I am impressed with the long-term support. This board definitely shows the possible future direction in SBC design. I wouldn't mind you revisiting this board later to see how the software has improved, or what additional software has been added. Actually, I wouldn't mind you revisiting some of the other SBCs that still had clunky software, when you first reviewed them. Looking forward to your next video!
A very nice board, and quite well laid out. I am beginning to really love ARM based devices, it was a novelty at the beginning, but lately I am finding them almost essential. Much appreciate the review and the OS try out Chris, you are an excellent guide as always.
Aside from the economic and marketplace limitations, the Mac M1 is a freaking AMAZING piece of hardware. It blows away more expensive hardware (by 3-4x) at the same task (building software, playing games, rendering videos, etc).
@Tiago The Apple M1 benchmarks somewhere between an 11th and 12th gen desktop Intel i5 chip, depending on the latter's clock speed, the benchmark used, and single vs multi-threaded performance. That's of course with a much lower TDP of 15W vs at least 65W. How much of that is inherent to ARMv8 core architecture vs Apple's choices in overall SoC design, I couldn't say. The M1 would not be my first choice for gaming, but it's certainly more potent at that task than a 2014 Intel Atom, or the integrated graphics on my desktop's i5-9400 CPU (2019). The main problem with gaming on an M1 computer (besides not running Windows) seems to be a lack of driver support for external GPUs. btw, fanboyism (whether for Apple, Intel, or AMD) won't get you very far in life.
I bought an Odroid M1 this summer to replace an ageing (32bit) HC1 as headless server, running Armbian. The EU price was quite competitive for an SBC with an M.2 slot, and wifi wasn't a requirement. It's doing pretty nicely, running mostly a Dovecot IMAP server and Prometheus+Grafana monitoring. The CPU is not a speed demon but the 8GB of RAM and the NVMe data disk are great for IOPS performance. And with the NVMe it also run cooler than the HC1 with an SSD, which is nice for keeping it in a small closed drawer.
I love ARM too, and i'd like it to become another competitor to Intel. It was too long time when Intel had the upped hand over AMD. Now they share the market, maybe soon enough there will be 3rd on the actual consumer market. If you ask a consumer what is Intel, you might hear an answer. If you ask what is AMD, again an answer might come up. But if you ask of what is ARM, they might wave their hand, even if having an arm processor in the phone they have in the same hand.
Like so many of the SBCs that you review, it seems to have corporate and institutional uses, but I fail to see what it can do for the home user. The Raspberry Pi is such a great device for home/casual users (when it's available) because of the support that is available. I look forward to other SBCs getting similar levels of love.
The lack of Wi-Fi/BT (especially in 2022) and inability to playback videos make it a non-starter for me but I do hope they eventually produce an SBC that has all the features. I really like that case too. Makes me want to refresh my noggin on the current crop of SBC's to see if anything stands out above the pack at a reasonable price.
well, tbh, it is a big board and wifi being so nice and convenient is never stable enough, not for me at least, so it is not a big deal, but a mali gpu is not weak, no 1080p video is a no go for me, and the cpu is too old and weak, a55 is just something i used on smartphones many years ago and i won't pay that much for that again
A lot of people look for boards specifically for having no wireless for security purposes, but would be good if they had the option (separate models or something).
SBC's are not desktop PC replacements, you can purchase Arm based Windows PC's that deliver a better desktop experience with working video decode in browser but on Linux Arm the chain of software and drivers needed to make V4L2 work is very long with few working on it, thats what would give you web browser + hardware video decode.
this would make a good HC4 replacement with its SATA port, to use as a home NAS server with a single drive . I'm running Debian 11 with LXDE (and OMV6) on the HC4 for a while now and it is working a bit snappier than Debian/Ubuntu you installed. Petitboot is great, and another nice thing you can do is have GRUB2 installed with different kernels etc, that are shown in the Petitboot menu, which i find very useful . for only 70USD (on HK website before shipping) - excellent value for money. thanks again for another great review
Wow, what a novelty, an Arm sbc that lets you install an operating system using "normal methods" instead of just imaging an SD card. Interesting solution, I'll have to look into how they did this.
Good video Chris - this is off-topic, but the way you deliver the line "So. Let's Go Take.... A. Closer. Look..." amuses me - it seems like it gets more enunciated with each video.
Yeah !! Another Sunday, another SBC video from EC. Have an amazing week, CB ! "3.5 mm audio jack, just like you don't get on an iPhone" was a nice cheeky reference! 😆
Thank you very much! The commands you showed for installing Ubuntu 22.04 "udhcpc" and "netboot_default" were extremely helpful. I have not come across this possibility anywhere else. I enjoyed your video very much, thanks again.
Thanks Chris for this video. Now with all these SBCs out there and with your wide knowledge and experiment with many of them. It is interesting to have a video that show a use case for each of them. Well, yes many of them can be used in many use cases but I thing there is an area were each of these lovely SBC excels! One video that puts each SBC on the map of 'use cases' like robotics, multimedia, content creation, NAS, Internet browsing, ... etc. will be appreciated. A table (or tables) showing their specs, prices, sizes, power consumption will be great.
I run an ODROID HC1 since years, extremely satisfied with it. Power consumption is ultra low due to the mobile chipset. Running dietpi as SMB NAS, Pihole, TVheadend, jellyfin. All in parallel, without any performance issues. Bets 50€i´ve ever spent!
Hi Chris, Thank You for making this video. Your review was the second source showing this board CHOKE on a simple RUclips video, or Firefox browser….in the year 2022? This board could have been so awesome had they only put a slightly more aggressive cpu/gpu combo. I wanted it to be so much more. I don’t see much “future proofing” choosing this chipset that anemic for “forward looking” SBC design in the year 2022. ✌️
Thanks for this, but it is not the hardware that is the problem when it comes to video playback. The GPU is perfectly capable of decoding the video. But there is no driver for it to allow hardware video decoding. Hence the issue could be resolved . . .
Nice review, and the more exposure the M1 gets, the better development and support it will have...my main issue with this board is nvme support...i have purchased 3 different nvme drives and had the same poor results installing anything based on Linux 5.xx kernel (meaning it simply will not boot)...4.19 works fine but am still disappointed because nvme support was one of the main draws when i purchased this back in April 2022..I can report that Android 11 mounted on a microSD card works a treat! And media play back at 1080p/60 is buttery smooth on it! So, this thing still needs some work, but I will ride the tide on this one and hopefully one day the nvme issues will be sorted...Cheers!
