OrangePee Posted January 22, 2020 Posted January 22, 2020 Hello community, I wonder how Armbian could run on this (now dirt cheap*) Mecool M8S Plus W Android 7.1 TV Box (Amlogic 905W) which doesn't have a microSD card slot or even ethernet. *Did I say dirt cheap? Around $18 shipped for the 2GB/16GB RAM/ROM sounds cheap - doesn't it? See here for more information: https://www.cnx-software.com/2020/01/22/mecool-m8s-plus-w-tv-box-sells-for-less-than-15-promo/
OrangePee Posted January 23, 2020 Author Posted January 23, 2020 Some one wrote in the comments from cnx: Quote NicoD wrote: I just ordered one with 2GB and 16GB eMMC. I’ll try to make Armbian work on it.It’ll have to be over USB. Balbes Armbian already supports booting from USB on Amlogic. So I see no reason why it wouldn’t work. That sounds nice. But who Balbes? @balbes150 maybe?
balbes150 Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 No port for LAN -> will not work properly. WiFi is shit that will never work properly. If you add a USB module for a wired network, the price of this solution will be clearly higher than models with a built-in wired network port. The s905 uses USB 2.0, so the speed will be low. Perhaps this model uses not s905W, but s905y shit, so this is a low price. IMHO I would not recommend spending money on this stuff, for working with Armbian this is a bad option. By the way, it is still unknown which WiFi chip is used there, it may not work at all on Linux. 1
noname4public Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 Interesting piece of hardware! I just ordered for $17.70 including shipping the 2G/16G version (including the case, sure because it's a TV box, power plug, hdmi cable and a remote). The bang for bugs is already amazing. I hope it will run at least a *elec thing, maybe one day also armbian could work. From reviews I read so far it should be really a S905W - for the WiFi I have no idea. In the worst case a USB WiFi/ethernet will fix it. The running Android should be prerooted and without bloat/spyware. This should be already a big plus. Intact this is my first SBC (it's a TV box, I know) with more than 1Gb of ram: I am excited! I'm not a robot 1
NicoD Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 1 hour ago, NewDisplayNameRequired said: NicoD wrote: I just ordered one with 2GB and 16GB eMMC. I’ll try to make Armbian work on it.It’ll have to be over USB. Balbes Armbian already supports booting from USB on Amlogic. So I see no reason why it wouldn’t work. I bought it to play around with. Nothing of imprortance. It was the cheapest I ever found. 18.70euro for 2GB 16GB eMMC delivered at home. I can made a video on what is possibe with it. I bought the X96Air and loved it. But gave it away as new years gift for my nephew. So I could use another Anrdoid box. Its got Mali450, so it might work with Lima in Armbian. There are no nice new SBCs I want, so I've got to find something to play with. Didn't get a PineBookPro or OPi4. I'd rather have played around with those. I only see the RockPiX of importance that's coming. It's gonna be a long wait for higher performing ARM SoCs than S922X. Maybe a half year or more. 22 minutes ago, balbes150 said: IMHO I would not recommend spending money on this stuff, for working with Armbian this is a bad option. By the way, it is still unknown which WiFi chip is used there, it may not work at all on Linux. I bought it to have an Android device to learn how others use android. I truly hate working with it, but so many others are only interested in Android. To grow my following I can try going that way too. It is good for gaming and media. Having Armbian on it is not needed for me, but would be nice to do my benchmarks. I've got way better boards for Armbian. I'd rather also buy a S922X TV-Box with 4GB ram and 64GB eMMC. Found some good choices, but couldn't decide. If you know of a good cheap model. Its to do video editing and rendering. The N2 lacks in its cpu performance vs the VIM 3 while vim3 has too litle ram with 2GB. So anything with the CPU of vim3 and 4GB ram would be just perfect for me. 2
balbes150 Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 On 1/23/2020 at 10:45 AM, noname4public said: I just ordered for $17.70 including shipping the 2G/16G version (including the case, sure because it's a TV box, power plug, hdmi cable and a remote). "Congratulations," you threw the money in the trash. Here for $ 20 is a full-fledged model with a wired network and tested for working with Armbian (without WiFi). Here's a link to a model with a much better chip that your model doesn't even remotely compare to. s905w with a full LAN port and SD card support, it's easy to buy for$20 and If desired, you can even find the s905x3 (which is an order of magnitude better than the s905w) for the same $ 20-22. The S905x3 has a USB 3.0 SD LAN ...... Spoiler The link was removed to avoid creating ads for a specific store. Everyone can find similar products with a similar price. 2
wtarreau Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 5 hours ago, balbes150 said: > The link was removed to avoid creating ads for a specific store. Everyone can find similar products with a similar price. It would have been nice at least to keep the mention that the device Balbes was talking about was the X96 Max, that's not specific to any store and it's just a board with a supported SoC (S905X3), otherwise his post becomes confusing or misleading since it's a different hardware from the one posted above. 1
TRS-80 Posted January 23, 2020 Posted January 23, 2020 9 minutes ago, wtarreau said: X96 Max Yes I also learned of this device from this thread. Just becoming acquainted with TV Boxes recently, so this was good information for me. I'm sure others coming across the thread, too.
