Floppy Drive Sized SBC Crams Intel Tiger Lake and Iris Xe

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Tiny Lake

The LE-370 board
(Image credit: Taiwan Commate Computer Inc)

From Taiwan, we get news via CNX Software of a single-board computer that must surely be at the heart of something pretty hot very soon. Built on Intel’s Tiger Lake UP3 platform, Commate Computer Inc LE-370 is aimed at embedded industrial systems and AI applications such as computer vision, this 3.5in board is barely bigger than a Raspberry Pi 4, yet packs Intel Iris Xe graphics and much more.

LE-370 uses the 11th Gen i7 as its default processor, with a dual-core Celeron as a lower spec option. The Celeron option does not come with Iris Xe graphics, rather we  are left with Intel UHD graphics, good enough for the intended usecase. No matter the CPU, you get up to 32GB of DDR4-3200 in a single SO-DIMM, a mini PCIe slot, two M.2 slots, with one supporting Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Then there’s a huge array of ports around the edge, including two SATA 6GBps, full-size HDMI and DisplayPort, 2.5GB and 1GB Ethernet, four USB 3.2 Type-As, and even an RS232 serial port. 

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CPUIntel 11th Gen Tiger Lake UP3 Core i7-1185G7E
Row 1 - Cell 0 1.8GHz Celeron 6305E
RAMUp to 32GB 3200MHz DDR4 via a single socket
Storage2x SATA 3.0 with RAID 0,1 and Intel Rapid Storage Technology
Row 4 - Cell 0 mSATA available via mini-PCIe
Row 5 - Cell 0 NVMe SSD available via M.2 M-key
NetworkingGigabit Ethernet port (Intel i219-LM)
Row 7 - Cell 0 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet ports (Intel i225-LM)
Row 8 - Cell 0 WiFi/BT available via M.2 E-key
DisplayDisplayPort, HDMI, VGA, LVDS
Other IO4 x USB 3.2 Gen 2
Row 11 - Cell 0 2 x USB 2.0
Row 12 - Cell 0 2 x RS-232
Power9 - 35V DC
Dimensions5.6 x 3.9 inches (144 x 101 mm)

With four cores and eight threads in its i7 incarnation, plus clock-speeds of up to 4.4GHz, Tiger Lake UP3 can drive up to four independent displays, supports USB4, Thunderbolt 4 and PCIe 4.0, not that we find those ports on this board.

It’s clear there’s a lot going on. Windows 10 support is in the bag, and Linux support should be good. Availability and pricing have yet to be announced for this tiny, yet formidable PC.

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Ian Evenden
Ian Evenden
Freelance News Writer

Ian Evenden is a UK-based news writer for Tom’s Hardware US. He’ll write about anything, but stories about Raspberry Pi and DIY robots seem to find their way to him.

5 Comments Comment from the forums
  • peachpuff
    What's a floppy?
    Reply
  • TerryLaze
    peachpuff said:
    What's a floppy?
    A floppy is something the size of a current laptop...well, almost.
    Title should specify 3.5"
    Reply
  • mikeebb
    Back in the day ... there were single-board PCs that would actually fit in a half-height 5 1/4" floppy bay. Saw some at the Computer Faire's bazaar while searching for a pair of floppies and a case to add on to my Radio Shack Model 1. A two-drive floppy case could hold the computer and a floppy - enough to work with. A 4-drive (half-height, equivalent to 2 full-height floppies) case could hold 2 floppies or one and a hard disk (mostly 10-20MB at the time) along with the computer. Not popular with hobbyists, but perhaps industrial. Simply the fact that you could get a complete computer on a board that size was amazing at the time.
    Reply
  • JWNoctis
    "Desktop hard drive sized" might have been a better description...But that sure doesn't sound as good. Many younger readers are probably as familiarized to a floppy drive as the average latter-day 3.5in floppy users to punched tapes and cards.

    The logical next step would be a single board computer the size, including thickness, of an actual 3.5in floppy.:LOL:
    Reply
  • DataMeister
    It seems like this could make for a pretty powerful 2-bay NAS. Now what case options are there for this with two 3.5" drive bays?
    Reply