Hey Chris, one thing that would be really useful on future videos is where an SBC requires a barrel-jack PSU to also advise what size (i.e. 2.1mm, 2.5mm or other) and whether its centre positive (or highlighting where its centre ground). Its always annoying when 'adding' an SBC to the collection if I don't have a PSU to guess which one to order. ;) Great work and video as ever though!
A shame about the inflated UK price, but I guess with the current economy and poor exchange rates it's to be expected. This actually looks like a decent all round board, worthy of being a competitor to the mythical Pi 4 8GB that doesn't seem to exist anymore!
Wait til you realize that Raspi was receiving their Broadcom chips at costs and the company that bought Broadcom has a track record of caring only about the bottom line. Where Broadcom was open to supporting accessible computing, this new company could care less. They’re facing an uphill battle AND dealing with supply shortages. Edit: Avago - Avago Technologies to Acquire Broadcom for $37 Billion
I bought an X3 years ago from their site, postage to Australia killed me so it was a no-brainer to get the special ufs? Memory chip. Long story short it died the following summer after purchase, video issues not related to firmware/software. It was a nice unit and I almost bought a c2. Did I say postage kills them.
@@ThisPageIntentionallyLeftBlank I have many raspi although my own experience says these are nice unit with more oomph or other specs for other uses. Also if you looked into their platform you will see they openly use whatever chips they can source for the units they produce at time of production and have enough support that if you are an enthusiast come inventor they may make you terms for a couple 1000s units instead of millions of cm4 you can order from mouser/e14/others
@@ThisPageIntentionallyLeftBlank That was quite a while ago, they've got a contract so the prices wont suddenly jump. In any case given their hirings and work on the pico its pretty clear they're building their own in-house SOC to replace the broadcom one.
I think these ARM-based SBCs are great, but I'm *very* excited about the x86-based units. I think they have a lot to offer for makers--especially considering the built-in Arduino-like co-processors many of them have. If you are developing some sort of hardware/software prototype for instance, having the ability to get user input via GPIO pins is incredible. Also, for things like using the Qt Framework for developing UI-based application, licensing is significantly less expensive on x_86-based devices. But overall it's a very exciting time to be in the market for an SBC for projects. Thanks to CB's channel I seem to have acquired *boxes* of them now, lol...
to be honest, I'd be more excited about getting a couple second hand i5 based micro office PCs from lenovo, HP or dell at the same price, knowing that I saved them from a landfill. Not to mention they would not be as crippled as the topical sbc.
Hey. I've tried running a Minecraft server on a Raspberry Pi 4 at 2GHz, but the CPU performance just ain't enough. As much as "synthetic benchmarks" don't reflect real-world performance for all use cases, I think that the SBC space is definitely missing someone reporting performance numbers for some use cases. I think I might not be wrong if I said that people from a great spectrum of use cases come here to enjoy your wonderful content. And I believe some perfomance numbers for CPU (Single-Threaded and Multi-Threaded) and GPU (and rankings comparing {current board} to other already reviewed boards) might be highly appreciated by some. If you're not sure what to benchmark with, maybe a community poll could help out. Also I'd love to see you do a collab with Jeff Geerling, because he too loves explaining computers :)
Greetings!! Received my M1 a couple of days ago and just started tinkering with the board. I also received a pre-flashed eMMC with Ubuntu 20.04 and it seemed VERY laggy to me. Next tests will be using the petitboot system with an NVMe drive to see what that is like. A funny issue I found was the locking screw for the NVMe drive had the barest "impression" of a phillips scredriver marking but no actual way to use it. Had to resort to small needle nose pliers to remove the screw. Still trying figure out how Hardkernel got the screw in there in the first place. :) Anyway, looking forward to getting some fun tinkering done with this LTS board. I do not use SBCs for YT playback so that is not a deal breaker for me. Thank you for this fine video sir! BTW, I did catch and love that shot you took at Apple about the 3.5mm audio jack. Well done!
Thank you sir. Last time I left a message was when I was retiring. I thought I'd have time to learn Linux but with all the years I spent on Microshaft products , I decided that I was going to go the Apple route. I use my pc for surfing the web and some crafty stuff but my apple m1 is my preferred playground. Being forced to use a certain OS (in the work environment) tends to put ones knickers in a bunch. Not having an Apple product for my professional years , I'm starting on the bottom. I do enjoy your different OS's and pc's.
Thanks for the great review, I am happy to see ARM SBC keeps coming up in the market and it is affordable. I am a Pi user and find it is little under power, I don't know if there is a standard architecture in ARM computer like the x86, so that I can use any one I like and can have plenty of software support.
Video playback actually got much better at 12:13. Like the computer was busy doing something else before finally getting serious about playing the video.
This looks like a viable alternative to Raspberry Pi's. I've been looking to add another Pi 4 to my setup, but considering that this has built in NVMe support (currently using an external NVMe @ 330MB/sec), I think this is a no-brainer. Thanks for this video.
Thanks for the video. I was tempted to order a M1 a few months back, but decided the C4 I have meets my needs for now. For speed comparison fun though, I have a PNY SATA SSD plugged in via USB to SATA adapter, and with the same hdparm test getting 185.52 MB/sec with my ORIOD-C4.
Great to see Mr. Scissors! This board has a single HDMI port. On the plus side, it IS a full-size port. (I hate those tiny things on a Pi.) But why don't SBCs use DisplayPort? Many, if not most, monitors have at least one DisplayPort connection. And with DisplayPort, you at least have the option of daisy-chaining the monitors so you can get up to three monitors using the single port on the board. It's true that the monitors have to be built for daisy-chaining, but that is not an insurmountable problem. And it would be great to have the option.
Good point. There is display port on some SBCs -- eg the Rock Pi 4C has a mini DP connector -- see: ruclips.net/video/BTyIFZPgBT0/видео.html and there's also one (via USB-C) on the LattePanda 3 Delta.
Lets hope the M1 is better than the previous N2 model in terms of reliability. Many people report that the USB hardware goes faulty and there is also a firmware bug associated with the real time clock. I'd be more interested in the expanded features if I could trust the reliability of the hardware and the support provided by the company that stands behind said hardware.
Happy Sunday afternoon Chris & thank you for an interesting SBC video & a surprise appearance from Mr Scissors. I kept my fingers crossed hoping that this would be the genuine desktop replacement, but as you say when they sort out the drivers it should help. You had a choice which desktop to install would some of them have been lighter than Ubuntu/Debian making it less laggy? Looking forward to next Sunday's video : )
I have the odroid HC1. It's a perfect little file server for a home git server or to dump backup and shared files on. I installed OMV on it, firewalled it off the internet and it's just been serving files for the last 1.5 years with no issue. I think I rebooted it once or twice in that time. I'm interested in this one too. Support for NVME and SATA just makes it more capable. The price is right too.
