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ODROID C2 S905 2GB RAM HDMI 2.0 $46
#91
If you are not playing back 2160p DVB-S 10-bit HEVC Satellite TV Broadcasts there will not be a problem on the C2.

Plays all the usual 8/10-bit HEVC I throw at it, without artifacts. Video Sync using Android Lollipop is very good using the WeTek Jarvis mediaplayer.

I believe all 10-bit decode when using any version of Kodi on any platform is output as 8-bit video until the devs get into Kodi code and mod it, maybe later this year.
The only 10-bit video output I know of is possibly 4K 10-bit HDR Netflix on the nVIDIA Shield.

WeTek probably have something up their sleeves if they are releasing the 2160p DVB-S 10-bit HEVC capable - Play 2S next month.

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#92
At the moment the C2 appears to be running in 8-bit output mode system-wide over the HDMI connection. I've yet to see any switching to a non-8 bit mode.
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#93
(2016-03-29, 12:27)wrxtasy Wrote: If you are not playing back 2160p DVB-S 10-bit HEVC Satellite TV Broadcasts there will not be a problem on the C2.

Though - to be fair - unless you master content yourself, these are the only non-subscription, legitimate sources of HEVC content really...
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#94
Seems to boot to a desktop in like 15 seconds from a microSD card. I'm really happy with the way it runs. It's been really stable so far as well, but I honestly haven't had much time to play with it. I did the huge apt-get upgrade and a dist-upgrade. They took a good while, but it all seemed to go very smoothly. I haven't tried Android yet, but I will as soon as I get another flash card.

Too bad no USB3 or SATA connector, but I still like it a lot. Bluetooth and WiFi would have been cool, but certainly not a deal breaker for me. The Pi3 is "nifty", but this device is really putting the Pi developers in the hot seat for needing to catch up to this level of performance.

I want to install Kodi and try that out, but the apt archive only has 15.2 Isengard available. All of my recordings in my MythTV backend are MPEG-2 also, so I believe that's going to be a problem for a while, assuming I understood what I've read so far about the S905 support. I believe that there is no hardware deinterlacing for MPEG-2. I'm hoping that there is hardware decompression for it though. I know it will all come along eventually.

How long do you think it will be before OpenELEC is ready for the S905?
Experience: It's what you get when you were expecting something else.
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#95
(2016-03-29, 12:52)afremont Wrote: Seems to boot to a desktop in like 15 seconds from a microSD card. I'm really happy with the way it runs. It's been really stable so far as well, but I honestly haven't had much time to play with it. I did the huge apt-get upgrade and a dist-upgrade. They took a good while, but it all seemed to go very smoothly. I haven't tried Android yet, but I will as soon as I get another flash card.
I'd seriously recommend eMMC if you are serious about using the C2 long-term. It's really quick. The Ubuntu boot speed is incredibly quick. I just timed it at around 15" too though, so maybe boot isn't time isn't dictated purely by storage speed.
Quote:Too bad no USB3 or SATA connector, but I still like it a lot.
Less a case of no connectors, more a case that the S905 doesn't support them. SATA would need to be implemented via a USB2.0->SATA bridge - so no real point including it.
Quote:Bluetooth and WiFi would have been cool, but certainly not a deal breaker for me.
Yes - they would be useful - but can see why they were left off. The cost of testing would be prohibitive. The Pi foundation blogged about how much they had to spend to get the Pi 3 approved (which is why it doesn't have external antenna connectors fitted)

Quote:The Pi3 is "nifty", but this device is really putting the Pi developers in the hot seat for needing to catch up to this level of performance.

I'm not sure the ODroid is massively on the Pi Foundation's horizon. The C2 isn't aimed at the Pi Foundation target market - which is education.

