UDOO’s New BOLT Is Like a Raspberry Pi Turned Up to Eleven

Single-board computers have taken the maker world by storm over the last several years, and the undeniable market leader has always been Raspberry Pi. Small form factor, impressive performance, and low cost have kept the line firmly in the lead. But, what if you want something more powerful, with performance on-par with a full-size computer? That’s what UDOO has been making for years, and their new BOLT SBC is now the flagship of their model lineup.

That’s all thanks to the AMD Ryzen Embedded V1000 SoC. There are two versions of the Bolt available: the V3 and the V8. The V8 has an AMD Ryzen V1605B that has four cores running at 3.6GHz and integrated AMD Radeon Vega 8 Graphics. The less expensive V3 has the Ryzen V1202B, which also has four cores but runs at 3.2GHz, and Vega 3 graphics. Both boards come standard with 4GB, which can be expanded, and are more powerful than a MacBook Pro 13".

The UDOO BOLT isn’t just a powerful mini computer though, and it even has Arduino-compatible pinouts so you can use it to directly control your hardware — something Raspberry Pi doesn’t even have. Put that all together, and you’ve got a small coaster-size computer that can play AAA games, watch movies on four 4K screens simultaneously, or power a robot with processor-intensive computer vision capabilities.

BOLT is currently crowdfunding on Kickstarter, and the campaign is running until July 30th. It’s already surpassed the funding goal of $100,000, which is very impressive considering it just launched today. A basic BOLT V3 will cost you $229, while the V8 is $279. Rewards should ship in December.