Hey, Chris. Nice review, as usual. Would you care to include Alpine in your future sbc reviews? I ask, because i have recently moved almost all of my sbcs and old laptops to Alpine and it really makes performance difference to any other linux distro (156mb after install, fastest package management, supports tons of hardware and most used desktops, thou i usually go with Wayland+XFCE if a device needs gui).
The standard SATA power connector port would have taken a lot of valuable PCB space. But at least they've used a polarized connector to help prevent a reverse connection. I say _"help"_ because you obviously (carefully) bypassed that. ;-)
@@ExplainingComputers - Same connectors but wired differently? That's scary annoying! I noticed on their website they sell a SSD cable kit for it. But for your proof of concept your cable did the job just fine.
Thanks. now I absolutely need to start working on a pxe boot server, hopefully on docker or k8. been thinking of doing that for a while and this net boot just was great on that. I hate dealing with tiny SD cards that I keep loosing.
I still think the Raspberry Pi 4 is a much better desktop than the Odroid M1. However, the Odroid M1 would make an excellent server and/or router for your SOHO (small office and/or home) network. Once they get OpenWrt running on it, it would be excellent for that.
@Tony I mean...for a lot of people these are replacements, especially for kids. These are great computers for introducing them to programming and giving them something capable of doing things they need for school without breaking the bank....
@Tony i replaced my mom's Windows XP PC with Pi4 4GB two years ago, and she didn't really notice the difference for web browsing, besides it was working quicker. specially when i upgraded to Raspberry OS 64bit not long ago
@Tony I've been using a pi400 as a home computer for a couple of months and it's alright actually. You definitely notice the difference between software or websites that are lean and those that are bloated.
:Thorough ADJECTIVE [usually ADJECTIVE noun] A thorough action or activity is one that is done very carefully and in a detailed way so that nothing is forgotten. [...] Hence.. I WANT ONE!! Thank you Sir ChrisTOWFER
The difference will be anecdotal if we're comparing SBC's and not other types of computers. Unless you have a project in mind which will involve using a dozen or more of these devices, that is! As somebody has pointed out, it would make some sense to look closely at power consumption differences if you're going to run your board on a battery pack.
I have been setting up M1 and a few N2+ boards. Running 20.04 with MATE the UI on M1 is noticeably sluggish and the N2+ is very responsive. The M1 runs a lot warmer with 250GB WD SSD. So warm that I drilled a series of vent holes in the blue alloy housing of the M1. One of my N2+ boards has a faulty ethernet port. Often but not always the download speed is 0.5-1% of what it should be. Determined to be the board by swapping boards and OS's on eMMC modules.
Well, graphics drivers are not very good. But other than that, I really like this board. Booth menu and sata/m2 ports are a significant advantage over raspberry-like boards. I really could find a use for it. Thanks for the review, it's good (but still I would like some GPIO tests).
Graphics drivers are the weak spot. Let's hope it gets improved before the board gets outdated, otherwise it doesn't stand much chance against RPI4 which is getting long in the tooth. If RPi5 adds NVME boot in next release then it's game over unless they bloat the price way up.
"And next to that, a 3.5mm audio jack just like you don't get on an iPhone." I've heard that some Android phones these days don't have audio jacks either! I'm sure glad my phone has one. As for the single board computer, it's a very nice computer, especially for the price (well, here in the US anyway. The UK's economy not doing too well should explain the higher prices over there... 😞) even if there's no on-board wi-fi and RUclips doesn't run well at all. With that being said, a gold medal 🏅 for you for Olympic storage drive powering! Mr. Scissors gets one too for Olympic bag opening.
Great video. I was looking for something to replace my Odroid C2 as a media player with CoreElec, from your video this board definitily is not good for that purpose. I guess N2 is still a better option from Odroid to be used as a media player.
the nvme speed is great - good for netfs and 1200mb/s can saturate 2.5 gbe or 5gbe (bonded or bridged) - this looks like a nice machine - great content! - expect driver improvements - you should run sisoft and phoronix test suite - the next gen of these should be even better (ie expect pi5 to be slightly better but diversity is ok too cause it helps supply chains
This looks like a promising candidate for a small home server. My only concern is energy. Can you check the power consumption in idle and at 100% CPU, please?
I have an Odroid XU-4. Really powerful for its size but no where NEAR the community support of some other boards when I bought it. Maybe it's time to do a revisit?
I used Armbian when I was using my odroid xu4 and at one time a well supported community build of Debian maintained by meverick I think it was. I upgraded to the odroid-n2 but was unsatisfied with the USB problems exhibited by the board, hardkernel effectively washed their hands of the matter by saying it was an architecture problem. I am wary of the odroid-m1 as I wouldn't like to experience the same usb problems as I had with the odroid-n2. I'm thinking of dusting off the odroid xu4 again as it was extremely reliable and with current Armbian builds I'm sure I can find a use for it.
I use ODroid, have gathered a lot of different versions since 2014. Most of them are working 24/7 since, to handle everything in my shop and house. I find it's a great little device for "SBC as a Service". I also have some different devices from the rPi family, Arduino, ESP8266, ESP36, even rPI2hdmi in an A500.. At the moment I use the M1 with LineageOS, connected to an AverMedia video input card, for use with RaspberryShake App. But Android doesn't boot M.2 drive... yuk.. I wouldn't say why in the end, but I always had more interest in ODroid. Even if I really love the fact rPI comes from England, I like that Korean engineer having done Hardkernel from Scratch, with love. And excuse my french ODroid don't suck at stocks supplies.
Can't help but notice the _IR detector_ (3:16 lower left next to the battery) being bent way over. Not exactly off to a good start quality control wise.
it was mentioned on the video, and could happen on shipping or packaging steps, not just on the assembly line and ir is not that used anymore, perhaps if you use it as a media pc but the gpu is not capable of 1080p, so, is the last of the concerns tbh
@@arch1107 - Ya, I commented before Chris got to it in the video. The sensor is a through hole part and needs a bit more care to install it versus SMD. If it was installed properly (it can go down quite a bit) it wouldn't move with a bump in shipped, etc. They sell a simple IR remote on their website so I imagine users do use it. It makes for a simple controller unlike some push buttons that you might connect to the 40 pin GPIO connector. I would use it more for custom control than for a media controller. As you said you're not going to be using this as a media player at least until they really work on the video play back.
