U8K-ULTRA: FW003 BETA build

MINIX - Ken

MINIX - Ken

Staff member
Dear all,

We have decided to release this beta firmware as our whole office is closed due to the Lunar New Year holidays till early February,

the final FW003 is still under development and will not be ready for official release till late February.

We want to utilize the next two weeks to get your comments and feedback so that the official FW003 will be even better.

Changelog since official FW002B:

Fixes/updates:

1. Updated boot screen logos (Dolby Vision and Dolby Audio certified are officially completed)
2. Added TrueHD passthrough support, including the Plex Media server app (to use TrueHD passthrough, the interface option must be set to TV mode)
3. Enhanced Prime Video app compatibility
4. Dolby Vision defaults to source-led output
5. Patched a Kodi playback bug after prolonged pausing
6. Patched a Kodi app crashing bug when playing some 8K files
7. Patched 24.000fps video playback quality when frame rate switching is turned on
8. Optimized the position of the "Clear All" apps tab in the Recent apps shortcut, from left-most to bottom for easier access
9. Added "launcher3/Quickstep" option

Experimental new features:

10. Added Samba server function (To access: Device Preferences -> Storage -> Samba server)
11. Added Bittorrent client (To access: Device Preferences -> Storage -> BT)
12. PIP support (app itself has to support PIP)
13. Added split screens feature (To test this feature, first you must go to AOSP settings -> Enable developer options -> App -> Enable freeform windows)

Some other features are still under development and have not been found in this beta, such as: HDMI spoofing.

Full system image, to be flashed with a Windows computer using the bundled OTG cable:

OTA offline package, run inside our MINIX OTA app in the U8K:


Last but not least, this beta will be eligible for future OTA to official FW003.
If you are willing to try it out, please do. We appreciate your efforts!

Best Regards,
Team MINIX.
 
P.S. Replies will be limited during the Lunar New Year holiday period, we won't be back to work till the 2nd week of February, please kindly understand.
 
@MINIX - Ken

Ken,

I think the instructions for updating via the OTA upgrade package should mention that you need to first extract the files in the downloaded zip and it is the " tyson-ota-eng.root-20250121-1305.zip" that needs to be copied onto the usb drive.

I think someone else also mentioned that it would be be nice that whilst the installation is taking place that there was some sort of progress bar moving along to give users a bit of confidence that something is indeed happening !

I've installed OK and initially all seems fine. :)

I don't follow your changelog points 8 and 9, can you expand, perhaps a screenshot ?
 
OK So installed FW003 via the windows computer method, as im so use to doing it that way with my Minix u22. Everything installed flawlessly, but here comes the problems I found myself with using setup booting into Launcher3

I only use a K400+ keyboard to operate my setup and a bluetooth standard remote (No Gyroscope) I have been playing with it for about 3-4 hours now.

1. I had to setup for the first time the supplied remote just to get to the main menu, to setup internet connections etc.

2. Once I had setup my Google play account it wouldn't let me access my history of downloaded apps, or update the apps already there so I had to search for them and download them manually. That problem continued for about 2 hours until after many reboots of the U8K Ultra it just started to work...kinda strange right.

3.I noticed all apps pre-installed like Disney, Plex etc and many i dont want or will ever use can not be uninstalled only disabled, I mean no apps only the ones I downloaded myself.

4.. when you boot into Launcher3 it actually leave a blank window open behind the home screen that cant be removed by "clear all" you have to slide it up to remove it which is a little annoying.

5. The biggest annoyance to me is the search box on the home screen. it cannot be removed, I tried disabling Google and rebooting but it just remains there, their is no option to remove it.

6. just recently i have noticed the screen going blank a few times but only for a second or two but that might just be a bad connection on the HDMI cable.


Please don't think I doing this to have a moan, these are just the problems i was faced with. I understand this is only a beta firmware and i am delighted with all the efforts of the Minix team that have gone into making all the other improvements PIP works good now. Just hoping that on the finished firmware the wrinkles will be ironed out by then.

