Trash-talk

    Quote from The Coolest

    I have a SBC based on another Rockchip, and the last time I tested it, it was pretty useless as a media player in all regards.

    H264 video stuttered, HEVC video would lock up after 10 seconds of playback, no HDR support, etc.

    Please try the latest LibreELEC 9.0.1 / Rockchip Alpha 014 build (on a rockchip sbc with a "supported"/tested devicetree), it should work very good.

    Do not stare blind at the alpha name, it is mostly there because there is features missing (HD-audio and full HDR infoframe metadata).

    Quote from Smurfette

    So LE has stopped supporting Amlogic and Rockchip users?

    Rockchip is very much working and "supported" even if it is still flagged as alpha, the 9.0.0 / Alpha 013 and 9.0.1 / Alpha 014 images should work very well.

    My focus for Rockchip at the moment is on mainline linux, hd-audio and adding more codecs to the rk v4l2 request api driver and ffmpeg hwaccel.

    Quote from The Coolest

    I still don't understand why you fixate on the Kernel version, how old it is, or what GPU drivers it has. As long as it works well and fast, and it does work well, and it's also very fast, I personally don't care what version of kernel it is running on.

    LE pushes towards Mainline kernel support, I can understand why, LE has to cover multiple different platforms, so it makes sense for you.

    Even with the 4.9 aml kernel the drm/kms stack is unfortunately not used for video rendering. Compared to mainline (or RK 4.4) this mean that the new video rendering path in kodi (the direct-to-plane drmprime renderer) cannot be used. When amlcodec (and mmal) rendering is removed from kodi the kernel subsystems used for the display stack gets important.

    The drm prime decoder + direct-to-plane renderer was first designed and tested for RK 4.4 kernel but thanks to using "modern" kernel subsystems it is working with any drm/kms platform that can render video on a dedicated video layer / plane and has been proven to work very good on mainline aml, rk, rpi, imx and other platforms.

    Not quite sure how a mod figured i trashed talked anyone, but hey its not my job to moderate.

    I just felt a bit bad for balbes for what appeared to me as a few insults over what appears to be a personality rift based on things of no real pertinence to the topic that I actually started. Seemed to me like the whole topic which was based on information about the rk3399 turned into a debate about branding and things not even related to the technical information regarding the rk3399 which is what i started the post over.

    to be honest i was not aware of the comments that were made on cnx-software as i very rarely watch that site, and if thats whats been going on i would agree its not really the right thing to do as it effects opinions formed by others while they are looking for information, so i can understand how stuff like that can rub others the wrong way.

    Being a technical person I to at times go off on my total disappointment in Amlogic over the years and realize i need to temper my own remarks at times and i do understand that those types of things are sometimes best served by being kept more in a more private setting and out of the view of others trying to learn.

    anyways... hopefully I have not offended anyone as trash talk is not something i normally waste my time on, and truly my intent was to just try and put things into perspective because without that it just makes people not want to bother wasting their personal time trying to help out.

    • Official Post
    Quote from buzzmarshall

    Not quite sure how a mod figured i trashed talked anyone

    I moved the whole offtopic discussion into that thread, that was about RK and not about N2. And you may already realised that a lot at that topic here is more or less trashtalk and about throwing with mud. My time is limited so I moved everything since it started - thats it, I have no intention to police every single comment.

    • Official Post
    Quote from buzzmarshall

    to be honest i was not aware of the comments that were made on cnx-software as i very rarely watch that site, and if thats whats been going on i would agree its not really the right thing to do as it effects opinions formed by others while they are looking for information, so i can understand how stuff like that can rub others the wrong way.

    By the way, I recommend reading. I think you will be interested to know some nuances. :)

    Announcement : Odroid N2 - General chit chat - Armbian forum


    It is better to have the info from the source. Read from this comment and below ... :)

    ODROID-N2 Amlogic S922X SBC Coming in April for $63 and Up


    PS to other questions with reasonable arguments, I will answer as time becomes available.

    Quote from balbes150

    PS to other questions with reasonable arguments, I will answer as time becomes available.

    You can comment coolling solution. You wrote it is bad and tkaiser wrote it is good. Also numbers from real devices concur him. So why are you saying it is bad design? Do you even have this device to make some tests yourself? Or you just saying something to say something...

