AAEON PICO-ADN4 Pico-ITX Alder Lake-N SBC features Processor N50 to Atom x7425E SoC

AAEON PICO-ADN4

AAEON PICO-ADN4 Pico-ITX SBC comes with a choice of four Alder Lake-N processors – Processor N50, Processor N97, Core i3-N305, or Atom x7425E – and is available in SKUs with both standard (0°C ~ 60°C) and wide-temperature (-40°C ~ 85°C) ranges for industrial applications. The single board computer comes with up to 16GB LPDDR5, SATA and mSATA storage, three display interfaces (HDMI, eDP/LVDS, DDI), dual Ethernet with 2.5GbE and GbE RJ45 ports, USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports, and M.2 and mPCIe sockets for expansion. The board supports 12V DC power input by default, but AAEON company offers a 9V to 36V DC input option. PICO-ADN4 specifications: Alder Lake-N SoC (one or the other) Intel Processor N50 dual-core processor up to 3.4 GHz with 6MB cache, 16EU Intel UHD Graphics; TDP: 6W Intel Processor N97 quad-core processor up to 3.6 GHz with 6MB cache, 24EU Intel UHD Graphics; TDP: 12W Intel […]

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 […]

Raspberry Pi 5 review – Part 2: Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm, benchmarks, power consumption, and more

Raspberry Pi 5 Review Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm

A few days ago I finally went through the Raspberry Pi 5 kit I received last September going through all the items and booting it with Raspberry Pi OS bookworm. I’ve now had time to perform more tests to check out the performance with benchmarks and test various features on the Raspberry Pi 5. So I’ll report my experience in the second part of the review and compare the Raspberry Pi 5 SBC to the Raspberry Pi 4 and some other Arm Linux SBCs.

System information in Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm

Last time around, I installed the Raspberry Pi 5 in its official case, but for most of the testing, I decided to go back to the bare board fitted with its active cooler since it’s the best cooling option as we’ll see further in the review.

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 […]

SZBOX S100 pocket-sized Mini PC offers 2.5GbE & WiFi 6 networking, dual HDMI

SZBOX S100

SZBOX S100 is a pocket-sized mini PC powered by an Intel Processor N100 CPU, with 16GB LPDDR5 memory, and features such as 2.5GbE & WiFi 6 networking and support for dual 4K display setups through HDMI ports. The mini PC is either offered as a barebone model with 16GB RAM and no storage or with a 256GB to 1TB M.2 SATA SSD preloaded with Windows 11 Pro. Other highlights include three USB 3.2 ports and a  3.5mm audio jack. SZBOX S100 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 LPDDR5-4800 soldered on the motherboard Storage – Optional 256GB, 512GB, or 1TB M.2 SATA 2242 SSD Video Output 2x HDMI 2.0 ports up to 4Kp60 Dual independent display support Audio – 3.5mm headphone jack, digital […]

Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max (2023) features a 2 GHz MediaTek MT8696T CPU, support WiFi 6E

Amazon Fire TV 4K Max 2023

Amazon has recently introduced its second-generation Fire TV Stick 4K and Fire TV Stick 4K Max 2023 powered by MediaTek MT8696D and MT8696T Arm Cortex-A55 processors respectively and going for $49.99 and $59.99 on Amazon. The new Fire TV Stick 4K Max model is an incremental update compared to the Fire TV Stick 4K Max (2021) with basically the same processor but clocked slightly higher, twice the storage capacity, and WiFi 6E support instead of just WiFi 6. The Fire TV Stick 4K (2023) is a more notable update compared to the very first Fire TV Stick 4K launched in 2018. Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K / 4K Max (codenames: AFTKM and AFTKRT) specifications: SoC Fire TV Stick 4K (2023) – MediaTek MT8696D with quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor @ 1.7 GHz, Imagination GE9215 GPU @ 650MHz Fire TV Stick 4K Max (2023) – MediaTek MT8696T with quad-core Arm Cortex-A55 processor […]

Amlogic S905X5 Armv9 TV Box SoC supports AV1, H.266, Ai-SR

Amlogic S905X5 TV Box

The Amlogic S905X5 may be first the Armv9 processor designed for set-top boxes (STB) and TV boxes, supports the latest AV1 and H.266 video codecs, and also comes with a 4 TOPS AI accelerator. We don’t have the full details yet, and the news comes from a tease from SEI Robotics which is about to unveil an Amlogic S905X5 AI-SR (AI Super Resolution) Android TV box at IBC 2023. Preliminary specifications for S905X5 SoC and SEI Robotics TV box: SoC – Amlogic S905X5 CPU – Quad-core Armv9 CPU (likely Cortex-A510 cores) delivering 40K+ DMIPS GPU – Arm Mali-G310 V5 entry-level GPU clocked at 1 GHz for 4K HDR user interfaces VPU – Up to 2x 4Kp60 10-bit H.266/VCC and AV1 video codecs, and the usual VP9, AVS3, H.265/HEVC, H.264 AI accelerator – 4 TOPS NPU enabling AI-SR Process – “Second generation” 6 nm process System Memory & Storage – TBD […]

Blackview MP80 review – Part 2: An Intel Processor N95 mini PC tested with Windows 11

Blackview MP80 review windows 11

In the first part of our Blackview MP80 Mini PC review we’ve looked at the specifications of the Intel Alder Lake-N Processor N95 pocket-sized mini PC, gone through an unboxing, a (limited) teardown, and given it a quick try in Windows 11. We’ve now had time to test the mini PC with Windows 11 more thoroughly and the MP80 mini PC works quite well and smoothly for its size. So in the second part of the review, we’ll report our experience, run some benchmarks, test hardware features, and so on. Software overview and Blackview MP80’s features testing The System->About section in Windows settings confirms the Blackview MP80 mini PC is powered by an Intel Processor N95 Alder Lake-N CPU with 16 GB RAM, and comes with Windows 11 Pro version 22H2 OS build 22621.1702. HWiNFO64 provides more details about the Intel Processor N95 Alder Lake-N quad-core/quad-thread processor, the motherboard (Shenzhen […]

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