Review Kodlix GN41 Fanless MIN PC

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Data Consistency in Distributed System - CAP, PACELC

Morality series - a heptalogy

This blog is mainly focused on my Philosophical and theoretical ideas.

From time to time I have practical posts that are too few to deserve a blog by themselves. I still hope my other work (like above) is even more valuable than such practical article as below.

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Update 2020: My Kodlix died. I am highly disappointed. There was a long time from when I've seen a PC dying before it's moral obsoletion. This one does not show any light anymore, while the power source seems ok.

Review Kodlix GN41 Fanless MIN PC, 8G DDR4 64G eMMC, Intel Celeron N4100 up to 2.4Ghz/ 4K@60Hz UHD/Support SSD&HDD/ 2.4G+5.8G WiFi/ 1000M LAN/VGA&HDMI Outputs

 On short: good performance for a fanless configuration,  plays up to 4K video: 8GB RAM, Win10 included, with the possibility to add a SATA HDD (like 2TB). It has 1Gbps ethernet, it can make a  NAS or Media Server/Player. However, HDD bay is not very well ventilated and the case is a bit bigger than I expected.



Pros:
- fully fanless - except if you add a spinning hard drive ;)
- 8GB DRAM
- recent CPU generation (Gemini Lake)
- Intel® UHD Graphics 600 - plays 4K video
- Win10/Home pre-installed on 64GB eMMC allows for update without additional storage
- The mainboard seems relatively well ventilated, as it has a lot of holes in the plastic
- Multiple USB 3.0, even one USB-C
- HDMI and VGA
- Nice look
- You can also use it wireless, 5Ghz included
- The blue light is discrete enough
- Good price for the specifications

Cons:
- It is way bigger than the reference NUC from Intel
- The HDD bay is not very well ventilated and the hard drive kind of dangles if you don't add additional sponge yourself
- The eMMC is rather lazy, especially at boot time

Conclusion: a nice choice for a fanless desktop without too much performance requirements. You can also use it for NAS of Media Server/Player. Do not expect it to play demanding 3D games: Minecraft works well, Fortnite did not, at least for me. I just hope that the added spinning hard drive will not overheat too much.


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Comments

teleosus said…
Having just bought one, my first thought is to change out the probable thermal pad(s) for quality thermal paste... then add a quality slim type case fan above the Aluminum heat sink,
(Noctua NF-A12x15 PWM). There appears in an image I have seen, a small unused 4 pin connector near the power switch. Possibly a fan connection but since there is little to no specific data on the motherboard itself, it's just a hopeful guess. Upper left corner -(Fair Review Page) http://tvboxstop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/IMG_20190221_195929_HDR-1600x1200.png
24/2/19 21:10
Jack said…
" then add a quality slim type case fan"
Wouldn't that defeat the whole purpose of a "fanless PC."

These things are $200. It would be foolish to expect much beyond media playback. I bought 8 of these for digital signage endpoints, and they work superbly for that.
28/2/19 21:27
Teleosus said…
Had the unit for 3 days now, my thoughts: 1) Was new, still in labeled shrinkwrap 2)Windows was already activated, no user account though, as if Win 10 was reset. I reset again, because I want a clean machine, it was then not activated, but as soon as I went on network , it became activated again. 3) Even though it was reset, all windows drivers all worked fine, i.e. no need for driver installs (but may need updates). 4) I did not see any unusual quality issues considering the low cost of the machine. The usb’s are upside down i.e. as if the unit is “upside down” (“no big deal”) 5) It ran rather hot at idle 0%, per cpu temp gauge, ~53c… at 100% load (CPUZ stress test), 2300mhz – reached 75c in about 5 seconds and throttled down to ~52c — stayed at ~1400mhz. This even though the supplied heatsink never seemed to get very warm. 6) Took unit apart, found board to be some revision i.e. not the same as unit motherboard photos I’ve seen… has labels on many of the pinouts 🙂 7) Removed heatsink, found over 2mm thick of claylike thermal compound between cpu and heatsink (and some other unknown chip) 🙁 (!Not conducive to heat transfer!). 8) Lightly reamed 3 mounting screw holes to allow slight lower mounting height. 9) Made 1.5 mm aluminum spacers from old cpu heatsink fins, used quality thermal paste (did not use original clay), remounted. 10) Tested unit again. Idles at 35c, 100% load at ~60c 🙂 11) Installed 120 mm Noctua low profile 12v case fan on top, found case fan 4 pin jack location near power switch( but no jack installed or circuitry… it seems but there is 5v and gnd) It runs at minimum rpm at five volts, good and quiet adequacy. It also shuts down the fan when unit goes into sleep mode 🙂 12) Unit now idles at ~32c, — at 100% load ~ 40 🙂 🙂 In conclusion, it seems a good unit, especially since I have modified the cooling. It is too bad that was not done at the source/factory.
28/2/19 23:27
Unknown said…
You have pics for fan modding?i Need to install a fan in gn41 thanks
3/5/19 10:29
Unknown said…
watching a YouTube video the cpu is 93C for kernel 4.15 no throttle. With kernel 5.0 throttles and stumbles at 79C.
Going to try to fix heat problem as described above.
20/8/19 07:51
Stuza said…
I plan to put an m.2 in this. Is it possible to install Windows on that and get it to boot from that instead of the eMMC?
1/3/20 18:53
Mihvoi said…
@Stuza: did not tried the M.2/HDD boot.

I use eMMC and it's ok for, however you may encounter issues on some special software. For example Fortnite silently crashes on install. I guess it would be too slow anyway. It works fine for Minecraft, vlc/1080p.

I don't recommend HDD. My HDD crashed in Kodlix after around 1 year, probably because it is not correctly cooled. Not sure about M2.
4/3/20 00:01
Steveo said…
Yes is possible to install windows on to M.2 SATA, and bootable from it
29/3/20 04:30
Mihvoi said…
My Kodlix died. I am highly disappointed.

There was a long time from when I've seen a PC dying before it's moral obsolition. This one does not show any light anymore, while the power source seems ok.
29/3/20 17:08
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