HiSilicon D02 Server Board Supports up to 64 ARM Cortex A57 Cores

HiSilicon has showcased their latest server SoC and board at Linaro Connect Hong Kong 2015, with up to two processors with 32 Cortex A57 cores @ 2.1GHz, 8 DIMM DDR3 slots (up to 128 GB RAM), 12 SATA ports, 4 PCIe slots, 10GbE / GbE ports. D02 board specifications: SoC – Hisilicon PhosphorV660 Hip05 with 16 to 32 ARM Cortex-A57 cores @ up to 2.1GHz and 1MB L2 cache/cluster, 32MB L3 cache System Memory – 2x Memory channel 4x DDR3 DIMM(4x DIMM per processor) Storage 12x SAS 3.0 ports @ 12 Gbps (8 for the first processor, 4 for the second).  SAS port are compatible with SATA drives. You may want to read SAS vs SATA post for more details about SAS. 2x SPI Flash 158Mb BIOS/UEFI 1Gb NorFlash Connectivity – 2×10/100/1000Mbit/s Gigabit Ethernet ports, 2x xGE SFP+ ports (10Gb/s) Expansion – 2x 8x PCI express interfaces per processor (4 […]

Orange Pi Plus Development Board Gets Upgraded to Allwinner H3 Processor

Orange Pi boards were recently launched with a form factor similar to the Raspberry Pi Model B+, and featuring Allwinner A20 and A31s processors. Orange Pi Plus was initially fitted with Allwinner A31s processor, but Shenzhen Xunlong Software has now decided to use the latest Allwinner H3 quad core processor instead for this model, adding better CPU performance, and H.265 video decoding up to 4K @ 30 fps, likely at the cost of a slower Mali- 400MP2 GPU against the PowerVR SGX544MP used in Allwinner A31s. New Orange Pi Plus specifications: SoC – Allwinner H3 quad core Cortex A7 @ 1.6 GHz with ARM Mali-400MP2 GPU up to 600 MHz System Memory – 1GB DDR3 Storage – micro SD card slot, SATA interface (via a USB to SATA chip), unpopulated  8GB eMMC on the back of the board (despite picture, see comments section) Video Output – HDMI, AV port Audio […]

ArmSoM CM5 Raspberry Pi CM4 alternative with Rockchip RK3576 SoC

H88 HummingBird Development Board Powered by Allwinner A80 Comes with 4GB RAM, Built-in GPS, 4G LTE Support

Merrii Technology is having some fun churning out Allwinner A80 development boards, and after A80 OptimusBoard, H8 Hummingbird, here comes H88 HummingBird. The new board is somewhat similar to H8, but is quite larger, and features 4GB RAM, built-in GPS, and a few other goodies. H88 HummingBird specifications: SoC – AllWinner A80 octa-core processor with 4x Cortex 15, 4x Cortex A7 cores in big.LITTLE configuration with Imagination Technologies PowerVR GC6230 GPU compliant with OpenGL ES 3.0/2.0/11, OpenCL 1.1, and DirectX 9.3 System Memory – 4GB DDR3 Storage – 8GB internal storage (Hynix H27UCG8T2BTRBC), micro SD slot up to 32 GB Video Output/ Display Interfaces HDMI 1.4 up to 4K UHD resolution RGB/LVDS interface EDP LCD + TP interface MIPI LCD interface VGA output Audio – HDMI, headphone jack,LINE-IN, Camera I/F – Parallel and MIPI CSI interface. Integrated 16MP camera Connectivity – Gigabit Ethernet (Realtek RTL8211D/E), dual band Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n […]

Independent Dual Display Support on Firefly-RK3288 Development Board (Video)

