It’s just $80 for their 8″ tablet on a quad-core actions ARM Cortex-A9 with a 4000mah battery when you order 500 pieces minimum. $42 7″ tablet with allwinner a13. 13″ Intel netbook. $71 VIA WM8850 10.1″ laptop. Their Allwinner A31 9.7″ retina tablet costs just $135 with 2GB ram, 4GB flash memory. This company ships around 200,000 pcs/month and has around 300 workers.
Here’s my latest walk through the Rockchip booth featuring Chen Feng Vice President at Rockchip, walking through all the latest developments at Rockchip. Including their equation for performance per dollar per power consumption. Rockchip’s Android software optimization strategies, including some talk about some of their Chromium OS and Ubuntu experiments and some little talk about what Rockchip wants to do to support the hackers that want to build on top of their platform. Please join the ARMdevice Unlisted Mailing List https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/armdevices-unlisted to suggest how this description can be improved and to help me write the next batches of titles and descriptions so that I can release more Hong Kong HKTDC trade show videos sooner!
Filmed at the HKTDC Hong Kong Electronics Fair (Spring Edition) 2013
Allwinner Technology has an enormous booth showing off some of the latest implementations of their A31, A31s and A20 chipsets.
The quad-core A31 has been available for four months and already shipped more than 1 million units. The quad-core A31s started shipping at the end of March 2013 and has the same quad-core and GPU but is geared towards smaller displays (with less memory bandwidth.) They have introduced the A20 dual-core chip, at a price point quite close to the single core.
Their booth showed more than a dozen HDMI stick and small set-top box like computers. One of the dongles was running the mobile-oriented A20 SoC, which could be poised to take over that market at low cost. The A20 is a low-cost, dual-core Cortex-A7. The A20 is pin compatible with the A10 and offers integrated support for camera sensors. This is looking like a very capable chip to power a variety of low cost devices.
The Allwinner booth was showing off a very cool gamepad built with the A31, running Android 4.1, a built-in screen with 1280 x 800 resolution, and game controllers on the left and right sides of the screen. It works like a self-contained gamepad but also serves as a game controller that can product the game on a large HDMI display. The controller has front and back facing cameras, 1GB of DDR3 and 16GB of internal storage. There was no English-name known for the device, which was developed by www.ibenx.com, one of Allwinner’s many partners.
Wits-Technology was showing a development kit for Allwinner’s chips Other partners showed off full-sized and micro projectors built with Allwinner chips. A mobile karaoke amplifier with built-in tablet display was built around Allwinner chips. A novel, Android-based 13.3″ clamshell laptop was running the A20; faster A31 based laptops are expected later this month. Shenzhen Next-Huawen Technology Co., a design house, was showing off their tablet with keyboard dock. Allwinner says they are studying ChromeOS and also considering support for Linux based distributions like Ubuntu. The company says they have released software supporting the A31 to the open source community through a British company. Does anyone have a contact for that open source partner?
Here’s my latest 20-minute steadicam/GH3 walk through the SED Electronics Market in Shenzhen, that building is my favorite in the Shenzhen Huaqiangbei Electronics market area. This is where you can find all the tablets, HDMI sticks and tablet accessories. I film through this market with the Tiffen Steadicam Merlin 2 on arm and vest with the Panasonic GH3 camera and 12-35mm lense.
Check out my 41-minute video with Bernhard Rosenkränzer, Android engineer at Linaro, where he explains how iOS, Windows Phone/RT/8 and full Linux apps can soon run on Android. He shows off how GCC/LLVM/Clang now runs on Android, allowing developers to develop and compile code directly on Android. Soon, perhaps as 64bit ARMv8 devices reach the market by next year, developers won’t need an x86 Laptop machine to develop for/on Android. Compile a new Android and reboot into it, all within Android itself. He explains how Google and the open source Android project is using Linaro code to optimize and speed up Android Linux on all ARM devices. Here‘s the video that I filmed last year that got him to win the “Online Superstar” award at Linaro Connect 2013.
