E25 mini PCIe max current?

#1

What is the max current E25’s mini PCIe slot can deliver? Will it provide full 4A?

A major draw for E25 is potential for future upgrades. However, other SBCs and upgradeable router boards with similar purpose e.g. BPi/Unielec are often incapable of providing enough power even for modern AP-grade WLAN cards, and require hardware modifications to compensate. E.g. AsiaRF’s MT7916 card requires 3A at the very least, with 3.5A recommended. Future Wi-Fi 7 miniPCIe AP cards can further push it. Would be a shame if E25 suffered from the same problem.

#2

Currently the mini PCIE 3.3V power is 2A continuous, 3A peak load current capability.

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#3

@jack thank you very much for clarifying!

Please kindly consider adjusting this, at least for E55 if not E25, if it’s not too late for that.

#4

@jack
saw the news of E25.

want to provide some feedback.
I like the look of the case.

About the two slots (M2 B key and mini pcie).

Optional support for WiFi & Bluetooth via mini PCIe socket (multiplexed with 5G)
Optional support for 4G LTE via M.2 socket, 4G or 5G via mini PCIe socket; SIM card slot

My questions are

  1. does it provide USB 3.0 interface via the M.2 B key?
  2. does it provide pcie interface via the M.2 B key?
  3. how the bandwidth is shared between M.2 B key slot and the mini pcie slot?

feedback or suggestion.

Power:
The power requirement of wifi 6E (ax 6GHz) is very high.
Many aged router board doesn’t provide enough power on their mini pcie slot to drive a wifi 6E ap card.
Please kindly pay more attention to this.

Expansion:
For a device that only has two expansion slots (M.2 B key for 5G modem, M.2 E key or mini pcie for wifi ap), we need a dual bands dual concurrent card.

Currently, the ax ap card that has best openwrt support is AsiaRF AW7915-NPD. (dual band dual concurrent)
It has MediaTek chip. If you were to offer us a wifi 6E card, please consider provide hardware that openwrt support.
More detail here, http://www.en.techinfodepot.shoutwiki.com/wiki/AsiaRF_AW7915-NPD

Many network application boards provide three expansion slots.
[ 4G/5G modem && 2.4G AP && 5.0G AP ]

Eth ports:
Many network application boards have one GbE that use a switch to spilt into 4 GbE ports.
A very popular one like omnia (open source hardware, you know.)

turris_omnia_network_corrected.png2063×2127 175 KB

I would prefer the same, and keep the pcie lanes for proper
[ M.2 B key slot && (M.2 E key || mini pcie) ]

The reasoning behind this is that, the max one can get from a 5G modem probably doesn’t exceed 1gbps, multiple real 1GbE ports can’t use all bandwidth.
It is likely the shared bandwidth pcie lanes [ M.2 B && (M.2 E || mini pcie) ] become the bottleneck.

Storage:
I don’t really care about sata on a router. I prefer to not have sata. Too big. Some people prefer to have it. I prefer removable emmc. If additional storage were possible, I would prefer on M.2 pcie || M.2 sata || minipcie sata. (without compromising the dedicated pcie lanes for the 5G and wifi)

Looking forward to an openwrt 5G router from Radxa.

#5

I feel E25 is held down very much by 5V power. 12V or more with respectable current would be much more appropriate, in my opinion - although would certainly complicate board design and drive cost up a bit.

Overall, looking at many different RK3568 networking boards, they all leave quite a lot to be desired. E25 looks quite favourable in comparison - both design and pricing are very reasonable. However, looking at provided specs, using E25 with MT7916 - arguably the perfect option for a reasonably-priced DIY wifi AP at this moment - might require a minipcie extension with external power attached, or a hardware mod.

#6

Currently, the ax ap card that has best openwrt support is AsiaRF AW7915-NPD. (dual band dual concurrent)

It seems the AW7915-NPD only export one lane PCIe, but when I check the MT7915 datasheet, it seems it has P0 PCIe lane and P1 PCIe lane with two PCIe clock, so it seems the 2.4G and 5G AP are independent? The datasheet did not explain it.

#7

AW7916-NPD has overwhelmingly better hardware and, from what I read, uses the same driver.

There are many other boards that do exactly that, driving the cost and size up, sacrificing 2.5GbE ports for 1GbE. One can always add an external switch to E25 if they need one.

#8

AW7916-NPD has overwhelmingly better hardware and, from what I read, uses the same driver.\

Found the commit. It is quite recent. One more option for radxa to consider.

There are many other boards that do exactly that, driving the cost and size up, sacrificing 2.5GbE ports for 1GbE. One can always add an external switch to E25 if they need one.

It really depends on target application. I would say if the target application is 5G modem + router. I don’t need 2.5GbE. I prefer pcie lane goes to m.2.

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#9

Sorry, I didn’t dig into their datasheet. I am unable to provide you an answer for this.

#10

I have an application with 4G LTE modem for WAN i.e. nowhere near 5G speeds, but also a NAS. Even a capable Wi-Fi 6 AP saturates 1GBe link in my current setup, I expect Wi-Fi 6E MT7916 to perform better. 2.5GBe ports really make a difference in this scenario, allowing to further improve WLAN to LAN traffic speeds.