joaofl

My observations are:
 
- Android distribution: sucks! Very premature. One can not do anything. I was intended to test video playing, but could not get Kodi to run, neither any other app since Google play is not installed. So, even the apps that show up in the menu do not work. So I rapidly gave up on it.
Current when idle seemed stable at around 380mA
 
- Ubuntu server: distro does not boot if you have HDMI plugged in....
Idle current is 410mA
Ethernet seems to be really Gigabit... Results for iperf below.
in this case the current rises to 550mA.
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bandwidth [ 3] 0.0-60.0 sec 6.34 GBytes 907 Mbits/sec when using bidirectional simultaneous transfers with the following command:
root@OrangePi:~# iperf -c 192.168.1.100 -t 60 -d ------------------------------------------------------------ Server listening on TCP port 5001 TCP window size: 85.3 KByte (default) ------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------ Client connecting to 192.168.1.100, TCP port 5001 TCP window size: 113 KByte (default) ------------------------------------------------------------ [ 5] local 192.168.1.143 port 37423 connected with 192.168.1.100 port 5001 [ 4] local 192.168.1.143 port 5001 connected with 192.168.1.100 port 51684 [ ID] Interval Transfer Bandwidth [ 5] 0.0-60.0 sec 4.56 GBytes 653 Mbits/sec [ 4] 0.0-60.0 sec 4.92 GBytes 705 Mbits/sec  
Then I run the gcc_perf @Larry Bank from here: https://github.com/bitbank2/gcc_perf
Average current was around 560mA, with peak 640mA.
 
My conclusion is: This board makes sense as a remote video player, connected to some TV with Kodi, probably, so that you can stream from your main server. That because it has great ethernet, with great 4K video decoding capabilities....
 
One USB3 would make it a good choice for servers... But no...
 
 
 

probably not as long as things do not improve:
Xunlong provides an outdated 3.10.65 kernel (3.10.108 is the newest and reached EOL in Nov 2017), Mainline is... http://linux-sunxi.org/Mainlining_Effort#Status_Matrix on the way. (Edit: but for sure not ready yet, keep going @Icenowy ) There are no schematics released for the OPi One Plus (there are schematics in the 'user manual collection' but they are for the OPi Lite and it locks like copy paste...  (Design name: H6-PROTO, DC-In 12V/1A --> 5V/2A) spottend so far (xunlongs Ubuntu):
Thermal zones are there powering over microUSB 'works' (don't do it, but I've to wait for my second 5V barrel plug..) cpu freq seems to stay at 1800 MHz idle TZ0 48°C (1488MHz stress -c 4 ~10min TZ0: 83°C, TZ1: 69°C) minerd (~5min Total: 4.61 khash/s at 1488MHZ TZ087-89°C,  trip_point_1 would be at 90°C) keep in mind,  those numbers do not benchmark the SoC (it might benchmark the current available combination of OS and SoC). Cause SD-card is near to SoC, I stopped minerd to avoid a SD-Card BBQ... 
 
Hmm.. after minerd, the SoC idles sometimes at 480MHz...  Next topic might be the investigation of the  PMIC (AXP805).

Thanks for noticing that. I've got mine sitting on my desk as a paperweight waiting for someone to release a working Linux distro for it. I'll report back my power consumption and speed measurements later today.
 
Ugh - now I remember why I appreciate Armbian so much. The Linux distro provided by OrangePi is 1.5GB, yet somehow is missing everything I need. This may take a while...
 
Update: The board doesn't really seem to have any advantage over H5 boards. The max CPU frequency in the kernel shows as being 1.8Ghz, with the min set to 480Mhz. When pushed by my gcc_perf test, the results didn't fare much better than an RPI3. The power usage is what's really disappointing. The other H2+/H3/H5 boards I've tested usually max out at about 580mA when all 4 cores are cranking. The H6 is supposed to be a 28nm process and I thought that would mean lower power usage. The Orange Pi One Plus maxes out at 830mA when all 4 cores are stressed by gcc. Can anyone else do some testing to see if it matches my results?

I just (again) wasted two hours to remember that any of those kernels needs a lot of code cleaning and fixing than "just" USB3. When this is done, than it would be possible to start debugging without wasting hours / days. 
 
About year ago I was approached by Allo, when they were trying to design their own board around S500 (Sparky). They were talking about mainlining (wishes) or bringing things at least to kernel 4.4, but I guess they abandon the idea due to whatever reason. There was lots of discussion going on and after my second reminder, that they need to hire and pay for my time, if they want me involved into their activities, I tuned myself out. They didn't listen what I was trying to tell them anyway. 

Not necessarily. Most of those bench marking methods are wrong / pointless in first place. This way is more realistic, and as you can see, there is something wrong with USB3 stack ...  
 
 

All boards that fancy micro USB connector for powering are prone to power related issues. I would secure that part firs. Different cables, PSU, perhaps powering via GPIO.

It's all about kernel, which is most likely the same on all stock builds which is 1+ years old and generally in bad shape. IIRC there were some problems with USB3 and it's possible that is disabled.

There are three companies / boards which are using Actionsemi S500: Lemaker Guitar, Xapple RoseapplePi and Allo Sparky. We are using Lemaker's kernel, which is in better shape than from Xapple, while I haven't check if Allo made any progress. In any case, there is little to no community involvement.

On your text:
 
 
Thanks again.

Just upgrade the u-boot. I assume you already add my repository? (howto: http://forum.armbian.com/index.php/topic/211-kernel-update-procedure-has-been-changed/)
apt-get install linux-u-boot-cubietruck reboot I think this is all you need to do and you should be fine.

What do we have?

Serial connection:
 

 
Hardware schematics:
orangepi-plus-h3-v1_1.pdf
 
Wireless: Realtek RTL 8189 ETV
 
Allwinner introduced new way of storing board definitions (also on A23 and A80) so it's a bit different than on A20 boards.
H3_Manual_build_howto
 
Kernel building with Allwinner SDK is terrible and was not able to build it. I must admit I haven't invest much time and energy yet.