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May 31, 2026June 2, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 14 Comments

ODROID-H5 Review – Part 2: A dual 10GbE mini PC tested with Ubuntu 26.04

ODROID-H5 review dual 10GbE Ubuntu 26.04

I received a kit for review last week with an ODROID-H5 SBC, a Type1 case, an M.2 10GbE module, and other accessories. In the first part of the review, I went through an unboxing, assembled the kit, and tested whether it could boot an M.2 NVMe SSD with Ubuntu 24.04 and Windows 11. I’ve now updated the system to Ubuntu 26.04, run a few benchmarks, tested the two 10GbE RJ45 ports, as well as other features. I’ll report my experience about all that today. Upgrading from Ubuntu 24.04 to Ubuntu 26.04 The 512GB M.2 NVMe SSD I use in the ODROID-H5 comes from a laptop, which I upgraded with a 2TB SSD. That means the operating systems were not upgraded for a few months. While Ubuntu 24.04 could boot, it would not show the two 10GbE interfaces. That’s because the required drivers were not available in the version of Ubuntu […]

May 27, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

ODROID-H5 SBC Review – Part 1: Unboxing, Type1 case assembly, and first boot

ODROID H5 Review Type 1 case Ubuntu 24.04

Hardkernel has sent me a kit with the ODROID-H5 10GbE SBC for review. In addition to the Intel Core i3-300 board itself, the kit also comes with an ODROID-H5 Type-1 case, an M.2 card for a second 10 Gbps Ethernet port, and other accessories. I’ll start the review with an unboxing, my experience assembling the kit, and first boot using an M.2 NVMe SSD with Ubuntu 24.04 and Windows 11 in a dual-boot configuration. In a few weeks, I’ll continue the review after upgrading to Ubuntu 26.04 and perform thorough testing of all features and performance. ODROID-H5 kit unboxing An advantage of the ODROID family is that it’s highly flexible, and you can build your own customized system. For this review, Hardkernel sent me a package with the following items: External LED power button H5 Case Type 1 enclosure ODROID-H5 16GB DDR5 SO-DIMM (Crucial) 15V/4A PSU with US plug adapter […]

May 20, 2026May 20, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 24 Comments

ODROID-H5 – A $250 Intel Core i3-N300 SBC with 10GbE networking, four M.2 PCIe slots

Hardkernel ODROID-H5 is an affordable Intel Core i3-N300 octa-core Alder Lake-N SBC providing a 10GbE RJ45 networking jack, and four M.2 PCIe slots for storage, wired/wireless networking, or AI accelerator expansion. It relies on the same SoC as in the earlier ODROID-H4 Ultra SBC, but trades a single PCIe Gen3 x4 M.2 slot and four SATA ports for four M.2 slots, and upgrades from dual 2.5GbE to single 10GbE. It still features four USB ports, but only one USB 3.0 port, and three USB 2.0 ports. ODROID-H5 specifications: SoC- Intel Core i3-N300 CPU – Octa-core “Alder Lake-N” processor @ up to 3.8 GHz (Turbo single-core) or 2.3 GHz (Turbo multi-core) with 6MB cache GPU – 32EU Intel UHD Graphics @ 1.25 GHz TDP: 7W System Memory – Up to 64GB DDR5 4800 MHz SO-DIMM memory Storage Up to 4x 2280 NVMe SSDs via M.2 slots (See Expansion section) eMMC flash […]

April 28, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 21 Comments

What a difference two years make? Comparing SBC prices in 2024 and 2026

Looking back, 2024 feels like a golden year for single board computers, as the increasing price of RAM (and storage and other components) since late 2025 due to the AI demand has made those much less attractive, price/performance ratio-wise. We’ve already documented Raspberry Pi SBC price hikes, and after several increases, the Raspberry Pi 5 16GB went from $120 to $305, or a 154% change in price. Yesterday, I noticed the Banana Pi BPI-M4 Zero had a new version with 4GB RAM and 32GB eMMC flash, and a reader was quick to point out the $181 price tag to Europe was painful, bearing in mind it also includes VAT and shipping. Looking at the original December 2023 article, the BPI-M4 Zero 2GB/8GB sold for $28.90 plus shipping, and it now shows up at $115 before taxes. That’s a 297% hike, or about four times the price from a little over […]

May 14, 2025May 14, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 34 Comments

