ItI want to give heartfelt thanks to Jerry from AMedia for the review sample!
Shenzhen AMedia Technology Co.,LTD is a technology-based company engaged in the research, development, sales of OTT TV box. AMedia offers a wide range of TV Boxes based on Allwinner, Amlogic, Rockchip and Realtek chipsets, as well as Mini PCs based on Intel and AMD chips.
What’s in the Box?
X96Q Pro+ is a black matte plastic box containing H728 chipset from a company I don’t often get to review – Allwinner. X96Q Pro+ is rectangular, but not square. The power button button is located in the back, on the right. X96Q Pro+ does not have external antennas but uses internal ones. It includes a Micro-SD/TF Card slot, with support for high capacity Micro-SD memory cards (I have tested it successfully with a 200GB such card). The box also contains a bluetooth remote, a small user manual, the power adapter, and a HDMI 2.0 cable.
X96Q Pro+ Box Contents
Here are the items that come in the box: X96Q Pro+ :
X96Q Pro+ Specifications
| Chipset | Allwinner H728 Octa-core ARM Cortex A55 |
| GPU | Mali G57-MC1 |
| Memory / Storage | 4GB (2GB Optional) / 32GB (16/64GB Optional) |
| Storage Expansion | TF (MicroSD) Card Slot |
| Wireless Connectivity | Option:IEEE802. a/b/g/n/ac IEEE802. a/b/g/n/ac/ax |
| Network | 2.4GHZ ~ 5.8GHZ |
| Bluetooth | BT5.0+ |
| OS | Android 14 |
| Video & Audio Output | 1* 4K 2K Output, HDMI 2.0a 3.5mm audio jack, optical S/PDIF, digital audio via HDMI |
| USB Port | 2* USB 2.0+1*USB3.0 |
| Supported Video Codecs | H265 Main10@L5. 1 decoder up to 4K@60fps or 8K@24fpsVP9 decoder up to 4K @ 60fpsH.264 BP/MP/HP@L4.2 decoder up to 4K@30fpsMulti-format 1080p@60fps video playback, including VP8, MPEG1/2 SP/MP, MPEG4SP/ASP, AVS+/AVS JIZHUN Video encoder:H.264 encoder , up to 4K @ 25fps MJPEG encoder , up to 4K @ 15fps JPEG encoder , up to 8K x 8K resolution |
| Supported Audio Containers | MP3, AAC, WMA, FLAC, Ogg. |
| HDR support | 10-bit HDR support |
| Remote control | Included |
| Power | DC 5V- 3A |
| Dimensions | 140mm x 90mm x 20mm |
| Net Weight | 150 grams |
X96Q Pro+ Benchmarks and Testing
All completed benchmarks have been repeated 3 times and results have been averaged to give a more accurate reading:
Antutu Benchmark
The Antutu benchmark tests single core performance over multi-core as it is a better indication of the performance of one device over others in most situations. X96Q Pro+ takes 4th place in Antutu which is quite a nice result.
Bellow is a screenshot of the latest Antutu benchmark (v10):
GPU Mark Benchmark
GPU Mark tests 3d gaming performance and also provides a normalized score according to the used screen resolution (for a more accurate result). The test is quite short and should be taken as a supporting result to that of the more serious 3D Mark benchmark. X96Q Pro+ takes 6th place, which is not too shabby, especially for a allwinner based box. Frames per second place it at 9th place, though.
A1 SD Benchmark
A1 SD Benchmark tests RAM and flash memory speeds. As can be seen in the provided graphs, RAM is much faster (by a factor of about 40) than flash memory – that is why it’s in smaller amount and is also volatile (does not keep its contents after a reboot). X96Q Pro+ shows surprising results, as read speed of it’s internal storage places it in first place (!), but RAM copy speed only places it at 7th place.
PC Mark Benchmark
X96Q Pro+ takes 10th place at PCMark productivity suite of benchmarks. As can be expected from this chipset.
3D Mark Benchmark
3D Mark benchmark is considered as one of the best ways to test 3d performance on Android (and other platforms). X96Q Pro+ takes second (!) place on Wild Life test, and 7th place at Slingshot Extreme. However, even so, the GPU in this box is not capable of any serious performance.
