2023 Year in review – Top 10 posts, statistics, and what to expect in 2024

CNX Software Happy New Year 2024

It’s the last day and last article of the year, so we will look at some highlights of 2023, some traffic statistics on the CNX Software website, and speculate what interesting developments may happen in 2024. Looking back at 2023 The semiconductor shortage that had happened since 2020 started to fade away in early 2023, and supplies for most electronics components and devices seem to be adequate at this time, so that was a bright spot this year, and hopefully, it will stay that way in 2024 despite geopolitical tensions. We did not have any super exciting new Arm application processors from Rockchip, Amlogic, or Allwinner announced this year, although the Amlogic S928X penta-core Cortex-A76/A55 CPU started to show up in some 8K TV boxes. The launch of the Raspberry Pi 5 SBC with a Broadcom BCM2712 quad-core Cortex-A76 processor was probably the main highlight for Arm on this side […]

GEEKOM unveils its presence at CES 2024 (Sponsored)

GEEKOM mini PC CES 2024

GEEKOM, renowned as the Green Mini PC Global Leader, proudly announces its participation in the long-awaited CES 2024, solidifying its standing as the global leader in Mini PCs. With two decades of industry expertise, GEEKOM has consistently delivered high-quality, environmentally friendly Mini PCs, establishing itself as the go-to brand for reliable computing solutions. As CES 2024 approaches, GEEKOM is gearing up to showcase its latest innovations. Besides exhibiting its already diversified lineup of mini PCs, GEEKOM has also promised to release a few new exciting products at CES 2024. First up is the IT14 Pro. The 0.7L mini PC will feature up to an Intel Meteor Lake Core Ultra 7-155H processor, with dual-channel DDR5-5600 RAM and dual SSDs. Built on the all new 4nm process, the Ultra 7 chip is 20% faster compared to last generation’s Intel Core i7-1360P in terms of CPU multi-core performance, delivering ample oomph for even […]

ASRock Industrial NUC Ultra 100 Meteor Lake-H motherboards feature Core Ultra 5 125H and Core Ultra 7 155H processors

ASRock Industrial NUC Ultra 100 Motherboard

ASRock Industrial has just announced two NUC Ultra 100 motherboards powered by Intel Core Ultra Meteor Lake-H processors namely the Core Ultra 5 125H and Ultra 7 155H with up to 16 cores and 22 threads, and integrating Intel ARC Graphics and the new Intel NPU AI engine. As the name implies, the NUC Ultra 100 Motherboard Series are designed in NUC form factor, support up to 96GB dual-channel DDR5-5600 MHz memory, three storage interface, up to four 4K displays, and offer two 2.5GbE networking ports, one USB4/Thunderbolt, and four USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports. ASRock Industrial says those features make the motherboards suitable for smart retail, kiosks, digital signage, smart cities, embedded industries, Edge AIoT applications, etc… NUC Ultra 100 motherboards specifications: Meteor Lake-H SoC (one or the other) Intel Core Ultra 7 T4 155H 16-core (6P+8E+2LPE) processor @ 1.4 / 4.8 GHz with 24MB cache, Intel 8Xe LPG […]

iKOOLCORE R2 (Core i3-N300) system review – Part2: Proxmox VE, Ubuntu 22.04, pfSense

iKOOLCORE R2 Ubuntu Promox VE dual display

In the first part of iKOOLCORE R2 mini PC & router review, I had a look at the hardware with an unboxing and a teardown of the Intel Core i3-N300 Alder Lake-N computer and also noticed the device booted to a UEFI shell. So for the second part of the review, I will report my experience installing Proxmox VE on the iKOOLCORE R2 and setting up and using Ubuntu 22.04, pfSense 2.7.2, and OpenWrt 23.05 virtual machines, making sure I can still use a physical display, keyboard, and mouse with Ubuntu while pfSense firewall is running. As a side note, the previous generation iKOOLCORE R1 mini PC that was sent to Ian for review with Proxmox VE and various virtual machines preinstalled OpenWrt, Debian 11, and Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC set to Chinese language by default. As I understand it, iKOOLCORE still does that for the Chinese market, but not […]

Congatec conga-TC675r – A COM Express Type 6 module with soldered RAM, 13th Gen Intel Core CPU

Congatec has recently announced Six new COM Express Type 6 Computer-on-Modules based on 13th Gen Intel Core(Raptor Lake) processors. The module comes with up to 14(6P+8E) cores and 20-thread, ultra-fast LPDDR5x memory, all within a total TDP of 45W.

