Are High end SBC toast or is 12thGen / AMD X64 going to kill them off?

[beanflying]

Serious question you can now (apart from dedicated GPIO) buy PC's for similar or less $ than PI4 (with a few options and storage/case etc) so does the higher end PI SBC et al still have a place?

I have been looking for a solution for a light industrial application that I want to link to my NAS, the Internerd and currently an Arduino based shield for the GPIO (firmware exists for the project already). Size and physical board size is a consideration as is power consumption.

Currently in the mix is one of the new N100 (6W TDP, 100x100 board) based micro PC's or a well specced PI4 or clone (80x50'ish).

Thoughts?

[beanflying]

We won't mention more power and speed for the $ either then  Size isn't a total killer for this project as it is going into a 120kg bit of gear about 1x1x.5 m and will sit on a mobile cart nearly the same size again, but even an M-ITX is getting to large and more expensive than it needs to be.

I should also mention the GUI for this is available on Windoze, Mac and several versions of Linux so it's not an OS thing, likely regardless of the hardware I choose in the end I think I will give Linux a go (now as a heretic and critic of the Distro mess I expect to burst into spontaneous flames  )

[bw2341]

Do you have a specific model in mind?

I haven't bought a mini PC myself, but a youtuber I follow seems to be enthusiastic about them. Check out the ServeTheHome youtube channel and website.

My impression is that they come from variety of small Chinese brands and are inexpensive compared to name brand desktops.

They should work as advertised, but I am worried about long term support. Will you be able to get timely system firmware and microcode updates? If proper Windows licensing is important, you may have to price in a new copy of Windows. For instance, in a review of a particular mini PC, Patrick from STH found that a clean reinstall of Windows left the system unactivated. The seller sent him new keys that worked, but this means that this particular mini PC was not BIOS activated like all complete PCs from the big brands.

If your needs are very generic, it might make sense to use one of these mini PCs if you are prepared to quickly swap it out with a completely different one if you have a problem.

If you need support, a more expensive small form factor or ultra small form factor PC from a big brand would make more sense.

[Nominal Animal]

Serious question you can now (apart from dedicated GPIO) buy PC's for similar or less $ than PI4 (with a few options and storage/case etc) so does the higher end PI SBC et al still have a place?

I don't use Pi's, and consider higher-end to be boards like Odroid M1, Odroid N2+, Radxa Rock 5b, and such.

To me, there are two key points:

• Vanilla kernel support.  I don't want to be stuck with vendor kernels, I want to be able to use my board even after the vendor switches to newer models, so I want all support to be pushed/pushable to vanilla upstream kernels.  Vendor kernels are useful, if and only if the source is close enough to vanilla to be ported upstream.  Custom flattened/modified kernel trees are useless to me.
• Connectivity.  Not just GPIO, but also stuff like CSI for direct camera connections.

None of my SBCs are used as a laptop/desktop replacements.  I see the PC's you referred to as mini-desktops used for web browsing, social media, maybe to run dedicated applications and appliances, with the PC mounted to the back of the display as usual; and not as replacing any of my own SBC use cases.  Perhaps NAS boxes and IOT gateway/firewall servers, if the power consumption is low enough?

Using microcontrollers (especially via high-speed USB like Teensy 4.0) to interface to outside does blur the lines a bit, but CSI and similar high-speed parallel buses are still relatively rare in cheap microcontrollers, and tend to only be available on SBCs.

I should also mention the GUI for this is available on Windoze, Mac and several versions of Linux so it's not an OS thing, likely regardless of the hardware I choose in the end I think I will give Linux a go (now as a heretic and critic of the Distro mess I expect to burst into spontaneous flames  )

I like that GUI approach myself.

As to heretic, BAH!  There is nothing worse than axiomatic/dogmatic opinions.  You have constructed your opinion based on observable details, so hereticism definitely does not apply, whether or not one agrees with your conclusions or the importance of those details.  As to being critical about Linux, so am I; it is only a tool, after all.

What annoys me, is how people take Windows and x86-based systems as the prototype and pinnacle of computers, and assume stuff they observe under Windows is directly applicable to all other systems.  The recent discussion on using USB3-connected ADC and process it on the host computer is a particularly annoying example.  Just because you need a high-end Intel Core i7/i9 processor to do something in Windows, does not mean a cheap SBC cannot do the same processing task at a fraction of the cost and power consumption; it only depends on the exact details of the processing task, and whether the SBC has buses and facilities suitable for such processing.
Such misconceptions lead to using the wrong tool for the job, wasting resources for no sensible reason.