Riku Voipio of Linaro, Andrew Wafaa of ARM, Olof Johannson of Google, Sonny Rao of Google and Marcin Juszkiewicz of Linaro talk about hacking and using the full performance of the ARM Powered Samsung Chromebook to run Ubuntu, Debian, Open Suse on this ARM Powered laptop, talking about how much the Mali-T604 is being used in this ARM Powered Chrome OS, which feature improvements the ARM Powered Chromebook may get to possibly improve battery life, and a bit about the possibility of running Chromium OS or Chrome OS on older/cheaper ARM Powered laptops such as ARM Cortex-A9 and previous.
ARM demonstrates GPU Computing on the new ARM Mali-T604 GPU, rendering graphical features, filters, encoding, processing certain things much faster and using much less power by processing those things on the GPU instead of on the CPU.
ARM runs the Epic Citadel benchmark at 55fps at 2560×1600 (4 megapixels = 2x 1080p) on the Mali-T604 while on Intel’s latest mobile platform, that same benchmark runs 10fps slower at a resolution of only 1280×720 (less than 4x lower resolution?). ARM also shows the improvements when using the Mali-T604 with Open GL ES 3.0 which hopefully is soon going to be added in Android, providing higher quality 3D graphics features.
Nvidia is releaing their quad-core ARM Cortex-A15 processor, here demonstrating their Chimera camcorder and photography engine that enables fast and easy HDR photography and video recording. They have a special sensor and technology that allows one optical system to record enough range to create HDR video at full 1080p 30fps framerate enabling also HDR photography on all upcoming Tegra4 devices without needing to take more than one picture. Tegra4 can playback 4K video, it has a 72-core GPU enabling advanced graphics and GPU Compute and a lot of other features.
Check out this GoClever Hybrid tablet with keyboard dock. It’s similar to the Asus Transformer but for about half the price, selling at 299€ in 15 European countries. This device runs on the Rockchip RK3066 dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 and they plan to also release one featuring the Allwinner A31 quad-core ARM Cortex-A7.
Is this the Pixel Qi Google Chromebook for long battery life and outdoor usability? 12.85″ 2560×1700 resolution touch screen? ARM Cortex-A15 preferably big.LITTLE, is this a Texas Instruments OMAP5 powered or does Samsung provide Google with an Octa Exynos5 for Chromebook already?
What do you think the price is going to be? My guess is $100 for non-touch non-Retina version and $200 for touch Retina version. The goal to basically make the ARM Powered Chrome OS the number 1 OS for laptops/desktops worldwide.
Giulia D’Amico, OLPC Vice President of Business Development, unboxes and talks about the all-new XO-4 Touch One Laptop Per Child laptop, featuring the new Marvell Armada PXA2128 dual-core 1.2Ghz 40nm processor, Marvell 8787 WiFi chip and the Neonode IR Touch touchscreen technology. The OLPC XO-4 Touch now also features a HDMI output. Currently still running Fedora Linux based Sugar OS, the OLPC is thinking to port Sugar to Android to use on all OLPC Laptop/Tablet devices during 2013. Thus far, OLPC has shipped over 2.8 Million Laptops to children in schools worldwide. Australia is going to be the first country to deploy over 55 thousand OLPC XO-4 Touch laptop/tablets in the months to come.
Marvell shows off the new OLPC XO-4 powered by the Marvell PXA2128 dual-core 1.2Ghz, Marvell 8787, and uses Neonode IR touch screen technology to thus add touch functionality to the One Laptop Per Child XO-4 laptop. Performance is thus increased and battery life further improved by using this latest 40nm process node Marvell ARM Processor in the upgrade.
The XO 4.0 is powered by the Marvell ARMADA PXA2128. Optimized by ARM v7 high-performance mobile processors with Hybrid-SMP technology at up to 1.2GHz, the PXA2128 reduces power consumption by roughly half and enables an extended battery life thanks to a low-power mobile (LPM) processor.
