Best posts made by Rebel-Rider

I looked over the specs and noticed this "DC charging (9 V-20 V)" I assume that this feature will be present on a (3.0?) MB revision? if so, this would make it much easier to find a upmarket charger for it. Will the charging barrel will have the same dimensions as the current 2.0 revision MB?

Someone else mentioned a fingerprint sensor, those who are familiar with fingerprint HW support in Linux knows it is miserable to say the least. Most fingerprint sensors are essentially Windows only devices.
Yes a fingerprint sensor would be nice addition, but perhaps not a realistic one.

As for myself, back-lit keyboard as an option and better charging/bigger battery (sort of confirmed already) is a great next move. I think you're on the right track with the next revision of this machine.

Ive used the 2.0 version for quite a while now, and im quite pleased with it. The biggest downside is not the machine itself, but mainline kernel support (yes, i know its coming) . Thats what i think has been keeping any RK3588 based devices (like the CM5 laptop) from really catching on. Since the CM5 requires custom kernel and custom boot loader, but thats mostly Rockhip`s responsibility and not yours.

Intro

I have been looking into Arm architecture laptops for a good while, but
The offerings have been rather poorly designed, expensive (2000$+) and lacking Linux support ( Acer Aspire 1, Lenovo thinkpad X13s )
I originally stumbled upon the pre-production? variant of the Cm5 laptop on AliBaba last year, and was intrigued. So when it became available on Ali-express i ordered one right away. Placed the order 24 apr and received it 15 may (3 weeks)

First impressions

The laptop has a unusually thick shell (about 2,0mm+ and more in other places) Can`t think of any 14" laptop that feels as sturdy as this one, very little flex. The Keyboard has a quality feel to it, good to type on and low noise.
Touch-pad is large, a bit noisy when clicking, otherwise okay.
Screen is a 14" IPS, fair brightness (250nits) and vibrant colors, some light bleeding in the lower corners, but that is to be expected.
Ah and the "intel inside" sticker made me chuckle (before i removed it)

Hardware

The hardware is impressive, 8 core RK3588, 32gb lpddr4x (on a core board) Mainboard with Nvme, pcie slot for wlan, 1x USB3 and 1x USB-C port and internal connectors for additional boards and HW.

Initial expirience

First time i started it i is was taken back a bit by the boot time, but its on par with other comparable boards booting from emmc (looking forwards to future nvme boot support).

The bundled Ubuntu image (22.04) was minimalist. Only bare essentials and the kernel is quite old (5.10), so my scheme to turn it into Pop! OS Arm edition did`nt quite make it all the way. (there are recipes out there on how to do this).
So i loaded the 24.04 image that (failed due to a bad usb cable) corrupted the emmc partition, made a usb stick with 21.04, repaired the partition and loaded 24.04 (again) with a new cable.

After that, i installed Flathub (i hate snap) for apps, and installed the usual things i use on a daily basis. Customized the settings to mimic Pop OS (as close as i could get it anyways) I also put an Samsung 970 Pro drive in it, and had plans to "top it off" with a Intel AX200 card, but found that there was no firmware loaded for it, so ive put that on hold for now (it holidays, and i`m too lazy right now to bother with installing firmware)

I plan to daily this thing, and use it as my main laptop.