ASRock Beebox-S 6200U Review - An Alternative to the Skylake NUC
by Ganesh T S on August 10, 2016 8:00 AM ESTNetworking and Storage Performance
Networking and storage are two major aspects which influence our experience with any computing system. This section presents results from our evaluation of these aspects in the ASRock Beebox-S 6200U.
One of the interesting aspects of the Skylake-U platform is the bandwidth available for communication between the CPU and the PCH inside the Skylake-U package. By default, Intel ships them optimized for low power consumption (effectvely four lanes of PCIe 2.0 bandwidth). However, its customers can optimize for higher performance (effectively four lanes of PCIe 3.0 bandwidth) depending on the end system in which the Skylake-U SiP gets deployed. We covered this in detail in our article on choosing the right M.2 SSD for the NUC6i5SYK.
ASRock has configured the Core i5-6200U for hgher performance in the Beebox-S 6200U. Our quick check for this involved running the CrystalDiskMark benchmark on the Samsung SSD 950 PRO after installing it in the Beebox-S 6200U. We can see that the M.2 PCIe SSD is able to meet its full claimed performance numbers (possible only with a PCIe 3.0 x4 link).
In order to further evaluate storage performance, one option would be repetition of our strenuous SSD review tests on the drive(s) in the PC. Fortunately, to avoid that overkill, PCMark 8 has a storage bench where certain common workloads such as loading games and document processing are replayed on the target drive. Results are presented in two forms, one being a benchmark number and the other, a bandwidth figure. We ran the PCMark 8 storage bench on selected PCs and the results are presented below.
Thanks to ASRock's attention to the OPI link rate in the Core i5-6200U, the storage benchmarks show the Beebox-S 6200U come out in the top half of the list.
On the networking side, we restricted ourselves to the evaluation of the WLAN component. Our standard test router is the Netgear R7000 Nighthawk configured with both 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz networks. The router is placed approximately 20 ft. away, separated by a drywall (as in a typical US building). A wired client is connected to the R7000 and serves as one endpoint for iperf evaluation. The PC under test is made to connect to either the 5 GHz (preferred) or 2.4 GHz SSID and iperf tests are conducted for both TCP and UDP transfers. It is ensured that the PC under test is the only wireless client for the Netgear R7000. We evaluate total throughput for up to 32 simultaneous TCP connections using iperf and present the highest number in the graph below.
In the UDP case, we try to transfer data at the highest rate possible for which we get less than 1% packet loss.
The Beebox-S has very good antenna placement, and make it come out on top when other PCs that have 1x1 configurations are considered. However, mini-PCs that have 2x2 802.11ac WLAN chipsets obviously perform better than the Beebox-S 6200U.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
30 Comments
View All Comments
Arnulf - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
Where is Apollo Lake?I want one of those on a desktop-sized motherboard (uATX?).
Ro_Ja - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
The Celerons and the Pentiums? They'll be better off with Compute Sticks.maglito - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
Someone needs to make something like this with passive 24v 4wire Power over Ethernet or one of the active PoE standards that supports voltage in the 48v range. I have a NUC rigged up to run off of one of these switches: https://www.netonix.com/wisp-switch.html with this PoE extractor: http://tyconsystems.com/index.php/passive-gigabit/... (using 24VH mode on the switch) but it required a bit of cutting. There isn't really any good SFF PC with PoE input anywhere on the market I've found.BedfordTim - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
On the plus side at least there are still NUCs that support 24V input.MrCommunistGen - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
Wouldn't some of the Skylake NUC's performance advantage be related to the fact that the i5-6260U has 64MB of eDRAM?ganeshts - Thursday, August 11, 2016 - link
Very true. I had mentioned Iris graphics in the comparison table for the NUC6i5SYK, but didnt mention the eDRAM aspect in the text.Wineohe - Thursday, August 11, 2016 - link
I can appreciate the desire to test the unit in it's best light with a 950 Pro and the 16GB of RAM, but it seems like overkill and jacks up the price way up. You fail to even mention the base price, although I can go shopping. A more likely configuration for me is a mainstream 250gb SSD and 8GB. It would be perfect in my sailboat.Jookie - Wednesday, August 17, 2016 - link
I would love to see a NUC/UCFF that doesn't sandwich a hot WiFi adapter between the SSD and the MoBo. I usually don't install the WiFi if I care about the data on the drive.Mathewlin - Thursday, August 25, 2016 - link
Cool be good for my mom! :)Detosx - Saturday, August 27, 2016 - link
Another over-priced mini PC based around a low powered ultrabook-series CPU. Wouldn't it make more sense to buy an ultrabook laptop where a screen, keyboard, trackpad... memory and storage are included in the price?! I know it's a smaller footprint an ultrabook but I feel like potential customers are getting hammered on price, or certainly here in the UK. The NUC, with the much better Iris HD 540 graphics component, seems much more appealing, to me, but again the price is the big off putter and lack of things like a Thunderbolt 3 port limit the appeal of mini PCs, at the moment. If the price were much lower, I think the things it lacks would be less conspicuous by their absence. Thanks for the review. It would be nice to think it might spark some competition but here in price fixing UK, competition seems to be a dirty word. Hopefully the next generation will make for viably priced and appealing little gaming console alternatives.