CHH ID: Erosluvu
This was the machine I was most concerned about during the Mingfan meeting in August. With the help of a friend, I secured the opportunity for the first review.The main reasons for my interest are, on one hand, the super strong performance with an i9 13900H packed into this size, and on the other hand, besides a bunch of M2, U2, Thunderbolt, and 10Gbps interfaces, there is actually a PCIe 4.0 x8 slot in the 1L chassis, which offers incredible playability.I have thought of several ways to use it, whether to build an ALL IN BOOM, a super strong all-flash NAS, or a desktop machine. After getting it, I only had one thought: this is an ultra-powerful mini host, or a true mini workstation.UnboxingMingfan has jumped out of the galaxy naming series since the 780XTX, and this time it is simply called “M”ini work”S”tation 01.
The outer packaging box uses a pull-push structure again. Is this better for packing? No, it is significantly more expensive.
On the front, besides the logo, there is a relief of the chassis front panel.
The back has a super high expansion rear panel that corresponds to the front, with manufacturer information and configuration in both Chinese and English, which is an old routine.
This packaging approach should still be the same as before, but the difference in contents causes the box to shake a bit, but the main body is wrapped in foam and is unaffected.
This time, there is no ancestral VESA bracket in the accessories. Only the U.2 adapter kit, HDMI cable, and 180W adapter are included.
The maximum turbo power of the i9 13900H is rated at 115W, and the other machines’ 120W small adapter from Huanjia definitely won’t be enough to feed this “beast”.
The U.2 adapter card uses the M.2 interface, but it is worth noting that due to the limited space inside, only 7mm U.2 drives like SN640 can be installed; my 1.2T 750 is destined to be “dust of history”.Comparing with ordinary ITX motherboards: it is larger on the plane but has a similar height. A few days ago, I just drooled over the 4 NVMe slot AR900i unboxed in the forum, and here comes a desktop machine more suitable for middle-aged babies!
The single machine weighs 1410 grams, directly crossing the kilogram category:
The adapter weighs 656 grams, so with one it definitely exceeds two kilograms.
However, the use case of this adapter is definitely not comparable to a gaming laptop; there is basically no need to carry it back and forth. Mingfan also specifically mentioned that when using a dedicated graphics card, you need to replace it with a 240W adapter, which is definitely not a challenge for middle-aged men whose hobby is “charging heads”. Therefore, buying a 240W adapter as needed can avoid the big pit of high-wattage GaN.
Of course, I didn’t avoid it several years ago.From the grid design, it can be seen that Mingfan has put a lot of effort into the design language this time, which is closer to the design of mainstream workstation brands on the market, and can even see the shadow of several brands at a glance. However, compared to these mini machines, it can achieve differentiation in functional segmentation, belonging to the “high expansion track” player. The ability to walk this road has a lot to do with its own factory “design + self-production”, not just relying on OEM, which only knows how to buy and blow.The front panel didn’t do anything special; not having an SD card slot is considered a “forced negative review”. The combination of audio ports, a 5G USB 3.0A port, and two USB2.0A ports feels a bit inconsistent with Mingfan’s usual fear of not giving enough.There are no heat dissipation holes on both sides, probably to avoid affecting the airflow of the turbine. The top cover only has a large area of heat dissipation holes on the front panel side.
The bottom edge is full of heat dissipation holes, and there are also four soft rubber feet.
Next is the highlight of the so-called “fastest computer by Mingfan to date” – the rear panel. In addition to the HDMI 2.0b interface, USB 3.0 Type-A, USB4 40G, 2.5G LAN port, and SFP+ 10Gbps interfaces are all in pairs. Adding two 20G “Thunderbolt Ethernet” USB4, Mingfan simply and brutally states that “the total transmission speed can reach 65Gbps”, which feels quite fitting… For players who really do “All in Boom” and family data centers, it is simply a boon!
The two SFP+ are the “big investment” Intel X710, occupying PCIe 3.0 X4, and are configured with independent heat sinks. I can only say it’s too strong!The two 2.5G ports are two 226, with the left one supporting INTEL vPro technology, which is an enhanced version of “IPMI”; those who have used it say it’s good!
