Benchmark results for Raspberry Pi 3 Model B, ODROID-C1+, ODROID…

We ran several benchmark tests to measure the computing power of the XU4. The same tests were performed on the Raspberry Pi 3 Model B, ODROID-C1+, ODROID-C2 and ODROID-XU4. The values of the test results were scaled uniformly for comparison purposes. The computing power of the XU4 was measured to be ~7 times faster than the latest Raspberry Pi 3 thanks to the 2Ghz Cortex-A15 octa-core and much higher 64bit memory bandwidth. Using the XU4 as a computer provides a “desktop like” experience, unlike the industry wide sluggish performance of most single-board computers! Particularly for developers, compiling code on the XU4 is super fast. The coveted high-performance 2GB DDR3 RAM is an additional advantage allowing most programs to be compiled directly on the XU4.

Benchmarks (Index Score) Raspberry Pi 3 ODROID-C1+ ODROID-C2 ODROID-XU4
Unixbench: Dhrystone-2 865.4 1571.6 2768.2 5941.4
Unixbench: Double-Precision Whetstone (x3) 1113 1887.3 3076.8 6186.3
Nbench 2.2.3: Integer (x40) 619.92 1173.6 1808.92 2430.52
Nbench 2.2.3: Floating-Point (x100) 781.8 1245.3 2300.3 3787.3
mbw100: Memory Bandwidth (MiB/s) 542.912 616.339 1472.856 2591.461

The most affordable high-performance DIY 8TB NAS

A ODROID forum user @linuxest reported the most affordable 8TB external storage could work with XU4 UAS driver in Kernel 4.9.

I also wanted to make my own NAS because my Google Cloud storage was almost full.
I ordered the same storage(STEB8000100) from Amazon. It is US$180 only. 1TB costs $22 approximately.
https://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Expansion-Desktop-External-STEB8000100/dp/B01HAPGEIE

It has arrived here this morning and I have run a few samba performance test with kernel 4.9 on my xu4q. I formatted the storage with EXT4 file system before testing because its stock file system is NTFS.

Downloading an 8GB file to my laptop from the XU4 NAS. It shows 110MB/sec of transfer speed stably.

Uploading an 8GB file to the XU4 NAS from my Windows laptop. It shows 90~100MB/sec of transfer speed.

 

Helios LanTest (3GB transfer option) also shows good performance too.

How to Assemble !

XU4Q and the official case

Velcro tape (3M Scotch 40mm x 25mm 4-pairs)

Attach Velcro tape (loop side) to the XU4Q case bottom

Attach Velcro tape (hook side) to the Seagate HDD case

Place the XU4Q case on the HDD case

Connect cables.
DC plug for HDD, DC plug for XU4Q, Ethernet and USB 3.0 cables.

 

New Ubuntu 16.04.2 LTS with Linux Kernel 4.9 LTS on ODROID-XU4

Hardkernel announced the Linux kernel 4.9.11 support for the ODROID-XU4 and XU3 platforms in late February and we started a debugging party. After ten weeks of debugging party with our community members, we are proudly releasing a new Ubuntu image based on latest Linux kernel 4.9.27 LTS.

We’ve improved and added new features UASP, UHS1 mode, IRQ balancing, HW mouse cursor, HW RTC Alarm, overlayfs, faster armsoc DDX, multi-touch screen and much more. You can find over 300 commits in our GitHub history.
https://github.com/hardkernel/linux/commits/odroidxu4-4.9.y

We’ve packed all the new updates into a new OS image for every XU4 users. This official Ubuntu OS image is available on this link.
http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=en:xu3_ubuntu_k49_release_note_20170510

We will keep improving and update the Linux OS since we still have some issues.

Note that there is no reliable way to update the Kernel to 4.9 from 3.10.
So please freshly install the new OS image after backup your data.

Linux Kernel 4.9 LTS on ODROID-XU4

Hardkernel proudly announces the Linux kernel 4.9 release for the ODROID-XU4 and XU3 platforms.
This LTS(Long Term Support) kernel 4.9 will be actively updated until early 2019.

Key features of the XU4 hardware are working on kernel 4.9.11 as of today.
Cortex-A15/A7 Octacore HMP, HDMI video and audio, USB 3.0, Gbit Ethernet, Mali-T628MP6 GPU, MFC VPU and eMMC HS400 mode are functional now.

There are tons of commits, patches and merges done for the last few months.
Grab the source code from our kernel 4.9 Github branch.

