Beelink A1

Beelink A1 TV Box

Beelink A1 RK3328 TV Box is the best choice for you to have the smooth experience to watch the video or play games, for it is equipped with RK3328 quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 CPU. With 4GB DDR3 RAM and 16GB eMMC ROM, you can download whatever you like, keep them and enjoy them. 4K x 2K resolution enables you to feel the most high-definition video! Support dual-band WiFi of 2.4G and 5.8G as well as Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity.

The A1 is absolutely tiny and will comfortably sit in an adult hand. Its dimensions (76 x 76 x 17mm) mean that it can be hidden almost anywhere, but the lack of a VESA mount means that you won’t be able to fix it securely to a monitor.

The manufacturer opted for a white finish all round except for the base which is bright orange. The device’s plastic shell means that the bill of materials can be kept to a minimum while ensuring adequate heat dissipation thanks to an aluminum heatsink just under the surface.

The front is adorned with a white LED display which provides the time and system status at a glance, which can come in handy. Despite its size, the A1 manages to cram in two full-size USB ports (one of which is USB 3.0), one microSD card reader, one full-size Gigabit Ethernet port, a full-size HDMI port and an audio jack.

Bearing in mind that this is a sub-£50 box, we were surprised to find that it had 4GB of RAM (albeit DDR3), something that will definitely be helpful for future versions of Android, or if you intend to run more memory-hungry applications.

Beelink opted for a quad-core CPU – a Rockchip RK3328 – clocked at up to 1.5GHz. It supports 4K at 60Hz, H.265 and VP9 formats as well. The choice of the Mali-450MP2 remains unexplained as it is a GPU that is nearly six-years-old, and doesn’t come with architectural improvements found on later models.

The small storage capacity (16GB) is probably the only worry, although the presence of a microSD card slot mitigates our concerns – note that the thin client also sports 802.11ac Wi-Fi connectivity and Bluetooth.

As expected, the A1 is powered by a 5V2A (10W) power supply unit with a proprietary connector. We’d have preferred a microUSB affair as it would have allowed portable battery chargers to be hooked up to the device.

The tiny box is simple to operate: just power it on and you’re ready to go. There’s no button to press – you will land on a standard grid homepage that resembles a dashboard. Sadly there are limited configuration options.

There’s a handful of applications: a memory cleaner, media player, file explorer, music player and a proprietary app store. Fortunately Google Play is present (but not YouTube or any other Google apps).

There’s even a camera app which will be of no use (obviously), and the bundled Android 7.1.2 OS means that you get most recent new features. You can also use this box as a Wi-Fi hotspot, although you’ll need to use the wired internet connection in lieu of wireless.

Don’t expect the A1 to be a pacey roadrunner. It will be fine with mundane and office productivity tasks, but anything remotely taxing is likely to bring this system to its knees, especially games.

Having a poor video subsystem means that benchmark results for graphical tests were far below what we’d expect, with the A1 scoring zero frames per second on Antutu’s demanding 3D Marooned test.

There’s a lot to love about the Beelink A1 and anyone who has an Android smartphone will immediately feel at home with it. This box packs a lot of technology into such a small space, and its finish is as good as it gets for such a cheap price tag.

A decent amount of memory combined with a recent Android build means that businesses should be able to use this device out of the box with little concern over security issues or compatibility.

Our only real complaint is that the on-board storage is on the stingy side, but adding a microSD card should alleviate that. There are other solid alternatives in the same ballpark price bracket, and picking the right model for you will ultimately come down to your budget and priorities.

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