Hello! When is the Rock 5A model expected to be released?
Rock 5A release date
Up…
Stay tuned. ROCK 5A will start promotion soon. What features do you expect for ROCK 5A?
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Rpi4 size, RK3588S SoC , m.2 2280 slot && 2230/2242 m.2 slot, PCIe 2.0 interface, competitive price like OrangePi5, removable eMMC slot, uSD slot, SPI chip, Like Edge2 board, a WIFI/BT built-in, full HDMI port, Ethernet port. maskrom physical button, 8Gb and 16GB of RAM SKU’s.
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I’ve seen a top view photo of an engineering sample. Looks pretty good so far.
I personally think it would be good to keep it similar to the Rock Pi 3A, so two M.2 slots (M-key, E-key) and no Wi-Fi chip.
Not including a soldered down Wi-Fi chip will lower the cost of the board, while giving users the choice to pick their own card if they wish to.
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Full sized hdmi in RPI 3b form factor. If it has micro/mini hdmi I won’t buy it.
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Rock5a should be as minimal as possible as it is with Raspberry you have the 5B with the IO.
Rock5a has the great CPU/GPU/NPU.
I have the OrangePi5 and maybe it could be even more minimal but prob would offer a version with soldered eMMC also.
Onboard mic is pretty pointless but would of been better without or Mic-in.
Basically whatever you can do to keep costs down so there is an obvious choice between 5A & 5B.
Also for a while I have wondered if addon daughter boards could help with cost for a minimal version and those who wish extra can just purchase addons, where connectors are avail as a hat with the ‘if you need then’. Khadas use this to good effect but maybe just smaller pitch headers or FFC is more economical.
Due to Soc pinout GPIO often is impossible to be the same and also limiting but likely exchangeable ‘GPIO Hats’ would allow specific GPIO arrangements that could give more compatibility to 3rd party hats. Also it will negate the problems that cause gpio revisions.
Also on the Opi5 it runs perfect with its own 5v Usb_C Pi4 PSU without a single PD problem and the usb-c is still spare to be used.
I love the Pico-ITX I/O all on one plane of the 5b but 5a again should be just what is economical and not as critical as the top of the tree 5b.
On the OrangePi02 it has a usb on GPIO which is a big plus as with cases all your IO becomes external so a GPIO usb means a whole range of devices can be implemented internally even with a modest sized case.
I second the call for full size HDMI like on the Rock 3A.
In fact, if you were able to maintain the same form factor as the RPi3B+, that would be excellent for hot-swapping into existing cases. The Rock 3A comes incredibly close, however, the dimensions of the full size HDMI port there are either slightly larger or it is in a slightly offset position compared with the RPi3B+.
My interest is in providing an upgrade path for the Pi-Top [3] to make it far more powerful and reduce e-waste but with minimal end user modification necessary.
I tried with the Rock 3A but the interface between its HDMI port and the Pi-Top [3]’s hubv2 didn’t quite work. I’m certain that it’s the HDMI port on the Rock 3A that’s the issue because the hubv2 still aligns correctly with the HDMI port of the RPi3B+ and with that of Waveshare’s CM4 to RPi3B+ adapter/carrier board.
There are a lot of Pi-Top [3]’s in school labs, as well as private homes, that could really do with such an upgrade as the RPi3B+ is really getting long in the tooth; just try using one tab open in Firefox ESR, without it hanging or crashing…
If it’s a question of part size, rather than part position, the part must still be available as Waveshare use it on their only recently launched CM4 to RPi3B+ adapter/carrier board so I hope you can use that part rather than the one on the Rock 3A.
If it’s a question of part position, I hope you can check the alignment and position it in the same way Waveshare did so that it is the same as on the RPi3B+.
EDIT: I guess we’ll have to wait ‘til the 5C for the RPi3B+ form factor 