Frequently Asked Questions

Current as of December 7th, 2010

Q: What are the full specifications of the Efika MX Smartbook?
A: The Efika MX Smartbook is equipped as follows;

• NXP i.MX515 Cortex A8 processor @ 800MHz
• 512MB RAM
• 1024x600 LCD Display
• “Chiclet” Keyboard & Trackpad with integrated “mouse” buttons
• Networking & Wireless:
  • Bluetooth 2.1+EDR (Broadcom)
  • 802.11b/g/n Wireless (Ralink RT3070)
  • Optional 3G module (GSM SIM slot behind battery, module is country-specific)
  • Wireless killswitch
• Storage
  • 2x SDHC card slot (1x SDHC, 1x MicroSDHC behind battery)
  • 16GB PATA Solid State Disk
• Expansion
  • 2x USB ports
• 3-cell battery & worldwide AC adapter

Note that the Efika MX Smartbook does not include wired networking capability, although software support for USB Ethernet dongles is available. It also does not include an external display connector.

Q: What is the battery life like?
A: Estimated at between 6 and 7 hours for the included 3-cell battery.

Q: What software comes with the system?
A: The Efika MX Smartbook ships with a pre-installed distribution derived from Ubuntu Linux (Maverick).

Q: What are the specifications of the video codec?
A: The i.MX515 Video Processing Unit (VPU) supports video decoding of H.264, MPEG4, MPEG2 and other compressed video, supported at bitrates exceeding commonly available video files. Optimized software support of audio formats and media containers is planned. Encoding of MPEG4 video using the VPU is planned. Maximum supported video resolution is 720p for decoding, limited by internal processor bandwidth only. Maximum supported video resolution for encoding is D1 (roughly equivalent to DVD resolution).

Q: What are the specifications of the OpenGL ES unit?
A: The i.MX515 includes an OpenGL ES 2.0 compliant 3D core with a unified shader model. Also  included is an OpenVG 1.1 compliant 2D core. Software support for OpenGL ES 1.1, 2.0, OpenVG 1.1 and EGL 1.3 will be provided as updates.

Q: Does it support Adobe Flash?
A: An Adobe Flash plugin (10.1) equivalent to the desktop PC flash plugin exists but has not been officially certified by Adobe, therefore it is only distributed for evaluation purposes.

Q: Do you plan on shipping an Android operating system or Windows CE, Windows Embedded, or anything other than Linux?
A: We feel that Android at its current level (2.3) is not ready for Smartbooks. Android has been designed from the ground up to support touch screens and limited input models based on “cursors” like TV remotes or simple dials, and as a consequence operation using a keyboard and a reasonable mouse or trackpad is not an ideal experience. Support for Windows for embedded devices is under investigation but not active development. Genesi is also investigating support for Google ChromeOS, however will not provide support until Google has made their 1.0 release.

Q: 512MB isn’t enough for me. Can I upgrade the RAM?
A: No. 512MB is the maximum the i.MX515 processor supports. Some of this memory is reserved for usage by the GPU (between 32 and 96MB). However, standard Linux distributions do not even come close to using the full amount of memory, and it is fairly safe to use an SSD as swap space.

Q: 16GB of disk is not very much. Can I upgrade the disk?
A: No. The SSD is soldered to the motherboard to reduce costs. The SD card slots do however support up to 32GB cards. The MicroSDHC slot (behind the battery) is the best place for storage expansion as it will be secured by the battery and leave the SDHC slot on the side of the unit available for digital camera cards and other removable media usage.

Q: What GSM frequencies does the 3G model support?
A: Please see the following chart:

Q: What are the warranty terms?
A: Please visit the following page: http://www.genesi-tech.com/legal/warranty