Thanks everyone for a great forum and will keep you posted on any other problems or improvements I find.
 
Hi guys.

Here are my first impressions of the firmware.

I tested the firmware via OTA (offline package):

Steps:
-installation failed, incorrect upgrade package parameter (i noticed that @pusb87 extracted the file so i did the same)
-i extracted the zip file and it worked, the update process began and finished
-when the installation process finished the OS rebooted, after that i have a black screen (i can see and acess some things such as all apps, settings, mouse cursor, etc (through the minix a3 pro remote ) but i am unable to boot the u8k properly (selection of minix metro or another launcher), the normal GUI is not working.
I rebooted and turned off the machine but it is the same.
-i was able to acess minix settings and i did a factory reset, after that i was able to configure and choose the minix home launcher , i choose metro launcher.
My manual ota update did not work as i expected.
Now i need to configure everything.

So far:
Apps that i miss: x-plore file manager (i will try to install via playstore, i will also test playstore).
I will test this firmware more and i will give my feedback and i will see if need to downgrade to a previous version.

So far my ota experience was not good at all :(

Attached files:
some screenshots for better understanding
 

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Last edited:
notrui said:
-when the installation process finished the OS rebooted, after that i have a black screen (i can see and acess some things such as all apps, settings, mouse cursor, etc (through the minix a3 pro remote ) but i am unable to boot the u8k properly (selection of minix metro or another launcher), the normal GUI is not working.
Click to expand...
very weird...mine rebooted straight back into the normal metro with all my apps still present located on the bottom row as normal

i struggled to even find where you can change the launcher...I couldn't find it as any option in settings until I did a search within settings for "Home"

I did switch to it just to see but its not my cup of tea :)
 
So it wasn't just me, good to know im not going mad One more app that doesn't work is Contacts it fails to sync. Maybe there are plenty more things I will find as i begin using it. But still very usable and remember this is a beta for testing only. Im sure in time it will all be sorted out.
 
Just to add one more note to Ken and the team. It would be nice to be able to access the main Minix menu directly on the screen as apposed to having to select it from the remote. I use mine like a laptop as well as a media hub so I use a keyboard (Logitech K400+) and a simple wireless remote (Similar to the U22 remote) but with a dongle and it works very well don't need to point anything directly at the box. Works well for my uses
 
Anyone know how to remove this now disable Google widget. I have tried everything. It is really annoying and I'm trying to avoid installing another Launcher.
 

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OTA offline package worked just fine for me! (y)

Downloaded on device and unzipped on device then System Update, Local updates.

Took around 5 minutes to complete the update. :)
 
Brecon said:
OK So installed FW003 via the windows computer method, as im so use to doing it that way with my Minix u22. Everything installed flawlessly, but here comes the problems I found myself with using setup booting into Launcher3

I only use a K400+ keyboard to operate my setup and a bluetooth standard remote (No Gyroscope) I have been playing with it for about 3-4 hours now.

1. I had to setup for the first time the supplied remote just to get to the main menu, to setup internet connections etc.

2. Once I had setup my Google play account it wouldn't let me access my history of downloaded apps, or update the apps already there so I had to search for them and download them manually. That problem continued for about 2 hours until after many reboots of the U8K Ultra it just started to work...kinda strange right.

3.I noticed all apps pre-installed like Disney, Plex etc and many i dont want or will ever use can not be uninstalled only disabled, I mean no apps only the ones I downloaded myself.

4.. when you boot into Launcher3 it actually leave a blank window open behind the home screen that cant be removed by "clear all" you have to slide it up to remove it which is a little annoying.

5. The biggest annoyance to me is the search box on the home screen. it cannot be removed, I tried disabling Google and rebooting but it just remains there, their is no option to remove it.

6. just recently i have noticed the screen going blank a few times but only for a second or two but that might just be a bad connection on the HDMI cable.


