Amlogic S905X3 Specifications & Block Diagram

A few days ago, we wrote about upcoming quad core Cortex-A55 processors from Amlogic with S905X3, S905Y3, and S905D3 SoCs. Today, we got a little more information with a product brief including the main features, and a block diagram.

 

Amlogic S905X3 is described as an “advanced application processor designed for hybrid OTT/ IP Set Top Box (STB) and high-end media box applications.

 

 

Amlogic S905X3 Specifications:

  • CPU Sub-system
    • Quad core Arm Cortex-A55 CPU with Armv8-A Neon and Crypto extension, 8-stage in-order full dual issue pipeline, unified system L3 cache
    • Arm Cortex-M3 core for system control processing
    • Optional Arm Cortex-M4 core for always-on processing
    • TrustZone
    • Internal QoS based switching fabrics
  • Optional Neural Network Accelerator – 1.2 TOPS NN inference accelerator supporting TensorFlow and Caffe
  • 3D Graphics Processing Unit – Arm Mali G31MP2 GPU with support for OpenGL ES 3.2, Vulkan 1.0 and OpenCL 2.0 support
  • 2.5D Graphics Processor
    • Fast bitblt engine with dual inputs and single output
    • Programmable raster operations (ROP)
    • Programmable polyphase scaling filter
    • Support for 4:2:0, 4:2:2, and 4:4:4 video formats, and multiple pixel formats (8/16/24/32 bits graphic layer)
    • Fast color space conversion
    • Advanced anti-flickering filter
  • Crypto Engine
    • AES block cipher with 128/256 bits keys
    • TDES block cipher with ECB and CDC modes
    • SM4 block cipher with ECB, CBC, CTR modes
    • Hardware crypto key-ladder operation and DVB-CSA for transport stream encryption
    • TRNG, CRC and SHA-1/SHA-2/HMAC SHA engine
  • Video/Picture CODEC
    • Amlogic Video Engine (AVE) with dedicated hardware decoders and encoders
    • Support multi-video decoder up to 4x 1080p60
    • Support multiple secured video decoding sessions and simultaneous decoding and encoding
    • Video/Picture Decoding
      • VP9 Profile-2 up to 4Kx2K @ 60 fps
      • H.265 HEVC MP-10 @ L5.1 up to 4Kx2K @ 60 fps
      • AVS2-P2 Profile up to 4Kx2K @ 60 fps
      • H.264 AVC HP @ L5.1 up to 4Kx2K @ 30 fps
      • MPEG-4 ASP @ L5, WMV/VC-1, AVS-R16/AVS-R2 JiZhun Profile, MPEG-2, MPEG-1, and RealVideo 8/9/10 up to 1080p60
      • Multiple language and multiple format sub-title video support
      • MJPEG and JPEG unlimited pixel resolution decoding (ISO/IEC-10918)
      • Support JPEG thumbnail, scaling, rotation and transition effects
      • Supports mkv, wmv, mpg, mpeg, dat, avi, mov, iso, mp4, rm, and jpg file formats
    • Video/Picture Encoding
      • Independent JPEG and H.264 encoder with configurable performance/bitrate
      • JPEG image encoding
      • H.265/H.264 video encoding up to 1080p60 with low latency
  • 8th Generation Advanced Amlogic TruLife Image Engine
    • Supports Dolby Vision (optional), HDR10+, HDR10, HLD and Technicolor HDR processing
    • Motion compensated noise reduction, and 3D digital noise reduction for random noise
    • Block noise, mosquito noise, spatial noise, contour noise reduction
    • Motion compensated and motion adaptive de-interlacer
    • Edge interpolation with low angle protection and processing
    • Smart sharpness with Superscalar technology including de-contouring, de-ring, LTI, CTI, de-jaggy, peaking
    • Dynamic non-linear contrast enhancement
    • All dimension multiple regions smart color management including blue/green extension, flesh-tone correction, wider gamut for video
    • 2 video planes and 3 graphics planes hardware composer
    • Independent HDR re-mapping of video and graphic layer
  • Video Input/Output Interface
    • Built-in HDMI 2.1 transmitter including both controller and PHY supporting CEC, Dynamic HDR and HDCP 2.2, 4Kx2K @ 60 Hz max resolution output, ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode)
