UDOO BOLT GEAR Mini PC Review

By Nathan Kirsch

UDOO BOLT GEAR w/ AMD Ryzen Gets Benchmarked

Last year, UDOO BOLT, powered by AMD Ryzen, became the most powerful maker board on the market. Now you you can get the UDOO BOLT GEAR, which is basically a do-it-all Mini PC kit that you need to build. This unassembled system includes the mainboard with an AMD Ryzen Embedded V1605B 4-core, 8-thread CPU featuring AMD Radeon Vega integrated graphics, Microchip ATmega32U4 8-bit RISC-Based MCU (Arduino), metal case, WiFi/Bluetooth module, 19V/65W AC power adapter and power cable for a promotional price of $399.

You’ll need to supply your own RAM, storage drive and Windows or Linux OS. Pricey, but you have to keep in mind that the list price for an AMD Ryzen Embedded V1605B is around $150 to $200. AMD doesn’t seem to have a super low cost 4-core, 8-thread part for the embedded market.

Udoo Bolt Gear Mini PC

Once you build the system you’ll end up with a tiny Arduino-compatible Mini PC that might be ideal as a portable workstation, lightweight gaming machine, home-theater, Deep Learning brain or as its original purpose a toolkit.

Connectivity on the UDOO BOLT GEAR is rather impressive as it features two USB-C ports, two USB 3.0 ports, two HDMI 2.0, Gigabit LAN, SPDIF, 3.5mm audio jack and a DC power in header on the front and rear of the device. On the side you have all the grove connectors for the Arduino Leonardo compatible ATmega32U4 MCU. The nice thing about this mini PC is that it can handle four 4K monitors simultaneously.

AMD Ryzen Embedded Arduino Block Diagram

Our UDOO BOLT GEAR review sample came straight from SECO over in Italy. The box itself was actually a little larger than expected, but this was due to the fact the mainboard is not yet installed in the system and the packaging is fairly thick.

UDOO Bolt Gear AMD Ryzen Embedded Kit

The instructions are pretty sparse and don’t even show you where to plug the power button pins on the mainboard, so some folks might find the build a little tough. We did run across videos on how to build a system using the UDOO BOLT metal case that will likely be really helpful for folks. The UDOO BOLT metal case runs $32.00 in the UDOO shop if you happen to have one of these UDOO BOLT maker boards without the case.

UDOO BOLT GEAR

UDOO BOLT GEAR Specifications:

  • SoC AMD Ryzen Embedded V1605B quad-core/eight-thread processor @ 2.0GHz (3.6GHz boost) with Radeon Vega 8 graphics with support for Directx 12, OpenCL, OpenGL, Vulkan, H.265 Decode & Encode (8-bit), Vp9 Decode; TDP: 12W to 25W
  • System Memory 2x DDR4 dual-channel 64-bit SO-DIMM sockets With ECC for up to 32GB RAM @ 2400 Mt/s
  • Storage
    • M.2 Socket Key B 2260 for SATA SSD (also features PCI-e x2)
    • M.2 Socket Key M 2280 for NVMe SSD (PCI-e x4 Gen 3 Interface)
    • SATA 3.0 6 Gbit/s connector
  • Video Output
    • 2x HDMI 1.4/2.0a with CEC support
    • 2x DisplayPort via USB Type-C port
  • Audio
    • Realtek ALC888 HD audio codec
    • 3.5mm combo connector for headphone & microphone
    • 3.5mm combo connector for optical S/PDIF & stereo audio
    • Pre-amplified stereo speaker connectors
  • Networking
    • Gigabit Ethernet (RJ45) Realtek RTL8111G
    • WiFi/Bluetooth via M.2 Socket Key E 2230 (included)
  • USB 2x USB 3.0 Type-A, 2x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C ports with DP Alt. Mode and USB PD 3.0
  • I/O Expansion (via Embedded Controller) 2x UART, 2x I2C, 1x SPI, 1x Keyboard Scan, 1x Fan Controller, 10x GPIO
  • MCU Subsystem
    • Microchip ATmega32U4 8-bit AVR microcontroller, Arduino Leonardo compatible
    • Arduino Leonardo-compatible I/O 12x Analog Inputs, up To 23x Digital I/o (including 7x PWM); 1x UART, 1x I2C, 1x SPI
    • 3x Grove Connectors 1x Analog Input, 1x UART or Digital I/O, 1x I2C or Digital I/O
  • Misc RTC battery (included), power button
  • Power Supply 19V (65W) via DC jack or USB Type-C Power Delivery
  • Dimensions 13 cm x 13 cm x 7 cm

UDOO BOLT GEAR

To complete our UDOO BOLT GEAR Mini PC we went with a WD Blue SN550 1TB NVMe SSD ($128.85) and two Transcend 16GB DDR4 2400 MHz (TS2GSH64V4B) SO-DIMM modules ($90.62). This added $310.09 to the $399 promotional price of the system, so the total build cost of our system with a 1TB SSD and 32GB of RAM is currently $709.09 before any operating system costs. After the first 1,000 units are sold the discounted $399 price will be gone and it will be available for $449. So, at full price you are looking at over $750 for this build.

We went with Windows 10 Pro as our OS and had no issues installing the latest Windows 10 May 2020 Update (v2004) on the UDOO Bolt Gear. Driver support for AMD Embedded solutions in the latest version of Windows is still not the best, so we needed to go to AMD’s website to download the latest embedded drivers.

Let’s take a look at the benchmark results on the next page.