Great purposeful device, however, as for the lack of WiFi & BT onboard, imo, by leaving these two elements off, encourages the manufacture and production of addons (clearly readily available) thus supporting other tech markets which I don't see as an issue. Moreover, in the absence of WiFi & BT, should also be reflected in the price, comparable to other SBCs with them.
Nice review. I think Odroid have the correct form factor having space for NVME drives and room for plenty of USB ports. The heatsink is clever. The petitboot is nice. It's a real real shame about RUclips playback. This is a deal-breaker for me and probably most. I am looking forward to RK 3588 processors because the arm based SBCs have been stuck in a rut recently. I am hoping there will finally be an arm SBC that is easy on the wallet and is truly capable of running Linux for general tasks. Could this be the year?
The market niche for this is controller of small networks, perhaps industrial controls, where you don't want a machine enthusiastically trying to talk to anything that wanders past?
The model featured in the video is advertised as consuming 1.3 watts, however, real world tests show it is between 3-7 watts under load, depending on cpu/gpu frequency settings.
Thanks for informing me about SBC's getting upset when they're upside down, Chris. No wonder they've always been so contrary with me. I'm sure that we'll be right as rain, from now on. 😎 Does cursing at them cause them to stubbornly lock up, as well?🙄 Are techno-therapists or SBC counselors covered under national health?
@@ExplainingComputers Yes. I find it very difficult to think straight with a head full of steam, so it helps to release the pressure. I'll bet that's true for the SBC's, as well. But, we can't hear their little bits,. So, we never know until we see their release of magic smoke. BR 😎
I wish these boards came in micro itx form factor and with a couple of PCI express slots. I'm more interested in the power saving aspect rather than the size.
but, in itx form, you get at best 2 slots, 1 to be precise but i have seen weird itx expecting you to use a pci riser cable what would you use those slots for? i have a nice itx case that i would love to upgrade to one of these sbc but cost and gpu power is a no go for me so far, the power consumption is very nice tbh
You can buy mini ITX motherboards with soldered on integrated CPUs that are just barely removed from sbcs. I just bought one to build a new desktop machine for my mother. All I needed to add to the motherboard was some RAM sticks, an m.2 SSD, and a pico power supply (I hadn't encountered them before but it's basically just a small circuit board attached directly to a motherboard power header, the other end is a barrel jack you need to provide with 12 volts from an external power brick). The PSU is rated for 250 Watts peak output but the computer draws like 11. This one in particular doesn't actually have any pcie slots but looking on New egg it looks like Asus makes a few and they tend to sell for under $100. You do need to add RAM and storage to that so not as cheap as an SBC, but it'll help you hit a low power target.
I didn't get a warning or watch battery when I got mine, just the base unit. Also if you think it's cheap, it's not. The $90 is just the base cost, there's also a delivery fee and the taxes were more than the board itself.
I am impressed with the long-term support. This board definitely shows the possible future direction in SBC design. I wouldn't mind you revisiting this board later to see how the software has improved, or what additional software has been added. Actually, I wouldn't mind you revisiting some of the other SBCs that still had clunky software, when you first reviewed them. Looking forward to your next video!
Greetings Perry.
Please mind that long term support is for B2B customers, who builds their devices around such boards, not necessarily end users like hobbyists.
@@aeonikus1 Agreed, not necessarily end users like hobbyists.
Another Sunday with ExplainingComputers!
It's the best way to spend your Sunday morning.
@@John_Locke_108 Sunday afternoon in my case as I'm also in the UK
Late Sunday evening here in Australia, in fact now it's Monday!
@@deanstyles2567 How was Sunday? Anything I should be prepared for?
A very nice board, and quite well laid out.
I am beginning to really love ARM based devices, it was a novelty at the beginning, but lately I am finding them almost essential.
Much appreciate the review and the OS try out Chris, you are an excellent guide as always.
Aside from the economic and marketplace limitations, the Mac M1 is a freaking AMAZING piece of hardware. It blows away more expensive hardware (by 3-4x) at the same task (building software, playing games, rendering videos, etc).
@@tsalVlog I mostly agree with you, but playing games? lmao
@@tsalVlog its got the processing power of an 8 year old atom lol
@Tiago The Apple M1 benchmarks somewhere between an 11th and 12th gen desktop Intel i5 chip, depending on the latter's clock speed, the benchmark used, and single vs multi-threaded performance. That's of course with a much lower TDP of 15W vs at least 65W.
How much of that is inherent to ARMv8 core architecture vs Apple's choices in overall SoC design, I couldn't say.
The M1 would not be my first choice for gaming, but it's certainly more potent at that task than a 2014 Intel Atom, or the integrated graphics on my desktop's i5-9400 CPU (2019). The main problem with gaming on an M1 computer (besides not running Windows) seems to be a lack of driver support for external GPUs.
btw, fanboyism (whether for Apple, Intel, or AMD) won't get you very far in life.
@@wereoctopus yes but this isnt a apple cpu
I bought an Odroid M1 this summer to replace an ageing (32bit) HC1 as headless server, running Armbian. The EU price was quite competitive for an SBC with an M.2 slot, and wifi wasn't a requirement.
It's doing pretty nicely, running mostly a Dovecot IMAP server and Prometheus+Grafana monitoring. The CPU is not a speed demon but the 8GB of RAM and the NVMe data disk are great for IOPS performance. And with the NVMe it also run cooler than the HC1 with an SSD, which is nice for keeping it in a small closed drawer.
I love the idea of a computer running in a drawer. :)
I did the exact same thing. I had an HC1 and bought this M1 to replace it. Actually using the HC1 for a single purpose pi-hole.
I love ARM. I love SBC's. I love this narration style. Therefore enjoying this video immensely! 💪🙏
You love too many things
@@Remigrator is such a thing even possible, Robert? 😁
Thanks for watching! :)
I love ARM too, and i'd like it to become another competitor to Intel. It was too long time when Intel had the upped hand over AMD. Now they share the market, maybe soon enough there will be 3rd on the actual consumer market. If you ask a consumer what is Intel, you might hear an answer. If you ask what is AMD, again an answer might come up. But if you ask of what is ARM, they might wave their hand, even if having an arm processor in the phone they have in the same hand.
@@valkoh5161 Well said 💪😅
The bit where you so casually stated the lack of 3.5mm audio jack on the iPhone has really made my day.
It's always a good day when Mr Scissors makes an appearance. Cheers.
Like so many of the SBCs that you review, it seems to have corporate and institutional uses, but I fail to see what it can do for the home user. The Raspberry Pi is such a great device for home/casual users (when it's available) because of the support that is available. I look forward to other SBCs getting similar levels of love.