    Quote from CvH

    I moved the whole offtopic discussion into that thread, that was about RK and not about N2. And you may already realised that a lot at that topic here is more or less trashtalk and about throwing with mud. My time is limited so I moved everything since it started - thats it, I have no intention to police every single comment.

    fair enough, i understand and am well aware of a mods job being tough enough and really don't want to be part of a problem over stuff like this... i am capable of getting into enough trouble on my own and this just ain't worth the time

    Quote from vpeter

    You can comment coolling solution. You wrote it is bad and tkaiser wrote it is good. Also numbers from real devices concur him. So why are you saying it is bad design? Do you even have this device to make some tests yourself?

    i would agree with what your saying as well..

    being a old semi-retired dude one thing i still actively do is repair at motherboard level a lot of macbook motherboards and one thing i have learned thru experience is that its one thing to just look at something and try and form a opinion when the reality is that until you actually watch something in its running environment its almost impossible to rate if its a good working design... when it comes to heat you can't just go by what you think based on a visual look. I do reflow's all the time and have all the appropriate equipment and its easy to make the assumption that what appears bad actually works well enough to stay within the operating specs and manufacturers do that all the time.

    thermal transfer and dissipation are not things to judge just on appearance... and sorry to say balbes that if you don't actually have the unit to test i would have to disagree with the logic, i understand your visual concerns but without actually testing the board its hard to say how its going to react and operate.

    Out of curiosity are you talking about the normal Libreelec github sources or is this something from your own github sources? i have built bables rockpro64 build and am interested in looking at others as well...

    My normal toolchain is different then the Libreelec one and lately ive been fighting with it not finishing while CoreELEC's and balbes seem to work without any intervention on my part... Libreelecs probably just because of the huge coverage of devices its trying to handle and i never build on anything but real linux boxes... sofar i can get Coreelec and balbes to work on 15.04, 16,04 and 18.04 machines.

    Sorry not that has anything really to do with my question, just thought i would qualify what i build with but am curious to have a look at what your referencing against and was not sure if it was your own github or libreelecs

    thanx

    Quote from buzzmarshall

    Out of curiosity are you talking about the normal Libreelec github sources or is this something from your own github sources? i have built bables rockpro64 build and am interested in looking at others as well...

    The Alpha 014 image is build from the libreelec-9.0 branch at official LE repo.

    My mainline testing is built from GitHub - Kwiboo/LibreELEC.tv: Just enough OS for KODI (final LE 9.0.0 + rockchip-5.x patches) using following commans:

    Code
    PROJECT=Rockchip DEVICE=RK3288 ARCH=arm UBOOT_SYSTEM=tinkerboard LINUX=rockchip-5.x make image
PROJECT=Rockchip DEVICE=RK3328 ARCH=arm UBOOT_SYSTEM=rock64 LINUX=rockchip-5.x make image

    The two test images at Index of /test/ is built from the rockchip-5.x commit at my LE repo.

    Kernel patches is based on Commits · Kwiboo/linux-rockchip · GitHub and rockchip-5.x-rebase (locally I have rebased those branches on latest 5.0-rc8 and will rebase and push an update with final 5.0 any day now.

    I do all my building insed docker containers to minimize influense from build host, see README at LibreELEC.tv/tools/docker at master · LibreELEC/LibreELEC.tv · GitHub for a short example on how I build my images.

    cool thanx...


    i predate docker and even things like github so taking the time to learn new things at my age is hard to justify so i tend to stick to what i know and am familiar with.

    to be honest thats probably one of the main reasons i have never pushed anything to the kernel repo or other things as i learned the old way and have been building custom kernels since the 90's... over the years ive learned some of the rudimentary github commands and can clone and do the basic things but for all these years i just alter the kernel source code to what i need and the stuff the finished sources on a server farm i keep close so even the simple things like creating a patch for me was just easier to edit the sources the way you need then compile and your good to go.

    just to old , and to lazy and would sooner spend my time playing around at wafer level under the microscope...

    thanx tho...