We must say that Samsung OSG(Open Source Group) helped a lot to make the dream comes true.
They contributed 394 patches that modified 15,856 lines of code in kernel 4.9 tree.

We invite you to a Debugging Party in our community forum. We will pull your ideas, comments and applause.
Try and verify Ubuntu 16.04.2 Mate image which launches the kernel 4.9.11 in that forum too.

Let’s enjoy the party together.

2017-02-22.jpg

Celebrating the beginning of our Third Year of ODROID Magazine!

To celebrate the beginning of our third year, we released a shiny new website for the Magazine earlier this month that includes a searchable article index, user manuals, and a separate Spanish version. Everyone on the staff works very hard to produce the best issue possible each month, and we are proud to say that we have a consistent readership of 10,000 ODROIDians and growing.

 

List of Issues
25th Issue
2016 January
24th Issue
2015 December
23rd Issue
2015 November
22nd Issue
2015 October
21st Issue
2015 September
20th Issue
2015 August
19th Issue
2015 July
18th Issue
2015 June
17th Issue
2015 May
16th Issue
2015 April
15th Issue
2015 March
14th Issue
2015 February
13th Issue
2015 January
12th Issue
2014 December
11th Issue
2014 November
10th Issue
2014 October
9th Issue
2014 September
8th Issue
2014 August
7th Issue
2014 July
6th Issue
2014 June
5th Issue
2014 May
4th Issue
2014 April
3rd Issue
2014 March
2nd Issue
2014 February
1st Issue
2014 January
 ODROID Magazine is a free monthly PDF e-zine available for download at http://magazine.odroid.com as a service to the open-source world-wide ODROID and ARM communities. This cutting-edge online publication brings you the latest ODROID news, as well as featured articles from the expert community that has grown around the amazing ODROID family of micro-powerhouse computers. Intended for all levels of users, ODROID Magazine offers definitive guides for new owners, with easy-to-follow tutorials on setting up your ODROID, installing operating systems and software, troubleshooting common issues, and playing both modern and classic games. For more experienced users, we feature expert tips, programming examples, DIY projects, and other advanced technical topics on exploring new ways of making your ODROID even more versatile. ODROID Magazine is an ideal opportunity for our growing international community to come together to share and contribute articles, so that everyone can be successful with their ODROID. Community members are encouraged to send their submissions and article ideas to odroidmagazine (at) gmail.com. Published authors are eligible for free monthly gift awards from the Hardkernel store at http://www.hardkernel.com. Article guidelines are posted at http://bit.ly/1ypImXs.

 

 

Rob Roy : Editor-In-Chief

“All of the contributors constantly amaze us with their innovations, and some of the highlights from the last two years include a soccer-playing robot, electronic grape synthesizer, a fully automated Pixar lamp with a sassy personality, a Wall-E clone, and an inexpensive yet powerful quad-copter drone. Our regular columnists like Tobias, Venkat and Nanik write fantastic in-depth tutorials and reviews that help our readers find new ways to work with and enjoy their ODROIDs. We always feature more than a few games in each issue as well, since ODROIDs can emulate so many different platforms. My favorites include the wonderful DOS-based games from our childhood, along with modern Android games like Clash of Clans, Beach Buggy Racing, Hearthstone and Five Nights at Freddy’s. We look forward to continuing to produce the best magazine that we can, and are expanding our staff this year with a few more assistant editors. I hope that the ODROID community continues to send us great and fascinating articles, since the community is what really makes our publication thrive.”

 

Bruno Doiche : Senior Art Editor

“ODROID Magazine is more than a project in that some months we toil hard. It is extremely humbling to work side by side with so many talented folks, and to see the power of a community that keeps building its knowledge using the ODROIDs for different reasons, such as gaming, server, hacking, and robotics. I think that we all have the brightest future ahead of us, and what is even better, having endless fun!”

Manuel Adamuz : Spanish Editor

“ODROID magazine is awesome. I have learned to do many things from reading it, such as flashing images, installing and updating the OS, installing and playing games and emulators, and much more. One thing that I love about ODROID magazine is that it has articles for all levels. No matter if you’re a beginner or an expert in Linux, It has something for everyone. I hope that people keep writing articles that are so good and extensive, although that means that I have more work as a Spanish translator 🙂 Happy anniversary!”

Nicole Scott : Art Editor

“Cheers to the third year ODROID Magazine! So much has happened in such a short time. I’m continually impressed with all the developments in ARM technology in both hardware and software. Working on the magazine is both fun and rewarding, as well as a great conversation starter. Having learned so much with each issue, I look forward to seeing what the ODROID inventors, developers, and computer science enthusiasts come up with next!”

