Firmware and SD Card Test - manster-zz/R36S-LINKS GitHub Wiki

Conclusion

  • Minimal performance difference between different SD cards
  • ArkOS has better fast-forward performance for GBA + SNES
  • ArkOS takes about 15-16 seconds to boot
  • AmberELEC takes between 24-33 seconds to boot
  • Themes can affect the boot time by a few seconds
  • Time needed for flashing process + initial boot up/partition creation ranges from 2-14 minutes
  • I can recommend ArkOS and AmberELEC. Features are almost identical.
  • I can't recommend ROCKNIX (see reddit thread)
  • Instead of using Lakka, I can recommend this feature in ArkOS
  • Stock SD cards suck

Firmware and SD Card Test

Firmwares

  • AmberELEC-RG351MP.aarch64-prerelease-20240804_1341.img
  • ArkOS_R35S-R36S_v2.0_07042024.img (Community Maintained Image)
  • Lakka-OdroidGoAdvance.arm-3.7.4-rg351mp.img
  • ROCKNIX-RK3326.aarch64-20240702.img

microSD Cards

Important

Refer to the SD Card section for compatibility. Not every card works in the TF2 slot.

Samsung EVO Select (2021) 128GB, microSD UHS-I U3, MB-ME128KA/EU
SanDisk Ultra 32GB, SDSQUNC-032G Micro SDHC Ultra Class 10 UHS-I
Verbatim Premium 16 GB, SDSQUNC-032G Micro SDHC Ultra Class 10 UHS-I
Samsung EVO 32GB, MicroSDXC UHS-I Grade 1 Class 10

Emulator and roms

Fast-Forward performance with standard settings and without frameskip.

  • GBA - gpSP core
    • Pokemon - FireRed Version (USA, Europe)
  • SNES - Supafaust core
    • Super Mario World (USA)

Device

Transparent black R36S. Original display. Sold By: YYDZ GAME Store (2024-03-19)

Dual SD Card Setup

Firmware
 TF1 (OS) TF2 (Roms) 1 Boot time GBA SNES
AmberELEC 33s 395 FPS 130 FPS
AmberELEC 33s 397 FPS 130 FPS
ArkOS 16s 405 FPS 140 FPS
ArkOS 16s 410 FPS 143 FPS

1 Samsung EVO Select (2021) loaded with 1393 games

Single Card Setup

Firmware
 TF1 (OS) Boot time GBA SNES
AmberELEC 24-28s 1 385-395 FPS 150 FPS
ArkOS 15s 405-415 FPS 140 FPS
Lakka 15s
ROCKNIX 32s

1 Fastest was Samsung EVO Select (2021)

Stock SD Cards

Boot process is fast. Very poor GBA performance.

Firmware
 TF1 (OS) TF2 (Roms) Boot time GBA SNES
ArkOS 04242024 64GB - 15077 games ❌ 20s 180 FPS 144 FPS
ArkOS 04232022 64GB - 15086 games ❌ 16s 180 FPS 133 FPS
ArkOS 04232022 32GB 64GB - 15092 games 18s 180 FPS 134 FPS
ArkOS 04232022 stock SD 32GB 1 23s 180 FPS 134 FPS
ArkOS stock SD 64GB - 15092 games 18s 400 FPS 140 FPS

1 Samsung EVO Select (2021) loaded with 1393 games

Misc stuff

Themes

  • Themes can affect the boot time.

ArkOS

  • Flashing the image with Rufus takes up to 10 minutes. Fastest was on Samsung EVO Select (2021) 128GB with 2min 10s.
  • First Boot Process for ArkOS takes about 3-4 minutes.
  • Using ArkOS on a 16GB card leaves 5.49GB of space for the EASYROMS partition.
  • Using ArkOS on a 32GB card leaves 20.8GB of space for the EASYROMS partition.
  • Fast-Forward speed of up to 900 FPS is possible in Pokemon - FireRed Version (USA, Europe) with the GBA - gpSP core.

AmberELEC

  • Flashing the image with Rufus takes about up to 6 minutes. Fastest was on Samsung EVO Select (2021) 128GB with 50s.
  • First Boot Process for AmberELEC takes about 1-2 minutes.
  • Using AmberELEC on a 16GB card leaves 7.44GB of space for the GAMES partition.
  • Using AmberELEC on a 32GB card leaves 22.7GB of space for the GAMES partition.
  • Fast-Forward speed of up to 650 FPS is possible in Pokemon - FireRed Version (USA, Europe) with the GBA - gpSP core.
  • Does not support custom boot and loading screens.

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