Imagination Creator CI20 Now Shipping With Spec Bump & Kodi Support

Imagination has sent along word that the Creator CI20 we covered in some detail late last year is now shipping to North America and Europe. For those unfamiliar with this development board, I have reproduced the specification table below and included the Raspberry Pi 2 for comparison. Along with the shipping announcement, Imagination has bumped the on board storage from 4GB of NAND up to 8GB. I updated our original coverage with this welcome unexpected improvement. They have also revised the PCB to be purple, matching Imagination's color scheme.

	Imagination Creator CI20	Raspberry Pi 2 Model B	Raspberry Pi Model B+
SoC	Ingenic JZ4780	Broadcom BCM2836	Broadcom BCM2835
CPU	Dual 1.2GHz XBurst (MIPS32 instruction set)	4x 900 MHz ARM Cortex-A7 (ARMv7 instruction set)	700 MHz ARM1176JZF-S (ARM11 family, ARMv6 instruction set)
GPU	PowerVR SGX 540 @ Unknown MHz	Broadcom VideoCore IV @ 250 MHz	Broadcom VideoCore IV @ 250 MHz
Memory	1GB DDR3	1GB DDR2	512MB DDR2
USB	1x USB OTG (A and Mini connectors) 1x USB Host	4x USB 2.0 Host	4 USB 2.0 Host
Camera Interface	24-pin connector (ITU-R BT.645)	15-pin MIPI (CSI) connector	15-pin MIPI (CSI) connector
Video Output	HDMI 1.4a	HDMI 1.3a Composite video 3.5mm jack	HDMI 1.3a Composite video 3.5mm jack
Audio In	3.5mm jack shared with output	via I²S interface	via I²S interface
Audio Output	HDMI 3.5mm jack shared with input	HDMI 3.5mm jack I²S interface	HDMI 3.5mm jack I²S interface
Storage	8GB NAND 1x full SD slot 1x SD slot via expansion header	via MicroSD	via MicroSD
Network	10/100 Ethernet 2.4GHz WiFi b/g/n + BT 4.0 (BCM4330)	10/100 Ethernet	10/100 Ethernet
IR	Input (IRM-2638A)	-	-
Max Power Consumption	4 Watts	< 5 Watts	3 Watts
Power Connector	5V barrel connector	MicroUSB	MicroUSB
Size	Approx. 90mm x 95mm (3.54 in x 3.74 in)	85.60 mm × 56.5 mm (3.37 in × 2.22 in)	85.60 mm × 56.5 mm (3.37 in × 2.22 in)
Price	$65 or £50	$35 without MPEG2 and VC1 codecs $40.60 with MEPG2 and VC1 codecs	$35 without MPEG2 and VC1 codecs $40.60 with MEPG2 and VC1 codecs

The evaluation board provided to me by Imagination is green with 4GB of NAND and I should consider it a collectors' item now. I am working to get some power measurements directly on the VDDCORE line to characterize CPU performance/watt but that requires some delicate PCB modification. Stay tuned.

Also, for the media center users, great news came three days ago with MIPS32 support merged into the master branch of Kodi (XBMC). Therefore, users willing to compile binaries themselves can now run Kodi on the Creator CI20 or any other MIPS32 device. For those willing to wait, the next major release of Kodi should include this support in their provided binaries.