Yep. Odroid makes good hardware. RPi makes good software. A used Mac mini has both.
Well one thing it can do is get the home user an SBC for under $100 with a multitude of features the RPi doesn't have
"3.5 mm input just like you don't get on the iPhone" 🤣. Excellent video tutorial 👍
The lack of Wi-Fi/BT (especially in 2022) and inability to playback videos make it a non-starter for me but I do hope they eventually produce an SBC that has all the features. I really like that case too.
Makes me want to refresh my noggin on the current crop of SBC's to see if anything stands out above the pack at a reasonable price.
Indeed; it appears that graphics is the sticking point on ARM SBCs right now.
well, tbh, it is a big board and wifi being so nice and convenient is never stable enough, not for me at least, so it is not a big deal, but a mali gpu is not weak, no 1080p video is a no go for me, and the cpu is too old and weak, a55 is just something i used on smartphones many years ago and i won't pay that much for that again
A lot of people look for boards specifically for having no wireless for security purposes, but would be good if they had the option (separate models or something).
SBC's are not desktop PC replacements, you can purchase Arm based Windows PC's that deliver a better desktop experience with working video decode in browser but on Linux Arm the chain of software and drivers needed to make V4L2 work is very long with few working on it, thats what would give you web browser + hardware video decode.
Cheap ones with wifi/bt orange pi 4 lts, rockpi 4b..
As the raspberry pi continues to be unavailable, at least not at a reasonable cost, the quest for new SBC is critical. Thanks for these updates!
As usual , clear , concise and complete .....you are quite excellent at these videos
Many thanks!
this would make a good HC4 replacement with its SATA port, to use as a home NAS server with a single drive . I'm running Debian 11 with LXDE (and OMV6) on the HC4 for a while now and it is working a bit snappier than Debian/Ubuntu you installed. Petitboot is great, and another nice thing you can do is have GRUB2 installed with different kernels etc, that are shown in the Petitboot menu, which i find very useful . for only 70USD (on HK website before shipping) - excellent value for money. thanks again for another great review
I agree, great NAS potential here.
Very impressive, I really like the trend of having firmware like Petitboot on more and more SBCs.
Greetings Chris.
Wow, what a novelty, an Arm sbc that lets you install an operating system using "normal methods" instead of just imaging an SD card. Interesting solution, I'll have to look into how they did this.
Good video Chris - this is off-topic, but the way you deliver the line "So. Let's Go Take.... A. Closer. Look..." amuses me - it seems like it gets more enunciated with each video.
We all become caricatures of ourselves as we age . . .
Yeah !! Another Sunday, another SBC video from EC.
Have an amazing week, CB !
"3.5 mm audio jack, just like you don't get on an iPhone" was a nice cheeky reference! 😆
Thank you very much! The commands you showed for installing Ubuntu 22.04 "udhcpc" and "netboot_default" were extremely helpful. I have not come across this possibility anywhere else. I enjoyed your video very much, thanks again.
Thanks for your support. :)
Thanks Chris for this video. Now with all these SBCs out there and with your wide knowledge and experiment with many of them. It is interesting to have a video that show a use case for each of them. Well, yes many of them can be used in many use cases but I thing there is an area were each of these lovely SBC excels! One video that puts each SBC on the map of 'use cases' like robotics, multimedia, content creation, NAS, Internet browsing, ... etc. will be appreciated. A table (or tables) showing their specs, prices, sizes, power consumption will be great.
Just fell in love and started daydreaming about the board! The heatsink! that onboard IR receiver! and the M.2 NVMe .... alters my hormone levels 😍
I did pickup Odroid x 2 a long time ago when you last reviewed them with hard drive tray. Still running!
These boards work great with Home Assistant. I'm using the N2+ and as HA continues to improve, all is well. Cheers Chris!
Good to know.
I run an ODROID HC1 since years, extremely satisfied with it. Power consumption is ultra low due to the mobile chipset. Running dietpi as SMB NAS, Pihole, TVheadend, jellyfin.
All in parallel, without any performance issues. Bets 50€i´ve ever spent!
Hi Chris, Thank You for making this video.
Your review was the second source showing this board CHOKE on a simple RUclips video, or Firefox browser….in the year 2022? This board could have been so awesome had they only put a slightly more aggressive cpu/gpu combo.
I wanted it to be so much more. I don’t see much “future proofing” choosing this chipset that anemic for “forward looking” SBC design in the year 2022.
✌️
Thanks for this, but it is not the hardware that is the problem when it comes to video playback. The GPU is perfectly capable of decoding the video. But there is no driver for it to allow hardware video decoding. Hence the issue could be resolved . . .
Nice review, and the more exposure the M1 gets, the better development and support it will have...my main issue with this board is nvme support...i have purchased 3 different nvme drives and had the same poor results installing anything based on Linux 5.xx kernel (meaning it simply will not boot)...4.19 works fine but am still disappointed because nvme support was one of the main draws when i purchased this back in April 2022..I can report that Android 11 mounted on a microSD card works a treat! And media play back at 1080p/60 is buttery smooth on it! So, this thing still needs some work, but I will ride the tide on this one and hopefully one day the nvme issues will be sorted...Cheers!
Hey Chris, one thing that would be really useful on future videos is where an SBC requires a barrel-jack PSU to also advise what size (i.e. 2.1mm, 2.5mm or other) and whether its centre positive (or highlighting where its centre ground). Its always annoying when 'adding' an SBC to the collection if I don't have a PSU to guess which one to order. ;)
Great work and video as ever though!
Good point, and I did used to provide such information on the power jack. I must do so again.
A shame about the inflated UK price, but I guess with the current economy and poor exchange rates it's to be expected. This actually looks like a decent all round board, worthy of being a competitor to the mythical Pi 4 8GB that doesn't seem to exist anymore!
Wait til you realize that Raspi was receiving their Broadcom chips at costs and the company that bought Broadcom has a track record of caring only about the bottom line. Where Broadcom was open to supporting accessible computing, this new company could care less. They’re facing an uphill battle AND dealing with supply shortages. Edit: Avago - Avago Technologies to Acquire Broadcom for $37 Billion
@@ThisPageIntentionallyLeftBlank That was ... 7 years ago. Broadcom has continued to support accessible computing.
I bought an X3 years ago from their site, postage to Australia killed me so it was a no-brainer to get the special ufs? Memory chip. Long story short it died the following summer after purchase, video issues not related to firmware/software. It was a nice unit and I almost bought a c2. Did I say postage kills them.