James LeFevour : Art Editor

“It’s amazing how much expertise and geeky knowledge gets poured into this magazine every month. I am blown away by how much there is to learn about ODROIDs, and especially how much enthusiasm it promotes. I love being a part of this team!”

 

Feel the sound!!

The nostalgic 20 year-old Macintosh analog amplifier meets 21st century audiophile.

The C1+ HiFi Shield is a high-resolution Digital to Analog Converter(DAC) for the ODROID-C1+. This is a special sound card for the C1+, that is optimized for the best fidelity audio playback quality. It delivers a nicely balanced sound, solid, deep, wide and nicely layered.We’ve analysed the the audio quality of the HiFi Shield DAC output with the famous industry standard equipment, Audio Precision. The Audio Precision is a high performance audio analyser optimized for the digital audio product.

The analog output of the HiFi Shield is connected to the equipment and measurement data shows on the host PC.
This picture shows a basic configuration of the set-up. Note that I disconnected the external amplifier when we measured the line-out audio quality.

The Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR)
The Noise Level in dBm
The Frequency Response and RMS output level in dBV
The Total Harmonic Distortion + Noise Ratio  (THD+N)
The FFT spectrum analyzer for 1Khz signal

This is a great idea if you want an audiophile set-up with ODROID-C1+. Enjoy a variable output connecting directly into a power amp or active speakers.

Good Bye ODROID-U3

Exynos4412 platform has been the most loved products for the last 3 years. The ODROID-X was the first on 11th of July, 2012. And the family models of the ODROID-X2, U2 and U3 followed it. The ODROID-U3 was the latest model with Exynos4412 processor.

We have got the notice from Samsung that Exynos4412 will be discontinued soon. Because their SoC semiconductor production line is upgraded to the next generation like 28nm and 14nm. The Exynos4412 was made with the slightly old 32nm process. The more critical reason is that Samsung DRAM memory production has moved to the LP-DDR3/DDR4 technology while Exynos-4412 can use only the old LP-DDR2 memory which must to be pre-assembled on the SoC (Package-on-Package). So there is no way to keep buying the key component securely anymore to make the U3.

The ODROID-U3 was the most loved model by Hardkernel members. We have tried to keep this model even the price increases. The price of ODROID-U3 was $65.00 and we had to increase it to $69.00 this year due to material cost increase. But, we cannot make the ODROID-U3 even at higher price now.

We are really sorry that we couldn’t expect this situation earlier, and that caused any inconvenience who needs more U3 boards.

Now, the ODROID-XU4 will replace the position with the next generation processor, Exynos5422 Octa-core. The ODROID-XU4 has better performance and better connectivity with similar price range. We will make a long term plan with ODROID-XU4 supporting for a couple of years.

Thanks,

from Hardkernel members.

Moving to new office

We have just moved to new place. It’s a two-story building. Our new address is below;

[English] 475-1 Mananro, Manangu, Anyang, Gyeonggi, South Korea ZIP:430-852
[Korean] 경기도 안양시 만안구 만안로 475-1 우:430-852
The first floor is duplex type warehouse. We need more time to organise it.
The second floor is our main office. The developers are working here.
A garden on the rooftop. We can have lunch here when the weather is good.
Following the Korean traditional shamanism, we prepared some food and bowed preying for people’s safe and for being Hardkernel forever.

Volumio Audiophile Music Player for Odroid C1 released

Time to enjoy the great Volumio audiophile music player on the ODROID-C1.

Michelangelo Guarise (The creator of Volumio) has announced the Volumio OS image for the ODROID-C1 today.

We have a 1.5 Ghz quad Core CPU, which on paper is faster than many competitors (not only the PI). I’m not able to say how those figures are actually a sensible improvement, as I just started looking at the Amlogic SOC ( which seems quite ubiquitous in embedded multimedia appliances).

But what makes it really interesting for Volumio based scenarios are the Gigabit Ethernet, the eMMC memory slot (sold separately) and the integrated IR receiver. Add that Hardkernel seems to have the widest range of accessories for their boards, and you get that we can consider the C1 one of the best candidates to power a Volumio system.

Talking about real-world performances: the Odroid C1 delivers one of the smoothest Volumio experiences. It boots faster, and loads faster than the high-specs comparable quad-core boards (UDOO, Cubox-i).


More exciting news.

