microSD Express memory cards to support up to 2GB/s data transfers

microSD Express 2GB per second

SD Association (SDA) has announced the new SD 9.1 specification that doubles the speed of microSD Express memory card speed up to 2GB/s, defines four new SD Express Speed Classes to ensure guaranteed minimum sequential performance levels, and adds support for multi-stream access and related power and thermal management to assure the guaranteed performance. We first covered the microSD Express cards in 2019 as they were added to the SD 7.0 specification with promises of SSD performance through a PCIe 3.0 interface delivering up to 985MB/s. Over four years have passed since then, and I have yet to write about devices supporting the new standard, but the SD Association is not giving up with the introduction of the SD 9.1 specification that doubles the speed of the microSD Express cards, and full-size SD Express card can even reach close to 4GB/s. More specifically, the maximum speed achievable on microSD Express […]

Intel N100 mini PC offers eight USB ports, NVMe and SATA storage

Intel N100 mini PC 8x USB ports

We’ve already written about many mini PCs powered by the Intel Processor N100 SoC and other SKUs part of the Alder Lake N-series family, but the HUNSN BM34 is a bit different as it offers eight USB ports, with two USB 3.0 and six USB 2.0 ports that should remove the need for an external USB hub for most use cases. The fanless mini PC ships with up to 16GB DDR4 memory, supports one mSATA SSD, one NVMe SSD, and one 2.5-inch SATA drive, and offers two HDMI ports and DisplayPort video output, plus dual GbE, WiFi 5, and two audio jacks for speaker and microphone. HUNSN BM34 specifications: SoC – Intel Processor N100 quad-core Alder Lake-N processor @ up to 3.4 GHz (Turbo) with 6MB cache, 24EU Intel HD graphics @ 750 MHz; TDP: 6W System Memory – Up to 16GB DDR4 via SO-DIMM socket Storage 1x mSATA socket, […]

Orange Pi Compute Module 4 – A low-cost Rockchip RK3566-powered alternative to Raspberry Pi CM4

Orange Pi Compute Module 4

Orange Pi Compute Module 4 is a system-on-module mechanically and electrically compatible with the Raspberry Pi CM4, but powered by a Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 AI processor just like the Radxa CM3 introduced a few years ago, or more recently the Banana Pi BPI-CM2 (RK3568). The new module, also called Orange Pi CM4 for shorts, comes with 1GB to 8GB RAM, 8GB to 128GB eMMC flash, and an optional 128/256MBit SPI flash, as well as a Gigabit Ethernet PHY and on-board WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0. It comes with the two 100-pin high-density connectors found on the Raspberry Pi CM4, and a smaller 24-pin connector for extra I/Os. Orange Pi Compute Module 4 specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3566 quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor @ 1.8 GHz with Arm Mali-G52 2EE GPU, 0.8 TOPS AI accelerator, 4Kp60 H.265/H.264/VP9 video decoding, 1080p100f H.265/H.264 video encoding System Memory – 1GB, 2GB, 4GB, or […]

Morefine M600 6900HX review – A Ryzen 9 6900HX mini PC tested with Windows 11 and Ubuntu 23.04

Morefine M600 6900HX Review

Under review today is Morefine M600 6900HX mini PC which is a generational update to the previously released S500+ (5900HX or 5700U) although it should be noted that Morefine will soon be releasing a newer version of the M600 with either a Ryzen 7 7840HS or Ryzen 9 7940HS. The current M600 (6900HX) brings both processor and iGPU improvements over the S500+ together with a couple of port upgrades and the welcome introduction of USB4, DDR5, PCIe Gen 4.0, and an additional M.2 storage slot. This review will look at Windows 11 performance together with a quick look at running Ubuntu 23.04 and experiences from using the new features. Morefine M600 6900HX product specifications The Morefine M600 6900HX specifications are as follows:   Product overview Overview of hardware The M600 physically consists of a 149 x 145 x 40 mm (5.87 x 5.71 x 1.57 inches) square metal case with […]

GEEKOM AS 6 (Ryzen 9 6900HX) mini PC review – Part 1: unboxing, teardown, and first try