@@ThisPageIntentionallyLeftBlank I have many raspi although my own experience says these are nice unit with more oomph or other specs for other uses. Also if you looked into their platform you will see they openly use whatever chips they can source for the units they produce at time of production and have enough support that if you are an enthusiast come inventor they may make you terms for a couple 1000s units instead of millions of cm4 you can order from mouser/e14/others
@@ThisPageIntentionallyLeftBlank That was quite a while ago, they've got a contract so the prices wont suddenly jump. In any case given their hirings and work on the pico its pretty clear they're building their own in-house SOC to replace the broadcom one.
Informative as ever. Great to see subscribers swelling by about 1k per week.
I think these ARM-based SBCs are great, but I'm *very* excited about the x86-based units. I think they have a lot to offer for makers--especially considering the built-in Arduino-like co-processors many of them have. If you are developing some sort of hardware/software prototype for instance, having the ability to get user input via GPIO pins is incredible. Also, for things like using the Qt Framework for developing UI-based application, licensing is significantly less expensive on x_86-based devices. But overall it's a very exciting time to be in the market for an SBC for projects. Thanks to CB's channel I seem to have acquired *boxes* of them now, lol...
to be honest, I'd be more excited about getting a couple second hand i5 based micro office PCs from lenovo, HP or dell at the same price, knowing that I saved them from a landfill. Not to mention they would not be as crippled as the topical sbc.
Hey. I've tried running a Minecraft server on a Raspberry Pi 4 at 2GHz, but the CPU performance just ain't enough. As much as "synthetic benchmarks" don't reflect real-world performance for all use cases, I think that the SBC space is definitely missing someone reporting performance numbers for some use cases.
I think I might not be wrong if I said that people from a great spectrum of use cases come here to enjoy your wonderful content. And I believe some perfomance numbers for CPU (Single-Threaded and Multi-Threaded) and GPU (and rankings comparing {current board} to other already reviewed boards) might be highly appreciated by some.
If you're not sure what to benchmark with, maybe a community poll could help out. Also I'd love to see you do a collab with Jeff Geerling, because he too loves explaining computers :)
All noted! :)
Greetings!!
Received my M1 a couple of days ago and just started tinkering with the board. I also received a pre-flashed eMMC with Ubuntu 20.04 and it seemed VERY laggy to me.
Next tests will be using the petitboot system with an NVMe drive to see what that is like. A funny issue I found was the locking screw for the NVMe drive had the barest "impression" of a phillips scredriver marking but no actual way to use it. Had to resort to small needle nose pliers to remove the screw. Still trying figure out how Hardkernel got the screw in there in the first place. :)
Anyway, looking forward to getting some fun tinkering done with this LTS board. I do not use SBCs for YT playback so that is not a deal breaker for me.
Thank you for this fine video sir!
BTW, I did catch and love that shot you took at Apple about the 3.5mm audio jack. Well done!
Greetings! My M.2 screw was certainly not deeply stamped for the screwdriver -- I could not use my normal one.
Thank you sir. Last time I left a message was when I was retiring. I thought I'd have time to learn Linux but with all the years I spent on Microshaft products , I decided that I was going to go the Apple route. I use my pc for surfing the web and some crafty stuff but my apple m1 is my preferred playground. Being forced to use a certain OS (in the work environment) tends to put ones knickers in a bunch. Not having an Apple product for my professional years , I'm starting on the bottom. I do enjoy your different OS's and pc's.
Another winner, Chris. Thank you.
Greetings Jim. :)
A jolly bright video. Thank you, E/C.
3.5mm audio jack - "...just like you dont get on an iPhone..." that line made me laugh out loud and people look at me.
Thanks for the great review, I am happy to see ARM SBC keeps coming up in the market and it is affordable. I am a Pi user and find it is little under power, I don't know if there is a standard architecture in ARM computer like the x86, so that I can use any one I like and can have plenty of software support.
Thanks for this. There is sadly no standard ARM architecture, so every board need its own OS images.
Video playback actually got much better at 12:13. Like the computer was busy doing something else before finally getting serious about playing the video.
This was precisely the video I was looking for, bravo.
Thank you so much for this video, it was the review I needed about the new M1 :)
This looks like a viable alternative to Raspberry Pi's. I've been looking to add another Pi 4 to my setup, but considering that this has built in NVMe support (currently using an external NVMe @ 330MB/sec), I think this is a no-brainer. Thanks for this video.
Thanks for the video. I was tempted to order a M1 a few months back, but decided the C4 I have meets my needs for now. For speed comparison fun though, I have a PNY SATA SSD plugged in via USB to SATA adapter, and with the same hdparm test getting 185.52 MB/sec with my ORIOD-C4.
Great to see Mr. Scissors! This board has a single HDMI port. On the plus side, it IS a full-size port. (I hate those tiny things on a Pi.) But why don't SBCs use DisplayPort? Many, if not most, monitors have at least one DisplayPort connection. And with DisplayPort, you at least have the option of daisy-chaining the monitors so you can get up to three monitors using the single port on the board. It's true that the monitors have to be built for daisy-chaining, but that is not an insurmountable problem. And it would be great to have the option.
Good point. There is display port on some SBCs -- eg the Rock Pi 4C has a mini DP connector -- see: ruclips.net/video/BTyIFZPgBT0/видео.html and there's also one (via USB-C) on the LattePanda 3 Delta.
Lets hope the M1 is better than the previous N2 model in terms of reliability. Many people report that the USB hardware goes faulty and there is also a firmware bug associated with the real time clock. I'd be more interested in the expanded features if I could trust the reliability of the hardware and the support provided by the company that stands behind said hardware.
Your intro sounds good on my sound system attached to my tv
Great to hear!
Mr. Scissors is back!
He always returns . . .
Was Mr. Scissors in prison for yet another crime?
Mr. Barnatt will be appearing in a city near you performing his new hit single, "Snippity, snippity, snip"
I use it mainly as an headless linux server... with a wifi/bluetooth dongle and nvme storage.. pretty nice.
"Mr Scissors"!
You're awesome - thanks for the giggles 😀
😀
Happy Sunday afternoon Chris & thank you for an interesting SBC video & a surprise appearance from Mr Scissors. I kept my fingers crossed hoping that this would be the genuine desktop replacement, but as you say when they sort out the drivers it should help. You had a choice which desktop to install would some of them have been lighter than Ubuntu/Debian making it less laggy? Looking forward to next Sunday's video : )
Greetings Alan. :)
I have the odroid HC1. It's a perfect little file server for a home git server or to dump backup and shared files on. I installed OMV on it, firewalled it off the internet and it's just been serving files for the last 1.5 years with no issue. I think I rebooted it once or twice in that time.
