Minisforum AD650I
Anyone has any experience with this motherboard? I'm thinking about using it as a NAS/Plex server
Anyone has any experience with this motherboard? I'm thinking about using it as a NAS/Plex server
Minisforum AD650I - ITX with Intel 12650H
- Thread starter boz
- Start date
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No experience with it, but I've been thinking it'd be a great sff all flash nas since I saw it. Only thing I'd like is if they put in 10gbe instead of the 2.5gbe.
I've thinking something like this is missing in the market ever since I read STH article about the Qnap TBS-574TX e.1 nas that was spotted.
If an m.2 to 10gbe nic adapter fit in without hacking up the supplied heatsink too much it'd have everything I want in a sff nas.
I've thinking something like this is missing in the market ever since I read STH article about the Qnap TBS-574TX e.1 nas that was spotted.
If an m.2 to 10gbe nic adapter fit in without hacking up the supplied heatsink too much it'd have everything I want in a sff nas.
I honestly find MINISFORUM BD770i even more interesting
but definitely good place we're in these days (Also, erying has ITX i7 12700H boards check them out as well)
but definitely good place we're in these days (Also, erying has ITX i7 12700H boards check them out as well)
Uses around 17W+ in idle (there are some laptop reviews of the same chipset) ... aka twice the power draw as the AD650I as its really a desktop AMD 7700 (chiplet) that has been put in a laptop format. It kind of defeat the purpose to buy a ITX with a desktop CPU, ... For laptops they have a use as workstation laptop where you do not care about the battery life but need a mobile workstation with a lot of horsepower.
And while the 770i is faster, its not really a NAS product like the AD650I...
The problem with erying their boards, is they do not support proper 4x/4x/4x/4x bifurication. So your stuck with 1 or 2 m.2 slots and a X16 PCIe slot (what can be NVME 3 drive).
TB4 with 10Gbe adaptor ... Or you take one of the M.2 for 10Gbe ... or you add a 2.5gbe in the empty wifi slot and double link them on your router, gives you a cheap 5gbit solution.
Or you simply have a few extra seconds of patience
If you really push the amount of data where you feel like waiting long is a issue, then your probably going to saturate whatever NVME drive its SLC cache, and your going to be writing at 200 a 400MB/second anyway (aka 2.5gbe is plenty).Ordered one, we shall see. Still no shipping confirmation but its been national holiday in China...
A few reviews that are out:
EYERTEC AD650I Mini-ITX "Intel Core i7-12650H" Motherboard Review - Six M.2 Slots!
EYERTEC's AD650I Mini-ITX motherboard features Intel Core i7-12650H CPU and an insane six M.2 slots in a small form factor design.
Last link is Chinese but it shows the real system in action. Seem to be good old basic bios. Something that is not correct in their marketing, that its not 6x Pcie 3.0 but in reality 4x Pcie 3.0 and 2x Pcie 4.0 (on the backside).
That's because Intel simply never will put in bifurcation into their consumer hardware.
What this has is a pcie switch.
Also you say it's more power hungry?
Average idle it's within earshot of the 13700HX, while in use in practice uses less power
And this is the whole laptop
What this has is a pcie switch.
Also you say it's more power hungry?
Average idle it's within earshot of the 13700HX, while in use in practice uses less power
And this is the whole laptop
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Well ... Alder Lake has bifurication, its just only at 8/8 ... so never say never.
Yea, this board had a asm2824 controller for the MXM card 3 m.2 slots.
Does not negate my point, about erying, as these boards simply do not offer the same functionality as this one. Aka, limited to max 3 m.2 slots, as i pointed out.
The only way your getting max 5 m.2 on a board, is buying a AMD ITX board and using a 8/4/4 splitter. And that is the max your getting on anything power efficient (as 4000/5000g only split into 8/4/4). And then your looking at best ~ 18W idle. Ask me how i know
Sure, you can go 4/4/4/4 on a desktop, but then your looking at 40W+ idle already.We are talking about a 7W idle 6 m.2 itx solution, out of the door. That combination is kind of unique.
Alder lake bifurcation is actually done outside the CPU not by itself. It has to be specifically enabled by the board design (using bifurcation chips) x4 is also possible if designed but it's cheaper to use a pcie switch but that would depend on how many upstream lanes they have that determine whether it's any good at total bandwidthWell ... Alder Lake has bifurication, its just only at 8/8 ... so never say never.
Yea, this board had a asm2824 controller for the MXM card 3 m.2 slots.
Does not negate my point, about erying, as these boards simply do not offer the same functionality as this one. Aka, limited to max 3 m.2 slots, as i pointed out.
The only way your getting max 5 m.2 on a board, is buying a AMD ITX board and using a 8/4/4 splitter. And that is the max your getting on anything power efficient (as 4000/5000g only split into 8/4/4). And then your looking at best ~ 18W idle. Ask me how i know
We are talking about a 7W idle 6 m.2 itx solution, out of the door. That combination is kind of unique.
Nah, don't need an atx power supply, website is confusing. The motherboard has a 4pin header and comes with a 4pin to sata cable to power two drives. That review linked above talks about it
I just got this board to try and set up a low power SSD based NAS. So far I've been pretty disappointed with the idle power consumption I can get from this setup. I am using 32GB of ram, 3X Teamgroup 4TB MP34 NVME, and one 256GB Samsung NVME drive I had leftover from a laptop upgrade for an OS drive.