Where the Pi still wins is in support. There are far fewer rough edges on the Pi 1/2/3/Zero than on the C1/C1+. Development of the kernel for the C1/C1+ seems to have stopped (forgive me if I'm wrong on this - but when I asked in the ODroid forums I was told there were no plans for newer kernel support), and I don't see much new stuff coming out from Hardkernel for it. The Pi Foundation is still updating code that will work on the original 2012 Model B. wrxtasy is great at pushing out new OpenElec builds for the C1 - but he's a one-man band and if he stops we're probably stuffed. On paper the C1 is better than the Pi2. The Pi 2 is still, IMHO, a better supported platform and what I'd recommended as a Kodi platform until the Pi 3 came out (unless you want Netflix, then the Core is good if you are happy with stereo audio only)

Sure the C2 is more powerful than the Pi 3 in hardware terms. HDMI 2. (even 4:2:0 only) and HEVC 10 bit hardware decode (even if with some flaws) is still an amazing improvement. eMMC and a faster clock speed are great. Gigabit Ethernet and two USB 2.0 buses not shared (the 4 Type A are on one bus and the OTG is on another I believe, with the GigE separate again) On paper it blows the Pi out of the water.

But then you realise you are limited to PCM 2.0 audio (driver not hardware limit), no Frame Packed 1080p 3D output (probably driver limit but who knows), and currenty even DD/DTS bitstreaming is flawed. No sign at the moment of the work done by Wetek to add HD Audio bitstreaming and PCM 5.1/7.1 in Android appearing on the C2 (even though the hardware should support it the route used may not be available to ODroid currently).

Sure - it will hopefully include HD Audio or PCM 5.1/7.1 - but Hardkernel appear to be very tied to AMLogic in development terms, and not really driving things. The Pi has the advantage of developers who can really get to the 'bare metal' in driver/firmware terms. 3D MVC decode appeared because a Pi dev wanted to implement it. So they did.

Multichannel PCM audio support over HDMI was there since the early days, because the drivers were implemented right pretty early on.

And I am still smarting over Hardkernel's approach to the C1 HDMI drop-outs. The fault was in the C1 config, but everything else was blamed... (It wasn't until some of us pointed out that a similar problem had briefly hit the Pi and been fixed by changing the way the HDMI clock was altered to keep things in sync that a non-HK (I think) dev tweaked the HDMI Clock settings and fixed it... Hardkernel appeared to have given up.)
Quote:I want to install Kodi and try that out, but the apt archive only has 15.2 Isengard available. All of my recordings in my MythTV backend are MPEG-2 also, so I believe that's going to be a problem for a while, assuming I understood what I've read so far about the S905 support. I believe that there is no hardware deinterlacing for MPEG-2. I'm hoping that there is hardware decompression for it though. I know it will all come along eventually.

There's a good thread at getting a newer build of Kodi running with hardware acceleration over at the ODroid forums. I've got it running on mine. Fixed with PCM 2.0 output at the moment (I've not looked harder to see if I need to fiddle with ALSA/PulseAudio stuff - there are simply no passthrough options available in Kodi) Changing screen resolution is fun (when I start Kodi at 3840x2160 I runs with a 1280x720 GUI top left, and you have to read through screens of overlaid garbage to correctly set 3840x2160 GUI, and then Exit and Restart Kodi).

I think the Android + Wetek Media Player experience is probably better. It has DD/DTS output - albeit with drop outs.

Quote:How long do you think it will be before OpenELEC is ready for the S905?

Be interesting to see. The differences between C2 and C1 are non-trivial apparently. But OpenElec is surely the holy grail, along with better audio support.

Don't get me wrong - I know why there are big differences between the maturity and quality of support on the Pi vs the C1/C2, and I want the C1/C2 to succeed (I own both) However I really don't think Hardkernel are driving what the Pi foundation does. The Pi 3 will have been in development long before the C2 announcement, similarly the Pi 2 and the C1. They arrive at roughly the same time as that is when the SoC technology matures at the right price point.
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#96
Yes Android Lollipop + WeTek mediaplayer is not bad at all so long as you do not watch Interlaced mpeg2/h264 TV Broadcasts.

amcodec is partially broken. Refresh switching enabled. Try playing 29.97 mpeg2 with amcodec on Android and you will end up with a blank screen. Same with 23.976fps H264/HEVC. The usual S8xx video display modes amcodec uses in Kodi have changed with the AML S905's Kernel. (Damn you AMlogic !)

disable amcodec and use Android mediacodec and life is a lot better. No black screens when refresh switching but Interlaced content reverts to inferior software deinterlacing. Which is fine if you don't watch TV.

eMMC 5.0 and the GigaE on the C2 are nice and nippy indeed Smile

I do know what needs fixing with amcodec, its all a matter of free time available...

