Enter The Quad Core HDMI Stick

RK3188

It was less than 12 months ago that Rikomagic released its single core AllWinner A10 HDMI stick – a mini Android PC housed inside a tiny little plastic box with a HDMI plug on it. Now, 11 months later, those ‘powerful’ A10 processors are long since obsolete as we clamour for faster speeds, more cores and higher benchmark scores. Ever willing to oblige, our friends in China have dutifully managed to cram all that fresh new horsepower into the same tiny little plastic box and the web stores are about to explode once again with a thousand variations of the same tiny little computer.

One of the first to be recognised, thanks to Liliputing, is the Tronsmart T428 which was in pre-order status for a very long time – but is finally available to buy for $99 from Geekbuying. In true Chinese style, Tronsmart have just released the MK908 which is pretty much identical but in a different shell and costing $9 less at $89.99.

I hunted around for a while for something cheaper until stumbling across a new model by Ugoos called the UG007B. Our friends at Willgoo are offering a reduced price pre-order of the UG007B for the princely sum of $76.99 including shipping. No doubt the price will drop again over the next few months until we’re able to pick these up for around the $50 mark, but if you simply must have one now then this is the cheapest price I’ve found so far. If you’ve found another RK3188 stick cheaper somewhere else, do let me know!

Ugoos UG007B
Ugoos UG007B

8 thoughts on “Enter The Quad Core HDMI Stick”

  1. I wish someone makes a tablet – or a screen, speaker, and battery setup that you can install these cards into. That could be a jump on the “upgragable tablet” or handheld.

    Reply
    • I think the closest you can get to that is the Motorola Lapdock, it does have mini HDMI and usb on it. If you search for it on Amazon I’m sure you can find it for around eighty bucks.

      Reply
    • I agree, if one brand could standardise the size of the casing so that multiple versions all fit inside the same handheld “shell”, it could be a great product. You’d open a battery type cover on the back (ventilated though I guess), slide in your mini PC and clip it closed. And when you want to use it on the TV you could either do it via HMDI on the handheld shell or take the mini PC out and plug it straight into the TV. It’s a great idea man, a semi modular handheld. I hope someone with the know how and facilities to make it happen makes it happen some day. 😀

      Reply
    • Not yet, everywhere has it as pre-order. If Ubuntu was available for any of the previous RockChip sticks then it’ll probably be available for this as well after a bit. The RK3188 really is a powerful SoC, it’ll be interesting to see what comes of it and if RockChip stick to their word about making the SoC easier to hack on.

      Reply
  2. These things are really cool to play with I’ll tell ya.
    In fact it was playing with an MK802+ that I came around to the idea of Ouya being simply a super duper version of one of these sticks and that’s when I bought in.
    My MK802+ unfortunately fell victim to ESD (Electrostatic discharge) and was destroyed, but that was a design flaw in that model that left out the oh-so important ESD circuitry.

    I picked up an MK803III for the in-laws and now they can access my home file server and watch movies or do any of the other things these little wonders can do on their great big HDTV. They love theirs!

    Now I’m waiting for my Ouya to arrive so I can basically wipe it and treat it like an open stick PC just like one of these (if and when I can).

    Reply

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