Tronsmart TV Box Ara X5 in August with Cherry Trail Z8300 Windows 10

[bluesmanuk]

Could be a licencing issue.

All players apart from Kodi and Film and TV give pretty poor video performance.

[Myst3r]

Thanks for the info. Wondering if no HD audio is a Kodi issue or the box. Can you play a DTS-HD or Dolby TureHD movie outside of Kodi?

Default Media Player : No sound at all
VLC 64 bit : Audio : Same as Kodi (Passthrough with DTS HD, but only stereo and No Passthrough with Dolby True HD); and Video is really really bad

As I said, maybe I've an issue with my AV receiver setup, i've never tried DTS HD or Dolby TrueHD before

[Jir591]

Just tried with sample files from http://www.demo-world.eu/2d-demo-trailers-hd/

I have a 7.1 AV receiver but I only have a 5.1 speaker installation
On Kodi 15.1 :

DTS-HD MA 7.1 in 1080P -->Passthrough but sound in 2.0 only (no drop frame)
Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Atmos in 1080P --> No passthrough, sound in 2.0 (no drop frame)

DTS-HD MA 5.1 -->PAssthrough, but sound in 2.0 (no drop frame)
Dolby TrueHD 5.1 in 1080p -->No passthrough, sound in 2.0 (no drop frame)


Maybe it's an issue with my AV receiver.

As a remember, DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 work perfect

Thanks for the info. Wondering if no HD audio is a Kodi issue or the box. Can you play a DTS-HD or Dolby TureHD movie outside of Kodi?

[Myst3r]

From the comments I see that DTS and Dolby 5.1 HDMI passthrough seems to work. What about DTS-HD and Dolby TrureHD?

Just tried with sample files from http://www.demo-world.eu/2d-demo-trailers-hd/

I have a 7.1 AV receiver but I only have a 5.1 speaker installation
On Kodi 15.1 :

DTS-HD MA 7.1 in 1080P -->Passthrough but sound in 2.0 only (no drop frame)
Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Atmos in 1080P --> No passthrough, sound in 2.0 (no drop frame)

DTS-HD MA 5.1 -->PAssthrough, but sound in 2.0 (no drop frame)
Dolby TrueHD 5.1 in 1080p -->No passthrough, sound in 2.0 (no drop frame)


Maybe it's an issue with my AV receiver.

As a remember, DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 work perfect

[bluesmanuk]

It is not just synthetic test. Thatmean this box will trottle in any 3D game. Any good boxes with Z8x00 predecessor Z3735F (like Minix Z64, etc) can work unlimited time in 3D games (and unlimited LinX and AIDA64) without trottling. Tronsmart has not considered the experience of the other manufacturers (that builds Atom Z3700 boxes for the 1 year) and users comments. Eglobal makes Broadwell-U (i3, i5, i7!) boxes with passive cooling that works without throttling. Tronsmart Ara X5 is crude product. It like bad joke..

I doubt that a 3D game is going to stress test the box in the same way as the synthetic tests do and as shown earlier by alwaysbless, gaming is actually quite reasonable.

So in order to really carry out a real world test you would have to show what happens when a 3D game that should run on such a device is used.

That is more of an acid test, so I'm afraid that you have yet to really show it to be a bad joke.

[jchoong]

Kyrie, thanks for the very detailed "torture" tests you put the Ara X5 through. However I concur with bluesmanuk's comments.

I am a light user; and no games. So, I am not going to be worried about the heat dissipation issues you cited.

For those heavy users and gamers, would a cooling fan eg the Targus chill mat (pic in earlier post) be the answer to the heat problem?

[Kyrie]

It's just a synthetic test.

It is not just synthetic test. Thatmean this box will trottle in any 3D game. Any good boxes with Z8x00 predecessor Z3735F (like Minix Z64, etc) can work unlimited time in 3D games (and unlimited LinX and AIDA64) without trottling. Tronsmart has not considered the experience of the other manufacturers (that builds Atom Z3700 boxes for the 1 year) and users comments. Eglobal makes Broadwell-U (i3, i5, i7!) boxes with passive cooling that works without throttling. Tronsmart Ara X5 is crude product. It like bad joke..

[bluesmanuk]

The last chance to a Tronsmart Ara X5 — http://www.ixbt.com/blogs/case/posle...rt-ara-x5.html (you may use Google Translate). Passive cooling modding, my second topic. Bad news, only alu case will help that box. Tronsmart Ara X5 is not ready for market and end users.

I think that you are being way too pessimistic and not thinking about the real world use.

If I sat in my parked car and put my foot flat on the accelerator for 15 minutes I would expect my engine to get very hot indeed but that won't ever be a condition that I would expect in day to day use.

So by the same token I would not expect the X5 to be stress tested in the same manner for long periods.

It's just a synthetic test.

On a day to day basis, with an average of 8 hours use a day mine doesn't put a foot wrong and to me that is the real test of something that is ready for market, the fact that it does exactly what it says on the tin.

[Kyrie]

The last chance to a Tronsmart Ara X5 — http://www.ixbt.com/blogs/case/posle...rt-ara-x5.html (you may use Google Translate). Passive cooling modding, my second topic. Bad news, only alu case will help that box. Tronsmart Ara X5 is not ready for market and end users.

[alwaysbless]

Great review and ever more reasons to get one of these boxes.

Appreciate it! and Yea so far it seems like theres a lot more pluses then minuses like we saw with the baytrail mini pcs when they first hit the streets

[alwaysbless]

Thanks for the video, I am not a gamer but that was very impressive....

Yea I dont get to game too much either since I have a 3 year old now but its really interesting to see what these things are capable of doing if the right hardware is around

[Myst3r]

If you give me a link of a sample file with DTS-HD or Dolby TrueHD, i can test for you. My AV reveiver is pretty old, but it seems it is able to decode it : http://www.uk.onkyo.com/en/products/...ml?tab=Details

[Jir591]

From the comments I see that DTS and Dolby 5.1 HDMI passthrough seems to work. What about DTS-HD and Dolby TrureHD?

[Myst3r]

Tested KODI + Audio Passthrough (Codec AC3) : WORKS PERFECT !

Did anybody manage to connect PS3 controller in Bluetooth ?

[bluesmanuk]

Heres my gaming review guys if you wanna check out some xbox one or steam in home game streaming it should give you a good idea of what to expect

Great review and ever more reasons to get one of these boxes.