The SolidRun CuBox-i seems almost stubborn. On a desk, it sits or almost disappears because it’s only two inches across and weighs less than a coffee mug. But it runs a full desktop Linux environment without any problems. The first time you hold one, you might not give it enough credit. It turns out that instinct is wrong.
The first CuBox came out in December 2011 from the Israeli hardware company SolidRun. A few weeks later, it started shipping. At first, it was marketed as an open-source platform for developers working on embedded systems. Not exactly a product that wants to be popular. But there was something about the idea that kept people interested: serious computing didn’t have to be big, loud, or waste electricity.
Freescale Semiconductor’s i.MX6 processors were added to the picture when the CuBox-i line came out in November 2013. All of a sudden, the platform felt strong. For $169.99, the top-of-the-line CuBox-i 4X4 had a quad-core i.MX6 SoC, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, Bluetooth 4.0, WiFi, Gigabit Ethernet, eSATA, optical audio output, and an infrared receiver and transmitter. Such a long list for something the size of a Rubik’s Cube takes a moment to fully understand.
The specs sheet isn’t the only thing that makes the CuBox-i interesting. That’s what those specs mean when they’re used. Full HD video decoding at over 100 Mbps bit rate is possible with the 4X4. It can also encode full HD streams. It’s surprisingly smooth to run Kodi on, which is something a lot of people do. Android does work. Debian does work. Yocto does work. Rabeeh Khoury, SolidRun’s CTO, made it clear when the 4X4 came out: the hardware wasn’t just made to check technical boxes; it was made to give developers and makers more functionality.
The CuBox-i doesn’t have a fan, which is something to keep in mind. The whole platform doesn’t have any fans and uses less than three watts of power when it’s working and less than one watt when it’s not. Sometimes the silence is nice after being around desktop computers that buzz and hum all day. There is a discipline in engineering that makes sure nothing is wasted or done twice.
The Marvell Armada 510 SoC was used in the first CuBox, which came before the i-series. It is said to have been the first commercially available desktop computer with that chip. SolidRun has always seemed happy to work in that slightly less-known part of the market—the first-mover territory that bigger companies ignore until it’s no longer hidden. It’s hard to say if that positioning was strategic or just a sign of the company’s focus on engineering. Most likely both.
Later, SolidRun added the Hummingboard, an i.MX6 variant without a case, and the CuBoxTV, a simplified version for media playback that was announced in late 2014 and is based on Kodi and runs on OpenELEC. The CuBoxTV gave up some raw flexibility in exchange for a better media experience right out of the box. It was made for a different type of user who wanted a small machine for the living room rather than a developer board.
It is still not clear if products like the CuBox-i will ever become popular enough to reach people who aren’t fans in a big way. It takes some time to set up, and not everyone likes the Linux-first experience. But for this price, it’s hard to find a more honest piece of hardware for the right person—a developer, a maker, or someone making their own home server or media center. It’s small, quiet, and strong. There are times when that’s enough.