[DavidAlfa]

You can get pretty decent slim clients for cheap on eBay, look for S720, S920, T630...
I bought a T630 for $60, 2GHz Quad core, 8GB RAM DDR4+128GB SSD, USB 3.0, Gbit...

https://www.ebay.com/itm/195699749645

[beanflying]

That is sort of where I think I am heading although I am more likely to stump up the extra $ for a current gen N95 or N100 based system as you get a power and size saving over an older Generation Elitedesk/Optiplex etc thin client. Locally finding anything under $100USD equivalent (with a 'reasonable' spec) is fairly rare too.

I suspect that the GUI and NAS access requirements would see me needing a minimum 4Gb/64Gb on Linux and some more if I stay with Windoze.

Just ran across this and quirky as always and generally on point 

[beanflying]

While this is getting up in price a bit at $180'ish USD delivered with 8Gb of Ram and a 256Gb NVMe it ticks all the boxes for a light industrial PC and then some. The Home user versions come with a lot less inputs and outputs and generally a plastic case and fans for $30-50 less.

The N95 is cheaper and has more 3D poke but also needs more power.

[Nominal Animal]

Did you notice the J6413 sticker?  It's an 11th generation Elkhart Lake processor one can easily mistake for 13th generation Alder Lake processor; they're very similar.

[beanflying]

Same listing and three options of CPU AliX

The same unit is also seemingly sold by a few others but I think having a poke around MiniTree is closer to being the manufacturer than the others.

[Nominal Animal]

Yep; I just wanted to make sure you knew about the potential risk of bait-and-switch, triggered by the suspicious sticker.  The screenshot you posted first did not include any mention of the 11th gen processor, only about N95 and N100 processors.

(Those who do such scams tend to leave telltale signs, because they want to target gullible people who don't see the signs, and not have to fight those who are sharp enough to check the hardware they get.  Just the same as with email scams: they are often deliberately bad, in order to catch only the gullible ones, and be ignored as obvious scams by anyone who might detect the ongoing scam before the money hits the scammers accounts.  Phishing is different though, often trying to seem as authentic as possible, to collect peoples banking passwords and such.)

[DavidAlfa]

No doubt the N100 performs great for 6W TDP (Like a i5-2600K) but it's too expensive for a small computer, $150 + RAM + storage, here it goes $200+.
The AMD GX420GI in the T630 performs like 1/3rd of the N100, but you still get a nice value for the money, similar to a i3-2350m.

[beanflying]

No doubt the N100 performs great for 6W TDP (Like a i5-2600K) but it's too expensive for a small computer, $150 + RAM + storage, here it goes $200+.
The AMD GX420GI in the T630 performs like 1/3rd of the N100, but you still get a nice value for the money, similar to a i3-2350m.

Currently the cheapest N100 versions I have found without getting to the suspect end of AliX are actually on Amazon.com Morefine or Beelink are two of them and there AliX shops work out a bit more expensive than this. So around $160USD delivered to me with coupons etc. I am considering upgrading my current datalogging Aldi Atom fanless trashpile (2Gb Ram 32bit) to one of these as it will save some power for long term use and I need to upgrade to more memory and 64bit.

If you aren't so worried about power then some bargains for even last gen versions are getting around.

[SiliconWizard]

As Nominal pointed out, you may not need all the processing power these mini PCs provide. Regarding processing power - and even the internal graphics performance - they'll put a RPi4 to shame. No question.
And they run Windows. They can also (usually) run Linux, although they are clearly not designed for this particular use case, so YMMV.

If you don't need Windows and a RPi4 (or similar) does the job for your application, why bother with something more powerful? That's the question. Knowing that below the $200 mark, you'll usually get crap hardware. About $300 is the mark to get something reasonable in terms of mini-PC. So even with the currently inflated prices of the SBCs, that's still way beyond.

Actually, these mini-PCs can be great as an alternative to laptops when you have to move places and there's already a monitor where you go, as (I think that was) Bruce pointed out in another thread a while ago.
The plus compared to many recent laptops is that they are at least somewhat upgradable - RAM and SSDs can usually be changed/added.

[beanflying]

Just for fair comparison and ApplesX86's to Pi's the Pi4 with a heatsink/fan and a case with some storage runs out at over $150 that is IF you can get one.

[DavidAlfa]

The T630 arrived, while not a Ryzen 9 it still performs nicely, installed Linux Mint, configured SSH for headless access, installed samba and a USB 3.0 drive.
On heavy load power consumption is ~24W, while on idling and light jobs it takes 5-12W, not too bad!

Furthermore I enabled suspension, the power is unmeasurable by my smart plug, must be 0.5W or so.