Thanks to the chipset, USB4 provides two at once, and in addition, there are two A ports, so you don’t have to worry about not having enough adapters; HDMI 2.1 is more conducive to unleashing the full potential of the 13900H with full-blooded 96EU Xe Iris.Above the network ports is the biggest surprise, or a “normal operation” in the eyes of 1L USFF mini host enthusiasts, a half-height full-length single-slot PCIe X16 (with a bandwidth of PCIe 4.0 X8)! 
Moreover, unlike other adapter cards and special slots, this is a complete half-height slot. Right next to it is the opening for the turbine, and most of the CPU and memory heat will be expelled from here.
By unscrewing the 8 screws on the bottom plate and pressing the button, you can easily slide down the bottom cover.First, let’s take a look at the back.
Above the 22110 slot is a 5V0.5A fan and a heatsink for the PCIe 4.0 x4 slot, forming the hard drive cooling module.
The fan is a 5V 0.5A DC fan, manufactured by BROAD.
A 2280/U.2 shared hard drive slot and two 22110 hard drive slots are arranged in sequence. The three slots are limited by the channel, with the left to right being 4.0 x4, 3.0 x4, and 3.0 x2. All-flash big HOUSE, it’s that cool…
The shared position of 2280 and U.2 needs to be switched on when in use. I’m familiar with this; back in the day, IDE optical drive and hard drive slots had to be placed in different positions by various brands (exposing my age).
The 2280 is from the previous batch of Kingston OEM “NV2 Enhanced Edition”; I was so familiar with it that I forgot to take a picture…The 22110 slot’s PCIe 3.0 speed just corresponds to the position of the big ship warehouse disk and can also install the 2280 disk. Let’s first try to install a Hynix PE6110 1.92T into it.
The network card is MT7922A22M, which is RZ616. I heard that it has a significant stability improvement over RZ608. Once again, using an A network card on the I machine, Mingfan, you really have your way.
The two antennas are arranged at the front.Disassembling the front, one side is CPU/memory, and the huge cooling module.
The memory is pre-installed with a single-sided 16G 5600 from Infinix, directly exceeding the standard according to the specifications of the 13900H.
The fan is a 12V0.25A specification, also from the BROAD brand.
Gently tear off the soundproof cotton, unscrew 4 screws, and the entire cooling module can be removed, revealing the 13900H.To be honest, I am really afraid of accidentally breaking it due to improper operation. However, since I forgot to take a picture during the first disassembly and the thermal paste application was a bit problematic, I can only brace myself.
The cooling module is standard, with size – check, soundproof cotton – check, heat pipes – check.The fin density is average, and the soundproof cotton can basically achieve lossless restoration. I hope this is the last time I peel it off.
The outlet side is blackened, and a phase change pad is attached to the capacitor, in line with Mingfan’s image of a cooling demon. They used thermal paste instead of their proud liquid metal material, which I guess is for durability considerations.
On the other side is the main highlight, the PCI-E 4.0 x8 interface: there are so many possibilities, single-slot half-height professional cards/stock cards, solid-state drives, and even sound cards, instantly raising the expansion capability of this machine to an unprecedented level.
Among all these options, as I mentioned at the beginning, what I want is an ultra-powerful mini host. As they say, what’s outside the chassis doesn’t count as size! Therefore, the SFF-8654 adapter card solution has emerged!Attachment:As I understand it, this solution is mostly used in the server field, as a single SFF-8654-8i output can achieve PCI-E 4.0 x8, and it can also connect two groups to achieve x16, but the specific actual situation still needs to be verified later.
The Lixun 8654 cable is bulky and cannot be compared to the highly portable Oculink. It’s a bit like the nightmarish U.2 cable from back in the day because the interface is x8, so only one can be used.
The adapter board has a FAN interface on it and needs to connect a graphics card 6Pin for power. Like Oculink, it cannot be hot-swapped and must be connected before booting, which is a bit troublesome. There may be more convenient solutions in the future.
The boss’s self-developed graphics card rack is cheap and practical. The whole set costs less than half the price of a JHL7440 graphics dock, and the boss is very hospitable. It just depends on whether the product is effective…
Because this is theoretically a physical form of PCI-E extension, the performance loss should be minimal, so I am very optimistic about this solution.
Desktop shooting: let’s start with a styling photo.
