[MediaPi]

The makers of cubox have released a board similar to the Raspberry Pi but more powerful hardware. The cost is $44.99 (I dont know if that is inclusive of shipping or exclusive.) £26.23.

I'm sure there will be people interested. I am. does anyone knowledgable enough willing to share the pros and cons? Is anyone planning on purchasing a HummingBoard.

they have other more expensive models if you want a look. You can actually swap the SOC for a dual core. pretty cool

[noggin]

The Hummingboard is the Cubox-i in a different form factor and with some slightly different I/O options. They share the same SOMs (System on Modules) which have the CPU+GPU and RAM on them.

You can buy the board+SOM as a single purchase, or the board as a carrier and the SOM separately. You can also buy the Cubox-i including the SOM or just as a carrier. The SOMs are common to both types of motherboard I believe. The IO included is pretty impressive.

AIUI the Cubox-i includes a Quad Core model, but the Hummingboards don't currently. The cheapest model in both ranges is the single core model - which is apparently marginal for XBMC? The cheaper of the two Dual Cores have the less powerful GPU (the GPU doesn't do video decoding though - that's a separate function). I think the higher-end of the two dual core or the quad core models are the ones to go for for future proofing - though others will know more. I think the single core is best avoided. The high end models include GigE, SATA (or mSATA) and IR functionality. They also include better analogue audio support. (The low-end ones have mono analogue audio output)

The first gen Cubox wasn't exactly brilliantly supported. The Cubox-i/Hummingboard uses a more popular CPU/SoC - the i.MX6 - which has better documentation and is being used on more platforms.

[Ned Scott]

mmm, Freescale. Now this guy I like :D

Though it still misses much of the point about being "similar" to a raspberry pi (in that the value of the Pi comes from things not directly related to the exact size and placement of ports) it's still an excellent little bugger. Freescale devices also have a much brighter future with XBMC than those old Allwinner chips.

I'm not sure were it stands when compared to various other ARM boxes, but it certainly seems attractive at first glance. Especially since the starting price is $45.

[whitebelly]

It is interesting. They claim high quality audio. If so, it could be a good fit for analog music applications (Edit...too bad its only on the expensive model). The S/PDIF out is smart to include as well.

Specs

[invisable]

It is interesting. They claim high quality audio. If so, it could be a good fit for analog music applications (Edit...too bad its only on the expensive model). The S/PDIF out is smart to include as well.

Specs

Ordered one of these earlier the hummingboard i2ex I'm in UK and think with shipping and power adapter it came out at £78 which doesn't seem to bad.
If it is really bad I will set up as a headless media seeing as it has the gigabit Ethernet port

[MediaPi]

you paid around £19 shipping when the cost of the board is around £58. Owch.

pay an extra £14 and get Intel DN2820FYKH Barebone Desktop (Celeron N2820 2.39GHz, HD Graphics, WLAN, Bluetooth 4.0)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Intel-DN2820FYKH...B00I60Z8Q2

nice case included and anything goes wrong ship back to amazon for free. all you need is Ram (£2 used from ebay for 1G) and USB3 stick (but you need to buy a microsd card for the Hummingboardanyway)

£16 more for the NUC...

these boards are misleading with the price tag. Shipping just takes these boards competing with boards much more capable that seem like more but have free shipping.

I was only interested in the cheapest board and was hoping it would be faster than the Pi but sometimes we dont know what we got. I've got my Pi running at 1.1Ghz. I have no interest in these boards anymore and before they can gather any momentum better cheaper boards will be out.

[QLink]

is it true they managed to give it the same CEC ability like the rpi ?

http://www.solid-run.com/products/hummin...fications/

[Abshole]

Just read about this today. Might buy the higher end one for giggles.

[fernandovg]

I thought it had wireless/bluetooth... there's not.

[noggin]

I thought it had wireless/bluetooth... there's not.

The Cubox-i 4Pro has WiFi/Bluetooth - there doesn't seem to be a Hummingboard equivalent of that model of Cubox-i. (Both use the same SOM range)

[Abshole]

I'd only get this (or the BB) was if I was certain it would work with the touchscreen I have with my RPi.

[skimshady]

The HummingBoard-i2eX (110$ + Box is extra) seems tempting!

This should be a solid choice for OpenElec according to specs However, is the Cubox-i2eX better for this? (110$, Box & Wifi/Bluetooth included, however with weaker GPU) Any other boxes that is a better choice in this price range?

Is these issues a problem with both boxes in question?

Known limitations to Android versions of XBMC, i.e. automatic framerate switch and full Airplay functionality. Will this be fixed in SW soon?

In Openelec picture quality have some issues:
- The output produces "crushed blacks", thus rendering PQ not watchable and like crap.
- The same problem had drivers for linux on Intel NUC (in particular on Intel HD graphics cards)... for more you can search on XBMC forum under NUC Haswell thread (look for posts from user called Imyllari).
- The problem is that Cuboxi doesn't tell the TV set at which color range the picture will come.

Bitstreaming doesn't pass TrueHD and DTS-MA.


Anyone tried it out??

[invisable]

The HummingBoard-i2eX (110$ + Box is extra) seems tempting!

This should be a solid choice for OpenElec according to specs However, is the Cubox-i2eX better for this? (110$, Box & Wifi/Bluetooth included, however with weaker GPU) Any other boxes that is a better choice in this price range?

Is these issues a problem with both boxes in question?

Known limitations to Android versions of XBMC, i.e. automatic framerate switch and full Airplay functionality. Will this be fixed in SW soon?

In Openelec picture quality have some issues:
- The output produces "crushed blacks", thus rendering PQ not watchable and like crap.
- The same problem had drivers for linux on Intel NUC (in particular on Intel HD graphics cards)... for more you can search on XBMC forum under NUC Haswell thread (look for posts from user called Imyllari).
- The problem is that Cuboxi doesn't tell the TV set at which color range the picture will come.

Bitstreaming doesn't pass TrueHD and DTS-MA.


Anyone tried it out??

Got mine through Friday, I've only had a couple of hours to test it, I see there are no stable builds out for it, however I did install one of the openelec Helix nightly builds, (which is a cuboxi version) seemed to play everything I have thrown at it, I was getting freezing when navigating through menus, I'm waiting for a new class 10 uhs-1 micro sdxc card to see if that's the problem. As it didn't help running through a usb 3 stick.

[skimshady]

Got mine through Friday, I've only had a couple of hours to test it, I see there are no stable builds out for it, however I did install one of the openelec Helix nightly builds, (which is a cuboxi version) seemed to play everything I have thrown at it, I was getting freezing when navigating through menus, I'm waiting for a new class 10 uhs-1 micro sdxc card to see if that's the problem. As it didn't help running through a usb 3 stick.

Did it work out fine regarding freezing? Had any other issues? How responsive is it etc?

[invisable]

Yes the class 10 micro sd sorted the freezing out, compared to the rasp pi there is a noticeable performance increase, also cec works better on my LG tv on the hummingboard then it does on the pi, however I have only found one version of openelec that works and is relatively stable, it doesn't seem like there a great deal of support for these from the solidrun community they seem more interested in the cubox i4 and the last 3 devel versions of openelec don't work on the hummingboard (no sound/ blank screen etc).
I decided to go for the hummingboard i2ex as I wanted to install a 1.8 msata ssd however I havnt got around to doing this.
So overall I would say that it works for me and is an improvement over my pi but not very user friendly. Definitely not for people that don't want to get their hands dirty.

---

Also to be fair haven't messed around with xbian,geexbox and arch Linux versions yet so I can't comment on these.