I'm interested in this one too. Support for NVME and SATA just makes it more capable. The price is right too.
Hey, Chris. Nice review, as usual. Would you care to include Alpine in your future sbc reviews? I ask, because i have recently moved almost all of my sbcs and old laptops to Alpine and it really makes performance difference to any other linux distro (156mb after install, fastest package management, supports tons of hardware and most used desktops, thou i usually go with Wayland+XFCE if a device needs gui).
The standard SATA power connector port would have taken a lot of valuable PCB space. But at least they've used a polarized connector to help prevent a reverse connection. I say _"help"_ because you obviously (carefully) bypassed that. ;-)
I indeed took great care. Initially I planned to use a lead I have for a RockPro64 -- right connectors on both ends, but wired differently . . .
@@ExplainingComputers - Same connectors but wired differently? That's scary annoying!
I noticed on their website they sell a SSD cable kit for it. But for your proof of concept your cable did the job just fine.
Sbc are getting better and better
They are indeed!
Thanks. now I absolutely need to start working on a pxe boot server, hopefully on docker or k8. been thinking of doing that for a while and this net boot just was great on that. I hate dealing with tiny SD cards that I keep loosing.
Nice job as always my friend!!
Thanks. :)
Nice, was just waiting for your new video to drop :D
Yay! A full size HDMI port!
Wow, is this a new one? Or new upgrades added? I’ll watch after I run errands for elderly mom…
Cannot wait! 🤣
I still think the Raspberry Pi 4 is a much better desktop than the Odroid M1. However, the Odroid M1 would make an excellent server and/or router for your SOHO (small office and/or home) network. Once they get OpenWrt running on it, it would be excellent for that.
@Tony I mean...for a lot of people these are replacements, especially for kids. These are great computers for introducing them to programming and giving them something capable of doing things they need for school without breaking the bank....
@Tony i replaced my mom's Windows XP PC with Pi4 4GB two years ago, and she didn't really notice the difference for web browsing, besides it was working quicker. specially when i upgraded to Raspberry OS 64bit not long ago
I ordered an 8Gb Pi4 just before Christmas last year. Delivery is due around the end of March next year. Hope the wait is worth it.
@@simonlb24 I admire your patience.
@Tony I've been using a pi400 as a home computer for a couple of months and it's alright actually. You definitely notice the difference between software or websites that are lean and those that are bloated.
:Thorough
ADJECTIVE [usually ADJECTIVE noun]
A thorough action or activity is one that is done very carefully and in a detailed way so that nothing is forgotten. [...]
Hence.. I WANT ONE!! Thank you Sir ChrisTOWFER
Excellent work, as usual!!!
Interesting SBC. With the current energy prices I think it would be interesting to mention the power consumption of the boards a well.
Fair point. :) I did a big energy consumption comparison not long back -- ruclips.net/video/rGUnsiivqeU/видео.html
@@ExplainingComputers Thanks, I think I missed that video.
Electricity prices aside, it's definitely relevant for anyone looking at an SBC for a battery-powered application.
The difference will be anecdotal if we're comparing SBC's and not other types of computers. Unless you have a project in mind which will involve using a dozen or more of these devices, that is! As somebody has pointed out, it would make some sense to look closely at power consumption differences if you're going to run your board on a battery pack.
Great Video, I am eagerly waiting for the new Raspberry Pi
I have been setting up M1 and a few N2+ boards. Running 20.04 with MATE the UI on M1 is noticeably sluggish and the N2+ is very responsive. The M1 runs a lot warmer with 250GB WD SSD. So warm that I drilled a series of vent holes in the blue alloy housing of the M1.
One of my N2+ boards has a faulty ethernet port. Often but not always the download speed is 0.5-1% of what it should be. Determined to be the board by swapping boards and OS's on eMMC modules.
Interesting video again Chris. Thanks for sharing
Greetings Brian.
Well, graphics drivers are not very good. But other than that, I really like this board. Booth menu and sata/m2 ports are a significant advantage over raspberry-like boards. I really could find a use for it. Thanks for the review, it's good (but still I would like some GPIO tests).
Graphics drivers are the weak spot. Let's hope it gets improved before the board gets outdated, otherwise it doesn't stand much chance against RPI4 which is getting long in the tooth. If RPi5 adds NVME boot in next release then it's game over unless they bloat the price way up.
Thanks, I agree that fro this SBC for sure need accelerated GPU, in general hardware good.
Holy connectivity Batman!
Now you talk love the subject of the video an pc board have a nice week pal
The solution to your long *_unreadable sentence_* is to buy a new keyboard that has a working period key!
M1 is a bit of a cheeky name, cashing in on the Apple M1 hype there?
Indeed!
The world is good ... a new SBC that's really worth something!
Always excited for new SBCs 💪😎
Hi Leslie. I thought you would appreciate this board. :)
"And next to that, a 3.5mm audio jack just like you don't get on an iPhone."
I've heard that some Android phones these days don't have audio jacks either! I'm sure glad my phone has one.
As for the single board computer, it's a very nice computer, especially for the price (well, here in the US anyway. The UK's economy not doing too well should explain the higher prices over there... 😞) even if there's no on-board wi-fi and RUclips doesn't run well at all.
With that being said, a gold medal 🏅 for you for Olympic storage drive powering! Mr. Scissors gets one too for Olympic bag opening.
Thanks for the medals. :) Hope all is OK with you.
@@ExplainingComputers You're welcome! I'm trying my best.
Great video about SBCs now let me continue to belabor you about why tower PCs will last forever……j/k
Thank you, Chris!
:)
Great video. I was looking for something to replace my Odroid C2 as a media player with CoreElec, from your video this board definitily is not good for that purpose. I guess N2 is still a better option from Odroid to be used as a media player.
Ye, the N2(+) is better for media -- at least with the software currently available.
the nvme speed is great - good for netfs and 1200mb/s can saturate 2.5 gbe or 5gbe (bonded or bridged) - this looks like a nice machine - great content! - expect driver improvements - you should run sisoft and phoronix test suite - the next gen of these should be even better (ie expect pi5 to be slightly better but diversity is ok too cause it helps supply chains
This looks like a promising candidate for a small home server. My only concern is energy. Can you check the power consumption in idle and at 100% CPU, please?
Very good PC inventions people put together nicely.
I have an Odroid XU-4. Really powerful for its size but no where NEAR the community support of some other boards when I bought it. Maybe it's time to do a revisit?