    • CVBS 480i/576i standard definition output
    • Support all standard video output formats: 480i/p, 576i/p,. 720p, 1080i/p, 4Kx2K
  • Audio Decoder and Input/Output
    • Supports MP3, AAC, WMA, RM, FLAC, Ogg and programmable with 7.1/5.1 down-mixing
    • Low-power VAD (Voice Activity Detection)
    • Built-in serial digital audio SPDIF/IEC958 input/output and PCM input/output
    • 3x TDM/PCM/I2S ports with TDM/PCM mode up to 384 KHz x 32 bits x 16ch or 96 KHz x 32 bits x 32 ch, and I2S mode up to 384 KHz x 32 bits x 16 ch
    • Digital microphone PDM input with programmable CIC, LPF & HPF, support up to 8 DMICs
    • Built-in Stereo audio DAC
    • Supports concurrent dual audio stereo channel output with combination of analog+PCM or I2S + PCM
  • Memory & Storage Interface
    • 32-bit DRAM memory interface with dual ranks and max 4GB total address space
    • Compatible with JEDEC standard DDR3-2133 / DDR3L-2133 / DDR4-3200 / LPDDR3-2133 / LPDDR4-3200 SDRAM
    • Support SLC/LMC/TLC NAND flash with 60-bit ECC
    • SDSC/SDHC/SDXC card and SDIO interface with 1-bit and 4-bit data bus width supporting up to UHS-I SDR104 mode
    • eMMC and MMC card interface with 1/4/8-bit data bus width supporting spec version 5.0 HS400
    • Support serial 1, 2 or 4-bit NOR flash via SPI
    • Built-in 4k bits One-Time-Programming memory for key storage
  • Network
    • Integrated 10/100/1000M Ethernet MAC with RGMII interface
    • Integrated 10/100M Ethernet PHY interface
    • WiFi & Bluetooth supported via PCIe, SDIO, USB, UART, or PCM
    • Network interface optimized for mixed WiFi and Bluetooth traffic
  • Digital Television Interface
    • One serial and one parallel Transport Stream (TS) input interface with built-in demux processor for connecting to external digital TV tuner/demodulator
    • Built-in PWM, I2C and SPI interfaces to control tuner and demodulator
    • Integrated ISO7816 smart card controller
  • Integrated I/O controllers and interfaces
    • 1x USB XHCI OTG 2.0 port
    • One USB SS and PCIe 2.0 combo port up to 5 Gbps configurable with either:
      • 1x USB 2.0 host port + PCIe
      • 1x USB 3.0 without PCIe
    • Multiple PWM, UART, I2C and SPI interfaces with slave select
    • Programmable IR remote input/output controllers
    • Built-in 10-bit SAR ADC with 4 input channels
    • GPIOs with built-in pull up and pull down
  • System, Peripherals and Misc. Interfaces
    • Integrated general purpose timers, counters, DMA controllers
    • 24 MHz crystal input
    • Embedded debug interface using ICE/JTAG
    • Integrated Power On Reset (POR) module
  • Power Management
    • Multiple internal power domains controlled by software
    • Multiple sleep modes for CPU, system, DRAM, etc..
    • Multiple internal PLLs for DVFS operation
    • Multi-voltage I/O design for 1.8V and 3.3V
    • Power management auxiliary processor in a dedicated always-on (AO) power domain that communicate with an external PMIC
  • Security
    • TrustZone based Trusted Execution Environment (TEE)
    • Secured boot, encrypted OTP, encrypted DRAM with memory integrity checker, hardware key ladder and internal control buses and storage
    • Separated secure/non-secure Entropy true RNG
    • Pre-region/ID memory security control and electric fence
    • Hardware based Trusted Video Path (TVP), video watermarking and secured contents (needs SecureOS software)
    • Secured IO and secured clock
  • Package – FCBGA, 14 x 14mm, RoHS compliant

 

The Cortex-A55 cores deliver up to twice the performance compared to Cortex-A53 in memory benchmarks, and a more typical 20 to 30% performance improvement for common tasks at the same frequency.

Amlogic S905X3 has some optional features like the Neural Network Accelerator and a Cortex-M4 core for always-on processing, so we should expect several part numbers, but this was not detailed in the product brief.