Computers Linux Reviews & Articles

There have been 267 Linux hardware reviews and benchmark articles on Phoronix for computers. Separately, check out our news section for related product news.

How time flies... This week already marks one year since the debut of AMD's Zen 5 Strix Point laptop processors with the likes of the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and Ryzen AI 9 365 that also rolled out the RDNA 3.5 integrated graphics. In marking one year that Strix Point laptops have been available, here is a performance benchmarking redux of the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 with the ASUS Zenbook S16 for looking at how the Linux performance at launch-day compares to a very leading-edge Linux software stack now one year later.

Last month the Framework Laptop 12 began shipping as an upgrade-friendly, convertible 2-in-1 laptop that is friendly with Linux as we've come to expect out of Framework Computer devices. The launch-day Linux testing at Phoronix of the Framework 12 was done out-of-the-box on Ubuntu Linux with the defaults on it and the other comparison laptops tested. But as we've shown with recent Intel and AMD laptops, ACPI Platform Profile adjustments can make a significant impact on bettering the performance or extending battery life with more power efficient operation. For those wondering about the impact of the platform profiles on Framework Laptop 12, here are some power and performance benchmarks.

Back in February the Framework Laptop 12 was announced as the company's first 2-in-1 convertible laptop while still being well-built and upgrade-friendly/modular as we have come to enjoy out of their various Linux-friendly laptops. Today the review embargo lifts on the Framework Laptop 12 and thus can share our initial impressions on this Intel-powered 12-inch laptop.

Last week alongside announcing the AMD Instinct MI350X/MI355X and the ROCm 7.0 software preview, AMD also introduced the AMD Developer Cloud as a new means for developers to easy try out Instinct accelerators with their own software and with the ROCm compute stack already setup. Having tried out prior AMD cloud compute environments, as soon as my email invite for the AMD Developer Cloud arrived I decided to give it a try.

Over the past month I have been testing out the HP ZBook Ultra G1a powered by AMD Ryzen AI Max+ PRO Strix Halo. Simply put: WOW! I don't remember the last time I have been so fascinated by a laptop SoC from its incredible performance generationally and even compared to existing AMD SoCs within the Ryzen AI 300 series and outright dominating against the Intel Lunar Lake for its Xe2 integrated graphics. The HP ZBook Ultra G1a thanks to AMD Strix Halo offers an incredibly potent integrated GPU and allowing up to 16 cores / 32 threads offers immense CPU performance too. HP packages Strix Halo up into a very well built, mobile workstation oriented laptop design to create an amazing laptop. It's a reliable laptop with captivating performance but does carry a high price tag but with good Linux support too except for one caveat.

In April we looked at the Framework 13 updated for the AMD Ryzen AI 300 series and its great out-of-the-box performance and nice power efficiency of Strix Point. Via ACPI platform profiles the power/performance mode can be tuned if desiring a longer battery life or preferring even greater performance. Today's article is looking at that power/performance impact of the different ACPI platform profiles available on the Framework 13 motherboard with the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370.

Last week I began posting Linux benchmarks of the flagship "Strix Halo" SoC, the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ PRO 395 with powerful Radeon 8060S graphics using the HP ZBook Ultra G1a laptop. Both the CPU and GPU results for the data published thus far have been mighty impressive and done at the Ubuntu Linux defaults... But the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 within the ZBook Ultra G1a can be pushed even further by leveraging the ACPI Platform Profiles capabilities. In this article is showing how much further performance -- and the power costs -- can be achieved out of this AMD Strix Halo SoC when leveraging the HP Power Profiles as well as the power efficiency for those wanting to run the SoC instead in the "power saver" / "low power" configuration.

As part of fresh re-testing of existing laptops on-hand given the recent release of Ubuntu 25.04 and then also recent Linux reviews of some interesting models like the Framework Laptop 13 with AMD Strix Point and the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 Aura Edition, I have been running a lot of Linux laptop benchmarks the past few weeks. I ended up taking things a bit further after those reviews and have now extended it to a 21-way laptop comparison of AMD Ryzen and Intel Core SoCs from the past few generations in looking at their performance on Ubuntu 25.04 across more than 200 benchmarks.

The Framework Laptop 13 with AMD Strix Point is now shipping that as detailed in our review earlier this month can provide for a very capable Linux laptop for Linux developers, creators, and enthusiasts. But for those hesitant about the high price and still weeks away before they have shipped all their pre-orders, if you are principally concerned about battery life, and/or after proven build quality backed by on-site warranty and other warranty/support options, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 Aura Edition ends up being a solid option for a very reliable and well-engineered laptop for Linux use. Here is a look at the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 Aura Edition on Linux that is powered by Intel Lunar Lake.

