Among all the inexpensive Intel Alder Lake-N mini PCs, ZXIPC is selling a no-name AMD Ryzen 5 5500 mini PC for $177 with 8GB of RAM and a 128GB SSD, or $143.03 as a barebone system. This weekend, I compared the benchmarks of various Intel Alder Lake-N processors using results from our mini PC reviews, and one user asked me whether I could do the same for AMD systems: It would be interesting to compare the performance on these to similarly priced AMD offerings. I’m specifically thinking here of Mini PCs based on the Ryzen 5560U and the Ryzen 5800U/H Since we haven’t reviewed this type of mini PC, I won’t be able to do such a comparison, but I was still intrigued, as most AMD mini PCs I had seen sold for at least $300. So I went to Aliexpress and found a few AMD Ryzen 5/7 mini PCs […]
Get $200 discount on GEEKOM A7 AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS mini PC (Sponsored)
GEEKOM A7 is a powerful mini PC based on an AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS octa-core/16-thread processor that normally sells for $849 with 32GB RAM and a 2TB SSD. But you can get $200 off using cnxa7off coupon code to get the discount on GEEKOM US or GEEKOM UK bringing the price down to $649. The mini PC also supports up to four 4K displays through HDMI 2.0 and USB-C ports, provides fast networking via a 2.5GbE jack and a WiFi 6E + Bluetooth 5.3 module, and offers plenty of USB ports for expansion in a compact form factor. GEEKOM A7 specifications: SoC – AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS 8-core/16-thread processor up to 4.0GHz with 16MB cache, AMD Radeon 780M Graphics; TDP: 35 to 54W System Memory – 32GB dual-channel DDR5-5600 via 262-pin SODIMM sockets, upgradeable to 64GB Storage 2TB NVMe PCIe x4 Gen 4 SSD Full-size SD card reader Video Output […]
SolidRun Bedrock R8000 is the first Industrial PC to feature AMD Ryzen Embedded 8000 series
Israeli embedded systems manufacturer, SolidRun, has recently introduced the Bedrock R8000, a new fanless, Industrial PC targeted at edge AI applications. The Bedrock R8000 integrates the newly-announced AMD Ryzen Embedded 8000 series processors with 8 Zen 4 cores and 16 threads clocked at up to 5.1 GHz. The Ryzen Embedded 8000 Series has a 16 TOPS NPU for AI workloads and offers up to 10 years of guaranteed availability. Also, up to 3 AI accelerators (either Hailo-10 or Hailo 8) can be combined with the onboard NPU to achieve over 100 TOPS for generative or inferencing AI workloads. Apart from the Ryzen Embedded 8000 series, the Bedrock R8000 series also supports other Accelerated Processing Units (APU) in the “Hawk Point” family. The CPU power limit can be adjusted in the BIOS within a range of 8W to 54W. Memory goes up to 96GB DDR5 ECC/non-ECC and three NVME PCIe Gen4 […]
AMD Ryzen Embedded 8000 Series processors target industrial AI with 16 TOPS NPU
AMD has recently “announced” the Ryzen Embedded 8000 Series processors in a community post with the latest AMD embedded devices combining a 16 TOPS NPU based on the AMD XDNA architecture with CPU and GPU elements for a total of 39 TOPS designed for industrial artificial intelligence. The Ryzen Embedded 8000 CPUs will be found in machine vision, robotics, and industrial automation applications to enhance the quality control and inspection processes, enable real-time, route-planning decisions on-device for minimal latency, and predictive maintenance, and autonomous control of industrial processes. AMD Ryzen Embedded 8000 key features and shared specifications: CPU – Up to 8 “Zen 4” cores, 16 threads Cache L1 Instruction Cache – 32 KB, L1 Data Cache = 32 KB (per core) L2 Cache – Up to 8 MB (total) L3 Cache- Up to 16 MB unified Graphics – RDNA 3 graphics with up to 6 WGPs (Work Group processors) […]
SolidRun’s first COM Express module is powered by the AMD Ryzen V3000 series APU
SolidRun has recently introduced the “Ryzen V3000 CX7” x86-based CoM Express 7 module powered by an AMD Ryzen V3000 Series V3C48 or V3C18I APU. This module is designed with AMD’s 6nm ‘Zen3’ architecture and can reach speeds up to 3.8GHz. It supports up to 96 GB of DDR5 memory, which can be either ECC or non-ECC, offering strong performance for different uses. The module features 20 PCIe Gen4 lanes, dual 10Gbps Ethernet MAC, and two SATA Gen3 6Gbps interfaces (on V3C18I and V3C48 models) all these features make this module useful for high-speed networking, embedded computing, and storage applications. Previously we have seen many similar COM Express & other modules based on the Ryzen V3000 Series of APUs including the ADLINK Express VR7 (COM Express) and another custom CPU module found in SolidRun Bedrock V3000 fanless industrial computer. Feel free to check those out if you are looking for similar […]
GEEKOM A7 mini PC review – Part 3: Ubuntu 22.04 (and Ubuntu 24.04)
After a GEEKOM A7 mini PC unboxing and teardown, I tested the AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS mini PC in Windows 11 Pro, but I’ll now report my experience with the GEEKOM A7 running Ubuntu 22.04.4 to see how well the AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS system performs in Linux. I also had to install Ubuntu 24.04 to check the wireless module further, so I’ll report on that too. The Ubuntu 22.04 review will include features testing, several benchmarks, storage, 2.5GbE, and WiFi 6 networking performance testing, a stress test to check thermal performance, as well as fan noise and power consumption measurements. Ubuntu 22.04 installation I resized the Windows 11 partition to get an unused 500GB partition to install Ubuntu 22.04 from a USB drive. But the first time, it did not work as I was asked to disable BitLocker disk encryption in Windows 11 just like I did for the […]
GEEKOM A7 review – Part 2: Windows 11 Pro tested in a compact AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS mini PC
We previously had a look at the hardware of the GEEKOM A7 with an unboxing and a teardown of the powerful AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS mini PC with 32GB DDR5, a 2TB NVMe SSD, four 4K-capable video outputs, and high-speed interfaces such as USB4 and 2.5GbE, as well as WiFi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 wireless connectivity. We’ve now had time to test it with Windows 11 Pro in detail, so in the second part of the GEEKOM A7 review, we’ll report our experience with the mini PC including a software overview, features testing, various benchmarks, networking and storage performance testing, fan noise, power consumption, and more. Software overview and features testing The System->About window confirms the GEEKOM A7 mini PC is powered by an AMD Ryzen 9 7840HS processor with Radeon 780M graphics with 32GB RAM and runs Windows 11 Pro 23H2 build 22631.2861. That also means we only had […]
Testing AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS’ AI Engine in Windows 11
Some of the newer AMD Ryzen processors come with an AI Engine (also called NPU or IPU) that works in Windows 11 including the Ryzen 9 7940HS, Ryzen 7 7840HS, Ryzen 5 7640HS, Ryzen 7 7840U, and Ryzen 5 7640U. I’ve just completed the review of the GEEKOM A7 mini PC powered by an AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS CPU with Windows 11 – but need to wait before publishing it – so I decided to try the AI engine on the Ryzen 9 7940HS processor. The AI Engine relies on AMD XDNA architecture, and AMD provides instructions to get started with examples, demos, and developer resources. So I decided to try some examples, but for some reasons I’ll explain below, I eventually had to settle for some demos. Ryzen AI software installation (for the demos) The examples hosted on GitHub require us to install dependencies for the Ryzen AI software […]