Features of the Marvell ARMADA PXA2128 include:
Marvell optimized ARM®v7 dual High-Performance Mobile (HPM) processors with Hybrid-SMP technology at up 1.2GHz
Architecturally matched ARMv7 Low-Power Mobile (LPM) processor optimized with Hybrid-SMP technology for extended battery life
Dual-channel independent memory controllers (LPDDR2 or DDR3/DDR3L)
Multiple power islands, dynamic voltage/frequency scaling, clock and power gating and standby modes
Powerful hardware accelerators for 2D/3D graphics, 1080p video, HiFi audio codecs and camera ISP
Dedicated security engine with hardware keys, secure memory and ARM® TrustZone® for secure boot and cryptography
Marvell’s Avastar 88W8787 delivers the wireless performance and range that will make the XO 4.0 a connected learning experience. Designed for both simultaneous and independent operation of the following:
IEEE 802.11a/g/b and 802.11n payload data rates for Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN)
Bluetooth 3.0 + High Speed (HS) (also compliant with Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR)
FM transmit and receive (digital encoder/decoder FM radio with RDS/RBDS)
The device supports the 802.11i security standard through implementation of the AES/CCMP, WEP with TKIP, AES/CMAC, and WLAN WAPI security mechanisms
Infotmic launches the iMAPx15 at CES 2013 as the cost-down version of their iMAPx820 dual-core ARM Cortex-A5 to target the entry-level tablet and laptop market.
Here are my expectations for Google’s rumored upcoming Chrome OS laptop/tablet hybrid:
– 12.85″ Pixel Qi LCD, Google sponsored, to be available to all other Android hardware makers as a new component. (Plastics based flexible unbreakable LCD for thinner lighter waterproof dustproof unbreakable build)
– Optical lamination allows for outdoor readable capacitive Pixel Qi LCD. Otherwise IR based Neonode touch can work.
– 20 million initial production batch, enough to make a significant mark on the market, next batch can be 100 million units.
– Android 5.0 to support Chrome OS on top of Android. Same for Ubuntu on top of Android. Multi-booting becomes standard feature of Android. It’s not really multi-booting, it’s enabling to run alternative Linux OSes on top of the base Linux OS of Android.
– $200, available worldwide on day 1. Second batch can be sold for $150 or $100. Schools can get rebates if they order one for every child. Google can subsidize a few of those millions to be used by Children in developing countries through the One Laptop Per Child project.
– 16GB Flash with SD slots and potentially a 2.5″ HDD slot.
– 25 hours battery life. 200 grams flat battery dock doubles battery life to 50 hours.
– Swivel screen. Super slim keyboard can hide behind screen for tablet mode.
– ARM Cortex-A15, either OMAP5 with SGX544 or Exynos5 with Mali-T604. Maybe another comparable ARM Processor.
– Modem slot, all types modems available as options, 3G+, LTE, White Spaces, easily user swapable. There is space for an internal usb modem too.
Let me know what you think of this rumored Google hybrid here or at my Google+ thread.
Hanging out with Zach Pfeffer, Android lead at http://linaro.org, they are working to optimize Linux on ARM.
Would you like to join the next Google+ Hangout? Post a comment here with a link to your Google+ Profile or comment under the Google+ Post and I’ll invite you to the next Google+ Hangout on Air! The next one is tonight midnight Copenhagen/Paris/Berlin time, 11PM UK time, 6PM EST, 3PM PST. Make sure I have circled you then look at my Google+ Profile Page at that time to see the Hangout invite. The topic is going to be the stories of the day at http://techmeme.com but it can also be any other technology news topics that you’d like to talk about!
This is the most awesome device in the world. First Exynos5250 ARM Cortex-A15 Mali-T604 device on the market. I ordered 3 that I’ll hopefully receive tomorrow from Amazon, and that I can video-review over several videos in the days to come. I plan to use this ARM Cortex-A15 Powered Chromebook as my main laptop for all my video-blogging work going forward. I only use YouTube video editor anyway, and I expect to have my 2TB USB3 portable 2.5″ hard drives work quite fine to backup SD cards from the camera, I expect the USB Ethernet adapter to work fine, I expect the performance to be good enough also on a 720p or 1080p external 42″ HDTV as external monitor with external mouse and keyboard, I expect to find FTP support, and hopefully my favorite VPN service providers (especially when I need YouTube while in China) can also be used, perhaps there’s VPN support in extensions. I really look forward to see what performance and battery life optimizations can be made in the weeks and months to come. This isn’t big.LITTLE yet and the battery is ultra thin and light, but I still expect/wonder if this device can be optimized utilizing full Mali-T604 hardware acceleration to reach 10 hours battery life in the months to come.