Earlier this month Canonical announced Ubuntu Linux support for the Orange Pi RV2 as a low-cost RISC-V developer board. The Orange Pi RV2 with eight RISC-V cores and 8GB of RAM costs just around $64 USD. The price point and specs were interesting that I ordered one and have been running performance benchmarks on it since for seeing how capable this is as finally an interesting, low-cost and readily available RISC-V board.

Today the review embargo lifts on the Framework 13 with AMD Ryzen AI 300 "Strix Point" SoCs: wow, what an upgrade! I've spent the past week testing out the Framework 13 with the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and it's been terrific. Framework 13's modularity continues to pay off and allows easily upgrading to the new Strix Point bearing motherboard with AMD Zen 5 CPU cores and the Radeon 890M (RDNA 3.5) integrated graphics. If you are on a fresh Linux distribution the support is in great shape and paired with great performance for delivering a great 2025 Linux laptop option.

For those that are curious about the Linux support and performance of the AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 360 laptop processor, I've recently been testing it out within a Lenovo ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 (AMD) laptop. Up today are benchmarks of the Ryzen AI 7 PRO 360 within the ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 up against an assortment of other recent Intel and AMD laptops all while running the near-final state of Ubuntu 25.04.

SiFive recently sent over a review sample of the much anticipated HiFive Premier P550 developer board, their newest RISC-V creation featuring four RISC-V cores, Imagination AXM-8-256 integrated GPU, Gigabit Ethernet, PCIe x16 slot, and 16GB or 32GB of RAM. The HiFive Premier P550 is a modern RISC-V developer board capable of desktop uses, developer build boxes, and similar with pricing starting out at $399 USD. Here is a look at the SiFive HiFive Premier P550 as well as comparison benchmarks of this RISC-V board to the popular Raspberry Pi single board computers.

Earlier this month the Raspberry Pi 5 16GB was announced for finally pushing the Raspberry Pi single board computers beyond an 8GB limit for RAM. This opens up the Raspberry Pi 5 to new use-cases, more multi-tasking, and other applications where 8GB of RAM / 2GB per core was a bottleneck. In my tests thus far of the Raspberry Pi 5 16GB it's been working out well and helping the performance of some workloads by reducing the memory pressure / swapping.

Four years ago already the Raspberry Pi 400 was announced as a Raspberry Pi keyboard computer built around the Raspberry Pi 4, passively-cooled, and all packaged up nicely in a keyboard form factor. Announced earlier this month was the Raspberry Pi 500 as the successor and now built around the Raspberry Pi 5. For $90 USD this keyboard computer is a very versatile and convenient compact Linux PC.

Apple last week released their latest iMac, Mac Mini, and MacBook Pro products powered by their fourth-generation M-series Apple Silicon. The new Mac Mini in particular is interesting for under $600 starting out with the all re-designed Mac Mini with 10-core M4 and now the base model having 16GB of memory. It will take some time before there is any reasonable Linux support on the M4 hardware with Asahi Linux, but for those curious about how the M4 Mac Mini with macOS compares to AMD Ryzen and Intel Core CPUs under Linux, here are some preliminary benchmarks.

System76 is announcing one of their most innovative and interesting products going back to their Launch Configurable Keyboard and HP Dev One collaboration: the System76 Thelio Astra. The Thelio Astra is a high-end ARM64 desktop system geared for developers with a focus on AI / STEM / self-driving technologies and powered by Ampere Computing and NVIDIA.

On Sunday there was a new patch posted by an Intel Linux engineer to boost the Lunar Lake Linux performance out-of-the-box for ASUS laptops by adjusting the new ASUS Intelligent Performance Technology "AIPT" feature so that Linux follows the same behavior as Windows 11. My initial testing of this ASUS AIPT patch has indeed shown the Core Ultra 7 256V "Lunar Lake" yielding much better performance with this patch applied.

For those that have been eager to see more Intel Core Ultra Series 200V Lunar Lake Linux testing, here is the latest installment of testing as well as an update from Intel following my Lunar Lake Linux testing recent reports. Today's article is looking at Intel Lunar Lake versus AMD Strix Point across different ACPI Platform Profile configurations for whether you are after peak performance or the most power savings.

