Voyo V3 Review - A Fanless Intel Atom x7-Z8700 (Cherry Trail) mini-PC
by Ganesh T S on March 1, 2016 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Systems
- Intel
- Atom
- Passive Cooling
- Mini-PC
- Cherry Trail
Miscellaneous Aspects and Final Words
The Voyo V3 provided us with the opportunity to evaluate the capabilities of the Intel Atom x7-Z8700 in a wall-powered device. Thanks to the presence of a SATA controller (ASM1061) and a 128GB M.2 SSD as well as 4GB of RAM, the unit is actually able to provide a better experience compared to all the passively-cooled Braswell PCs that we have evaluated before. However, before talking more about the positives, let us recount all the issues we faced with the Voyo V3.
- The advertising of the product in online stores is very misleading - there is no 5G / dual-band Wi-Fi (only a Bluetooth 4.0 + 1x1 802.11n 2.4 GHz radio), HDMI 2.0 or USB 3.1 Type-C port. The Type-C port in the system is only for power delivery and not available for data transfer
- Voyo doesn't seem to have much experience in tuning BIOS options for stability. DTS / thermal protection was disabled in the default configuration
- The pre-installed WIndows 10 copy is a mess - UAC was disabled and the OS refused to activate. We will be charitable when saying that Voyo doesn't know how to ship licensed versions of Windows pre-installed on the PCs, but it is more likely that the shipped OS is bootlegged. Consumers buying this PC would do well to wipe out the SSD and re-install their own copy of Windows on the machine
- Voyo has nil support for users treating the PC as a barebones (sans OS) unit. There are no drivers available for download on their website, and we had to download the Windows install image from a Chinese filesharing website in order to get all the necessary drivers
- The thermal design, while being effective, is not as efficient as it could have been - the heat from the SoC is transferred to the underside of the unit (with very little clearance to the surface on which the unit is placed).
The drawbacks listed above are not showstoppers, but things that consumers need to keep in mind before purchasing the unit. Moving on to the positives:
- The fanless Voyo V3, with its top-end Cherry Trail-T SoC, 128 GB M.2 SATA SSD and 4GB of RAM, outperforms passively cooled Braswell-based mini-PCs in almost all benchmarks
- The M.2 SATA SSD is miles ahead of eMMC-based storage subsystems found in most other Cherry Trail PCs in this price range. The RAM capacity is also quite large for this price range.
- The industrial design of the unit, with its curved edges, metal chassis and glass top, is quite pleasing
- The unit is perfect for a secondary 1080p HTPC where HD audio bitstreaming is not a must - Kodi 16.0 works flawless with hardware video decoding for all major codecs
In terms of possible improvements, we would like Voyo to rethink the thermal solution in order to extract even more performance out of similar platforms. A better WLAN chipset is definitely needed, and I am sure consumers would be willing to pay even a $10 - $20 premium for the same. A LAN port would also be nice (though we understand that the issue has more to do with the absence of Ethernet on the Atom x7-Z8700 itself). The marketing department needs to advertise the unit with the correct specifications, and, obviously, the Windows OS issue needs to be resolved in a legal manner. It might even be better for Voyo to just ship the unit as a barebones system and make the drivers alone available for download on their website.
Based on our research, the pricing of the unit varies quite a lot. The supplier of our review unit, Gearbest, ships the system from China and has the product on sale between $208 and $215. If you are looking for a US-based seller, Amazon has got you covered for a hefty $360.
In summary, once we got past the initial setup issues and learned to ignore the misleading marketing points, it became difficult to not like the Voyo V3. The price of the unit, the system performance and the nature of some of the important components (such as the SSD and RAM) make it a very good value.
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Pissedoffyouth - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
I wish Intel could sort out it's Atom Linux support. Something like this with Linux support would be fantastic. It's been like 3 years and my Asus t100 Baytrail still doesn't work properly 100% without invasive patches for its kernel.BrokenCrayons - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
I've had endless problems getting Linux working on an Asus X205TA that's got a Bay Trail to the point where I've given up on it and it's basically a Windows paperweight sitting in a drawer. HP was a lot better/easier with the Stream 11, but even it isn't as easy as it ought to be to get a proper operating system installed. The hardware specs on these low end Atoms with their passive cooling and low price make them perfect candidates for Linux. I'm not one to spread conspiracy theories, but I think that there's been active work put into the idea of preventing people from easily abandoning Windows on cheaper systems. After all, if Microsoft is giving the OS away for free, they need to recoup their costs through targeted advertising and the Windows Store so the last thing Microsoft would want is the end user population hopping onto an OS where they don't reap any financial return.PsychoPif - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
"I'm not one to spread conspiracy theories, "Except you just did :)
Unless you can provide any shadow of a doubt, I'll keep beliving it has more to do with the fact that Linux is too small of a market to warrant the cost for the hardware maker.
BrokenCrayons - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
I might be mistaken, but the number of computing devices running a Linux kernel is currently higher than those running a Microsoft built kernel. While a lot of that is due to Android, there's also super computer dominance and other fringe markets. Because of Microsoft's recent missteps with Windows 8's user interface and privacy concerns that arose due to Windows 10 telemetry, I think there's a reason for shareholders to be concerned. It didn't take that many years for the Linux kernel to reach a dominant state in the mobile sector. Yes, on desktop and laptop PCs, the market share is about 1.7% running Linux, but that traditional computing model is mature and even in a state of decline as mobile devices running alternative operating systems are apparently taking sales. As handsets have proven, change can happen quickly. It's in Microsoft's best interest, particularly with Secure Boot, to implement mechanisms that help to achieve ecosystem lock-in.Flunk - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
I don't think it's Intel's problem that the Linux kernel has compatibility issues with their hardware. Microsoft initially had some problems with bay trail and cherry trail too, but they fixed their issues. The issues are mostly concerned with certain hardware things these SoCs no longer have that OSes assume x86 chips have. It's not an issue with the hardware.Flunk - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
Also, I should follow this up with the standard open-source argument. If you want bay trail/cherry trail support then you should write it yourself.eek2121 - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
I'm not normally one to agree with a troll, but thank you Flunk, as someone who has read that very line across many different open source projects...you made my night. I said this 15 years ago, and i'll say it again. The open source world has 3 problems when it comes to open source adoption. The biggest one is the asshole community. Fix that issue and you'll go a long way towards widespread open source adoption. Unfortunately, there is no shortage of assholes out there...so good luck!sprockkets - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link
I'm on such a cpu right now, the Pentium 3700. About the only issues with Linux are video, and the drivers for it are from Intel, open source as well.What is weirder is that video wise, Android works way better than typical Linux. Probably because it doesn't use X. I'd look into Remix OS or the Android x86 project. Best part of the latter is you'll have no issue with updates or upgrades vs the typical android tablet.
extide - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
No, it is an issue with Intel because they should be submitting the patches and drivers to make stuff work properly.Camikazi - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link
But it's Linux, if it doesn't work you can fix it yourself, isn't that the big thing about it? I don't think Intel should submit anything to make it work, they do it if they can and if they want to other than that you are on your own making it work.