Kodi can send Wake-on-Lan automatically before accessing network devices, and it works great.
On Windows, I'll find a neat way, not important as I won't transfer a lot of files, it's mostly for the TV.

Still It takes a lot of time to setup a Linux system, that will be all for now, perhabs in the future I'll add more services to it.

[beanflying]

Much as I might have bagged SBC's a little here   

Only just out or getting released tomorrow on Amazon. Way more Single Board PC than SBC/Pi but fairly serious little package with EMMC Memory and NVME and a slot for WiFi if needed. Seems a little cheaper at least at this stage on AliX.

There is a couple of early release reviews on YouTube but nothing serious about the actual IO or performance testing.

[Zucca]

The day I will see a SBC on a production line I will maybe consider it...

[DiTBho]

Much as I might have bagged SBC's a little here

I am working with that kind of Orange-pi stuff at the moment.
Hacking u-boot and part of the kernel, like I did for the Neo-pi.

if they put it in the package, the SoC needs a more serious heatsink than the supplied one.
I also hacked the PLL to keep the SyS clock lower in order to heat up as little as possible.

[beanflying]

Orange themselves are not showing a case or heatsink 'yet' but I guess they will in time. Some of their last gen options look ok. ** Also found out that not all WiFi cards suit this new one either, no idea if that is firmware/os or hardware 

OEM Laser Cut case and I ran across below.

       

I also just might have pushed the button on one of those N100 Passive cooled systems above too  $0.02 Teardown when it gets here.

[Nominal Animal]

Much as I might have bagged SBC's a little here   
[Orange Pi 5]

Yup, Orange Pi 5 belongs to the class of higher-end SBCs I referred to earlier.  In particular, Radxa Rock5b uses the same SoC, Rockchip RK3588S.

It does bug me a bit when people think of Raspberry Pis (EDIT: for example, Raspberry Pi 4) as "typical" or "higher end" SBCs.  They're not, and they do have significant design flaws (bus organization) and even hardware flaws (USB bus dropping packets after acknowledging them, with only a heuristic software workaround).
To me, Pis are "Chinesium"-level SBCs, whose only saving grace is a vibrant (but walled-garden type) community.

[beanflying]

I referred to 'higher end' in my opening post for just that reason, PI Zero's and other similar ones are a different thing entirely. The line between these higher end ones running a full Linux install and even Windoze or a lower end X86 doing the same with or without separate I/O is a very fuzzy thing.

Throw RISC5 into the mix when it matures a bit more and it will get really blurry.

[Nominal Animal]

I referred to 'higher end' in my opening post for just that reason, PI Zero's and other similar ones are a different thing entirely.

No, I was not referring to Pi Zero, but to latest full Raspberry Pi.  Will edit the post for clarity!

[SiliconWizard]

It does bug me a bit when people think of Raspberry Pis (EDIT: for example, Raspberry Pi 4) as "typical" or "higher end" SBCs.

They're not, and they do have significant design flaws (bus organization) and even hardware flaws (USB bus dropping packets after acknowledging them, with only a heuristic software workaround).
To me, Pis are "Chinesium"-level SBCs, whose only saving grace is a vibrant (but walled-garden type) community.

Yep. In terms of design and specs, they are meh. Most of the competition, even in the same price range (or sometimes cheaper), has eMMC support for instance. And yes, better USB and Etherrnet performance.

Sticking to Broadcom is probably not the best idea either. I guess they must have a reason for that though.

But RPi did make the concept of "SBCs for the masses" popular. Others followed. Before the RPi, SBCs were mainly very expensive industrial boards.
These days, it's definitely worth considering alternatives. Especially at the current prices.

[DiTBho]

Orange themselves are not showing a case or heatsink 'yet' but I guess they will in time

bought qty=5 Banana Pi BPI R64, ~120 euro each

I dealt directly with one of the resellers; these cards cost a lot, on an order of 600 euros, I managed to get 5 heatsinks, PSUs, miniPCI wifi modules with their antenna stick, and a serial RS232 lvTTL adapter, all included.

Not serious but it's a decent enough heatsink, however, as a first step, I lowered the sys clock to 800Mhz.

[beanflying]

Under $15USD delivered. Not a total solution but another very early option for it I guess.



EDIT Did some more looking into the above cooler and there is issues with heat coupling from the CPU to the Memory IC's so stick with individual heatsinks!


When they get some eMMC memory back into their stores (got a message stating a few days and $4USD for 64Gb price extra on their website ) I might grab a 4Gb model to play with on the bench as it is closer to the sort of spec and expansion options I would want for a decent price.