Product Description

You are looking at the Quad Core RADXA Rock 3A - 4GB Development Board

Our stock is in the United States (Bellevue Washington State), and we offer the 4GB Ram version that you are looking at now, and we also offer the 8GB Ram version too HERE.

This thing is exactly the same size as a Raspberry Pi 4 board. (but it won't fit a Rpi case without modifying the case).

This is the perfect option in a world where getting a Raspberry Pi is impossible.

These things area amazing, they have gigabit ethernet, quad core A55 Arm 64 bit processors and have SD card slot, and NVME slots, USB 3.0. As well as the usual 40 GPIO. They also have onboard camera and display ribbon cable connectors.

We just got these boards in, and we aren't experts on them. But from what we can see, they have done work to make Raspberry Pi shields work on these boards. You would need to research that yourself and see what you think. And even better, they can run Debian Linux, just like the Raspberry Pi.

These won't replace your Raspberry Pi as a "drop in" that works without tinkering to replace them. You may want to do some research on them first. We don't allow returns on microcontroller boards.

You can install the OS to either the SD card and boot off of that. Or you can install your OS to an NVME (not included) SSD and boot off that. That makes these SIGNIFICANTLY faster than the Raspberry Pi storage options.

These do not have WiFi or Bluetooth built in by default. But you can use the NVME/PCIE slot on top to add a WiFi/Bluetooth combo card.

See the WiFi + Bluetooth Card HERE

Just like the Raspberry Pi, these are powered off a USB-C port. We really reccomend THIS POWER SUPPLY to run them. You also may want a C to C cable too!

We reccomend using the official Debian operating system on these. You can get it here: rock-3a-debian-buster-xfce4-arm64-20220701-0158-gpt.img.xz Currently Buster is the newest version that works on these without a weird error we couldn't figure a way past. I am sure they will fix that soon on the "Bullseye" version.

It needs to get written to an SD card (I think it can also be written to the NVME SSD too). You need to use a tool to write the .img file to an SD card. The tool they reccomend is: balenaEtcher or you can visit their site and see other versions and the list of operating systems they offer for these boards using this link: https://wiki.radxa.com/Rock3/downloads

OR if you don't want to go through the work, we will write the .img file to an SD card you buy from us for a $10 dollar fee on top of the cost of the SD card. If you go this route and you are in store, you will need to allow about 10 to 15 minutes to write the image to the SD card.

Read the "Getting Started" Guide here: https://wiki.radxa.com/Rock3/getting_started/rock-3a

Read more from the manufacturer here: https://wiki.radxa.com/Rock3/3a

Here is some general specification information from the manufacturer about this line of boards:

Rockchip RK3568 64bit quad core based SBC

The latest generation SBC based on RK3568 in the traditional form factor. Outstanding features, highest flexibility and leading edge development standards make this SBC most certainly the highlight of 2021 in this market segment.

Rock 3A product details

RK356864bit quad core processor

Quad Core Cortex-A55 up to 2GHz

GPU

Mali G52 GPU, OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0/3.2，OpenCL 2.0，Vulkan 1.1, high performance dedicated 2D processor

NPU

0.8T NPU

Memory LPDDR4

64bit dual channel LPDDR4@3200MT/s, 4GB

DRAM controller frequency up to 1560MHz

SPI Flash

16MB SPI flash soldered

Wifi/BT

Wifi/BT with external M.2 module support (Not included)

eMMCmodule (removable, not included)

Industrial level high performance eMMC storage, 16G/32G/64G/128G available but not included

Micro SD card

uSD slot supports up to 128G uSD card (not included)

M.2 Interfaces

M.2 connector M key (bottom) for NVMe with PCIe 3.0 x2 lanes

note: M.2 extension board plus heat-sink is recommended for proper mounting on Rock 3 (not included)

M.2 connector E key (top) for connectivity with PCIe 2.0 x1/SDIO/UART, WiFi6 cards supported (please check the available M.2 WiFi modules)

Display HDMI

HDMI 2.0 up to 4k@60

1x MIPI DSI

Peripherals

MIPI DSI 2 lanes via FPC connector

HDMI and MIPI DSI can work at the same time, support mirror mode or extend mode.

Audio 3.5mm jack with mic with improved mechanics

HD codec that supports up to 24-bit/96kHz audio.

Camera MIPI CSI

MIPI CSI 2 lanes via FPC connector, support up to 8MP camera

USB 3.0 OTG x1

USB 3.0 HOST x1

hardware switch for host/device switch, upper one

dedicated USB3.0 channel, lower one

both USB3.0 ports can be configured in SATA mode with an optional SATA breakout cable (muxed USB3.0/SATA mode)

USB 2.0 HOST x2

Network

Wireless / Bluetooth

via optional M.2 WiFi/ BLE modules (not included)

LAN

GbE LAN with PoE support

additional HAT is required for powering via PoE

IO 40-pinexpansionheader :

- 1 x UART
- 2 x SPI bus
- 2 x I2C bus
- 1 x PCM/I2S
- 1 x SPDIF
- 1 x PWM
- 1 x ADC
- 6 x GPIO
- 2 x 5V DC power in
- 2 x 3.3V power pin

Others

RTC battery connector for time backup

Power USB PD (new generation QC/PD protocol IC)

Support USB Type C PD 2.0, 9V/2A, 12V/2A

Power Supply Qualcomm® Quick Charge™

Support QC3.0/2.0 adapter, 9V/2A, 12V/1.5A

Size 85mm x 54mm

One board per package.