ODROID-C1+ is coming with a native I2S interface to support the HiFi DAC add-on boards. It will be available in the middle of August.
Volumio 2 is coming with four exciting key words Speed, Modularity, High Fidelity and Future Proof.

For those of you with an ODROID-C1, grab the image from the DOWNLOADS page as usual, and drop your feedbacks on this thread !

Setup

Setting up your C1 as a Volumio music player is dead easy, and the project’s website has documentation to guide you though the steps.

– Download Volumio image for C1 from http://volumio.org/get-started/
– Install the image on an SD card (2GB or larger). Installation guide is here.
– Connect the C1 and a USB-DAC to your amplifier and the network
– Boot the C1
– On any PC/Mac/Phone/Tablet, browse to http://volumio.local
– Configure NAS locations, Samba shares, etc,
– Add file to the playlist, sit back and listen !

First impressions

On the C1+, 192Khz/24bit FLAC/WAV files in a NAS server could play back flawlessly thanks to the 1.5Ghz quad-core processor and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity of ODROID-C1.
We could control the full features of Volumio with iPhone or Android smartphones. The Web UI does well on mobile.

Android for the Embedded System

Do you want to control various GPIO/ADC/PWM/I2C/UART/1-Wire devices on Android?
Quick & Easy to make a nice GUI application with Java on Android ?
Can we call it “Embedded Android” ?

We’ve prepared 5 examples with some proper Kernel drivers for the ODROID-C1.
It is very basic and essential to learn the Embedded Android.
Note that you must update the Android OS image to enjoy below examples.

LED on GPIOs control with ADC input

PWM Duty control GUI

I2C sensor access and Display temperature, pressure, humidity, UV index, illumination and so on.

UART read/write access. You can test Tx and Rx signals.

1-wire access example can read the DS1820 sensor values from two nodes.

Source code and how-to guide are available now!
http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=en:c1_enhancement_gpio40_on_android

Android OS image v1.5 for C1 is here.
http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=en:c1_android_release_note_v1.5

$35 Quad core ARMv7 PC : ODROID-C1

Quad Core Linux computer is now $35.00.

Don’t put up with the slow single core computer anymore.
If you are considering a tiny computer for general purpose computing, software development or as a project platform,
the ODROID-C1 will give you a lot more satisfaction and fun with incredible performance for a very low price.

* Amlogic Cortex-A5(ARMv7) 1.5Ghz quad core CPUs
* Mali-450 MP2 GPU (OpenGL ES 2.0/1.1 enabled for Linux and Android)
* 1Gbyte DDR3 SDRAM
* Gigabit Ethernet
* 40pin GPIOs
* eMMC4.5 HS200 Flash Storage slot / UHS-1 SDR50 MicroSD Card slot
* USB 2.0 Host x 4, USB OTG x 1,
* Infrared(IR) Receiver
* Ubuntu 14.04 or Android KitKat

for more detail >>

odroid-C1.jpg
OpenGL ES and XBMC on Ubuntu

ODROID Magazine for November 2014 is now available!

This month, we demonstrate how to enable virtualization on the XU3 with KVM, setup dual monitors with the XU3, install NativeBOINC, evaluate the DOSBox and Fake86 applications for DOS and X86 emulation, install Node.js and Open Media Vault, program a GPS navigation system for an unmanned ground vehicle, and much more!

– KVM Virtualization on the ODROID-XU3: A Brave New World of Computing
– Installing NativeBOINC: A Pictorial Guide
– Infographic: History of Ubuntu
– Building a BOINC Monster: 96 Cores for Only 135 Watts
– Microsoft-Free Mining with Freeminer: Now that Mojang has Set Sail for Redmond, How About An Open Source Game?
– Fake86: An Extremely Fast 8088/8086 Virtualizer
– Linux Gaming: DOSBox Emulator – Play Your Original DOS Games in HD
– Using Dual Monitors with an ODROID-XU3
– OS Spotlight: Code Monkey – Hardware and Software Developer’s All-In-One Operating System Image
– Easily Rotate Your Screen on Android: Defeat Your Virtual Enemies Without Rotating Your Entire Monitor
– Build An ODROID-Powered Off-Road Unmanned Ground Vehicle: Part 3 – GPS Navigation Programming
– Building a Weather Board Application: Create a Miniature Weather Data Collection System
– How to Install Node.js: A Modern Java-Based Web Application Platform
– Open Media Vault: Open Source Network Attached Storage for Debian GNU/Linux
– Meet an ODROIDian: Alexey Guseynov (@kibergus), Software Engineer Extraordinaire