[HH] ODROID-U2 announced...

[Tom Metro]

Kurt Keville wrote:
> http://www.hardkernel.com/renewal_2011/main.php
> 
> what a deal, not only is it half the price of it's larger brother...

The page has several inconsistencies. At the top it says both boards use
1.7 GHz CPUs. Further down, where the cheaper board is detailed, it says
it uses a 1.4 GHz CPU.

Yet on the dedicated product page for the ODROID-U2:
http://www.hardkernel.com/renewal_2011/products/prdt_info.php?g_code=G135341370451

It says 1.7 GHz everywhere. Which is right? That page also says it is
powered by the Exynos4412 Prime, rather than the non-prime version they
specify on the page Kurt linked to.

At the top the price of the cheaper board is $89. Lower down its shown
as $69. On the dedicated product page, where the actual "buy" button is,
its $89, so I assume that's right.

So let me guess...they planned to release a $69 version with the 1.4 GHz
non-prime CPU, but then decided instead to release an $89 version using
the same prime CPU, and never bothered to go back and clean up their old
pre-release info?

Quoting from the page:

  full metal enclosure

That's a bit of a stretch. It's a heat sink with two sides extended to
protect the board some (enough so you can set it on a metal table
without shorting anything out). 3 sides are still open and exposed.
Though I guess this is still better than the (lack of) enclosure you get
with most dev boards. But if you're going to use this as a set top box
in your living room, you'll need something better.

It has Ethernet, 2 USB, and audio, but curiously no mention of HDMI in
the feature list, although it is in the spec table. Also microSD slot.
(And it has a serial console.)

The product page has a video demonstrating the board running XBMC and
decoding 1080p H.264 video. (Near the end they show the CPU usage, which
was: CPU0  57% CPU2: 24%; So not likely hardware accelerated, but
apparently it has enough capability to do it the job in software. What
happened to CPU1 and CPU3?)

They sell a fan as an accessory. Is that a hint?


An interesting accessory on the product page:

  USB to IO expansion board for GPIO/PWM/SPI/UART/I2C/ADC interfaces
  3.3V/5V compatible PIC18F45K50-QFN USB Microcontroller is mounted.
  Breadboard friendly 28pin header pins
  Example code for Android / Linux will be released.

which they are selling for $15. Looks like it could be used as a general
purpose I/O board with any USB host.


> ...but they gave you their Credit Card number so you can complete the
> rest of your Xmas shopping as well...  :)

If you're curious, Kurt is referring to one of the photos on the page
where they show the new board next to a credit card for size comparison.
They made no attempt to hide the card number. (Probably a pre-paid or
expired card.)

 -Tom