http://www.hardkernel.com/renewal_2011/products/prdt_info.php?g_code=G1374633... Remember back when I told you about all them custom case mod guys and hard core overclocker guys that were left out in the rain when the PC when solder type ball connect and left them with nothing to fiddle with? That they were gonna have to get into Android in a big way eventually?
Well, it has started in South Korea already. And it is rapidly spreading across the world.
Hardkernel is a performance mod company that builds performance boards and accessories for Samsung chipsets. They have goosed and cooled and overclocked and generally had a good time playing with each generation of Samsung manufactured ARM hard macro designs as they rolled in.
This encased board set with the tiny little overclocker fan built into takes advantage of the FOUR sensors on the board that monitor chip heat and critical systems reliability. This little thing was built to cook, but not burn, to cook right along at rates not seen yet out of any Android chipset (especially after the refrigerated water jacket is put on, that is).
Remember these are the guys that figured out how to light all 8 cores at once, yup, this is them.
What is neat is that they fiddled with the OctaCore until Samsung paid attention -- they had uncovered ways to make the stock chip DO a lot more, so Samsung built some of their tricks into version 2 of the big dog Samsung OctaCore. Now they want to play with the 20-40% extra stock power in version 2 OctaCore to see what it can do.
Now, look at the first picture that has the smaller board partially stripped of connectors, etc. That is one small chipset to have so much power inside it.
We look forward to watching the Hardkernel crew goose this "second most powerful ARM chipset" to levels that go double and triple the output speed of the old white HP box that I type this on ....
Linux versions will be available for this board soon. If it sells big enough it will likely get supported by Ubuntu and Linaro and get into the kernel so it will be around for a long long time ..... See posts below for the bad news about VR graphics and no accelerated driver support from VR at all.HardKernel has been pretty regular about putting out new Samsung overclocker mini-boards for the last 3 generations of chipsets. Build quality is excellent and fan based software support is good, so we are watching this one to see how it turns out.
Watch out for the video specs if you want to buy something quick -- the OctaCore version 2 changed over to a fast Mali graphics core and this verbiage still refers to the old VR graphics -- watch out that they are selling the first run of boards built using the
unimproved Samsung chip.
I'd hold off buying until Linux distro support is mainstream Ubuntu 14.04 which will be out in April of next year.
Next, this thing is double up on the price of their old boards -- I'd expect the price to drop down during the wait time as well.