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#97
(2016-03-29, 13:19)wrxtasy Wrote: disable amcodec and use Android mediacodec and life is a lot better. No black screens when refresh switching but Interlaced content reverts to inferior software deinterlacing. Which is fine if you don't watch TV.

Does it really revert to software deinterlacing, or just software decode with no deinterlacing? I've not managed to get it to deinterlace at all (certainly not to a software Bob - though I haven't tried too hard).

The C2 should be powerful enough for a YADIF 2x - at least on 480i/576i SD - but doesn't seem to do this?

For native progressive stuff being carried over interlaced (i.e. movies, most sit com and many docs) you can do a basic 'treat it like a frame' process (which is either a Weave deinterlace or ignoring deinterlacing depending on how you look at it), but for native interlaced stuff you need to do a Bob, a YADIF 2x or 1x (which will give you comb-free video but at half the frame rate than is ideal) or similar?
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#98
Yes Bob, Bob inverted, Software blend with Android mediacodec. Turn off deinterlacing (which you cannot do when using amcodec) and you get the usual video combing effect when the camera pans about.

Looks like a Android Kodi coding deinterlacing limitation from way back in the day when Koying was playing about with deinterlacing on the FireTV1. Or AML have not implemented deinterlacing properly when using mediacodec in Android Lollipop.

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#99
Thanks for the great information guys. Is Amlogic as hard-core about NDA (non-disclosure) requirements as Broadcom is? I was hoping that a totally open piece of hardware would help speed things along, but I don't know that Amlogic is any more open than Broadcom, perhaps you guys could elaborate on that?

Until there is good deinterlacing, the wife isn't going to be very receptive to swapping out the Pi2 I use in the living room for a C2. I'm not going to be happy until I have 7.1 sound that I've come to love, 2.0 isn't going to cut it at my house. Passthrough is fine with me. Most of what we (at home here) use the Pi for is recorded TV that is SD interlaced MPEG-2 (480i), though we do watch a few HD programs live as well. I was hoping to be able to eventually swap in a C2 to get the program guide up quicker (lots of OTA channels here in houston)

I really hope that there isn't any hardware limitation to getting SD MPEG-2 scaled and deinterlaced nicely and/or getting Dolby passthrough from the C2. As long as the limits are in software, I'm good with waiting for the fixes.

I'm looking at playing with the new fork, LibreELEC too. I won't stick the C2 into "production" here at home, but I will be trying to make use of it as much as possible.

I'm a regular C programmer from way back and been dinking with Linux since it came on floppies ('94), but I know next to nothing about how all this OpenELEC stuff fits together. I always wanted to build my own copy of a Milhouse nightly, but just didn't find the time to do it. I'm not too handy with C++ either. I'm going to try building Kodi (Jarvis) from scratch and tinker with it under Ubuntu on the C2.
Experience: It's what you get when you were expecting something else.
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Android testing: - WeTek Jarvis 16.0rc3 Media Player
Deinterlacing is working and working well for 25/50fps SD/HD mpeg2, so long as you use amcodec with its Hardware Motion Adaptive deinterlacing only. 29.97fps mpeg2 resulted in a black screen.

BUT if you use Android you have to turn amcodec OFF all the time to watch 23.976fps movies if you want to have refresh rate switching working as well. Its a PITA.
The other alternative is disable refresh switching completely and just run everything at 50Hz or 60Hz to stop amcodec / Kodi switching to an old (non S905) unsupported S8xx AMLogic display mode.

I will try Ubuntu next with a few custom versions of Kodi to see if there are any amcodec improvements, particularly 25/50fps mpeg2 TV and 23.976fps movie viewing with refresh switching.

