PICMG has announced the release of the COM-HPC 1.2 specification adding the COM-HPC Mini form factor that’s about the size of a credit card (90x75mm) or half the size of the next-smallest COM-HPC form factor but still provides access to high-speed interfaces such as PCIe Gen5, USB4, and 10GbE.
The COM-HPC “High-Performance Computing” form factor was introduced a few years ago for more powerful CPUs (higher TDP) with support for PCIe Gen4 (the COM Express form factor can’t handle PCIe Gen 4 clock speeds and throughputs well), and until now four sizes were available with COM-HPC Client Type modules measuring 95 x 120mm (Size A) to 160 x 120mm (Size C) and Server Type modules having either 160 x 160mm (Size D) or 200 x 160mm (Size E) dimensions. The COM-HPC Mini brings a smaller (95 x 60 mm) credit card-sized form factor to the COM-HPC standard for applications such as autonomous mobile robots, drones, mobile 5G test and measurement equipment, and other edge applications.
In order to achieve the smaller size, COM-HPC 1.2 “Mini” modules come with a single 400-pin connector with the following interfaces:
- Storage – 2x SATA ports (shared with PCIe lanes)
- Display – 1x eDP, 2x DDI
- Networking – 2x 10 Gbps NBASE-T Ethernet ports
- USB
- 8x SuperSpeed lanes (for USB4/ThunderBolt, USB 3.2, or DDI)
- 8x USB 2.0
- PCIe – 16x PCIe lanes (PCIe 4.0 or PCIe 5.0)
- Misc – Boot SPI and eSPI, UART, CAN, Audio, FUSA, and power management signals.
- I/O voltage – 1.8V on most pins (while it’s 3.3V on larger COM-HPC modules)
- input voltage – 8V to 20V DC
- Input power – Up to 107W
- Dimensions – 95 x 70 x 15 mm (thickness from the top of the carrier board to the top of the heat spreader)
Cameras are still supported via an FFC connector exposing a MIPI CSI interface. That’s about all we know for now, as while the COM-HPC 1.2 specification has been released and is available for download, it costs 750 Euros to access it, and I got most of the information above from the press release.
It’s unclear when we may start to see actual COM-HPC Mini modules from companies such as congatec or ADLINK, but considering PICMG plans to release a “COM-HPC 1.2 Carrier Design Guide” in early 2024, I’d expect announcements later in H1 2024.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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It looks like COM-HPC is a standards organization that requires membership fees to join. I didn’t see any product listings.
COM-HPC is a system-on-module standard among others: https://www.cnx-software.com/2021/08/05/overview-and-list-of-system-on-module-and-computer-on-module-standards-q7-smarc-com-hpc/
The consortium managing the COM-HPC and COM Express standard is PICMG (PCI Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group). The member companies of the consortium are the ones manufacturing COM-HPC compliant modules.