    Leaked info: After all skepticism about SoC temperatures and having heatsink on bottom side of the ODROID N2 device company decided to make improved version: ODROID N2+ with legs. Sadly the price will be little higher because of bigger manufacturing costs. But anyway, now we can have even better device!

    Btw: It is very big honor because device is first presented here.

    cool...

    actually looking at that and seeing the size of the heat sync on the bottom i visually don't see why that would not be suffice.

    assuming from what i see the SoC is on the bottom and the heat sync is sitting on it i would think it should work not to bad as the board profile would allow air between it and the heat sync which is only planting on the top of the SoC.

    it appears to be the full size of the board so being on the bottom should be big enough to allow the radiated (convected) heat to spill up over the edge of the main board rather then trapping it under the board which would happen if the heat sync was smaller then the boards full profile.

    the only concern i can see would be Maybe a issue with the case ventilation itself but that is easy to play with.

    without actual test its hard to make any real conclusions but based on stuff i have hacked over the years i cant see any real issues. and as said before its way better then most others without anything in the tvbox market.

    the rockpro64 i got i still have not bother'd putting the heat sync on it as it barely gets warm not matter what i run... right now outside the kodi type of use i am running a hobbled together version based on slackware that i am running software i am righting that handles motion control over a huge 3d printer i build and am prototyping which pushes the board alot harder then any libbreelec or armbian type of setup and not had any heat issues.

    i currently build custom dc motor drives that handle up to 15amp per phase and use heat syncs like that all the time and they work great.

    thanx for posting the pics.

    • Official Post
    Quote from vpeter

    Leaked info: After all skepticism about SoC temperatures and having radiator on bottom side of the ODROID N2 device company decided to make improved version: ODROID N2+ with legs. Sadly the price will be little higher because of bigger manufacturing costs. But anyway, now we can have even better device!

    If it's not a fake from one of the users who added the legs himself, then such a HK solution could have two positive points.

    1. Elimination of design errors at the design stage.

    2. An indicator of HK's attention to constructive criticism.

    If it really is the info from HK, then respect them for these moments. Adding a package with 4 silicone feet to the package does not require large costs and further improves the stability of the entire structure on a smooth surface. If desired, HK can still make small changes that can improve the functionality and consumer properties of the equipment and reduce production costs.

    • Official Post
    Quote from vpeter

    You can comment coolling solution. You wrote it is bad and tkaiser wrote it is good. Also numbers from real devices concur him. So why are you saying it is bad design? Do you even have this device to make some tests yourself? Or you just saying something to say something...

    Do you think that in order to perform a thermal design calculation it is necessary to personally have a device ? Do you think a design engineer who designs a nuclear reactor should personally visit the inside of a working nuclear reactor to evaluate how it works, what kind of temeprature and other paramters ? Or the engineer who designs and calculates a heating system of a house, has to personally visit the house, touch all walls, to measure all parameters of materials of walls and only then will be able to execute thermotechnical calculation of a design ? To calculate the operation of the cooling system on N2 is not required to have it available, there are physical laws and methods of calculation that allow to perform with sufficient accuracy the analysis of how the design will work. There are also data from HK on the results of tests, there is information from real users who performed real work (at the request of users from the Armbian forum) and who provided the results. Based on this, it is not difficult to accurately calculate what and how it works. But again, if your information is not fake, the issue with the cooling system on N2 can significantly change for the better. It would be nice if HK would also add to the user manual the position of the device for users (radiator up). How users will implement this recommendation is another matter. The main thing is that HK would provide users with the right recommendations for working with their equipment.

    You still didn't back up your claims about bad cooling. The device works fine even if heatsink is placed on bottom. And numbers from users concur that. You are still saying cooling is bad?

    And if I'm not mistaken fan can be mounted on a heatsink (powering connector is already present on a board itself.)

    balbes150

    All users already owning this device are confirming, that the temperature never exceeds 45°C even under high load, but you still keep claiming, that the cooling is a bad design.

    And the only prove are your very accurate calculations based on your excellent knowledge of thermal engineering.

    The links you were providing earlier doesn't prove anything, too, because the only one ranting about this device in all threads you linked to was you.

    Btw.: Could we please stop calling this metal thingy a "radiator", but a heatsink instead?