Reviews - Page 2 of 141 - CNX Software

June 27, 2026July 19, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition Review – Part 3: Ubuntu 26.04 on an AMD Ryzen 5 7545U mini PC

GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition Review Ubuntu 26.04 Linux

We’ve just reviewed the GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition mini PC on Windows 11 after having checked out the hardware with an unboxing and a teardown in the first part of the review. We’ve now had time to review the AMD Ryzen 5 7545U mini PC on Linux using Ubuntu 26.04 distribution. The Ubuntu 26.04 review includes feature testing, benchmarks, storage and networking (2.5GbE and WiFi 6) tests, and measurements of CPU temperature under stress, fan noise levels, and power consumption of the mini PC under various workloads. Ubuntu 26.04 installation We decided to install Ubuntu 26.04 alongside Windows 11 in dual boot configuration. To do so, we shrank the Windows (C:) partition to approximately half its size. We then inserted a USB drive flashed with the Ubuntu 26.04 ISO and began the installation process by entering the BIOS and selecting the drive. From there, the installation went smoothly, and we got […]

June 22, 2026July 11, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition Review – Part 2: AMD Ryzen 5 7545U Mini PC tested with Windows 11 Pro

GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition Windows 11 Pro review

We have already checked out the GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition mini PC’s hardware with an unboxing and a teardown in the first part of the review, before quickly trying the pre-installed Windows 11 Pro. We’ve now had time to test the AMD Ryzen 5 7545U mini PC more thoroughly in Windows 11, and we’ll report our experience, including feature testing, benchmark results, 4K and 8K YouTube video playback, 2.5GbE and WiFi 6E network performance evaluation, and cooling performance, as well as fan noise and power consumption measurements. Software Overview and Feature Testing – GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition The System > About window confirms we have an A7 computer equipped with a 3.2 GHz (base frequency) AMD Ryzen 5 7545U processor with Radeon 740M graphics, 16 GB of RAM, and 466 GB of storage preloaded with Windows 11 Pro 25H2. HWiNFO 64 provides additional details about the AMD Ryzen 5 7545U […]

June 21, 2026June 21, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

SpacemiT K3 Pico-ITX RISC-V Chassis Kit Review – Part 2: What works, what doesn’t in Bianbu OS 4.0

SpacemiT K3 Pico-ITX Chassis Kit BianbuOS 4.0 review

Last month, I received the SpacemiT K3 Pico-ITX Chassis Kit based on the company’s K3 16-core RISC-V SoC, and started the review with an unboxing, a teardown, and a first boot to Bianbu OS 4.0. Since the system features a 10Gbps Ethernet SFP+ cage, I also had to order a 10GbE SFP+ to Copper adapter, as my 10GbE networking gear is exclusively based on RJ45 ports. In this review, I’ll check system information in Bianbu OS 4.0.1, run a few benchmarks, test 10GbE, GbE, and WiFi 6 networking performance, play YouTube videos at various resolutions, run AI workloads (LLM), check all/most features work as expected, and measure the power consumption of the SpacemiT K3 “Pico-ITX Chassis Kit” mini PC. It’s a fairly long review, so if you are short on time, you can check out the “what works, what doesn’t” section. Bianbu OS 4.0 System Information Before running anything, I […]

June 14, 2026June 14, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Creality Sermoon S1 review – Part 3: 3D scanning with Khadas Mind 2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB dock

Creality Sermoon S1 3D scanner review with Khadas Mind Graphics 2 NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB dock

At the end of last year, I received a Creality Sermoon S1 high-end 3D scanner for review. After checking the specifications and going through an unboxing in the first part of the review, I used the 3D scanner with an Intel Core i5-13500H laptop with 16GB of RAM running Creality Scan 4 software on Windows 11. The laptop specs were below the minimum hardware requirements (NVIDIA GPU, 32GB RAM), and while I managed to scan a face and bust using infrared mode, it was a struggle with 4 to 5 FPS scanning, and I wasn’t able to use Blue light scanning at all. Luckily, shortly after the review, Khadas informed me they planned to send a Khadas Mind Graphics 2 dock featuring an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 560 Ti 16GB graphics card and a Mind 2 mini PC with 32GB of RAM and an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H 16-core Meteor […]

June 9, 2026June 22, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

GEEKOM A7 2026 Edition (AMD Ryzen 5 7545U) mini PC review – Part 1: specifications, unboxing, teardown, and first boot

GEEKOM A7 Mini PC AMD Ryzen 5 7545U review

GEEKOM sent us a review sample of the A7 2026 Edition mini PC powered by a 4.9 GHz AMD Ryzen 5 7545U hexa-core/12-thread processor, paired with 16GB DDR5 SO-DIMM memory and a 500 GB NVMe SSD. It comes with two HDMI 2.0 ports and two USB4 with DisplayPort Alt mode to enable four-monitor setups, 2.5GbE, WiFi 6E, and Bluetooth 5.2 connectivity, an SD card reader, a 3.5mm audio jack, and a few USB-A ports. As its name implies, it’s a variant of the GEEKOM A7 (Ryzen 9 7940HS) mini PC we reviewed in 2024 with Windows 11 Pro and Ubuntu 22.04/24.04, and we’ll keep that in mind to compare the more affordable 2026 Edition to its older sibling in our three-part review. In this article, we will cover the full specifications, unbox the device, go through a teardown to check the hardware design, and boot it to the pre-installed Windows […]

June 8, 2026June 8, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Armbian Imager 2.0 release supports over 300 boards from 64 SBC vendors, custom user profiles

Rock 5B Plus Armbian Operating System Selection

The Armbian community has just released the Armbian Imager 2.0 GUI program to easily flash pre-built Armbian-built Ubuntu or Debian images for over 338 boards from 64 SBC vendors. The new version features a slick user interface rewritten from scratch and implements custom user profiles in the settings with username and password, SSH key, Wi-Fi network credentials and country code, timezone, locale, and shell. That means the board is ready to use after flashing. In some ways it’s similar to the Raspberry Pi Imager 2.0, except it covers a much broader ecosystem of single board computers. To be honest, I had no idea Armbian had an imager so far. The last time I used an Armbian image, I downloaded it directly from their website and used USB Imager or another tool to flash it to a microSD card slot. So it’s a good opportunity to check out the Armbian Imager […]

June 7, 2026June 10, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

AweSun Cloud KVM Q1 Review – An ultra-compact, low-cost KVM over IP solution tested with Windows 11 and Android clients

AweSun has sent me a sample of their “Cloud KVM Q1” 4K KVM over IP solution for review. It’s a compact device with the minimum number of ports for a connected KVM: USB-C for keyboard and mouse emulation, HDMI input for video, and Ethernet for connectivity to the host. Like other such KVMs, it enables hardware-level remote access even in the BIOS, and the company advertised remote access to server, computer, and mobile phone targets, with the latter requiring an additional USB-C dock for HDMI input. I’ll start the review by going through the specifications, performing an unboxing and a teardown, and testing both mobile and desktop clients with targets like a Raspberry Pi 5 and an Android mobile phone. AweSun Cloud KVM Q1 specifications Here are the specifications from the company: Video Input HDMI port Resolution – Up to 2560 x 1600 with 15 FPS framerate Networking 100Mbps RJ45 […]

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 […]