First boot GEEKOM AS 6 MIni PC

GEEKOM AS 6 is a mini PC based on AMD Ryzen 6000HX CPU with up to 64GB dual-channel DDR5 RAM memory, two PCIe Gen 4×4 M.2 2280 SSD sockets, WiFi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2, and a range of ports, made in collaboration with ASUS (that’s the PN53 model) and which the company advertises as an alternative to the Intel NUC 13 Pro “Arena Canyon”. GEEKOM sent us a sample of the AS 6 mini PC with an AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX octa-core processor with Radeon 680M graphics, 32GB RAM and a 1TB SSD for review, and in the first part of the review, we’ll look at the specifications, check the package content, teardown the system, and give it a first try, before testing it more thoroughly with the pre-installed Windows 11 and Ubuntu 22.04 in the next parts. GEEKOM AS 6  specifications Here’s how GEEKOM AS 6 specifications compare the […]

Orange Pi 5 Plus SBC switches to Rockchip RK3588 SoC, brings dual HDMI 2.1, dual 2.5GbE, M.2 PCIe sockets

Orange Pi 5 Plus

Orange Pi 5 Plus is the first Rockchip RK3588 SBC from the company and succeeds the cheaper Rockchip RK3588S-based Orange Pi 5 and Orange Pi 5B single board computers that had a more limited number of high-end interfaces. Switching to the I/O rich RK3588 processor allowed Orange Pi to add two 2.5GbE networking interfaces, support for NVMe SSD storage up to 2,000 MB/s, up to four display interfaces with two HDMI 2.1 ports, MIPI DSI and USB-C with DisplayPort Alt. mode, as well as an extra M.2 socket for optional WiFi 6 and Bluetooth connectivity. Orange Pi 5 Plus specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3588 CPU – Octa-core processor with 4x Cortex-A76 cores @ up to 2.4 GHz, 4x Cortex-A55 cores @ up to 1.8 GHz Arm Mali-G610 MP4 GPU with support for OpenGL ES1.1/2.0/3.2, OpenCL 2.2, and Vulkan 1.2 6 TOPS AI accelerator with support for INT4/INT8/INT16/FP16 mixed operation VPU […]

NanoPC-T6 Arm Linux SBC offers dual 2.5GbE, HDMI 2.1 outputs, HDMI 2.0 input, 2x M.2 sockets, and more

NanoPC-T6

FriendlyELEC NanoPC-T6 is a feature-rich Rockchip RK3588 SBC with up to 16GB LPDDR4X RAM, 256GB eMMC flash, two HDMI 2.1 output ports, one HDMI 2.0 input port, dual 2.5GbE, two M.2 PCIe socket for storage or wireless, a mini PCIe socket and microSIM slot for 4G LTE connectivity, and more. The new NanoPC-T6 single board computer offered many more interfaces than the recent NanoPi R6S or R6C board based on the Rockchip RK3588S with fewer I/Os. As such, it would be suitable for a wider range of applications and FriendlyELEC says it is well suited to enterprise consumers who want to develop mini machine vision systems, and embedded systems hobbyists who want to explore and implement all sorts of prototypes. NanoPC-T6 specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3588 CPU – Octa-core processor with 4x Cortex-A76 cores @ up to 2.4 GHz, 4x Cortex-A55 cores @ 1.8 GHz GPU – Arm Mali-G610 MP4 […]

Beelink SER6 Pro 7735HS Review – Windows 11 benchmarks, USB4 port tested with NVIDIA RTX 3050 eGPU’s

Beelink SER6 Pro 7735HS review

Previously I reviewed Beelink’s SER6 Pro mini PC when it was released with an AMD Ryzen 7 6800H processor, mentioning that a ‘refreshed’ model had since been released. Beelink have kindly sent me this updated model which now uses an AMD Ryzen 7 7735HS. Given this is virtually an identical processor with just a 50 MHz improvement to the boost frequency, this review will look at confirming that the Windows performance is just as good as before and also revisiting the issues faced previously with the USB4 port. Spoiler alert: the USB4 now works perfectly! Beelink SER6 Pro 7735S specification Beelink list the SER6 Pro 7735HS specifications as: with the only differences to the original SER6 Pro being firstly the AMD Ryzen 7 7735HS processor which has a Max Turbo Frequency of 4.75GHz, and secondly that two variations are also available: one with ports exactly the same as the original […]