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MINISFORUM Launches the MS-A1 Mini PC

btarunr

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MINISFORUM is proud to announce the MS-A1, the world's smallest and most expandable AM5 platform Mini PC. Equipped with the latest AMD AM5 platform, the MS-A1 offers a replaceable CPU, ensuring a longer motherboard lifecycle and sustainable upgrades for future generations of CPUs. Integrated with the AMD Radeon 780M graphics card, the MS-A1 includes 12 GPU cores and a GPU frequency of up to 2900 MHz, effortlessly handling both graphical and gaming demands. Additionally, it incorporates a dedicated NPU unit with up to 16 TOPS of processing power, making it the first desktop processor to include a specialized AI neural processing unit (NPU).

At its highest configuration, the MS-A1 features the AMD Ryzen 7 8700G desktop processor, built on the Zen 4 architecture. This powerhouse boasts 8 cores and 16 threads, a maximum boost clock of 5.10 GHz, and a 65 W TDP, delivering unparalleled performance. The MS-A1 supports dual-channel DDR5 5200 MHz high-speed memory, with a capacity of up to 96 GB, enabling users to achieve fast and efficient multitasking. It also features four M.2 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD slots, offering transfer speeds of up to 7000 MB/s. These extensive expansion slots allow for a maximum system capacity of up to 27 TB, catering to the vast storage needs of creative and multimedia professionals.



Supporting RAID0 and RAID1, the MS-A1 provides enhanced storage performance and data management. RAID0 increases transfer speeds up to 14000 MB/s, while RAID1 boosts reliability, ensuring data security.The MS-A1 supports 8K triple-display output through HDMI 2.1, DP 2.0, and USB4 full-featured video output interfaces. Users can connect up to three 8K displays simultaneously, quickly setting up a high-efficiency multitasking platform.

The OCulink expansion allows for the connection of high-performance desktop discrete graphics cards, significantly boosting performance to meet the needs of gamers and creative professionals requiring high-end graphics processing capabilities.With dual 2.5G RJ45 network ports supporting WAN and LAN port aggregation, the MS-A1 offers robust throughput, double the speed, and greatly enhances the efficiency and experience of multiple users online simultaneously. The full-featured USB4 port, with speeds up to 40 Gbps, facilitates the rapid transfer of large files.Equipped with dual fans and a four-heat pipe cooling system, the MS-A1 ensures stable performance with noise levels as low as 37 decibels.

Minisforum's MS-A1 sets a new standard for Mini PCs, combining compact size with unprecedented expandability and performance. MS-A1 is now available on Minisforum website with the early bird price at from $259.



View at TechPowerUp Main Site
 
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I have recently bought UM773. It was a pain in a butt. Wifi - not detected. LAN - not detected. And they did not even add a USB drive with drivers.
Had to do some shenanigans to get network on this device and even then, i went to product page, downloaded all drivers, and LAN was still not detected. Wifi started working. Did not check blue tooth yet, but something tells me, it is not working.

All happened on windows 10.

I am really disappointed by my very first purchase of minisforum product.
 
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Jan 5, 2023
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I have recently bought UM773. It was a pain in a butt. Wifi - not detected. LAN - not detected. And they did not even add a USB drive with drivers.
Had to do some shenanigans to get network on this device and even then, i went to product page, downloaded all drivers, and LAN was still not detected. Wifi started working. Did not check blue tooth yet, but something tells me, it is not working.

All happened on windows 10.

I am really disappointed by my very first purchase of minisforum product.
Mine is just the opposite. have an HX90 and it's was turn on and go for me.
 
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This is almost perfect, now just make it 2-3x taller so it can hold a beefier heatsink and an exchangeable standard 25mm fan.
 
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I have recently bought UM773. It was a pain in a butt. Wifi - not detected. LAN - not detected. And they did not even add a USB drive with drivers.
Had to do some shenanigans to get network on this device and even then, i went to product page, downloaded all drivers, and LAN was still not detected. Wifi started working. Did not check blue tooth yet, but something tells me, it is not working.

All happened on windows 10.

I am really disappointed by my very first purchase of minisforum product.
Did a windows license come with your UM773? If so which version?
 

Packabowl09

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I have recently bought UM773. It was a pain in a butt. Wifi - not detected. LAN - not detected. And they did not even add a USB drive with drivers.
Had to do some shenanigans to get network on this device and even then, i went to product page, downloaded all drivers, and LAN was still not detected. Wifi started working. Did not check blue tooth yet, but something tells me, it is not working.

All happened on windows 10.

I am really disappointed by my very first purchase of minisforum product.

I had the same experience with my Minisforum mini pc. No drivers detected, and their website did have not a section with drivers for my model. The best way to get support is on their Discord. I don't want to have join a stupid chat room just to download drivers for my product. 8 months later the power supply died and it no longer boots up.
 
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features four M.2 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD slots, offering transfer speeds of up to 7000 MB/s. These extensive expansion slots allow for a maximum system capacity of up to 27 TB
So what combo of drives will get you 27TB ?

AFAIK, there are no 3TB m.2 drives, which is what you would need to arrive at 27TB, like 3x 8TB + 1x 3TB.....perhaps it's a typo or someone in marketing uses that "funny" or "NueMath" nonsense that it taught in schools nowadayz....

But anyways, hopefully we can get a review & tests on this little screamer box asap, and if it works well, I think I have found the replacement for my 11th Gen/i5 box :D
 
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I have 5 minisforum pcs, one of those is a ms-01 13900h.
for me this make no sense at all. Why no pcie slot? Why almost the same price with way less features like dual 10g lan missing?
Not even about intel or amd. but the product segment....
 
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Did a windows license come with your UM773? If so which version?
I bought a barebone system as i had Windows 10 system on my old pc. I moved the SSD to UM773 and i was expecting windows to find the adapters and install generic drivers at the very least and then update through windows update. But that didn't happen.
I've switched numerous times on "normal" desktops from intel to amd cpus, from amd to nvidia gpus, different LAN, different wifi modules, and everytime it would just work. First generic drivers, then branded.
 

Cheeseball

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I have 5 minisforum pcs, one of those is a ms-01 13900h.
for me this make no sense at all. Why no pcie slot? Why almost the same price with way less features like dual 10g lan missing?
Not even about intel or amd. but the product segment....
8700G only has 20 PCI-E lanes available to it, which is then shared to the four three (wait, I'm right, one of them can be used for U.2) four M.2 slots and the OCulink port (PCI-E 4.0 x4).

It would be worse if they plan to make a lower-end model with the 8500G or 8300G as those only have 14 lanes.

For comparison, the MS-01 with the i9-13900H CPU has 28 available lanes, with the 12600H having 20.

I think the motherboards on these units don't have dedicated lanes like the B and X (B and Z for Intel) chipsets do.
 
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Wow Strix Point is about to be released, so why not wait a few more weeks and offer those as options too?
 

LordElfriot

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Jun 18, 2022
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Español:
Estaba pensando en comprar este modelo, pero con la cantidad de malas críticas que tiene respecto a los controladores; Me rindo... No volveré a pasar por esta situación de buscar controladores en páginas chinas...

English: I was thinking of buying this model, but with the number of bad reviews it has regarding the controllers; I give up... I will not go through this situation of looking for drivers on Chinese pages again
 
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