android Set-top box with DVB-T2/C and DVB-S2 Tuner

U4 Quad Hybrid is an Android 4.4 satellite, cable and terrestrial TV receiver powered by HiSilicon Hi3796M V100 quad core Cortex A7 supporting video decoding for H.264 and H.265 up to 4K @ 30 Hz. I’ve already taken a few pictures of the device and the board and tuner, shown how to easily configure another device or computer to stream live TV from this Android TV box, so today, I’ll write more about the Android and DVB parts both in terms of features and performance in the full review. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions I’ve started by connecting USB peripherals and cables: USB 3.0 hard drive to USB 3.0 port, USB keyboard, and RF dongles for MINIX NEO A2 Lite air mouse and Tronsmart Mars G01 gamepad, as well as Ethernet and HDMI cables, and the terrestrial and satellite antenna cables. The DVB-T2 connector is using an F-connector, so […]

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 29, 2016March 13, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 24 Comments

Amlogic S905 vs S812 Benchmarks Comparison

After seeing benchmarks comparisons between Amlogic S905 and S805, as well as Amlogic S905 vs Rockchip RK3368, several people asked me to compare the older Amlogic S812 32-bit processor to the newer Amlogic S905 64-bit processor, so I’ve gone ahead and compared the results for several benchmarks obtained with WeTek Core and K1 Plus Android 5.1 TV boxes, respectively powered by Amlogic S812 and Amlogic S905. A ratio greater than one means Amlogic S812 is the fastest, and I’ve highlighted the ratio with red or green colors so that red color is a plus for S905, and green color means S812 achieved a better result. Amlogic S905 Amlogic S812 Ratio CPU Quad core Cortex A53 @ 2.02 GHz Quad core Cortex A9 @ 1.99 GHz GPU Penta-core ARM Mali-450MP Octa-core ARM Mali-450MP Antutu 5.x Overall 28,027 33,953 1.21 Multitask 4,260 4,701 1.10 Runtime 2,721 3,383 1.24 RAM Ops 1,960 2,228 […]

January 19, 2016January 26, 2016 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Ugoos UT4 Android 5.1 TV Box Review

Ugoos UT4 is one of many Rockchip RK3368 TV boxes available on the market today, but it’s one of the model with higher-end specifications including 2 GB RAM, and 16 GB flash, as well as Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11ac WiFi, Ugoos offers regular firmware updates for their devices, and as I found out in Ugoos UT4 specs and teardown post, the mini PC features a fan to keep the device cool at all times. Today, I’ll focus on reviewing the firmware including video playback capabilities, performance and whether advertised features work as they should. First Boot, Settings and First Impressions Before powering on the device, I connected some cables (Ethernet, HDMI, optical audio, AV to speakers), and made use of all four USB ports with a USB hard drive, a webcam, a keyboard, and a USB hub with two RF dongles for MINIX NEO A2 Lite air mouse and Tronsmart […]

December 21, 2015December 21, 2015 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments

GeekBox and Landingship Android Overview and Benchmarks

This week-end I checked out GeekBox TV box, and Landingship baseboard, explained how to connect the two together and install various optional accessories such as an RTC battery and a cooling fan. GeekBox comes pre-loaded with Android 5.1 + Ubuntu dual boot image, and as I’ve already reviewed other Rockchip RK3368 TV boxes, and GeekBox is also a development platform, I’ll simply run several benchmarks on GeekBox, as well as test SATA performance with an SSD connected to Landingship carrier board in Android, before checking out the Linux part a little latter. That’s no quite how you want to place the fan, but I wanted to show the USB to TTL debug board and other wires can be connected with the case closed. This allowed me to easily check whether the fan was spinning during testing, and it never did… According to one forum post, the temperature currently needs to […]