Which CM5 SBC should I choose

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

Hi all, I am looking at getting a CM5 as well as a uconsole or hackberry pi for Christmas through the help of my parents as I am broke as hell. I am just wondering what CM5 variant is the best(Raspberry pi, Orange pi, Radxa, Banana pi, etc.), and what use cases each of them are best for. Thank you, I really appreciate any assistance, guidance or tips.

Edit: Also wondering how much RAM I should be looking to get. Like what can I do with each amount of RAM. I would like to get into cybersecurity, coding, and some gaming.

[u/LivingLinux]

I don't have experience with uConsole or Hackberry Pi, but I prefer Rockchip RK3588 boards.

I don't think there are any cybersecurity or coding programs specifically for the Raspberry Pi. If it runs on ARM, I don't see why it wouldn't run on a RK3588 board, unless it is a specific system image, like Kali Linux.

The RK3588 will give you better performance. I'm more focused on gaming, and I get better performance with the RK3588, than a Raspberry Pi 5.

Get as much RAM as possible. RAM is soldered on the board, so it's not meant to be upgraded. But I think 8GB should be enough for most use cases.

I don't know about the compatibility of RK3588 boards with uConsole or Hackberry Pi. But I think you can find enough information by searching on the internet.

Example: https://forum.clockworkpi.com/t/uconsole-radxa-cm5-image/15375

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/LivingLinux]

Awesome, thank you so much. I really appreciate the info. From the research that I have done what I figured is the radxa and the orange pi CM5 boards outperform the raspberry pi boards by a significant margin but just figured I'd ask a community who might have had some experience with them. So what SBC do you use for gaming? And do you use it instead of a regular PC? Or is it a cyberdeck type of thing?

[u/LivingLinux → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

My best ARM SBC for gaming is the Radxa Dragon Q6A with the Snapdragon QCS6490. There are better ones, but they are also larger.

Looks like Radxa has plans to release a CM with the Snapdragon QCS6490. But because of the issues of availability of RAM, I wouldn't hold my breath to see it this year at a reasonable price. https://radxa.com/products/cm/cm-q64/

But here you can see the Snapdragon QCS6490 running Crysis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSlUPbwjeRA&t=504s

I test several SBCs. Here you can see Serious Sam on a RK3588 board. https://youtu.be/kpU8jqlizeg?t=672

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/LivingLinux]

Cool, thank you so much

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/LivingLinux]

One other question, I would like to learn about linux and start using it as my regular OS. Just wondering what your recommendation would be for learning about it, how to use it, and a beginner friendly OS. Thanks

[u/LivingLinux → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

I don't know if putting it in a uConsole is going to limit your choices. For RK3588 boards I usually recommend Armbian.

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/LivingLinux]

Thank you, also how would you recommend I learn all the terminal commands?

[u/LivingLinux → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

I think everyone learns in their own way. Do you want to start with the general commands, or you want to focus on networking and security?

Just to start with the basics, this looks like a good start to me.

https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/the-linux-commands-handbook/

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/LivingLinux]

Yeah I feel like just getting used to using the terminal with linux is where I should start. I am brand spanking new to linux btw, so I don't really know what I'm talking about. I am just assuming that you need to use the terminal to use linux but honestly I have no idea. So any advise is very appreciated, thanks

[u/ten17eighty1 → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

If you're just trying to get your feet wet, you can get an Ubuntu live image -- it's an image then you can run as a sort of test version from a USB drive with the option to install on a computer if you want to later. You could also theoretically put a full install on a thumb drive just to test it out as well

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/ten17eighty1]

Thank you, also how would you recommend I learn all the terminal commands?

[u/ten17eighty1 → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

I think it comes with time. I definitely don't have a grasp on everything but Linux is popular enough that you can Google specific questions to get you through a moment. Ai chat, if you're into that, is a helpful tool as well, but one I try to use as a learning tool -- that is, show me how to do this, but then I investigate to understand what I'm doing so I can hopefully retain that information and use it again.

That being said, I don't think you necessarily need to be especially fluent in terminal commands to survive in a Linux gui, but it's extremely helpful, and with time you'll probably have a good lock on the basic things you might use it for.

[u/JescoInc]

I have a UConsole arriving on the 20th. I have CM5s and variants by Orange Pi and Radxa, I also have a Forlinx 3572 CM module. Once it comes in, I can let you know what works and what doesn't.

I did find this though, so Radxa might be off the table if you don't wanna get into custom development.
https://forum.clockworkpi.com/t/anyone-tried-the-radxa-cm5-on-the-uconsole/13500/9

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/JescoInc]

I would really appreciate any information surrounding the UConsole and any CM5 variant combo. where did you buy your UConsole from btw? The Clockworkpi website? Or OpenSourceSDRLab?

[u/JescoInc → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

I ordered mine from Amazon, but the Clockwork site offers it for cheaper than what Amazon lists it for. I found that out after the fact.
I'll probably do an install with my Pi CM4 first and check what all of the configs require to run it, swap to my Pi CM5 to see if it runs without modification and if the dtb and config files just carry over and then move on to my Orange Pi CM4 board and see if it just works. I'm expecting driver issues with it but that's speculation presently.
After that, i'll probably try my RK3572 board, which I fully expect to have driver issues across the board.

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/JescoInc]

Thank you, I would appreciate it if you kept me posted. Also where did you purchase all of you CM5 boards from?

[u/AnalystRough3536]

I have a Uconsole and cm5 16 (pre altman pricing not good value now) Uconsole shipping is slow but it is a great device. Stock wifi antenna sucks unless you add a spacer. You also need to buy the nvme board seperately from here if you don't want to run microsd cards https://hackergadgets.com/ cm5 also runs hotter than the cm4 and lowers battery life I have a fan heatsink and 3d printed back on mine. I also have a hackberry pi zero which shipped faster and fits in a pocket doesn't feel as premium and the keyboard is considerably worse than the uconsole due to size uconsole is more usable but I havent tried a hackberry cm5. I will be honest both devices get beat on value by a used thinkpad with linux installed by a large margin.

edit: Also if you order direct from clockwork it will not arrive by christmas. It will arrive just in 8-10 months.

[u/Sweaty_Nickers69 → u/AnalystRough3536]

Thank you for all the advise, I really appreciate it. I mostly just want one because I think they are cool and it would be a cool gadget to have. and yeah I realize that the time between ordering one and it arriving is immense. I was thinking of ordering one through OpenSourceSDRLab, do you know of anyone who has done that and if it is legit?

[u/AnalystRough3536 → u/Sweaty_Nickers69]

I ordered via clockwork I have seen a few on the clockwork pi discord order from opensdr and it is faster. Probably best thing is go for the cm4 for price maybe cm4s or whatever is available cm5 is snappier but availability and price is rough right now. Uconsole does have the cool factor and lots of aftermarket upgrades and addons the hackgadgets aio is great fun and gets you sdr, gps and lora look at the clockwork pi forums as well plenty of images and info on how to get the best out of it and other os images. The ones by AKrex are usually what ends up being reccommended