Banana Pi BPI-M3

[Janos (retired)]

A83T ARM Cortex-A7 octa-core,512 KB L1 cache 1 MB L2 cache and if I read the spec correctly you can use all EIGHT cores at once.



http://www.bananapi.com/index.php/compo ... edit&id=85

[Silver]

Good spot Janos and I read the spec the same as you, 8 cores 8)
It'll be intersting to see what it's like when it goes on sale in October, oh and what sort of price it comes in at.

[Dirk Broer]

Most interestingly is the fact that the CPU/SOC onboard -the Allwinner A83T- is an Octo-core A7, not a big.LITTLE A17-A7 combo -like the Allwinner A80.

[Janos (retired)]

Can't wait to see some performance reviews.

[Janos (retired)]

http://forum.banana-pi.org/t/banana-pi- ... r-test/106

[skywalker tsbt]

Hi all. Hope everyone is having a great year!!

I'm considering grabbing some of these boards to play with but wanted to know what projects they can support. Can they do VGA processing to? OS? (linux GUI or command line?)

[scole of TSBT]

They have HDMI output, but if had to use VGA, you could try a HDMI-VGA adapter maybe. These are the OS options for the M3. Android (Android 5.1.1, Android 5.1.1),Linux (Bananian, Lubuntu, Raspbian, Debian GNU/Linux, Fedora, Arch Linux ARM, Gentoo, openSUSE), Berryboot, FreeBSD, OpenWrt. Not sure which linux versions, if any, have a GUI.

Here's a thread we try to keep up with projects with Android ARM apps.
http://www.dunadd.co.uk/seti/forum/view ... 140&t=2037
You could check those project pages to see if they also have a linux ARM app.

[Dirk Broer]

There's lots of OS options -theoretically. There's but one option though when you want to run BOINC applications: Android.
There's -at he time of the original posting- hardly any Linux ARM apps -with the exception of Raspbian for the ARM11 based Raspberry Pi. You can only hope for more Linux apps for ARMv7 based SBCs in the near future -a hope that has materialised.

Alas, still none of the Single-Boards so far has been able to offer us the use of their GPU for GPU-based crunching.

[Dirk Broer]

After the invasion of the Raspberry Pies there followed a rain of other fruit pies, the Banana Pi the most persistent so far.
Offered by two companies (BPI and Lemaker, who seems to have split up after the intial M1 and R1 models that they made -and still sell- together) they have rows of Banana's waiting for us.
The specs -at least- are good:

1000 MHz[/td]

Feature	Banana Pi M1	Banana Pi M1+	Banana Pro	Banana Pi M2	Banana Pi M2+	Banana Pi M3	Banana Pi R1
Size	92mm x 60mm	92mm x 60mm	92mm x 60mm	92mm x 60mm	65mm x 65mm	92mm x 60mm	148mm x 100mm
SOC	Allwinner A20	Allwinner A20	Allwinner A20	Allwinner A31s	Allwinner H3	Allwinner A83t	Allwinner A20
CPU	ARM Cortex-A7	ARM Cortex-A7	ARM Cortex-A7	ARM Cortex-A7	ARM Cortex-A7	ARM Cortex-A7	ARM Cortex-A7
Architecture	ARMv7-A	ARMv7-A	ARMv7-A	ARMv7-A	ARMv7-A	ARMv7-A	ARMv7-A
Speed	1000 MHz	1000 MHz	1200 MHz	1200 MHz	1800 MHz	1000 MHz	1000 MHz
Cores	2	2	2	4	4	8	2
RAM	1024 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	2048 MB	1024 MB
RAM/Core	512 MB	512 MB	512 MB	256 MB	256 MB	256 MB	512 MB
USB 2.0	2	2	2	4	2	2	2
LAN	10/100/1000	10/100/1000	10/100/1000	10/100/1000	10/100/1000	10/100/1000	4x 10/100/1000 LAN 1x 10/100/1000 WAN
WiFi	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Bluetooth	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	No
SATA	1x SATA-150	1x SATA-300	1x SATA-300	No	No	1x SATA-300	1x SATA-150
eMMc	No	No	No	No	8GB	8GB	No
Picture (clickable)
Drawing (clickable)

Despite being not as popular as the Raspberries, the Bananas do have some claim to fame.

• The original Banana Pi -now called the M1 and with two improved variants, Pro and M1+ - was a ARMv7 dual core with 1 GB RAM, when the original Raspberry Pi B still was a ARMv6 single core with 512 MB -and the original Raspberry Pi A still was a ARMv6 single core with 256 MB.
• The Banana Pi M2 already was a ARMv7 quad core -with higher clock speed- before the Raspberry Pi 2 arrived.
• The Banana Pi M3 is an ARMv7 octa-core, a feat which Raspberry has not managed -yet.
• The Banana Pi M2+ can be compared with the Raspberry Pi A+ (format-wise), but here the advantage is again with the Banana: it is a ARMv7 quad core with 1 GB RAM, while the Raspberry Pi A+ still is a ARMv6 single core with 256 MB.

Me personally, I am waiting for a Banana Pi R2, featuring all extra's (quad- or octo-core, WiFi, Bluetooth, eMMc, SATA-300).
Rumours are that you really need to cool the M3 to get all eight cores running at 1800 MHz.
Really need as in 'a small heatsink is not enough'.
Example of such a small heatsink (originally meant for the Raspberry Pi A and B):

These do excellent service on my BeagleBone Black at the moment and have a quite fitting colour.
The two biggies being 20x19x5 mm, the small one 8.5x19x5 mm.

[Dirk Broer]

I finally seem to have my Banana Pro running stable under Ubuntu Mate 15.04, first using an old 80486 heatsink (45x45x15 mm)

that covered both the Allwinner A20 SOC and the RAM chips. Temps were 55℃ (Celsius) / 132℉ (Fahrenheit) / 328K (degrees Kelvin).
Later I settled for an old P4 southbridge heatsink, that I was able to stick permanently -and tightly- unto the PCB. Temps now 60℃ (Celsius) / 140℉ (Fahrenheit) / 333K (degrees Kelvin). Might have to look for a small 40 mm fan when I go overclocking....

I may have called the BeagleBone Black the total and utter king of blinkenlights before -due to the eternally flashing blue LED lights- but the Banana Pro comes as a close 2nd with a eternally burning red, a constantly flashing green and a less frequently flashing blue LED. Now for a casing that fits both Banana Pro and added heatsink....