Khadas Mind Premium Review: Raptor Lake-P in a Modular Portable Workstation

Miscellaneous Aspects and Concluding Remarks

Networking and storage are aspects that may be of vital importance in specific PC use-cases. The Khadas Mind Premium by itself comes only with the Intel AX211 Wi-Fi 6E / Bluetooth controller. The Mind Dock adds a Realtek-based 2.5 Gbps LAN port.

On the storage side, the Khadas Mind does have support for a PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD as well as a PCIe 3.0 x4 one. The latter slot is unpopulated. Khadas uses the Western Digital WD SN740 M.2 2230 SSD as the primary drive. Cooling these SSDs within the space constraints imposed by the form-factor of the slim core computing unit is a big challenge, as shown in the SSD temperature graph in the previous section. From a benchmarking perspective, we provide results from the WPCstorage test of SPECworkstation 3.1. This benchmark replays access traces from various programs used in different verticals and compares the score against the one obtained with a 2017 SanDisk 512GB SATA SSD in the SPECworkstation 3.1 reference system.

The graphs above present results for different verticals, as grouped by SPECworkstation 3.1. The storage workload consists of 60 subtests. Access traces from CFD solvers and programs such as Catia, Creo, and Soidworks come under 'Product Development'. Storage access traces from the NAMD and LAMMPS molecular dynamics simulator are under the 'Life Sciences' category. 'General Operations' includes access traces from 7-Zip and Mozilla programs. The 'Energy' category replays traces from the energy-02 SPECviewperf workload. The 'Media and Entertainment' vertical includes Handbrake, Maya, and 3dsmax. The overall rating puts the WD SN740 in the middle of the pack - having gotten surpassed by systems equipped with SSDs using their own DRAM for the flash translation layer (FTL). The SN740 does excel in some of the workloads such as Life Sciences and Media & Entertainment.

Closing Thoughts

As a matter of editorial policy, we do not cover crowdfunding campaigns. Some exceptions are made once in a blue moon - typically when the company behind the campaign is an established vendor using crowdfunding as a promotion tool instead of actually relying on the collected money for product development. Khadas falls under this category, as the company already has many products under the belt. The company has put up the Mind Premium / Standard, the Mind Dock, and Mind Graphics for order on a crowdfunding site, with the core computing unit and the dock shipping next month. Mind Graphics is slated to ship in June 2024.

In determining the value proposition of any product, we typically present the pros and cons before discussing the pricing. However, the Mind Premium is not a typical product. It straddles two different product categories - mini-PCs, as well as notebooks. At the same time, Khadas has plans for a number of tightly-coupled peripherals to complement the core computing unit for a variety of use-cases. Significant context is lost in the discussion if the cost is not taken into account while discussing these use-cases. The Mind Premium configuration evaluated in this piece is priced at $1099, and the Mind Dock is priced at $179. These are the retail prices (there are discounts on the crowdfunding site, but we will refrain from considering that while discussing the value proposition aspect).

At $1099, the pricing is essentially equivalent to that of an ultrabook without a screen. Similar to an ultrabook, the number of ports is limited. While we have no complaints on that front, the main issue is that all current-gen ultrabooks have full-featured Thunderbolt 4 or USB4 ports. The Mind Premium and Mind Standard fail miserably on that front. We could find no credible reason (even from the platform design viewpoint) as to why the Raptor Lake-P SoC's native Thunderbolt ports are rendered ineffective in the core computing unit. Neither Type-C port supports PCIe tunneling, with one of them restricted to USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) speeds and the other to USB 2.0. The display output is carried on the ports, but that is scant consolation when the ports don't support the full 40 Gbps speeds promised by the SoC. Khadas does support Thunderbolt 4 in the upcoming Mind Graphics unit, but the shipping date for that is a few quarters away. In this context, it is not clear how Khadas can justify the ultrabook premium.

The Mind Link connector interface is definitely an engineering effort worthy of appreciation. Khadas is promising support for up to 8 PCIe Gen5 lanes (an impressive 256 Gbps theoretically) through the interface - even more than what is promised by Thunderbolt 5. Due to the limitations of Raptor Lake-P, the current Mind Premium and Mind Standard only support 4 PCIe Gen4 lanes (64 Gbps). While it is not meant as a direct Thunderbolt replacement (Mind Link is a much more tightly coupled interface), the use-cases from an end-user perspective have close equivalents in the Thunderbolt ecosystem. That brings to focus two issues - the Mind Dock we have evaluated in this article does not bring out the full benefits of the Mind Link interface in the core computing unit. At best, it acts as a USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) dock with an Alt-DP to HDMI converter. No functionality in the dock takes advantage of the PCIe Gen4 x4 link being tunneled through. So, we have not been able to evaluate all the promised features of the Mind Link interface. The second aspect is that the Mind Link interface and protocol are proprietary. This creates a vendor lock-in, as consumers have to wait for Khadas to release peripherals taking advantage of this interface. Though Thunderbolt (with its cable-based approach) can't achieve some of the use-cases promised by Mind Link (such as the xPlay 2-in-1 peripheral), consumers have a wide variety of device choices from multiple vendors to extend the functionality of their host system.

The RAM is soldered, which may be a deal-breaker for some users. That said, 32 GB of RAM in the Mind Premium is high-end for most mini-PC use-cases. The use of a M.2 2230 SSD as the pre-installed (not easily user-accessible) storage drive is a bit puzzling. High-performance SSDs require DRAM for FTL, and most commonly available 2230 ones (including the WD SN740 used by Khadas) are DRAM-less. The user-accessible M.2 2230 slot for the secondary storage drive is perfectly acceptable.

The default BIOS settings could also do with some optimizations on the idle power consumption front - both the Arena Canyon NUC and the ASRock Industrial NUC BOX-1360P/D5 have significantly lower idling numbers despite providing much better connectivity options.

With the disappointments out of the way, it is time to focus on the positives. The build quality and industrial design of the Mind Premium as well as the Mind Dock are both impressive - among the best we have seen in the mini-PC space. The thermal solution is excellent, with core temperatures stabilizing around 80C even when the package power is sustained at 28W. Most Raptor Lake-P mini-PCs have the SoC configured for a 40W PL1 even in the UCFF space. Khadas has played it relatively safe at 28W - so the performance is a bit behind what is offered by systems such as the Arena Canyon NUC and the ASRock Industrial NUC BOX-1360P/D5. Khadas markets the Mind's core computing unit as a modular portable workstation. A 40W PL1 could have delivered better performance worthy of a workstation, but the sleek form-factor would probably throw a spanner in the works. That said, given the use-cases considered by Khadas, the form-factor is quite important. The 28W PL1 setting is a reasonable compromise.

In creating the Mind product family, Khadas has embarked on an ambitious journey. The company's vision is worthy of plaudits, and the Mind Premium / Mind Dock are able to provide users with a teaser. Ideally, the company should be shipping the Mind Graphics now to be able to convince consumers about the benefits of the Mind Link interface. By the time it arrives in mid-2024, Intel would probably be shipping new mobile processors and the current Mind Premium would be outdated. The company could have partially addressed that aspect by shipping the core computing unit with full-featured Thunderbolt 4 ports. Without that, the current unit and the Mind Dock are a tough sell despite the other impressive technical aspects of the platform. The currently available components are a good start, but we would like to see the Mind Graphics in action before forming a firm opinion about the Mind ecosystem.