GEEKOM A5 AMD Ryzen 7 5800H mini PC review – Part 1: Unboxing, teardown, and first boot

GEEKOM A5 Windows 11

GEEKOM A5 is a Windows 11 Pro mini PC based on an eight-core, sixteen-thread AMD Ryzen 7 5800H processor with up to 64GB RAM, NVMe/SATA SSD support up to 2TB, and interfaces such as dual HDMI 2.0,  five USB 3.2 Gen 2 10 Gbps ports, 2.5GbE, as well as support a WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2 wireless module. The company has sent us a review sample of the GEEKOM A5 mini PC with 32GB RAM and a 512GB SSD. Today, we will look at the Mini PC’s specifications, go through an unboxing, followed by a teardown, and quickly check out if it works properly with a first boot to Windows 11 Pro. In the next part of the GEEKOM A5 review, we will test performance and features with Windows 11 Pro, followed by an evaluation of the mini PC with Ubuntu 22.04 in the final and third part of the […]

Gigadevice GD32VW553 RISC-V microcontroller supports WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2 LE

GD32VW553 WiFi 6 Bluetooth 5.2 LE

Gigadevice GD32VW553 is a new 160MHz RISC-V microcontroller for IoT applications with support for WiFi 6 (802.11ax) and Bluetooth 5.2 Low Energy (LE) and available in QFN32 and QFN40 packages with up to 28 GPIOs. As an IoT chip, the chip supports various power modes and target wake time (TWT) for low power consumption, as well as WiFi features such as WPA3 and WiFi direct, while the radio can handle Bluetooth 5.2 LE bit rates of up to 2 Mbps and support the Long Range mode. Gigadevice GD32VW553 specifications: MCU core – 32-bit Nuclei N307 RISC-V core @ up to 160 MHz with RV32I / M / A / F / D / C / P / B instruction extensions Memory – 320KB SRAM Storage – 2048KB or 4096KB flash Wireless WiFI 6 802.11b/g/n/ax HT20 up to 114.7Mbps 802.11e QoS Enhancement (WMM). 802.11i (WPA, WPA2, WPA3). Open, shared key, and […]

Firefly ROC-RK3588-RT Rockchip RK3588(J) SBC comes with three 2.5Gbps/gigabit Ethernet ports

ROC-RK3588-RT router SBC

Firefly ROC-RK3588-RT is a Rockchip RK3588(J) SBC suitable for networking applications such as routers and firewalls thanks to one 2.5GbE port and two gigabit Ethernet ports and available in both commercial and industrial temperature grades. But the board is likely to be used for more complex workloads since it also comes with three video output interfaces (2x HDMI and USB-C DisplayPort), M.2 sockets for a SATA or NVMe SSD, a WiFi 6/Bluetooth 5.2 module, a 6 TOPS NPU embedded in the Rockchip processor, and a (non-standard) expansion connector with PCIe Gen 3 and other interfaces. Firefly ROC-RK3588-RT specifications: SoC (one or the other) Rockchip RK3588 octa-core processor with CPU – 4x Cortex‑A76  cores @ up to 2.4 GHz, 4x Cortex‑A55 core @ 1.8 GHz GPU – Arm Mali-G610 MP4 “Odin” GPU @ 1.0 GHz Video decoder – 8Kp60 H.265, VP9, AVS2, 8Kp30 H.264 AVC/MVC, 4Kp60 AV1, 1080p60 MPEG-2/-1, VC-1, VP8 […]

MeLE Overclock4C is an ultrathin pocket-sized mini PC powered by an Intel Processor N95 CPU

MeLE Overclock4C

Mele Overclock4C is an Intel Processor N95 Alder Lake-N mini PC with an ultrathin (21mm) design which, as its name implies, supports “overclocking”, although what it really means here is the ability to increase the PL1 and PL2 power limits in the BIOS/UEFI in order to increase performance without actually changing the top frequency of the processor… It’s the same idea and virtually the same design as the MeLE Overclock3C which boosts the TDP of the Celeron N5095 Jasper Lake processor up to 18W instead of the 15W default. Here the TDP of the Processor N95 is likely boosted up to 20 Watts (as per Intel Ark) delivering a 33% performance improvement over the Celeron N5095. The Overclock4C is available with 16GB or 32GB DDR4, a 256GB eMMC flash, and a 256GB SSD. MeLE Overclock4C specifications: SoC – Intel Processor N95 quad-core Alder Lake N-series processor @ up to 3.4 […]

