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+#+TITLE: PC Engines APU Comparison
+#+DATE: 2020-06-17T00:50:06-04:00
+#+DRAFT: false
+#+DESCRIPTION: Comparison between PC Engines APU machines
+#+TAGS[]: hardware pcengines
+#+KEYWORDS[]: hardware pcengines
+#+SLUG:
+#+SUMMARY:
+
+#+ATTR_HTML: :alt PC Engines Comparison
+#+ATTR_HTML: :title PC Engines Comparison
+[[file:pc%20engines%20vs.png]]
+
+I've been looking at the [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu2.htm][PC Engines APU]] line for a while. They're a
+line of medium size single board PCs with a DB9 serial connector and
+no VGA port. They also have gigabit Ethernet. Because of this they're
+often used as firewall machines.
+
+I want to get one and use it as either the home router, or an
+experimental server to mess around with. Quite a few OpenBSD folks use
+them and recommend them as OpenBSD router and server hardware. They
+aren't too expensive, have decent specs and a small physical
+footprint.
+
+One thing that's always confused me was the naming scheme, which is a
+little confusing at first. Initially there was the APU, then the APU2,
+as described on their site, which makes sense. Then the APU model
+numbers get a little confusing. They come in several variants, I'll
+list them here for context.
+
+#+CAPTION: Taken from the PC Engines website
+#+BEGIN_SRC
+ apu2d0 (2 GB DRAM, 2 i211AT NICs)
+ apu2e2 (2 GB DRAM, 3 i211AT NICs)
+ apu2e4 (4 GB DRAM, 3 i210AT NICs)
+ apu3c2 (2 GB DRAM, 3 i211AT NICs, optimized for 3G/LTE modems)
+ apu3c4 (4 GB DRAM, 3 i211AT NICs, optimized for 3G/LTE modems)
+ apu4d2 (2 GB DRAM, 4 i211AT NICs)
+ apu4d4 (4 GB DRAM, 4 i211AT NICs)
+ #+END_SRC
+
+What do the letters between the numbers mean? What is the significance
+of the numbers in the first place?
+
+Let's take the =apu3c2= as an example. The =3= here means it's version
+3 of the APU board. The APU 1 is no longer sold, so it's left out of
+the list on the PC Engines website, along with most of their
+re-sellers. The letter =c= is the revision of that board. It's pretty
+much irrelevant for comparison. You'll want to get the most recent
+one, as listed on the PC Engines website. The revisions are mostly
+minor tweaks to the board. The final number, =2=, is the number of gigabytes
+of RAM (in most cases).
+
+The APU2E2 boards have a single mSATA slot, and a regular SATA
+connector, two mPCIe slots, and a SIM tray. It comes with 2 external
+USB 3.0 type A ports, 2 internal USB 2.0 ports (header only), an SD
+card slot, and a GPIO header. It also has 3 Intel i211AT gigabit
+NICs. Using the SIM tray will remove the ability to use one of the two
+mPCIe slots.
+
+So what are the major differences between version numbers? They all
+use the same CPU, the quad core AMD Embedded G series GX-412TC running
+at 1 GHz. Most other components on the boards are the same as
+well. I'll give a description of the differences relative to the APU2
+board.
+
+The APU2D0 is the same as the regular APU2, but without a GPIO
+headers, and it has only 2 NICs.
+
+The APU3 has an extra SIM tray, and the first slot, which is mSATA
+only on the APU2, can be used as either an mSATA or USB 3G/LTE Modem
+slot. The second slot can only be used for a modem. It also lets you
+do GPIO tray swapping and failover, so you can use only a single modem
+for 2 SIMs.
+
+The APU4D2 has 4 NICs instead of 3, and the second slot is modem
+only. It has 2 GB of RAM.
+
+The APU4D4 is the same as the APU4D2, except it has dual SIM trays. It
+has 4 GB of RAM.
+
+I found a lot of this information wasn't really obvious to upon first
+reading the PC Engines website, as there's no direct comparison
+between the board, and the site relies on you flipping between pages
+to find the details. The re-seller website I looked at also didn't
+elaborate on the differences.
+
+| Board  | RAM  | Slot 1      | Slot 2      | Slot 3 | Ethernet Controllers | SIM Slots | USB 2.0 | Headers |
+|--------+------+-------------+-------------+--------+----------------------+-----------+---------+---------|
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu2d0.htm][apu2d0]] | 2 GB | mSATA       | mPCIe/Modem | mPCIe  | 2 i211AT             |         1 |       2 | No      |
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu2e2.htm][apu2e2]] | 2 GB | mSATA       | mPCIe/Modem | mPCIe  | 3 i211AT             |         1 |       2 | Yes     |
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu2e4.htm][apu2e4]] | 4 GB | mSATA       | mPCIe/Modem | mPCIe  | 3 i210AT             |         1 |       2 | Yes     |
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu3c2.htm][apu3c2]] | 2 GB | mSATA/Modem | Modem       | mPCIe  | 3 i211AT             |         2 |       4 | Yes     |
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu3c4.htm][apu3c4]] | 4 GB | mSATA/Modem | Modem       | mPCIe  | 3 i211AT             |         2 |       4 | Yes     |
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu4d2.htm][apu4d2]] | 2 GB | mSATA       | Modem       | mPCIe  | 4 i211AT             |         1 |       2 | Yes     |
+| [[https://www.pcengines.ch/apu4d4.htm][apu4d4]] | 4 GB | mSATA/Modem | Modem       | mPCIe  | 4 i211AT             |         2 |       2 | Yes     |