AMD Phoenix in an UCFF Avatar

ASRock Industrial has been one of the prolific distributors within the ultra-compact form-factor (UCFF) PC house over the previous few years. They’ve been releasing 4″x4″ techniques primarily based on the most recent AMD and Intel platforms inside a couple of weeks of their bulletins by the processor distributors. On the AMD entrance, the corporate launched the Rembrandt Refresh-based 4X4 BOX-7735U earlier this 12 months, and adopted that up a few quarters later with the Phoenix-based 4X4 BOX-7040 collection.

The 4X4 BOX-7040 collection builds upon the I/O and iGPU enhancements within the 4X4 BOX-7735U with the incorporation of AMD’s newest Zen 4 CPU cores and RDNA3-based iGPU. The transfer to a 4nm TSMC course of (from the 6nm one used for Rembrandt Refresh) and the CPU / iGPU enhancements ought to theoretically supply a lot better efficiency and energy effectivity for a variety of workloads.

The Ryzen 7 7840U is a 28W TDP half that bears placing similarity to the Ryzen 7 7840HS that was already evaluated in a 65W mode in Beelink’s GTR7. Because of the decrease energy restrict, the bottom clock is lowered. The iGPU configuration, I/Os, and different working parameters stay the identical. The U-series is primarily meant for pocket book platforms, however ASRock Industrial (and different mini-PC distributors) have been deploying them in actively-cooled UCFF instances. The presence of a fan offers distributors a little bit of leeway in configuring the ability limits – and, as an extension, efficiency.

ASRock Industrial ships the 4X4 BOX-7840U within the ‘Regular Mode’ with AMD’s advised TDP of 28W. Nevertheless, a toggle within the BIOS can push the system right into a ‘Efficiency Mode’ with a souped-up TDP of round 40W. This overview explores the efficiency profile of the PC in each modes, and supplies detailed insights into the differentiating points of AMD’s Phoenix in a UCFF mini-PC platform.

Introduction and Product Impressions

UCFF techniques have been steadily changing cumbersome tower desktops for a lot of use-cases over the past decade. This class has been experiencing development in each residence shopper and industrial settings, with the latter prompting the B2B / industrial computing arms of many motherboard distributors to offer extra consideration to such techniques. ASRock Industrial (spun out of ASRock’s enterprise unit in 2018) has been creating UCFF techniques primarily based on each AMD and Intel platforms since 2019.

This overview delves intimately into the corporate’s AMD Phoenix-based flagship UCFF providing – the 4X4 BOX-7840U. Based mostly on AMD’s high-end Phoenix 28W providing (Ryzen 7 7840U), the brand new system is supposed to be a follow-up to the Rembrandt-R-based 4X4 BOX-7735U launched earlier this 12 months. The Ryzen 7 7840U continues with the identical 8C/16T configuration of the Ryzen 7 7735U. Nevertheless, the fabrication course of has moved from TSMC’s 6nm FinFET to 4nm FinFET, and the CPU cores at the moment are primarily based on Zen 4. The built-in GPU has additionally been re-architected, transferring from the RDNA2-based Radeon 680M in Rembrandt-R to the RDNA3-based 780M in Phoenix.

ASRock Industrial’s UCFF techniques are non-descript machines that don’t go for a flowery case design. The useful chassis utilized in earlier 4X4 BOX techniques is retained for the 4X4 BOX-7840U additionally. This does imply an extension of the lifespan of the shiny polycarbonate fingerprint magnet casing, however that’s set to alter in 2024. The I/O port areas are precisely the identical as within the earlier era. The interior board can also be largely the identical, because the USB4 ports and DDR5 assist had been already pencilled in throughout the design of the 4X4 BOX-7735U.

The corporate’s 4X4 BOX-7040 collection has solely two members – one primarily based on the Ryzen 5 7640U and the opposite primarily based on the Ryzen 7 7840U. A few of the key related points are introduced out in AMD’s introductory slide to the product household again on the 2023 CES.

ASRock Industrial’s alternative of I/O ports for the Intel and AMD techniques in the identical era is price a notice. Whereas the rear USB ports are solely USB 2.0 within the AMD ones, they’re USB 3.2 Gen 2 within the Intel variations. Nevertheless, the 2 entrance panel Kind-C ports assist the total USB4 characteristic set together with PCIe tunneling within the AMD techniques. The Intel boards are skimped on, with solely one of many Kind-C ports able to full USB4 / Thunderbolt 4 assist and the opposite falling again to USB 3.2 Gen 2 with Alt DP assist.

The corporate gives each barebones model of the system in addition to the motherboard alone. The previous is often offered in retail, whereas the motherboard is supposed for the B2B channel. The barebones model package deal comes with a 120W DC energy adapter (19V @ 6.32A), VESA mount (and related screws), a geo-specific energy wire, the principle unit, and a product overview / consumer information.

The barebones model wants two DDR5 SODIMMs and a M.2 2280 SSD to finish the construct. Essential’s DDR5-5600 SODIMM equipment (2x16GB) was complemented by a Samsung 990 PRO 2TB Gen 4 NVMe SSD for this function.

Entry to the SODIMM and M.2 slots is by way of the underside, much like the earlier era techniques. Elimination of the 4 screws on the backside permits the panel to be popped off.

Regardless of the assist for a 2.5″ SATA drive within the system, ASRock Industrial strongly recommends not utilizing it with a view to assist with correct airflow. The set up course of is in any other case much like the older 4X4 BOX techniques, and we had been up and operating with a freshly put in OS very quickly (after putting in the chipset drivers from the product assist web page). The Ryzen 7 7840U does embrace the XDNA engine (now rebranded as Ryzen AI in Phoenix Refresh), however the drivers for that (acknowledged as an IPU in System Supervisor) are usually not but out there by way of Home windows Replace.

The complete specs of the overview pattern (as examined) are offered within the desk under. As we are going to notice within the subsequent part, the BIOS permits the system to be configured in both of two modes with completely different TDPs, as specified within the Processor entry.

Within the subsequent part, we check out the system setup and observe it up with an in depth platform evaluation.