Vorke V1 Plus Review

[blinkone]

VORKE V1 Plus Intel Apollo Lake J3455 4K@60hz 4G RAM 64GB SSD Windows MINI PC 802.11AC WIFI Gigabit LAN Wake-on LAN Bluetooth4.2 HDMI & VGA Output USB3.0



Hi Guy's and Girls,This time we have another windows Mini PC to Review.The new Vorke V1 Plus from geekbuying


Highlights (From webpage)

Intel Apollo Lake J3455

J3455 , a quad-core processor, operates between 1.5 and 2.3GHz. Under the hood, it packs 2MB of L2 cache, TDP of 10W and a Intel HD Graphics 500 GPU.

DDR3 4GB RAM, 64GB SSD

VORKE V1 Plus brags a 4GB DDR3 RAM and 64GB of SSD storage, advantageous in performance, security and reliability. Ascribing to the eMMC memory, it delivers a richer end-user experience.

SSD Extendable, HDD 1TB.

Gigabit LAN

Gigabit LAN provides a data rate of 1 billion bits per second.

Applications

Office Work: Office, skype, yahoo, outlook and all other office requirement support and runs perfectly.
Design Work: Photoshop, CoreIDRAW, Dreamweaver, IIIustrator, Flash, Indesign and others.
Game Playing: Support most of the online games and PC games, like Warcraft, Counter-Strike (CS), support 3D games.
Entertainment: Support 4k@60Hz video play, XBMC and others.

Some Internal photos

SSD Cover Removed



Top Cover Removed



Rear of the PCB



PCB Removed from Base



64GB Memory module



The Front USB ports and battery



WIFI Chip



Cooling Fan + Heatsink





PCB With everything Removed





Right lets get this review started on opening the box the first thing you will notice is its quite a big device with a matt black finish to it.

The V1 plus is a all plastic square box with venterlation holes on the both sides.It has a aluminum heatsink & a mini fan Giving it a good chance to keep the unit cool BUT it should of came with some ear plugs too as its rather loude when it kicks in,Ok its not running all the time but when it is running Its a lot louder than the fans on my tower pc infact i can hear the fan over the tv even when im in the next room.Im doing some stress tests right now and it must be spining at 10 million RPM.

I tried to measure the sound with a app



On the first boot of the V1 Took me to the windows setup, language product key etc etc (No need to enter a windows key here) just skip it for now then you will find it gets fully activated after the setup is compleat.First thing i wanted to do was to get it fully upto date.I went to windows update center and that kept giving me a connection error,So i changed my tackticks and downloaded the windows 10 update assintant & 2 hours latter i now have the latest Windows Version 1703 Build 15063.540.




The V1 is now showing around 39GB of free space in windows after all the latest updates.should.The main plus on the V1 is being able to pick wether to use the VGA or the HDMI output both work as they should.

The V1 Plus has all the ports most people will need with the power button the top nice and easy to get to.



What works

64GB sd works
128GB USB Stick
Samsung 1TB unpowered HD works
Tronsmart Mars G01 Gamepad works
Logitech c270 webcam works
Wd 320GB hard drive works

Some tech stuff

The boot time on the V1 is nice and fast at 20 seconds.

