The Odroid U2 mini-computer announced last year is available now for $89 (£57) with worldwide shipping, direct from the South Korea based company (but the “shipment schedule” is three weeks from the date of purchase). This is a powerful “low-cost development platform” utilising an Exynos 4412 Prime 1.7Ghz ARM Cortex-A9 Quad Core processor.
Every small circuit board like minicomputer is compared to the Raspberry Pi, which probably isn’t fair as most rivals cost a lot more. However the RasPi has set a standard, it actually is sized on another standard – its credit card sized, also it’s been a great success in getting people interested, buying and using these devices.
What we see released here, in the form of the Odroid U2, is a very much more powerful machine. The Exynos 4412 Prime 1.7Ghz ARM Cortex-A9 Quad Core processor in the Odroid U2 is paired with a Mali-400 Quad Core 440MHz 3D accelerator and given an ample 2GB of Ram in which to operate. Add to this plenty of I/O options and connections including; USB ports, microSD card storage, ethernet, HDMI, microphone and headphone sockets. The power on offer in the Odroid U2 rivals many high end smartphones costing US$500+ for under US$90 (£57).
The Odroid U2 can run Android 4.x and Ubuntu 12.10. Suggested applications of this minicomputer include using it as a media centre and running arcade emulators on your HDMI TV. However if you are interested in one of these for a bit of fun on your TV it may be much more straightforward to just plump for buying an OUYA console, which doesn’t need the case, SD card, power supply etc that a bare Odroid U2 would require.
