PiPO is a Chinese leading manufacturer for Rockchip RK3188 based tablets. It makes a while that these devices are using a relatively old Linux v3.0.36 kernel, latest firmwares (Android 4.4 KitKat) for devices like the PiPO M7 Pro are reporting a Linux 3.4.0. When looking closely in the device system internals, it appears that an older kernel is actually running. Let's have a look!

Linux 3.4.0 reported in latest PiPO M7 Pro KitKat firmware

When looking at Android Settings / About tablet menu, you can see

Turns to be a Linux 3.0.36 kernel

When checking system tools or doing a

or

in a terminal as you can see below, we are actually getting a Linux 3.0.36+ Kernel version.

Check our video:

Quick investigation

As we love to have a closer look when something does not sound right, we have decompiled and checked the system Settings. Looking at the code, It turns the Kernel version display is actually modified to change the real version (3.0.36+ here) and replace it with 3.4.0 value. This information is quite misleading for the end user as the Kernel Version display does not correspond to the actual Kernel version running. It is not yet very clear about the manufacturer (or its developers) intention behind that manipulation.

Check for PiPO tablets custom root firmware updates in our forum:

Thanks to sclstore.fr for the test PiPO M7 pro tablet.