We’ve noticed a surge in the popularity of COM Express modules and Congatec has recently announced six new conga-TC675r COM Express Type 6 Computer-on-Modules based on 13th Gen Intel Core (Raptor Lake) processors that happen to come with soldered RAM instead of the usual SO-DIMM memory slots found in this form factor. The modules come with up to 14(6P+8E) cores and 20-thread, ultra-fast LPDDR5x memory, all within a total TDP of 45W. According to Congatec, this device is designed to work under extreme temperatures (-40°C to +85°C), and is built to withstand the highest standards for shock and vibrations notably thanks to the user of soldered onboard RAM, making this device suitable for off-road vehicles for mining, construction, agriculture, forestry, and other demanding mobility applications. Previously we have seen manufacturers like ADLINK announce COM Express modules based on the 13th Gen architecture, and both ADLINK and Congatec have also just […]

How to use a monitor and USB mouse/keyboard in Promox VE on an Intel Alder Lake-N mini PC

Intel Core i3-N300 Alder Lake-N Ubuntu 22.04 Promox VE passthrough

We’ve started to see several Alder Lake-N platforms acting both as a mini PC and a router or network appliance with products such as iKOOLCORE R2 or CWWK x86-P5 which features not only the usual HDMI, USB, and single Ethernet port, but come with multiple Ethernet ports making them ideal to run Proxmox VE to simultaneous run a desktop OS such as Ubuntu 22.04 or Windows 11 and a headless network OS such as pfSense or OpenWrt. I’m currently reviewing iKOOLCORE R2 mini PC that comes with four 2.5GbE ports and I could install Ubuntu 22.04 Desktop, pfSense 2.7.1, and OpenWrt 23.05 relatively easily, but the Ubuntu desktop is only visible in the Proxmox VE dashboard and the HDMI display physically connected to the mini PC only shows Proxmox VE login prompt. So at this point, I learned that I had to enable PCIe passthrough for the GPU in Proxmox […]

COM Express Type 6 Compact module features 14th gen Intel Core Ultra “Meteor Lake” processor

Intel Core Ultra COM Express

ADLINK cExpress-MTL is a COM Express Type 6 Compact module based on the just-announced 14th gen Intel Core Ultra “Meteor Lake” processor family with up to fourteen CPU cores in 6P+8E configuration, eight Xe-cores (128 EUs), and an NPU (11pTOPS/8.2eTOPS) in a 15 or 28W TDP thermal configuration delivering up to 1.9x the GPU performance of the previous generation (Raptor Lake). The power consumption will also be lower thanks to Intel Core Ultra’s new Low-Power E-cores that are 30 to 50% more efficient than the E-cores in 13th gen Intel Core processors, and the faster GPU and built-in NPU will enable hardware-accelerated AV1 encoding/decoding and various devices leveraging AI such as portable medical ultrasound devices, industrial automation, autonomous driving, AI robots, and more. cExpress-MTL specifications: Meteor Lake-H/U SoC (one of the other) Intel Core Ultra 7 MS3 165H 16-core (6P+8E+2LPE) processor @ 1.4 / 5.0 GHz with 24MB cache, Intel […]

GEEKOM Mini IT12 Core i7-12650H mini PC review – Part 1: unboxing, teardown, and first boot

GEEKOM Mini IT12 Review

GEEKOM Mini IT12 is a 12th Gen Intel mini PC offered with either an Intel Core i7-12650H or Intel Core i5-12450H Alder Lake processor, support for up to 64GB RAM, up to 2TB NVMe SDD, HDMI 2.0 video outputs and high-performance ports such as USB4 and 2.5GbE. The mini PC is also equipped with a WiFi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 wireless module and comes preloaded with Windows 11 Pro operating system. GEEKOM has sent us a sample of the Mini IT12 with a 10-core Intel Core i7-12650H processor, 32GB DDR4, and a 1TB M.2 SSD for review.  We’ll start the review by listing the specifications, before going and unboxing and a teardown, and finally boot the device to Windows 11 Pro. This will be followed by detailed reviews of the mini PC with Windows 11 and Ubuntu 22.04 in the next few weeks. GEEKOM Mini IT12 specifications SoC – Intel […]