X96Q Pro+ Extra Benchmarks
For some more information, see the following screenshots from other benchmarks such as GFX Bench, Performance Test Mobile, Vellamo, Geekbench, and AndroBench:
X96Q Pro+ Bugs, Issues, and Cons
Bugs
- Changing certain settings under “Display and Sound”, can cause a crash and requires full facory reset in order to restore full functionality
- Access to certain parts of the file system or storage is limited and depends on which application you use. An important component (“documents”) of android is simply missing, so it will not let you open certain folders or drives
- Root. It is not really rooted. Being rooted means that you can use functions of android that are normally unavailable for security reasons. For instance, file access to certain parts of the file system. Or screenshot capability. Especially under Android 14.. because the newer the version of Android, the more closed it is and more difficult to root. So X96Q Pro+ is recognized under root check apps as being rooted, but it’s only been half done. There is not management application, the SU binary is old (and does not let you update), and no root supporting app asks for root permission, nor recognize X96Q Pro+ as being rooted
Issues & Cons
- Audio Passthrough. X96Q Pro+ does not handle multi-channel audio. At all. It basically sends Stereo PCM audio to HDMI (only after setting it correctly under settings), and so you will only get virtualized multi-channel audio, and none of the actual audio codecs such as Dolby Atmos, DTS and so on. I was advised that the box simply does not support such codecs..
- Video Playback. X96Q Pro+ makes high claims regarding it supporting 8k video.. well, you can scroll down and see the video sample testing I did. 8k video is not on the table. at all. Even 4k (and even when played locally and not over LAN), will have issues playing – especially with high bandwidth video, such as HDR, or 7.1 audio (which will cause it to stutter, freeze and even crash to the point of reboot)
- Transfer speeds inside X96Q Pro+ are very limited. Even when I connected a USB 3.0 HDD, which easily gets to 30+ MB/s speeds when connected to my PC, rarely breaks 7 MB/s when connected to the X96Q Pro+
- No Samba support. X96Q Pro+ is probably the first TV box that I encountered which does not offer a built-in Samba server. And due to the afforementioned root issues, I cannot install one either
X96Q Pro+ Root function
It seems that X96Q Pro+ is rooted. Even though it “seems” like it is rooted, as two separate applications insist, various applications do not recognize it as being rooted.
X96Q Pro+ Video Playback testing (Using KODI)
X96Q Pro+ does not show good perfomance in high resolution (4k and up) video playback. And it has nothing to do with network speed (Even though the wireless speed is lacking). The sample files suffered from choppy video and/or audio playback. Especially with the heavier video samples.
I should mention that later in the review process, a new firmware was made available to me (not via OTA, but requiring flashing via PC), dated October 14th, 2024 (X96QProPlus_20241014-1955_uart0.img). I can say that it slightly improved some video playback, specifically in TS files which previously exhibited many video artifacts while playing.
X96Q Pro+ Network performance
I tested the network performance using the popular Speedtest.net application from the play store. I tested both Wi-Fi (the fastest Wi-Fi supported – in this case 5GHz 802.11ax, or Wi-Fi 6), and wired connection. My home connection is a symmetric 1Gbe Fiber connection so it would not limit the test in any way.
X96Q Pro+ shows good speeds when connected through wired LAN. But quite poor performance in WiFi:
X96Q Pro+ Gaming performance
Point of interest: X96Q Pro+ runs Android TV OS. As such, it will not install programs and games from Google Playstore native to the standard Android OS, but only ones that are considered native to Android TV. Due to that limitation, and the fact that side loading APK files also did not work properly for the games I wanted to install, I used a separate application (APKPURE) to install the following games.
Asphalt 8 Airborne – a 3d graphic intensive racing game. X96Q Pro+ plays well, although for some reason does not get to the game menu (only offers tutorial or race)
Angry Birds 2 – a popular 2d action game. X96Q Pro+ plays flawlessly with a bit of long load times
Walking War Robots – an online robot warfare game that requires a game-pad. X96Q Pro+ plays great – as long as you use a gamepad. Load times are a little long
X96Q Pro+Conclusions
Did I like it? Not so much, as it’s support of 4k video is lacking
Would I recommend it? If you are sticking with 1080p content, you may find the low price tag enticing
You like it! Where can you buy it? Starting from 38.20 USD (depending on the hardware configuration): X96Q PRO+ Smart TV BOX Android 14 Allwinner H728 Quad Core 8K Media Player 1000M LAN Wifi6 X96Q PRO PLUS Google Voice TV BOX
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