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Posted: **06 Jun 2016 22:00**

K 1 PLUS S2/T2 - ULTRA HD

Chipset: Amlogic S905 Quad core 64-bit Cortex A53 Up to 2.0GHz
GPU: Penta-core Mali-450 Up to 750MHZ
OS: Android 5.1.1
Tuner: Combo DVB-T/T2 and DVB-S/S2 with two connectors
Memory / Storage : 1GB, DDR 3 / Nand Flash 8GB (4-32 GB Optional)
LAN: Support LAN 100M/1000M Base-T
Wireless: Built in 2.4G WiFi
Bluetooth: Optional
Video Output: HDMI 2.0 4Kp60 10-bit HEVC, 4Kp30 MPEG / VC-1 / AVS+ / H.264
Audio Output: HDMI Data Output / SPDIF / AV 3.5 mm output
Power: DC 12V/1A DC-in
Dimensions : 130 x 120 x 32 mm
Optional DRM: Playready, Verimatrix, Widewine (Probably not available right now)
Peripheral: HDMI 2.0 4K 2K HDMI2.0 , HDCP2.2
Interface: 4 * USB HOST 4 High speed USB 2.0,support U DISK and USB HDD
1 * TF CARD Support 1~32GB
1 * AV AV output
1 * SPDIF Audio output
1 * RJ45 10/100 BaseT, 1000M( Optional)
Packing Includes: DC Power Adapter, IR remote control, HDMI 2.0 Cable, User Manual

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Oficial site: http://www.videostrong.com

Code: Select all

VideoStrong has launched K1 Plus TV box powered by Amlogic S905 processor last year, and I had the chance to review their model last November. But here I am reviewing K1 Plus again. Why? That’s because the company’s has several K1 Plus models: the “standard” version that’s just like any Android TV boxes, and the DVB version with DVB-S2, DVB-T2/C, or DVB-T2/C + DVB-S2 combo, and the latter is the one I’m reviewing today. K1 Plus DVB combo teardown revealed that the main board was exactly the same as K1 Plus “standard”, and that only a tuner card was added. So I’ll have a two part review with the first part checking if they fixed any of the bugs found on K1 Plus “Standard” with “November 2015” firmware in the new “January 27, 2016 DVB” firmware, and the second part will focus on testing DTV app with DVB-S2 and DVB-T2, PVR and time-shifting.


- Pre-installed Kodi 15.2 version does not work well when 2160p video output is selected (1080p output looks better); automatic frame rate switching is not working either. 
- HDMI – Dolby Digital 7.1+, DTS HD and Atmos pass-through not working; CEC not working; Video output resolution set in settings is not always used at next power on.
- Missing DTS and Dolby support for PCM output
- No DRM installed, even Widewine Level 3 required for SD playback on relevant apps.
- WiFi performance may be erratic (TBC), very good sometimes, and near stall speed at others.
- 3D games such as Beach Buggy Racing and Riptide GP2 are not playing very smoothly, and performance may degrade with play time (and higher heat).
- No option to show status and notification bars, no Download icon in app list.
- Lacks Bluetooth support
- USB hard drive partitions (NTFS / exFAT) reported as having 10MB free only, basically rendering the partitions read-only.

First I had to be careful to check output resolution is to 2160p @ 60 Hz, because the system will always revert to 1080p50 (as shown in the screenshot above), which remains a bug yet to be fixed. All videos were shown in Letterbox mode in K1 Plus “standard”, and i’s nice to see this have been fixed:

- H.264 codec / MP4 container (Big Buck Bunny) – 1080p – OK
- MPEG2 codec / MPG container –  1080p – OK
- MPEG4 codec, AVI container 1080p – OK
- VC1 codec (WMV) – 1080p – OK
- Real Media (RMVB), 720p / 5Mbps – OK
- WebM / VP8 – OK
- H.265 codec / MPEG TS container (1080p) – OK
- WebM / VP9 (no audio in video) – OK

4K video are also fairly well supported:

