Went low-end with 4gb model (soldered), Intel J4125 and no storage or wifi. Ordered separate radxa heatsink/fan, but will be interesting to see if I can run without the fan, and just the heatsink. Powered by at least a 25 watt RPI-5 usb-c (PD, or power-delivery) cube that can negotiate to 12 volts.
I can dongle the wifi anyway. Looks to be fun, since I'm not trying to make this a windows box with a lot of hardware upgrades. This is a 'natch for Porteus and family! We'll see, I'll let you all know when it actually gets here...
UPDATE: I got it, what a blast with Porteus and PorteuX !
Had to be careful with the thermal pad install with the heatsink. Don't forget to remove the clear plastic cover too! I wonder how many forget to take tweezers to remove (careful, don't tear it like I did) that before they screw it down?
Totally cool at idle and normal usage. Changed the fan temp control in bios (easy) to start up at a higher temp, rather than spinning all the time. (changed fan from default 10 to 48, and fan start from 40 to 55). Might remove fan altogether from heatsink, and attach a handful of smaller heatsinks with their own thermal pad... dunno.
Will pick up a CR1220 battery to actually save these values when I power down, along with date of course, but super easy control in bios and Porteus Control Centre to change the date that way.
New to USB-C power with "pd" or negotiated voltage switching. The 25 watt official RPI-5 power cube did fine, but now I know what to look for if I go higher power - as long as the manufacturer publishes their specs! I want to see 12 volts. I did test with a friends Anker usb-c PD cube, and it only spec'ed up to 11v, and the system ran fine, but it did seem to boot twice to get the negotiation right, or just give up and say ok to 11v.
Really snappy with Porteus of course! Fanless / mini pc's are a dime a dozen these days, and porteus made it totally fun, although if you have to buy all the stuff (board, power cube, heatsink etc), it isn't *that* cost efficient, but that's not why I got it.
The only thing missing seems to be HDMI audio (headphones work fine), but I'm not sure the board supports that! I'll have to check.
(update) Yep - it has HDMI audio. Just had to manually select it in the mixer.
Audio fidelity: (tip for hi-fi hobbiests) Great! Especially with sensitive IEM's. Many of my small computers chop the low end, or have funky spectral response. The X2L seems to have a full-spectrum, so really pleased. Purists of course will be bypassing all that with a usb-driven external DAC and headphone amp of their own, but that's a different forum.