Toradex Titan Evaluation Kit features NXP i.MX 95 AI processor for IoT, industrial, and automotive applications

Toradex TITAN NXP i.MX 95 evaluation kit EVK

Toradex Titan Evaluation Kit features the NXP i.MX 95 Cortex-A55/M33/M7 heterogenous AI processor introduced at the beginning of the year with an NXP eIQ Neutron Neural Network Accelerator (NPU) for automotive, industrial, and IoT applications. The design is comprised of a carrier board and a SO-DIMM system-on-module with the NXP i.MX 95 SoC, up to 16GB LPPDR5 memory, up to 128GB eMMC flash storage, a WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 wireless module, a gigabit Ethernet controller, a PMIC, and a few other components. The carrier board also comes with 10GbE and Gigabit Ethernet ports, HDMI video output, a few USB ports, and various expansion connectors and headers. Toradex Titan evaluation kit specifications: SoC – NXP i.MX 95 with Up to 6x Arm Cortex-A55 application cores clocked at 2.0 GHz with 32K I-cache and D-cache, 64KB L2 cache, and 512KB L3 cache 1x Arm Cortex-M7 real-time core clocked at 800 MHz […]

ESP32 Arduino Core 3.0.0 adds support for ESP32-C6 and ESP32-H2

ESP32-C6 ESP32-H2 Arduino

Espressif Systems has now released an alpha version of ESP32 Arduino Core 3.0.0 enabling the new ESP32-C6 and ESP32-H2 targets to be programmed with the Arduino IDE, and including a number of new features made possible by the ESP-IDF 5.1 SDK. Announced in 2021, the ESP32-C6 WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5 LE, and 802.15.4 wireless MCU became available in modules and devkits at the beginning of this year, but so far they could only be programmed with the latest version (5.1) of the ESP-IDF framework, and so was the new ESP32-H2 Bluetooth 5.2 and 802.15.4 (Zigbee/Thread) MCU. But fans of Arduino programming can now rejoice as an alpha version of ESP32 Arduino Core 3.0.0 brings support for the new microcontroller, and a stable release is planned for December 2023. But as you can probably imagine ESP32 Arduino Core 3.0.0 will also bring lots of other changes since the ESP32 Arduino Core […]

GEEKOM Mini Air12 Mini PC features Intel N100 CPU, 16GB DDR5, 512GB NVMe SSD, WiFi 6 module

GEEKOM Mini Air12

GEEKOM Mini Air12 is a new mini PC powered by an Intel Processor N100 CPU with 16GB DDR5 SO-DIMM memory, a 512GB M.2 NVMe SSD, and a WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2 wireless module from Azureware. The device also comes with a gigabit Ethernet port, support for up to three displays with HDMI 2.0, mini DP 1.4, and USB-C ports, as well as a few USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports and a 3.5mm audio jack, plus a full-size SD card slot and a Kensington lock slot. GEEKOM Mini Air12 specifications: SoC – Intel Processor N100 Alder Lake-N quad-core/quad-thread processor @ up to 3.4 GHz (Turbo) with 6MB cache, 24EU Intel HD graphics @ up to 750 MHz; TDP: 6W System Memory – 16GB DDR5-4800 via SO-DIMM socket Storage 512GB M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 3 x4 NVMe SSD, upgradeable up to 1TB; note: the socket also supports M.2 SATA drives Full-size […]

Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite – A 4.3 GHz 12-core Arm AI processor for next gen PCs and laptops

Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite highlights

Qualcomm has now provided Arm chips for mobile PCs (aka laptops) for several years, but apart from a 20-hour battery life, the performance and price of Snapdragon laptops have often been disappointing. The Snapdragon X Elite aims to change that at least on the performance front. The new Qualcomm 12-core 64-bit Arm processor is clocked at up to 3.8 GHz boosting to up to 4.3 GHz, and is said to deliver up to twice the CPU performance against the competition (Intel/AMD/Apple) or provides the same level of performance at a third of the power consumption. The SoC will also be able to run on-device generative AI with over 13B parameters thanks to 75 TOPS of AI performance and support the latest wireless connectivity technologies such as 5G and WiFi 7 through external chips from the company. Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite specifications: CPU – 12-core 64-bit Armv8 Oryon processor clocked at […]

EDATEC Raspberry Pi 5 fanless case