- HD.Club-4K-Chimei-inn-60mbps.mp4 – OK
- Sintel-2010-4k.mkv – OK
- Beauty_3840x2160_120fps_420_8bit_HEVC_MP4.mp4 (H.265) –  OK
- BT.2020.20140602.ts (Rec.2020 compliant video) – Stays in UI
- Big_buck_bunny_4k_H264_30fps.mp4 – OK
- Fifa_WorldCup2014_Uruguay-Colombia_4K-x265.mp4 (4K, H.265, 60 fps) – OK
- Samsung_UHD_Dubai_10-bit_HEVC_51.4Mbps.ts (10-bit HEVC / MPEG-4 AAC) – stays in UI
- Astra-11479_V_22000-Canal+ UHD Demo 42.6 Mbps bitrate.ts (10-bit H.265 from DVB-S2 stream) – Stays in UI

Unfortunately none of the 10-bit H.265 videos are playing. But it’s still a big progress since Kodi was pretty unusable in the standard version.
Last time I tested HDMI audio pass-through with Video Player, and this time I did it with Kodi, and sadly it’s not really usable.

- AC3 / Dolby Digital 5.1 – Audio OK (Dolby D 5.1), video not smooth
- E-AC-3 / Dolby Digital+ 5.1 – OK (Dolby D 5.1) most of the time, but two small audio cuts occurred during playback
- Dolby Digital+ 7.1 – PCM 2.0 only
- TrueHD 5.1 – PCM 2.0 only
- TrueHD 7.1 – PCM 2.0 only
- Dolby Atmos 7.1 – PCM 2.0 only
- DTS HD MA – DTS 5.1 only, and two short audio cuts during playback
- DTS HD HR – DTS 5.1 only, and one short audio cut during playback

That’s especially announcing since WeTek fixed HD audio pass-through in Amlogic S8xx and S9xx and confirmed it to work in both WeTek Core, and WeTek Play 2S at the beginning of the month, and even released the source code. But maybe Kodi is not a priority for Videostrong, and/or Chinese New Year holidays may have made February a slow month in China..

Since the company is not using Amlogic S905-H processor there was no way DTS and Dolby downsampling to PCM (stereo) would work with other apps, and I could confirm that MX Player would not output any audio from playing such files over PCM output.

I played a 2-hour 1080p video over WiFi from a SAMBA share, and it worked just fine.

K1 Plus DVB Android set-top box is one of the few Android TV boxes on the market with a combo DVB-S2 & DVB-T2 tuner, and I’m glad Videostrong brought this type of product to market. However, I’m very disappointed by the progress made on the firmware front between my review of K1 Plus standard with a firmware released in November, as they’ve almost fixed none of the issues I reported at the time. Kodi has improved a little (10-bit H.265 is not working though), Widevine DRM Level 3 has been enabled, but 3D games (Riptide GP2) still crash when graphics settings are set to high, 3D graphics performance is quite poor compared to other Amlogic S905 devices, it overheats leading to CPU/GPU throttling, the system feels sluggish at times with apps loading slowly, I still can’t use my USB hard drive (10MB bug), the user’s interface does not provide access to status and notifications bar, and so on… So it feels like either Videostrong does not have the resources for development, they don’t really care (or reuly think the firmware is good enough), or they are incompetent…

However, the DVB part is not that bad, as least compared to some other Amlogic Android DVB boxes I’ve tested in the past such as HD18T or ATV586. Most features work reasonably well, and I could use both DVB-S2 and DVB-T2 parts, but there are still some bugs such as artifacts at the beginning of recording videos or Timeshifting, and (Asian) font rendering issues. The system integration is also inexistent, meaning that the TV box and DTV app must be running at all times for scheduling to work, there’s no background process handling this, and you can’t simply use other Android apps, and expect to get a pop-up when the recording/playback start time has been reached. You also have to chose between DVB-S2 or DVB-T2, as you can’t record a program on DVB-S2, while watching a program on DVB-T2 for example.  The idea behind having a combo tuner is great, and it works, but the implementation is not as user-friendly and good as one may have expected.

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