Idle power consumption with the 3 4TB drives on the back M.2 slots and the 256GB OS drive on the MXM card is about 24W on a fresh install of truenas scale with nothing running.
After seeing this I checked powertop which showed the system not getting lower than a package C state of C3. I then went through testing various hardware configurations while running a live usb of ubuntu and installing powertop and running auto tune. I wasn't able to get lower than C3 in any configuration though. Below you can see my result for ubuntu desktop idle power consumption after running powertop auto tune.
No NVME drives and no MXM card installed - 7.5w
MXM board installed, no drives - 14w
1x 256GB Samsung on back side, no MXM - 9.5w
1x 4TB MP34 on back side, no MXM - 10.5w
2x 4TB MP34 on back side, no MXM - 14w
3x 4TB MP34 on back side, no MXM - 15.5w
3x 4TB MP34 on back side, MXM without drives - 23w
3x 4TB MP34 on back side, MXM with 256GB Samsung - 25.5w
All of these measurements were just taken by waiting for a low idle value to stabilize on the ubuntu desktop while visually reading the power draw from a P3 kill a watt meter so take them for what they are.
If anyone has any ideas to get improved package C state performance or lower idle power consumption please let me know. I was really hoping I would end up with a decently powerful NAS with idle power consumption at least in the low teens of watts or less. I'm kind of wishing I had gone with one of the N5105 based solutions even though it would be less powerful.
Idle power consumption with the 3 4TB drives on the back M.2 slots and the 256GB OS drive on the MXM card is about 24W on a fresh install of truenas scale with nothing running.
After seeing this I checked powertop which showed the system not getting lower than a package C state of C3. I then went through testing various hardware configurations while running a live usb of ubuntu and installing powertop and running auto tune. I wasn't able to get lower than C3 in any configuration though. Below you can see my result for ubuntu desktop idle power consumption after running powertop auto tune.
No NVME drives and no MXM card installed - 7.5w
MXM board installed, no drives - 14w
1x 256GB Samsung on back side, no MXM - 9.5w
1x 4TB MP34 on back side, no MXM - 10.5w
2x 4TB MP34 on back side, no MXM - 14w
3x 4TB MP34 on back side, no MXM - 15.5w
3x 4TB MP34 on back side, MXM without drives - 23w
3x 4TB MP34 on back side, MXM with 256GB Samsung - 25.5w
All of these measurements were just taken by waiting for a low idle value to stabilize on the ubuntu desktop while visually reading the power draw from a P3 kill a watt meter so take them for what they are.
If anyone has any ideas to get improved package C state performance or lower idle power consumption please let me know. I was really hoping I would end up with a decently powerful NAS with idle power consumption at least in the low teens of watts or less. I'm kind of wishing I had gone with one of the N5105 based solutions even though it would be less powerful.
I think you have multiple issues at the same time.
1. The backside NVME slots are a mix of Pcie 4.0 (2 slot) and 3.0 (1 slot). It looks like when you populate the PCIe 4.0 slots, this is when you have the highest idle power draw.
Fairly use that your PCIe lanes are not powering down / keeping active and or keeping your NVME drives from going to low idle/sleep. That need to be a bios setting that you can alter.
2. The MXM card, see problem 1... The moment you install it, your 8x PCIE 3.0 PCIe lanes became active and the MXM board has a active PCIe lane splitter. Aka, another source of power drawing and if that can not power down in combo with the active lanes.
Check if the bios has something called L1 in the PCIe section and enable it (that normally allows for more aggressive PCIe lane powering down). Try enabling any power management features (California Power management, in some bios called that or ... forgot the names of several other), if you have them available. That is about all i can say because i am not familiar with Intel Bios settings. Aka, Google it, and you will find a slew of power options that you can enable.
Also, not going lower then C3 state, is again a Bios issue. Remember reading that people have issues with C3 state being the lowest they got, and you need to enable some bios feature to get C6.
Even a basic ITX build does better then that. I ran a Gigabyte B550 + 4650G, with bifurcation (5 NVME slots) and that was down to 18~20W (3 NVME + 3 HDD sleep).
A Chuwii Larkbox n100 does like 3W with a single nvme installed. 5W with a nvme + bunch of USB3 2.5" drives.
Thanks so much for the suggestions. Unfortunately the BIOS on this board is very limited and doesn't have many settings to adjust. I'm thinking that unless there is a BIOS update it might not get any better which is very unfortunate. I have added some images of the BIOS settings available other than stuff like boot priority, clock, and secure boot. In case anyone is curious.
I'm considering switching to something like a Flashstor 6 instead, as I'm not sure I can resolve the issues with the Minisforum board. I hadn't seen the larkbox and it would be more powerful with the N100 vs N5105 but I'd like something that I can put 3 NVME storage drives in and then something to run the OS.
I'm considering switching to something like a Flashstor 6 instead, as I'm not sure I can resolve the issues with the Minisforum board. I hadn't seen the larkbox and it would be more powerful with the N100 vs N5105 but I'd like something that I can put 3 NVME storage drives in and then something to run the OS.