Antutu






CPU Z














Aida64 GPUID



Aida64 Cache & memory benchmark



Aida64 GPGPU




1 hour Stress test




Crystal Diskmark




WIFI







Bios Backup

https://mega.nz/#!oDpXnYLD!rOGrwFFVS...ZEI6WCecXIp0cU

Double driver Backup

https://mega.nz/#F!pS41BBBS!M7pxHvHgkfwM0kKt1cK6uA


Video Review

General	Brand: Vorke Model: V1 Plus Quantity: 1 Piece Color: Black
Hardware & OS	Operating System: Windows10 home 64-bit, Supports WIN8.1/ubuntu15.10&16.04 Chrome OS CPU: Intel® Apollo Lake J3455(1.5-2.3Ghz) GPU: Intel® HD Graphics 500 RAM: LPDDR3 4GB (1600MHz) ROM: 64GB mSATA SSD(Endless extension for SSD, 1TB extension for HDD, Support 2.5" SATA3 SSD) Sound Codec Chip: Realtek ALC269
Communication	Wifi Connectivity: Intel® Dual Band Wireless-AC 3165,802.11ac,2.4G/5G Ethernet: Gigabit LAN Bluetooth: 4.2 Card Reader: Micro SD card slot(Realtek RTS5170)
Media	Video Supported: 3GP,AVI,H.264,MP4 Audio Supported: AAC,ACC,MP3,OGG,WAV Picture Supported: BMP,GIF,JPEG,JPG,PNG Office Format: Excel,PPT,Word E-book Format: PDF,TXT
Interface	HDMI Port: Standard HDMI Male 2.0a,Support 4k@60Hz Wake On LAN: Yes Other Interfaces USB2.0 x 2 USB3.0 x 2 Headphone out&Mic-in x 1 VGA x 1 LAN 10M/100M/1000M x 1 TYPEA HDMI x 1 Power Button x 1 DC-IN x 1
Power	Power: 12V//3A Skype: Supported Youtube: Supported Speaker: Supported MIC: Supported
Dimensions&Weight	Dimensions: 153.4*153.4*38mm/ 6.039*6.039*1.496inches Weight: 390g/ 13.75oz
Package Contents	1 x MINI PC 1 x Power adapter (A right AC Adapter will be sent as your shipping country) 1 x Charging cable 1 x User manual

Basic unboxing Video

[bluesmanuk]

I know what you say about that fan.

It's just so annoying and I could not put up with it, so mine went back for a refund.

A shame really that such a simple design flaw should be so bad that it ultimately overshadows the rest of the functionality.

I did find that it kicks in a lot too, which for me, indicates that other heat dissipation techniques are not as effective as they should otherwise be.

[blinkone]

Yep the fan noise is so disappointing,

You should not be able to hear a fan on any mini pc from another room,

All I can think is the lab where this was built must be a very noisy place.

It may sound strange but i was kinda of hoping I got a bad one but since you had the same issue they must all be like it.

[bluesmanuk]

It's not as if silent fans have not been around for a while and don't add much to the cost of any small box such as this.

Also had an ACEPC AK1 with overheating issues, especially when using the SSD expansion capability, so perhaps this is a contributory factor.

[almstsobur]

The fan is annoying, but it was an easy fix. The thermal solution between the heatsink and CPU is just a thermal pad, not nearly as efficient as good thermal compound. I tried to apply some MX-4 CPU thermal compound it's it's place and realized the heatsink standoffs were just a hair too tall for it to make contact. I pulled out the Dremel and grinded about 2mm of each standoff and boom, in business. Put on a dab of MX-4 and put it all back together. 2 days later and I haven't even heard the fan kick on one time. Just a good thermal connection between that rather large heatsink and the CPU is enough too cool a 10 watt TDP CPU passively.

-RP

[trebor]

Good to know...
To the Dremel we must go....
Thanks

[almstsobur]

One more thing, I am not sure how close the heatsink gets to the on board soldered components once it's trimmed down, it looked to me like it had clearance, but to be safe I cut a little corner of the SATA spare drive anti conducting sheet and covered the about 1" square area of components between the CPU and exhaust port. You will see what I mean. Better safe than cooked.

[almstsobur]

I just did some 4 core benchmarks and stress tests to check the heat. With all cores going it never broke 61C. 70c is fan kick on, 105c is the ohh-shit point. So, nothing wrong with the huge heatsink, it's just the thermal pad. I don't think I'll ever hear the fan, unless the GPU really kicks up the heat, I did not run any stress tests on that. This is a living room Kodi, Dirac and Tidal machine for me. i added a USB Sound Blaster X-fi Pro, disabled the onboard sound in the BIOS and changed the C states to make sure it would turbo all 4 cores. Very solid little unit for the price, I'm quite impressed.

[trebor]

Yes my review Back in June...never got to hot at all.......

And the fan is no big deal here at all here....must been the British Summer...