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Thanks for the information wrxtasy. Unfortunately, I'm in 60Hz land so 29.97fps MPEG-2 is pretty important to me. Is hardware decompression for MPEG-2 also taking place? On the Pi, you have to buy a codec license to get MPEG-2. Is that free (available and already enabled) on the C2?

I didn't really want to go the Android route if avoidable. Netflix would be okay, but I've got that solved (along with Amazon Prime) a different way (smart BluRay player for the livingroom projector and smart TV in the bedroom). I just use the Pi for the live TV, recordings and some of the addons.

Because my Onkyo receiver and my projector don't like refresh rate changes, it's something that I live without on my Pi already. I don't seem to notice anything odd because of it, but then I don't really watch any 24fps things through my Pi.
Experience: It's what you get when you were expecting something else.
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Android Testing: - SPMC 16.1.2 (Kodi Jarvis)

Config:
- amcodec, mediacodec (surface), mediacodec - all enabled
- dynamic refresh switching enabled - start/stop
- Audio Android , PCM 2.0

Results:
--> 25/29.97/50/59.94fps Interlaced 1080i mpeg2/h264 all plays back correctly, with nice Hardware deinterlacing using amcodec.
Kodi refresh switches the TV to the correct display mode. I can now watch 25/50fps 1080i/720p mpeg2/h264 broadcast TV Smile

--> 23.976fps AVC/H264/ 8/10 bit HEVC plays correctly using amcodec decoding, refresh switching works Smile

--> 23.976fps 2160p 10bit HEVC plays using amcodec at a downscaled 1080p video output, but no refresh switching occurs.

--> 23.976fps VC-1 plays back with stutters (AML Kernel issue)

--> 29.97fps VC-1 is surprisingly the smoothest playback I've seen ever !

Bugs:
- 25fps 576i Interlaced TV uses ff-mpeg2 or mediacodec. Bob Inverted has to be used with Post Processing enabled. The picture is pretty watchable with this combo surprisingly, but still not as good as AML Hardware deinterlacing.

- after dynamic refresh rate switching occurs say to 23.976fps, upon stopping a movie the Kodi GUI will not switch back to 60Hz. The GUI stays at the last refresh rate of the video output used.

- a random black screen with Audio only. Fixed by bringing up any sort of OSD, video then displays properly.

Conclusion:
For my 1080p TV viewing and 10-bit HEVC movie playback purposes the C2 is now usable as amcodec no longer dynamic switches and tries to use unsupported AML S905 display modes. HDMI CEC control works. 2160p is still a WIP.


Interesting ODROID-C2, compared to Raspberry Pi 3 and Orange Pi Plus raw numbers review:
http://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2016/re...ge-pi-plus

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SPMC : Basic Bluray 3D iso playback (experimental; amlogic) = very promissing news , it is time to try it out
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(2016-03-30, 12:20)seba1970 Wrote: SPMC : Basic Bluray 3D iso playback (experimental; amlogic) = very promissing news , it is time to try it out

Frame Packed or Half-resolution output?
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(2016-03-30, 13:08)noggin Wrote: Frame Packed or Half-resolution output?

No Frame Packed with the current Kernel from AMLogic. You can switch to SBS and TB just fine using the magic "3dtb" and "3dlr" but no Frame Packing.
The version of SPMC I tried did switch to Top/Bottom when playing 3D content (I tried MVC mkv files) but the video wasn't displayed correctly.

For the fun of it, I modified the Kernel to also support Frame Packing on the C2, at least my BenQ projector switched to "Frame packing" when sending the correct HDMI packet. But I am currently stuck in being able to create a screen with 1920x2205 pixels at 24Hz so I could do a test and draw a frame packed demo image I have. The projector just stretches the 1080 pixels over both "eyes" so it's not better than Top/Bottom at the moment.
Anyone knows how to create a screen mode other then the ones offered in the boot.ini? I looked into the kernel sources from AMlogic but this is the first time kernel hacking for me. I know C, but have no knowledge of Linux.
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ODROID C2 S905 2GB RAM HDMI 2.0 $4610