laptop News - Page 2 of 35 - CNX Software

August 26, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

RCORE V2 RK3588 module launched for MNT Reform laptops (Crowdfunding)

MNT Reform has launched a crowdfunding campaign for the RCORE V2 module powered by a Rockchip RK3588 SoC coupled with up to 32GB RAM, and a 256GB eMMC flash for the company’s open-source hardware laptops, be it the original MNT Reform or the MNT Reform Pocket. It appears to me that it’s the same module as found in the MNT Reform Next 12.5-inch laptop scheduled to ship by the end of December, but it’s sold separately as an upgrade kit for users of previous models of MNT Reform laptops. The company explains that the RCORE V2 brings a third M.2 slot for fast PCIe-based Wi-Fi cards (with USB Bluetooth), and it’s easier to install since it works without an internal HDMI adapter. MNT Reform RCORE V2 specifications: Based on the Firefly iCore-3588Q module as found in the Firefly AIO-3588Q board SoC – Rockchip RK3588 CPU – Octa-core 64-bit Armv8 SoC […]

August 5, 2025August 5, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Argon ONE UP – A Raspberry Pi CM5-powered 14-inch laptop (Crowdfunding)

Argon 40 is better known for its Argon ONE Raspberry Pi enclosures, but the company has now launched a crowdfunding campaign for the Argon ONE UP 14-inch laptop powered by the Raspberry Pi CM5 module. We’ve already covered a range of Raspberry Pi 4/5 laptops, but existing models are either rather thick or the Raspberry Pi 5 is placed on the side of a laptop shell, not ideal for portability. The Argon ONE UP looks like a proper laptop, as thin as a typical consumer laptop, while keeping Raspberry Pi features such as access to the GPIO pins. The description is rather garbage, like on all recent Kickstarter campaigns we’ve covered, with low-resolution GIF animations and text in photos (instead of actual text), but I did my best to reconstruct the Argon ONE UP specifications: SoM – Raspberry Pi CM5 (included or BYO) SoC – Broadcom BCM2712 CPU – Quad-core […]

July 28, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Linux 6.16 Release – Main changes, Arm, RISC-V, and MIPS architectures

Linus Torvalds has just announced the release of Linux 6.16 on LKML: It’s Sunday afternoon, and the release cycle has come to an end. Last week was nice and calm, and there were no big show-stopper surprises to keep us from the regular schedule, so I’ve tagged and pushed out 6.16 as planned. It’s worth noting that the upcoming merge window for 6.17 is going to be slightly chaotic for me: I have multiple family events this August (a wedding and a big birthday), and with said family being spread not only across the US, but in Finland too, I’m spending about half the month traveling. That means that I will try very hard to get most of the merge window done the first week before my travels start, and I already ended upgiving a heads-up on that to the people who tend to send me the most pull requests. […]

May 26, 2025July 28, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Linux 6.15 Release – Main changes, Arm, RISC-V and MIPS architectures

Linus Torvalds has just announced the release of Linux 6.15: So this was delayed by a couple of hours because of a last-minute bug report resulting in one new feature being disabled at the eleventh hour, but 6.15 is out there now. Apart from that final scramble, things looked pretty normal last week. Various random small fixes all over, with drivers as usual accounting for most of it. But we’ve got some bcachefs fixes, some core networking, and some mm fixes in there too. Nothing looks particularly scary. And this obviously means that the merge window opens tomorrow as usual, and I see the usual people being proactive and having sent me their pull requests. It’s memorial day tomorrow here in the US, but like the USPS, “neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night” – nor memorial day – stops the merge window. [ Actually, thinking back […]

