Asus Announces Tinker Board 2 and 2S Single-Board Computers
The Raspberry Pi gets some fresh competition from Asus’ new boards, with 1.5x performance promised.

By Matthew Humphries

Single-board computers have grown in popularity over the last several years thanks to the Raspberry Pi. Asus introduced a competitor called the Tinker Board back in 2017, and now we’re getting a second-generation board with two model options.

As NotebookCheck reports (via French publication Clubic), the Tinker Board 2 and Tinker Board 2S are exactly the same except for one feature: The 2S includes 16GB of eMMC storage and a Micro SD card slot, whereas the Tinker Board 2 includes only a Micro SD card slot.

Both boards use the Rockchip RK3399 64-bit system-on-chip, consisting of a dual-core ARM Cortex-A72 running at 2GHz and quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 running at 1.5GHz. The GPU is an ARM Mali-T860 MP4 running at 800MHz, and 2GB/4GB dual-channel LPDDR4 RAM options will be available.

There are plenty of connectivity options on these boards (which measure just 85mm by 56mm), including:

1x HDMI 2.0 (4K-capable)

1x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-C (OTG & DisplayPort 1.2)

3x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-A

1x 22-pin MIPI DSI

1x 15-pin MIPI CSI-2

1x RJ-45 Gigabit LAN

1x Wi-FI 802.11 AC and Bluetooth 5.0

1x 40-pin GPIO header

1x DC fan header

1x RTC battery header

1x Power and recovery headers

1x 12 V — 19 V DC-in barrel connector

The expected performance gain over the original Tinker Board is 1.5x, and Asus is supporting Debian 9 Linux and Android 10, although Android support isn’t expected until Q1 2021. We don’t know pricing or an official release date yet, but the first Tinker Board cost $60, and it seems likely Asus will try to hit a similar price point again, especially considering the 8GB Raspberry Pi 4 costs $75.

Meanwhile, the latest product carrying the Raspberry Pi name is a keyboard with a Raspberry Pi 4 inside and offering everything you need except a display for under $100, or just the keyboard on its own for $70.
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['Raspberry Pi', 'Technology', 'Computing', 'DIY']