Please don't think I doing this to have a moan, these are just the problems i was faced with. I understand this is only a beta firmware and i am delighted with all the efforts of the Minix team that have gone into making all the other improvements PIP works good now. Just hoping that on the finished firmware the wrinkles will be ironed out by then.

Thanks everyone for a great forum and will keep you posted on any other problems or improvements I find.
Click to expand...

No problem, this is exactly why we released it as beta, we would like to hear more feedback, we do expect there are problems as the firmware is still under development.
 
Yesterday OTA offline upgrade: (other notes)

I tested on Samsung 43RU7105.
I Did not tried change resolution, i did not modified any settings (i also not test other launcher).
I don't know what happenned (something is telling me that the inclusion of another launcher caused the problem).

I decided:
factory reset (in order to clean everything).

Playstore is working, i will test this beta firmware better.
I Never had this kind of issue before (in any other previous android devices).
I also have to say that i had few apps installed (in addotion to pre-installed apps before the ota update)
I will also test the stability of the ROM

If the ROM is not good enough for my use case i will downgrade, i did not test the full beta package.
 
I don't know who would use FileBrowser?!
But it doesn't appear to work anyway, so could that be removed or fixed?
 
Villa said:
As for Launcher3, can not see that at all; no option to switch to that!

It would have been nice if the Launcher fix had been applied!
It still boots to Metro Launcher then have to press Home button to switch to Nova Launcher.
Click to expand...
I installed FW003 directly from my fully updated windows laptop (Only time I ever use it) and for me Metro/Launcher3 appear to work the other way round. It always opens in Launcher3, But leaves in the background what can only be described as a blank Metro page with a power on the very top. So when your using it and you press clear all it still leaves this blank Metro page behind which you have to grab and slide up to clear it. I do want to stress it was still a good idea for Minix to release it as it will help iron out all the wrinkles. I',m happy enough to play around with it and be a tester most of my play apps are beta.. I'm confident Minix will sort out all the twigerlly bits in the stable version.
 
A good idea would be to have a Beta testing page for those who don't mind playing with the problems and seeing how to resolve issues manually.
 
MINIX - Ken said:
9. Added "launcher3/Quickstep" option
Click to expand...
Villa said:
As for Launcher3, can not see that at all; no option to switch to that!
Click to expand...
I went to system/system_ext/priv-app/Launcher3QuickStep and installed it.

Now I get Home options but on every boot the options appear again even after selecting Always!
Also, the Options keep changing and it's difficult to actually set.
 
Brecon said:
I installed FW003 directly from my fully updated windows laptop (Only time I ever use it) and for me Metro/Launcher3 appear to work the other way round. It always opens in Launcher3, But leaves in the background what can only be described as a blank Metro page with a power on the very top. So when your using it and you press clear all it still leaves this blank Metro page behind which you have to grab and slide up to clear it. I do want to stress it was still a good idea for Minix to release it as it will help iron out all the wrinkles. I',m happy enough to play around with it and be a tester most of my play apps are beta.. I'm confident Minix will sort out all the twigerlly bits in the stable version.
Click to expand...
Hi.
Just out of curiosity. Did you use usb burning tool with default settings (with this all data/settings will be erased) ? Or did you change it ? (In order to keep data/settings)
 
notrui said:
Yesterday OTA offline upgrade: (other notes)

I tested on Samsung 43RU7105.
I Did not tried change resolution, i did not modified any settings (i also not test other launcher).
I don't know what happenned (something is telling me that the inclusion of another launcher caused the problem).

I decided:
factory reset (in order to clean everything).

Playstore is working, i will test this beta firmware better.
I Never had this kind of issue before (in any other previous android devices).
I also have to say that i had few apps installed (in addotion to pre-installed apps before the ota update)
I will also test the stability of the ROM

If the ROM is not good enough for my use case i will downgrade, i did not test the full beta package.
Click to expand...
Not sure notui if you can downgrade
 
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