Embedded 1.8-inch Zen PC: DFI Unveils Credit Card-Sized AMD Ryzen Board

DFI has announced what they consider the world’s smallest single-board computer (SBC) that uses on AMD’s Ryzen Embedded processor. The highly-integrated credit card-sized GHF51 motherboard can be used for a variety of applications that have to be small, yet offer capabilities as well as performance of a modern PC.

The DFI GHF51 1.8-inch platform carries AMD’s dual-core Ryzen Embedded R1000-series SoC with AMD Radeon Vega GPU featuring three compute units (192 stream processors) with hardware H.264, H.265, and VP9 decoding. The SoC can be paired with 2/4/8 GB of single-channel DDR4-3200 memory as well as 16/32/64 GB of eMMC storage. The SBC features one Mini PCIe slot for an add-in card, an 8-pin DIO header, two micro HDMI 1.4 outputs (4Kp30), one USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C port, a GbE connector (controlled by the Intel I211AT or the I210IT chip), and an fTPM 2.0 chip.

At present, DFI lists two AMD Ryzen-powered SBCs: the GHF51-BN-43R16 with the Ryzen Embedded R1606G APU (2.60 GHz – 3.50 GHz, 12 W) as well as the GHF51-BN-43R15 with the Ryzen Embedded R1505G APU (2.40 GHz – 3.30 GHz, 12 W). Both boards carry 4 GB of DDR4-3200 memory, 32 GB of eMMC storage, two micro HDMI outputs, a GbE port, and one USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C port. Eventually, the company plans to add motherboards powered by the lower-power Ryzen Embedded R1102G (1.20 GHz – 2.60 GHz, 6 W) or Ryzen Embedded R1305G (1.50 GHz – 2.80 GHz, 8/10 W) SoCs into the lineup in a bid to address applications that have to be less power hungry.

DFI’s GHF51 SBC is an example when AMD’s Ryzen Embedded enters the small form factor embedded market. The 1.8-inch SBCs can power various small form-factor or IoT applications that can take advantage of high-performance Zen cores, but theoretically they can also be used inside devices that currently use Raspberry Pi or similar. Obviously, a Ryzen Embedded SBC will probably cost more than a Raspberry Pi, but it will also provide higher performance, which opens doors to new use cases.

DFI has not announced pricing of its AMD Ryzen Embedded-based SBCs or their availability dates. In fact, the GHF51 product page currently mentions ‘Preliminary’ status of the boards.

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Sources: DFI