Horizontal placement, standard, a bit like the mini chassis that was popular back in the day that connected to DC-ATX power supplies, compared to the “Tiger Head Canyon”: it feels more business-like.
The graphics card dock will be moved to the windowsill, leaving only the cable outside. When I want to play, I’ll connect it. The Xe Iris can easily handle watching videos and browsing the internet…
The switch is from Xike, with 4×2.5G + 2×SFP+ 10G. Xike is currently a major player in the competition and is very willing to listen to user feedback. When others are vigorously rolling out 8+1, they introduced this new product, and the dual SFP+ very meets the demand.
Performance and temperature testing:CPU-ID, the 13900H is currently the top FCBGA1744 CPU, 14C20, 6P cores + 8E cores, with a maximum turbo frequency of 5.4G, a base power of 45W, and a maximum turbo power of 115W.
Under single burn FPU, after reaching 4.5G, it will stabilize at around 3.3GHz. At room temperature 22, the fan speed is around 3200, and the temperature is around 80 degrees, with a power consumption of around 60W, which conforms to the BIOS default PL1/PL2 at 60W/80W.
(Re-tested for 10 minutes FPU after reapplying thermal paste on 12/25)
The temperature improved slightly, and the main frequency increased by 0.1 to 3.3G. HWinfo did not detect overheating or throttling. After the score ended, the cooling module was able to quickly expel the remaining heat, indeed witnessing the strength of a cooling demon.* The performance of the 13900H under this scale of cooling makes me deeply anxious about the heat dissipation and throttling performance of the many mini hosts on the market that are currently fully copying (crossed out, borrowing) the Arena Canyon and Yuedong Canyon shapes and cooling solutions.At 60W BIOSCinebench R23 multi-core 16889, single-core 1981, multiplier 8.53
At 45W BIOS, single-core 1698, multi-core 14990, multiplier 8.83.
PCmark 5867, commonly used over 10,000, productivity 6892, digital content creation 7832, daily use, I can only say: performance surplus
V-RAY score 16317/90
Read and write tests for each disk: 980PRO 1T x4
980PRO 1T x2
* It can be seen that in the case where the protocol is already a bottleneck, the difference between x2 and x4 is even more apparent. After all, only high-capacity big ship disks are the way to go! Aida64 memory read and write test, memory information displays errors, read/write 75000/70000, latency around 96ns. The speed, however, meets the 5200 standard.
10G SFP+ reading my aging and weak 8100T NAS’s 970EVO 2TB SSD score
SFP+ to NAS copy (SMB) writing to NAS over 500+, reading over 700+, possibly due to the Unraid version being too low or settings being related
SFP+ to NAS (FTP)Dual-thread 500 or so, easily reaching 10Gbps, can be said to be quite satisfactory.
It seems that if I have the opportunity to renovate, pre-buried fiber optics are essential.External graphics card: The default BIOS design automatically reduces frequency when inserting PCIe devices, which conforms to the performance of the 180W power adapter. To obtain higher performance, adjustments must be made in the BIOS. The effect is immediate, and the fan noise is slightly louder. This performance can be said to be completely comparable to desktop level.CPU-Z6900XT running on PCIe 4.0 x8
6700XT, same principle
3DMARK TIME SPY score
Among them, 45W is the default BIOS with 45/60W throttling, and 60W is adjusted to PL1/PL2 for 60/90W.
Referring to other scores, the 6900XT is approximately (default frequency) 20400~(non-public overclocking) 23000, with little difference, indicating minimal loss. Running at x8 speed, it is naturally superior to the x4 of the external 780XTX, even exceeding my expectations. The previous idea of placing the graphics card on the windowsill for further cooling can actually be realized.I simply ran a CPU Profile.
Conclusion:I am very clear in my heart that as a workstation product refined by Mingfan for several months, making it an ordinary small host is a bit of a waste. However, this is also one of its versatile aspects. The nearly obsessive material stacking in the first-generation product shows Mingfan’s dedication to this line. Of course, the price of the i9 13900H version will inevitably be high, with a starting price of ￥4799 for the quasi-system and ￥5899 for the 32G+1T version, compared to the ￥3799 price of the 12900H version, which seems much more reasonable. Moreover, when making an AIO, there is no need to buy a pre-configured version, and you can wait for the upcoming 12450H version, which is expected to be available after the Spring Festival.
