DFI MTH556 Intel Core Ultra Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake 3.5" Single Board Computers with Dual 2.5GbE and 9 to 36 V DC Input

Machine vision stations, multi-screen HMIs and edge gateways increasingly run analytics, video and control software side by side, and a 3.5″ enclosure leaves no room for a second compute module. The DFI MTH556 series puts Intel Core Ultra processors on a 146 x 102 mm board, so a design built around the 3.5″ footprint can take on heavier software while keeping its size, its 9 to 36 V DC supply and its I/O layout.

Six builds cover two processor generations. The MTH556-BCN-165H carries the 16-core Core Ultra 7 165H and the MTH556-BCN-135H the 14-core Core Ultra 5 135H, both Meteor Lake H-series parts at 28 W with Intel Arc graphics. Four 12-core, 15 W U-series builds follow: the MTH556-ECN-155U with the Core Ultra 7 155U and the MTH556-ECN-125U with the Core Ultra 5 125U on Meteor Lake, and the MTH556-ECN-255U with the Core Ultra 7 255U and the MTH556-ECN-225U with the Core Ultra 5 225U on Arrow Lake. Two DDR5 SO-DIMM sockets take up to 96 GB at 5600 MHz on every build.

The graphics engine decodes and encodes HEVC, VP9, AV1 and AVC in hardware, which keeps camera streams and video playback off the CPU cores. HDMI 1.4b runs at up to 4096 x 2160, a USB-C port with DisplayPort Alt Mode at up to 4096 x 2304 at 60 Hz, and an internal dual-channel 24-bit LVDS connector drives a panel at up to 1920 x 1200, for three independent displays.

Two 2.5GbE ports on Intel I226LM and I226V controllers can keep a plant network and a camera or machine network apart. Three USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports sit on the I/O edge, with two USB 2.0 ports, two RS-232/422/485 ports, two RS-232 ports and 8-bit digital I/O on internal headers. Three M.2 sockets handle expansion: an M-key 2280 on PCIe Gen4 x4 for SSD storage, a B-key 3052 with a nano SIM slot for 4G or 5G, and an E-key 2230 for Wi-Fi. TPM 2.0, audio and a programmable watchdog timer complete the board.

Every MTH556 board takes 9 to 36 V DC on a 4-pin connector, which covers 12 V and 24 V supplies in machines and cabinets. The H-series builds operate from -5 to 65 °C, and the U-series builds are rated for wide temperature operation from -20 to 70 °C. All six use the active cooler DFI supplies, run Windows 11 and 10 IoT Enterprise 64-bit or Linux, and carry CE, FCC, UKCA, KC and RoHS compliance.