I used Armbian when I was using my odroid xu4 and at one time a well supported community build of Debian maintained by meverick I think it was. I upgraded to the odroid-n2 but was unsatisfied with the USB problems exhibited by the board, hardkernel effectively washed their hands of the matter by saying it was an architecture problem. I am wary of the odroid-m1 as I wouldn't like to experience the same usb problems as I had with the odroid-n2.
I'm thinking of dusting off the odroid xu4 again as it was extremely reliable and with current Armbian builds I'm sure I can find a use for it.
I use ODroid, have gathered a lot of different versions since 2014. Most of them are working 24/7 since, to handle everything in my shop and house. I find it's a great little device for "SBC as a Service". I also have some different devices from the rPi family, Arduino, ESP8266, ESP36, even rPI2hdmi in an A500..
At the moment I use the M1 with LineageOS, connected to an AverMedia video input card, for use with RaspberryShake App. But Android doesn't boot M.2 drive... yuk..
I wouldn't say why in the end, but I always had more interest in ODroid. Even if I really love the fact rPI comes from England, I like that Korean engineer having done Hardkernel from Scratch, with love.
And excuse my french ODroid don't suck at stocks supplies.
“Here we have an exciting box”. The sarcasm 😂
Can't help but notice the _IR detector_ (3:16 lower left next to the battery) being bent way over. Not exactly off to a good start quality control wise.
So often happens.
it was mentioned on the video, and could happen on shipping or packaging steps, not just on the assembly line and ir is not that used anymore, perhaps if you use it as a media pc but the gpu is not capable of 1080p, so, is the last of the concerns tbh
@@arch1107 - Ya, I commented before Chris got to it in the video. The sensor is a through hole part and needs a bit more care to install it versus SMD. If it was installed properly (it can go down quite a bit) it wouldn't move with a bump in shipped, etc.
They sell a simple IR remote on their website so I imagine users do use it. It makes for a simple controller unlike some push buttons that you might connect to the 40 pin GPIO connector. I would use it more for custom control than for a media controller. As you said you're not going to be using this as a media player at least until they really work on the video play back.
Make sure you remove your installation *_floppies_* before rebooting! 9:49
How many floppies would that be I wonder?!?! ;-)
:)
Great video. Are you going to be checking out the Odroid go ultra? If so I've got an upgrade to the stock image that adds a lot more systems.
Thanks a lot - your video is a Great start to soft soft. I'm onto it !
Will you be receiving any RK3588 boards soon? I’m really looking forward to hearing your take on that chip.
Great purposeful device, however, as for the lack of WiFi & BT onboard, imo, by leaving these two elements off, encourages the manufacture and production of addons (clearly readily available) thus supporting other tech markets which I don't see as an issue. Moreover, in the absence of WiFi & BT, should also be reflected in the price, comparable to other SBCs with them.
Nice review.
I think Odroid have the correct form factor having space for NVME drives and room for plenty of USB ports. The heatsink is clever.
The petitboot is nice.
It's a real real shame about RUclips playback. This is a deal-breaker for me and probably most. I am looking forward to RK 3588 processors because the arm based SBCs have been stuck in a rut recently. I am hoping there will finally be an arm SBC that is easy on the wallet and is truly capable of running Linux for general tasks. Could this be the year?
I am still hopeful for the RK3588 Rock Pi 5B . . .
Thanx for such interesting video. As I have understood Odroid M1 will not be a good choice to serve video files as a media server, or I am wrong?
11:14 - The GNOME desktop is like that (+1 GB RAM usage on cold boot), at least on Ubuntu.
Thanks again for another good video!
What a great tutorial very well spoken.
The market niche for this is controller of small networks, perhaps industrial controls, where you don't want a machine enthusiastically trying to talk to anything that wanders past?
Heath Robinson approves of that SATA power cable kit. 😉
Manjaro has an Odroid M1 spin, if you'd like to give that a go. 🐧
It does, but sadly -- at least a few weeks back when I made the video -- Manjaro did not support the M.2 slot or SATA port.
@@ExplainingComputers Ahh; I'm sure they're working on it. If I had an M1, I'd give it a go and see. 🐧
Please, next time measure the power consumption, it's a very interesting parameter for these machines
The model featured in the video is advertised as consuming 1.3 watts, however, real world tests show it is between 3-7 watts under load, depending on cpu/gpu frequency settings.
Great video 📸. Will this support Open Media vault? If so how would you install it?
Great video ! Do you try install Windows ?
Thanks. I'm not aware of an ARM Windows image for this board.
Thanks for informing me about SBC's getting upset when they're upside down, Chris. No wonder they've always been so contrary with me.
I'm sure that we'll be right as rain, from now on. 😎
Does cursing at them cause them to stubbornly lock up, as well?🙄
Are techno-therapists or SBC counselors covered under national health?
Cursing always helps a bit! :)
@@ExplainingComputers Yes. I find it very difficult to think straight with a head full of steam, so it helps to release the pressure.
I'll bet that's true for the SBC's, as well. But, we can't hear their little bits,. So, we never know until we see their release of magic smoke.
BR 😎
After last week's video, I went out and bought a new Beeline GTR5 32 to see if it can replace my aging gen 3 i7 tower PC. I blame you Chris...
I'm sorry . . .
I wish these boards came in micro itx form factor and with a couple of PCI express slots. I'm more interested in the power saving aspect rather than the size.
but, in itx form, you get at best 2 slots, 1 to be precise but i have seen weird itx expecting you to use a pci riser cable
what would you use those slots for?
i have a nice itx case that i would love to upgrade to one of these sbc but cost and gpu power is a no go for me so far, the power consumption is very nice tbh
You can buy mini ITX motherboards with soldered on integrated CPUs that are just barely removed from sbcs. I just bought one to build a new desktop machine for my mother. All I needed to add to the motherboard was some RAM sticks, an m.2 SSD, and a pico power supply (I hadn't encountered them before but it's basically just a small circuit board attached directly to a motherboard power header, the other end is a barrel jack you need to provide with 12 volts from an external power brick). The PSU is rated for 250 Watts peak output but the computer draws like 11.
This one in particular doesn't actually have any pcie slots but looking on New egg it looks like Asus makes a few and they tend to sell for under $100. You do need to add RAM and storage to that so not as cheap as an SBC, but it'll help you hit a low power target.
I didn't get a warning or watch battery when I got mine, just the base unit.
Also if you think it's cheap, it's not. The $90 is just the base cost, there's also a delivery fee and the taxes were more than the board itself.