[bluesmanuk]

The fan is annoying, but it was an easy fix. The thermal solution between the heatsink and CPU is just a thermal pad, not nearly as efficient as good thermal compound. I tried to apply some MX-4 CPU thermal compound it's it's place and realized the heatsink standoffs were just a hair too tall for it to make contact. I pulled out the Dremel and grinded about 2mm of each standoff and boom, in business. Put on a dab of MX-4 and put it all back together. 2 days later and I haven't even heard the fan kick on one time. Just a good thermal connection between that rather large heatsink and the CPU is enough too cool a 10 watt TDP CPU passively.

-RP

Glad you found a solution.

Worth mailing Vorke to let them know so that they can consider a more efficient design process.

[almstsobur]

Glad you found a solution.

Worth mailing Vorke to let them know so that they can consider a more efficient design process.

I'm guessing they are aware, I'm sure it's just a cost savings measure. Thermal pad is cheaper than paste, but with standoffs that don't actually reach the soldered in CPU you can't damage the board or CPU in the production process. No way to overtightened or flex anything. The cost of one CPU is likely a weeks salary for the poor b*****d who puts them together.

[SeekTruth]

The fan is annoying, but it was an easy fix. The thermal solution between the heatsink and CPU is just a thermal pad, not nearly as efficient as good thermal compound. I tried to apply some MX-4 CPU thermal compound it's it's place and realized the heatsink standoffs were just a hair too tall for it to make contact. I pulled out the Dremel and grinded about 2mm of each standoff and boom, in business. Put on a dab of MX-4 and put it all back together. 2 days later and I haven't even heard the fan kick on one time. Just a good thermal connection between that rather large heatsink and the CPU is enough too cool a 10 watt TDP CPU passively.

-RP

Instead of grinding down (don't have a dremel) could I purchase a 2mm thick aluminum square? Then use paste on either side of it? Are the heat syncs aluminum? Would you suggest this as an alternative solution? Thank you for any info.

[almstsobur]

Instead of grinding down (don't have a dremel) could I purchase a 2mm thick aluminum square? Then use paste on either side of it? Are the heat syncs aluminum? Would you suggest this as an alternative solution? Thank you for any info.

As long as you use something more or less designed to transfer heat, I.E. flat, straight, and put some thermal compound between the add-on and original, it should work. But the risers are just a light alloy, you could hand file or even wet sand with a heavy grit. Or, if you have the gonads; drill the riser pegs out and do your own screw setup. I think if you have some 200 grit or so sand paper, I would wet sand the riser pegs. Take a whole sheet on a flat surface and you can get them perfectly even by sliding the pegs on the sand paper instead of the paper on the pegs. Keep it wet, kinda messy.

[SeekTruth]

As long as you use something more or less designed to transfer heat, I.E. flat, straight, and put some thermal compound between the add-on and original, it should work. But the risers are just a light alloy, you could hand file or even wet sand with a heavy grit. Or, if you have the gonads; drill the riser pegs out and do your own screw setup. I think if you have some 200 grit or so sand paper, I would wet sand the riser pegs. Take a whole sheet on a flat surface and you can get them perfectly even by sliding the pegs on the sand paper instead of the paper on the pegs. Keep it wet, kinda messy.

Thanks for the advice! - I would like to keep it as stock as possible (just in case). So for a flat square for heat transfer, I'm guessing copper or aluminum alloy? Should I be worried about it being too thin and melting/bending backwards towards the processor due to heat? Thanks again!

[almstsobur]

Thanks for the advice! - I would like to keep it as stock as possible (just in case). So for a flat square for heat transfer, I'm guessing copper or aluminum alloy? Should I be worried about it being too thin and melting/bending backwards towards the processor due to heat? Thanks again!

I wouldn't worry about that, as long as you don't overtighten, just snug once contact is made. I would be more worried about the correct thickness. 2mm was just an after the fact, top of my head guess. It might be closer to 1mm. I'd get a good measurement, or buy a couple thicknesses. Copper would be the best heat transfer, but likely more expensive and since the original is aluminum, I don't think you will gain from copper.