As part of a busy day in the CPU world, Intel has lifted the embargo on the Core Ultra 200S "Arrow Lake" desktop processors. This isn't the review embargo but just an overview on this new generation succeeding 14th Gen "Raptor Lake Refresh" on the desktop.

For those wondering about the performance of the NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada Generation workstation performance on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS with the up-to-date NVIDIA Linux graphics drivers now relying on the open-source kernel modules, this article is for you in looking at the performance of this high-end workstation graphics card on the up-to-date Linux software stack. The NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada Generation is tested alongside the RTX 2000 / 4000 Ada Generation graphics cards and also the AMD Radeon PRO W7000 series competition atop Ubuntu 24.04 LTS.

While AMD Ryzen AI 300 series laptops have begun appearing with Zen 5 CPU cores, to date the launched laptops have revolved around having either the integrated Radeon 890M RDNA3.5 graphics and/or NVIDIA GeForce discrete graphics. For those wanting a Linux-friendly laptop with Radeon discrete graphics for more gaming and GPU/compute potential, that still leaves the still very powerful Zen 4 laptop options. Bavarian Linux PC vendor TUXEDO Computers recently launched the Sirius 16 Gen 2 as a nice workstation/gaming laptop featuring the Ryzen 7 8845HS with Radeon RX 7600M XT discrete graphics.

Back in May the folks at Framework Computer announced Framework Laptop 13 support for the Intel Core Ultra Series 1 (Meteor Lake) alongside announcing a new 2.8K 120Hz display option, a new web camera upgrade, and new colors for their expansion cards. Today marks the review embargo expiration with the hardware now shipping. Here's my initial look at the Intel Core Ultra Series (Meteor Lake) within the confines of the modular and upgradeable Framework Laptop 13.

Like most modern Intel and AMD laptops, the new ASUS Zenbook S 16 models for the AMD Ryzen AI 300 series "Strix Point" support ACPI Platform Profiles for allowing the system platform behavior to be modified depending upon whether you are seeking maximum performance, balanced (default), or power savings/efficiency. With the Ryzen AI 9 365 and Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 testing I have been doing thus far it's been on the default balanced mode (along with other laptops being compared) while in this article is a look at the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 performance impact on the ASUS Zenbook S 16 UM5606WA when trying the other platform profile options.

In part for preparing for upcoming Linux testing of AMD Ryzen AI 300 series laptops, I've been re-benchmarking various Intel/AMD laptops around the lab at Phoronix. In today's article is a fresh look at how the existing AMD Zen 4 laptop performance in the form of the popular Framework 13 and Framework 16 laptops is competing with the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H "Meteor Lake" SoC while using Ubuntu 24.04 LTS and upgrading to the latest Linux 6.10 development kernel as well as the newest Mesa open-source graphics driver support.

For those considering an Intel Core Ultra 7 165U "Meteor Lake" powered laptop, here are some benchmarks of the 165U using a Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 5 compared against the Acer Swift 14 with the Core Ultra 7 155H (Meteor Lake), the AMD Ryzen 7 7840U (Zen 4) within the Framework 13, and the AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS (Zen 4) within the Framework 16 under Linux.

The past two months I've been testing out the TUXEDO Pulse 14 Gen 3 laptop as a new AMD Ryzen laptop from this Bavarian Linux PC retailer. It's been working out very well under Linux (as would be expected of TUXEDO Computers) and quite adaptable for power and performance. For those needing a capable Linux laptop the TUXEDO Pulse 14 Gen 3 has proven quite stable and reliable under both their in-house TUXEDO OS distribution as well as Ubuntu Linux.

Earlier this month I posted some initial CPU benchmarks of the NVIDIA GH200 Grace Hopper up against AMD EPYC Zen 4 and Intel Xeon Emerald Rapids processors. That was a very interesting battle and showed the interesting capabilities of the 72 Arm Neoverse-V2 cores. With this GPTshop.ai GH200 system actually being in workstation form, I also ran some additional benchmarks looking at the CPU capabilities of the GH200 compared to AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7000 series workstations.

As an important notice to those with new TUXEDO laptops such as the TUXEDO Pulse 14 Gen 3 powered by the Ryzen 7 7840HS, installing their DKMS-based driver package can be very important if aiming to achieve maximum performance.

With Ryzen AI found in the very newest Ryzen processors, AMD began making use of IP from their acquisition of Xilinx. Today though AMD is announcing their Embedded+ Architecture that is taking the marriage of AMD and Xilinx tech much further by combining the wares onto a single PCB for new embedded applications as an integrated compute platform.