balbes150 Posted January 24, 2020 Posted January 24, 2020 13 hours ago, wtarreau said: It would have been nice at least to keep the mention that the device Balbes was talking about was the X96 Max, that's not specific to any store and it's just a board with a supported SoC (S905X3), otherwise his post becomes confusing or misleading since it's a different hardware from the one posted above. It's about the price for the equipment. S905X3 or any other equipment with the best characteristics, for the same amount, an order of magnitude better solution. I gave links to specific stores selling at these prices. 1
hexdump Posted January 24, 2020 Posted January 24, 2020 btw. i doubt that the initially mentioned box really has 2g/16g at this price - see my other posting about fake tv boxes here - i guess it will be 1g/8g maybe even nand instead of emmc if you are unlucky - all this with a hacked up android letting it look like 2g/16g so that a normal user will not recognize it ... 1
OrangePee Posted January 24, 2020 Author Posted January 24, 2020 20 hours ago, balbes150 said: "Congratulations," you threw the money in the trash. Let's See. I don't have it yet. To me it looks like that at least *elec is supported and a custom Android Rom is also available. My usecase is to replace my raspberry pi kodi box on my more than 10 year old TV to get a fresh(er) experience. I have a tight budget and are triying to use as little (money & resources) as possible. I just thought I check out if armbian is supported because it's nice to know and always great for a later live of a device. I used to own a beelink x2 (all winner h3) which is now serving as very reliable home assistant box based on armbian in his second live. 23 minutes ago, hexdump said: btw. i doubt that the initially mentioned box really has 2g/16g at this price - see my other posting about fake tv boxes here - i guess it will be 1g/8g maybe even nand instead of emmc if you are unlucky - all this with a hacked up android letting it look like 2g/16g so that a normal user will not recognize it ... This is valuable information. Any ideas how I could test the real amount of flash from inside android? For Linux I used to work with f3 which writes a disk full and then verifies the data after. You know then how big the drive is and have a simple benchmark for continuous writing big files. And ides how to check the real amount of ram out of android would be also very useful
OrangePee Posted January 24, 2020 Author Posted January 24, 2020 (edited) 4 hours ago, balbes150 said: It's about the price for the equipment. S905X3 or any other equipment with the best characteristics, for the same amount I did some research but the cheapest box with a s905x3 was going shipped for around $25 (2g/16g/100M without power plug/hdmi cable) which is not only $7 more than the one I bought but also exceeds the custom free limit in my country which not only involves monetary fees but also a 3 hours drive (one way) to pay and get my stuff. So even the price looks close (just around 20% more, actually 30%) it can be already out of reach for people in some countries... Any way: Back to topic How would I (try) to boot a armbian on a s905w TV box without the microSD. Some one mentions a USB boot is possible? Does this work "out of the box" if a bootable USB is present or are there modifications necessary before Is there any links/information available (maybe for other boxes with same soc)? Edited January 24, 2020 by NewDisplayNameRequired $25 (2g/16g/100M without power plug/hdmi cable) which is not only $7 more... actually 30%.....
balbes150 Posted January 24, 2020 Posted January 24, 2020 1 hour ago, NewDisplayNameRequired said: To me it looks like that at least *elec is supported and a custom Android Rom is also available. This is a forum about Armbian and Linux, for which this model has no use. Therefore, placing this information here has only one benefit, show the rest (who need to run Armbian), do not spend money on such options. If you want to discuss other systems (not related to the main core and Armbian) - they have their own forums, discuss it there. 1 hour ago, NewDisplayNameRequired said: (just around 20% more) it can be already out of reach for people in some countries... It is better to pay 20% more and get a working solution (with obviously better characteristics) than to throw$18 in the trash. Or for the same$ 18 to find a working solution.
OrangePee Posted January 24, 2020 Author Posted January 24, 2020 4 hours ago, balbes150 said: This is a forum about Armbian and Linux AFAIK the *elec systems are based on Linux and use recent kernels. If they run on the box and (maybe) even WiFi this information is highly valuable for armbian - if I understand it right. To know that a custom android ROM exist doesn't maybe help that much but even that is a complementary information for people who seek for information about this box and end up in this forum. 4 hours ago, balbes150 said: It is better to pay 20% more and get a working solution I understand you don't like this box or even the soc. But as I posted - it's maybe 20% more for you but for others it simply many 100% more. If you have any valuable information about this TV box your posts are very welcome @balbes150 Here are is a shot from inside (1G/8G version) I found in this thread (more in the link) Looks like a s905w and a piece of flash to me. If it's a nand or emmc I can't tell @hexdump ? Let's see what I get...
OrangePee Posted January 25, 2020 Author Posted January 25, 2020 So wifi should be a (sh*tty/unsupported) SSV6051P but the board/soc itself should be already supported in mainline Linux using the TX3 device tree.
balbes150 Posted January 25, 2020 Posted January 25, 2020 28 minutes ago, NewDisplayNameRequired said: So wifi should be a (sh*tty/unsupported) SSV6051P but the board/soc itself should be already supported in mainline Linux using the TX3 device tree. Chip 6051 (lame shit, not having any support), without a network, it is only suitable for garbage. Adding any USB network card automatically raises the price to 25-30$. Given that this is the worst s905w chip and only two USB ports (without SD card), this device does not have any practical use. The topic is closed.
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