May 20, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

Huawei Matebook Pro is the first laptop sold with HarmonyOS operating system

Huawei Matebook Pro (HAD-W24 / HAD-W32) resembles a typical laptop with a 14.2-inch display, 24GB to 32GB RAM, and 1TB or 2TB SSD storage. What’s less common is that the processor is not named, and the laptop is the first to run Huawei’s HarmonyOS operating system. Those two are due to Western countries’ sanctions against the Chinese company. Huawei used to sell Intel-based laptops with Windows and Android smartphones, but they’ve not made hardware based on US technology for a while. As software support would eventually run out, they had to work on an alternative named HarmonyOS, which has been used on smartwatches, smartphones, and tablets for a while, but the Matebook Pro is the first computer sold with the new OS. While we don’t know the processor used, reports mention the Kirin X90 10-core (4+4+2) / 20-thread Arm SoC as an “Apple Silicon” solution. MateBook Pro specifications: SoC – […]

February 25, 2025February 25, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Imagination DXTP GPU promises 20% higher power efficiency compared to DXT GPU for mobile devices and laptops

Imagination has announced the DXTP GPU for mobile and power-constrained devices with up to 20% greater power efficiency than its predecessor, the D-Series DXT GPU for longer battery life for AI applications or complex games. The company says the GPU is suitable for gaming, user interfaces, graphics-rich applications, computer vision, generative AI, and other AI applications designed to run on smartphones, tablets, laptops, desktops, or non-safety automotive products. Imagination DXTP highlights: Two off-the-shelf configurations: DXTP-48-1536 48 GPixel/s 1.5 TFLOPS FP32 (1536 FLOPs/Clock) 3 TFLOPS FP16 6 TOPS INT8 48 ppc Bilinear 3D Textured Up to 96 ppc 2D Dual Rate Mode DXTP-64-2048 64 GPixel/s 2 TFLOPS FP32 (2048 FLOPs/Clock) 4 TFLOPS FP16 8 TOPS INT8 64 ppc Bilinear 3D Textured Up to 128 ppc 2D Dual Rate Mode Bus Interface – AXI, ACE-Lite Compression PVRIC5 Lossless and Lossy Framebuffer Compression ETC and ASTC LDR and HDR Support Microarchitecture improvement – […]

January 28, 2025March 29, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

anyon_e DIY laptop features Rockchip RK3588 SoC, 13.3-inch 4K AMOLED display, aluminum chassis

We’ve already seen several Rockchip RK3588 laptops with the Cool Pi laptop and GenBook RK3588, as well as the open-source hardware MNT Reform Next. anyon_e is another open-source DIY laptop based on Rockchip RK3588 octa-core Cortex-A76/A55 SoC but with higher-end specifications compared to competitors. The anyon_e features a 13.3-inch 4K AMOLED display, a wireless QWERTY mechanical keyboard, a custom aluminum chassis that keeps the thickness of the laptop to just 18mm, and a battery good for about 7 hours. It’s based on the FriendlyELEC CM3588 core board found in the CM3588 NAS Kit. anyon_e laptop (preliminary) specifications: SoM – FriendlyELEC CM3588 SoC – Rockchip RK3588 CPU – 4x CortexA76 cores @ up to 2.4 GHz, 4x CortexA55 core @ 1.8 GHz GPU – Arm Mali-G610 MP4 GPU Video decoder – 8Kp60 H.265, VP9, AVS2, 8Kp30 H.264 AVC/MVC, 4Kp60 AV1, 1080p60 MPEG-2/-1, VC-1, VP8 Video encoder – 8Kp30 H.265/H.264 video encoder […]

January 25, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

Intel floats Modular PC design proposal for repairable laptops and mini PCs

Intel has published an article proposing a modular PC design that would improve the repairability/right-to-repair of laptops and mini PCs and reduce e-waste through the replacement of motherboard, display, and M.2 or FPC add-on modules for the user-facing ports. Making repairable, modular electronic devices is not a new idea, and the Framework laptops are probably the best-known option now, but they do come at a premium. But most projects are limited success, for instance, Project Ara modular smartphone from Google eventually died off. We’ve also covered modular or open-source hardware solutions from smaller companies over the years such as Firefly Station P3D modular Arm mini PC with swappable cards, or Olimex Teres-I DIY and open-source hardware laptop. It’s good news that a large company like Intel is taking the repairable, modular PC topic seriously, but as we’ll see below it’s currently a high-level proposal with few technical details. Most laptops […]