From time to time, I’m being asked which platform can support dual independent displays, and although I noticed Mele A1000 (Allwinner A10) did support dual displays in Linux, I never really investigated how well it handles it, so I normally recommend to have a look at x86 platforms with AMD or Intel processor that specifically claim support for dual independent display. But today, I’ve noticed a developer working for T-Chip posted a nice demo on T-Firefly forums with two displays connected via HDMI and VGA. The demo shows Firefly-RK3288 development board running Android with two displays in three configurations: Display Mirroring – The same content is shown on both display. Especially useful for digital signage application, where one board can drive two displays with the same content Extended Desktop – The user interface is extended on both monitors. It’s like having a single large monitor with a 32:9 aspect ratio […]

ODROID-XU3 Lite Board Ubuntu Review – Setup, Usability, and Performance

After testing ODROID-XU3 Lite with Android 4.4, and finding a workaround to some HDMI issues, I could finally try out Ubuntu, or rather Lubuntu with LXDE instead of Unity, in Hardkernel low cost octa-core development board. I’ll start this review by explaining how to install and setup Lubuntu on the board, followed by running various program to test the system usability as a desktop computer with LibreOffice, Chromium, XBMC, and 3D graphics, and finally run some performance tests with Phoronix Test Suit, build the Linux kernel natively, and transcode a video with avconf. Setting Up Ubuntu on ODROID-XU3 Lite All firmware images for ODROID development boards, can be found on odroid.in website, and if you want Ubuntu 14.04 image, go to ubuntu_14.04lts folder, to select the latest firmware file for your board. The latest image for ODROID-XU3 (Lite) is currently ubuntu-14.04.1lts-lubuntu-odroid-xu3-20141105.img.xz, it’s the same for micro SD card or eMMC […]

Merrii A80 Hummingbird Octa-core Development Board Supports HDMI, VGA, and eDP Video Outputs

Up to now at least three boards based on Allwinner A80 processor were available: A80 OptimusBoard by Merrii, pCDuino8 by Linksprite, and Cubieboard4  by Cubitech, and the first two boards are basically the same. Merrii has now introduced a new board which they call “A80 Hummingbird H8”, with more features and ports including HDMI, VGA and eDP video outputs,  LVDS / MIPI DSI display interfaces, MIPI CSI camera interface, an RTC with battery and more. Merri H8 specifications: SoC – AllWinner A80 octa-core processor with 4x Cortex 15, 4x Cortex A7 cores in big.LITTLE configuration with Imagination Technologies PowerVR GC6230 GPU compliant with OpenGL ES 3.0/2.0/11, OpenCL 1.1, and DirectX 9.3 System Memory – 2GB DDR3 Storage – 8GB internal storage (Sandisk SDIN7DU2 iNAND Flash), micro SD slot up to 32 GB Video Output/ Display Interfaces HDMI 1.4 up to 4K UHD resolution VGA port eDP v1.2 up to 2560×1600 @ […]

Rockchip RK3568, RK3588 and Intel x86 SBCs and SoMs in 2025

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 […]

Suptronics X200 Raspberry Pi Model B+ Expansion Board Adds Wi-Fi, RTC, VGA, optical S/PDIF, USB ports, Servo Support, and More

The Raspberry Pi is a nice little board, but in some cases you may want to add some extra ports. Suptronics released the X100 expansion board for Raspberry Pi Model B last year, and they’ve now come up with a little monster called X200 expansion board for Raspberry Pi Model B+ which adds Wi-Fi, a real-time clock + battery, a VGA port, optical S/PDIF output, 3.5 mm mic and audio jack, servo support (ULN2803), and a few USB ports to the low cost board. Key features of X200 expansion board: Input Voltage – 6V to 21Vdc converted to 5V, 3A via step-down DC/DC converter to power the Raspberry Pi. VGA output – HDMI to VGA converter supporting up to UXGA (1600×1200) and 1080p with 10-bit DAC Audio – 3.5mm MIC in jack, 3.5mm stereo audio jack, S/PDIF output, audio I/O connector (Microphone input and stereo audio amplifier 3.3Wx2) Connectivity – […]

Boardcon EM3562 Rockchip RK3562 SBC with 8 analog camera inputs