$39 ODROID-C5 is a power-efficient Amlogic S905X5M SBC with 4GB RAM, no heatsink needed

Hardkernel ODROID-C5 is a lower-cost upgrade to the ODROID-C4 SBC with a faster and more efficient Amlogic S905X5M quad-core Cortex-A55 SoC clocked at 2.5 GHz, 4GB DDR4 RAM, and almost the same features as the previous generation Amlogic S905X3 single board computer. That means a microSD card slot and an eMMC flash module socket for storage, HDMI 2.0 video output up to 4Kp60, a Gigabit Ethernet RJ45 port, four USB ports, and the usual 40-pin Raspberry Pi GPIO header. ODROID-C5 specifications: SoC – Amlogic S905X5M CPU – Quad-core Cortex-A55 processor @ 2.5 GHz GPU – Arm G310-V2 GPU @ 850 MHz supporting OpenGL ES 3.2, Vulkan 1.0 and OpenCL 2.0 VPU Video Decoding – 4Kp75 10-bit: AV1, H.265, VP9, AVS2; 4Kp30: H.264 Video Encoding – 1080p30 H.264 System Memory – 4GB DDR4 @ 3200MT/s Storage eMMC module connector with HS400 speed (16, 32, 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB modules available) MicroSD […]

April 28, 2025April 28, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

64GB DDR5 memory modules shown to work on ODROID-H4 Alder Lake-N SBC

The ODROID-H4 SBC powered by an Intel Processor N97 or Core i3-N305 Alder Lake-N CPU has been shown to work with up to 64GB DDR5 since Crucial/Micron released such modules earlier this year. There’s always been a lot of confusion about the maximum memory supported by Alder Lake-N CPU, mostly due to Intel Ark, which should be a trusted official source, but that will often wrongly report a maximum of 16GB RAM: But people quickly found out that 32GB RAM would work just fine, and the guys at Hardkernel even tested several 48GB RAM modules successfully when they launched the ODROID-H4/H4+/H4 Ultra single board computers last year. But domih noted that 64GB DDR5 SO-DIMM modules were now available, and several members of the odroid forums purchased 64GB CT64G56C46S5 DDR5 memory modules to give it a try. It worked for them. Pugglewuggle further added that IBECC worked too, and with faster […]

February 15, 2025February 15, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

ODROID-H3 and H4 SBCs get NetCard 3 card with four 5Gbps Ethernet ports

Hardkernl NetCard 3 is an expansion card with four 5Gbps Ethernet ports designed for the ODROID-H3 and ODROID-H4 SBCs and adding to the two 2.5GbE ports on the Intel Jasper Lake and Alder Lake-N single board computers. It follows the H2 Net Card with four 2.5GbE ports introduced in 2021 for the ODROID-H2, and tested by Ian with the ODROID-H3+ SBC in 2023. Hardkernel ended up selling more than expected, so they designed the Netcard 3 with 5GbE ports as an upgrade. It remains to be seen whether 5Gbps networking will be as popular as 2.5GbE or users will prefer moving to 10GbE hardware instead… NetCard 3 specifications: 4x 5Gbps Ethernet ports via RealTek RTL8126 5GbE controllers. M.2 edge connector with PCIe Gen3 x4 signaling Cooling with a long heatsink on RTL8126 controllers Compatible with ODROID-H3/H3+ and ODROID-H4/H4+ only, and not earlier ODROID-H2/H2+ boards You may need to flash a […]

September 2, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

DietPi 9.7 and Armbian 24.8 released with improved support for Rockchip, Amlogic, and Allwinner SBCs

Armbian and DietPi are two separate projects that provide Linux-based OS images optimized for Arm-based single board computers. The last time we had a look at both projects was in June with the release of Armbian 24.5.1 and DietPi 9.4, but there have been several updates since then including the releases of the latest DietPi 9.7 and Armbian 24.8 Yelt just a few days ago. So let’s check out the latest changes. DietPi 9.7 DietPi is a lightweight Debian-based Linux distribution for SBCs and server systems that ships as a minimal image but users can install any packages they want, including the ones required for desktop environment, to match the requirements of the applications. It’s notably used by the Linamp project – a Raspberry Pi 4-based project that brings WinAMP to real life – that we covered a few weeks ago. DietPi 9.7 was released on August 25, 2024 with […]