What is Today's "Flagship" LibreElec Hardware?

1st Official Post

    ...or are they just a series of tradeoffs?

    Conventional wisdom is that x86 has the raw power to keep the interface and everything else running smoothly, but unless you have a Gemini Lake or Gemini Lake refresh, that means no HEVC 10bit HDR due to the limitations of older HDMI standards.

    Some ARM boxes and systems on boards have HEVC 10bit HDR recording, but it is difficult to keep up on what is actually working, and what is temporarily broken and decoding in software. (which seems to be a lot of Amlogic stuff temporarily due to moving to new kernels) I don't know how people keep up.

    If everything in it were decoding properly (not sure if it is) the Odroid N2+ looks like it would be pretty awesome. Quite a powerful ARM chip with HEVC and HDR decoding support (once implemented)

    Then there are the little Gemini Lake x86 boxes. They may be small Atom based cores, not the big Core cores, but they do have more advanced decoding.

    Big X86 cores can probably brute force most things, but then we are talking heat and fan noise...

    If you were shopping for a LibreElec box today, and wanted the best possible experience, price - within reason - not being a limiting factor, what would YOUR choice be?

    Odroid H2+ was also on my list but at the Moment the NIC isn't supported in mainline Kernel. Should be there with Kernel 5.9.

    Odroid H2+, Realtek RTL8125B drivers

    smp Made a build with the Patches for the NIC.

    Btw. IMHO the Image quality on Intel x86 is better than what I saw on the N2 with KODi/Coreelec tested 1:1 on the Same TV.

    The best Image quality I saw from a "TV Box" with KODi so far was from the vero4k+ on par with Intel but, that's a subjectiv opinion.

    I am about to order an Odroid N2+ 4gb for Testing.

    Regards

    Nicolas

    Edited 3 times, last by Nicolas (July 24, 2020 at 8:52 AM).

    • Official Post
    Quote from mattlach

    ...or are they just a series of tradeoffs?

    There always are tradeoffs. x86 hardware can be faster and 'better', but it has a higher price tag.

    Not all x86-64 hardware is equally performant. Nvidia drivers for Linux are a mess. AMD has potential, Intel is the safest bet for now.

    The whole Android box scene is like the trees and woods metaphore to me.

    Quote from mattlach

    Big X86 cores can probably brute force most things, but then we are talking heat and fan noise...

    You don't want that, especially next to / under a TV. I have a J5005 Gemini Lake which seems to responds better overall with Kodi 19, so that's nice. I don't have HDR needs for now, so that makes it easy. The J5005 is passively cooled, and uses a fanless Pico PSU. Along with the SSD it is vewwy quiet.

    Second reason for me to choose x86 is to have an Ubuntu desktop next to LibreELEC as a dual boot, which functions nicely as well.

    Quote from Nicolas

    Odroid H2+ was also on my list but at the Moment the NIC isn't supported in mainline Kernel. Should be there with Kernel 5.9.

    Ugh. I wonder how far behind the latest mainline kernel the LibreElec project is?

    I don't understand why they did this. It would have been a much better device with a Gigbit Intel NIC, than 2.5Gigabit Realtek junk.

    I'll take the more reliable Intel NIC's any day of the week. I don't even know why the industry bothered with releasing 2.5 and 5Gigbit standards, when real 10Gig ethernet has been around for over a decade and should be able to make a cost effective jump to consumer. There is no need for anything in between.

    Usually I just don't buy boards with Realtek NIC's because it doesn't matter which Realtek chip you have, they are all utter garbage.

    If this little board had dual Intel NIC's it would open the doors for it to be used in so many more applications. It could even make for a great little pfSense box.

    I understand Realtek is probably cheaper, but how much does it save? $2 per port? I'd happily pay that to get Intel NIC's.

    Edited once, last by mattlach (July 24, 2020 at 4:45 PM).

    The N2+ works really well on Coreelec at the moment, runs quiet and is reliable. At some point in the future you can migrate to Mainline builds on the N2+ (not yet though). It offers the best price to performance ratio of any product at the moment. It runs quietly and handles just about any media you can throw at it. You could expect to pay 3-4x the price for anything x86 based that can do the same and it would cost you more in energy in the long run.
    X86 make better media servers, but ARM rules in the field of media players at the moment, and Odroid rule that field by a large margin.
    Libreelec follow Mainline development on ARM very closely - but its not mature enough to be a daily driver yet.

    Shoog

    Quote from Shoog

    The N2+ works really well on Coreelec at the moment, runs quiet and is reliable. At some point in the future you can migrate to Mainline builds on the N2+ (not yet though). It offers the best price to performance ratio of any product at the moment. It runs quietly and handles just about any media you can throw at it. You could expect to pay 3-4x the price for anything x86 based that can do the same and it would cost you more in energy in the long run.
    X86 make better media servers, but ARM rules in the field of media players at the moment, and Odroid rule that field by a large margin.
    Libreelec follow Mainline development on ARM very closely - but its not mature enough to be a daily driver yet.

    Shoog

    So, what is CoreElec anyway? Just a fork of LibreElec focused on getting all the Amlogic features working?

    Quote from Shoog

    Exactly.

    Ah,

    Is the relationship between the two projects good and collaborative, or are there hurt feelings? Often when projects split there is some level of animosity. I don't know if I am walking into a minefield :p

    Quote from mattlach

    Ah,

    Is the relationship between the two projects good and collaborative, or are there hurt feelings? Often when projects split there is some level of animosity. I don't know if I am walking into a minefield :p

    This is not worth discussing. Try Coreelec and see what you think.
    Your only other viable alternative is an expensive x86 system.