Beelink AP4. 2 Apollo Lake mini PC Linux Review with Ubuntu, KDE Neon, Elementary OS. Home. Hardware, Intel Pentium, Linux, Linux 4. Testing, Ubuntu, Windows 1. Beelink AP4. 2 Apollo Lake mini PC Linux Review with Ubuntu, KDE Neon, Elementary OS. Beelinks latest Intel mini PC offerings includes the AP3. AP4. 2 which are their first models using Intel Apollo Lake processors. The former uses an Intel Apollo Lake Celeron N3. Solution Authentication Problem During Kali Linux Start Up. Sometimes after successful installation of Kali Linux many users fails to login into Kali first time. Those instructions have helped people install Ubuntu since 12. Ubuntu 14. 04 and many Windows users upgrading to Windows 8. Selection_030.png' alt='How To Reinstall Grub2 After Windows' title='How To Reinstall Grub2 After Windows' />GHz, Intel HD Graphics 5. Graphics Burst Frequency 7. MHz and 1. 2 Execution Units while the latter uses the slightly more powerful Pentium N4. GHz, Intel HD Graphics 5. Graphics Burst Frequency 7. MHz and 1. 8 Execution Units. Both support Windows 1. Home and Beelinks marketing claim they support Linux system. Gear. Best has given me the chance to review running Linux on the AP4. Spot the difference Normally I first make a disk image before booting Windows or installing Linux. However initial attempts at booting a Live USB with a variety of Linux systems failed so both the reseller and manufacturer were contacted for comment. Interestingly there was no immediate reply but early indications that something was amiss was when the resellers advert right changed compared with the manufacturers advert left. Selection_029.png' alt='How To Reinstall Grub2 After Windows' title='How To Reinstall Grub2 After Windows' />This article explains, how to rescue, repair or reinstall a damaged Ubuntu machine which cannot be booted due to the Grub2 boot loader has been compromised. As Id previously had a comment on my website about using r. EFInd boot manager when a system wouldnt boot I gave it a try by manually building an Ubuntu Live USB which successfully booted. Unfortunately the ISO I had used was Ubuntu 1. USB drive, it couldnt see the e. MMC of the AP4. 2. Antivirus Tools Avira AntiVir Personal 07022011 Free antivirus and antispyware ondemand scanner, detects and removes more than 50000 viruses Windows. Hi Im running Windows 8. Pro went from Win7 to Win8 Pro to Win8. Arch linux, using Grub2 as bootloader. Im running in legacy mode tho my PC supports. Further experimentation with Ubuntu 1. Beta 2 and a variety of kernels showed that a minimum 4. MMC. Anyone wanting to boot an Ubuntu ISO can either manually add the r. RFInd boot manager, or use the latest version of isorespin. ISO with the r. RFInd boot manager and optionally update the kernel. Then having taken a disk image I booted Windows only to find that Windows was already set up with an Admin account. Which of course gave me the opportunity to test a full Windows restore that fortunately worked. Click to Enlarge. So with a nice clean and activated Windows system and 2. I was able to run my usual Windows tests to given me a basic comparison with other Intel devices. Click to Enlarge. Click to Enlarge. Click to Enlarge. Click to Enlarge. As can be seen there is a performance increment over Cherry Trail devices including better graphics performance and the new Apollo Lake Pentium N4. Celeron N3. 15. 0 processor. Click to EnlargeBeing a passively cooled device I was interested to see whether temperature was an issue. I ran HWi. NFO6. 4s Sensor Status utility before and after each test and rather unscientifically held the box to see how hot it was. Neither indicated that I had any reason to be concerned as whilst the box felt warm the temperature maxed out at around 7. C and no thermal throttling was encountered. Click to Enlarge. Having put the device through its paces under Windows, it was time to look at Linux performance. For a comparison I was going to use the results from my Phoronix mini PC test suite run on Intel Compute Sticks. However I initially had problems getting the unpack linux test to install so I decided to download the latest version directly from www. And because comparing results across different versions of test software and different releases of OS is often meaningless I first had to reinstall Ubuntu 1. For those not familiar with the model names they decode as STCK1. A3. 2WFC is the Intel Compute Stick Falls City, STK1. AW3. 2SC is the Intel Compute Stick Sterling City and STKM3. W6. 4CC is the Intel Compute Stick Cedar City with the specs listed in the above table. Unfortunately with the Phoronix Test Suite some tests give decidedly strange and confusing results even those they are the average of three runs. However, as per the Windows results there is a noticeable improvement as the power of the processor increases and the AP4. Click to Enlarge. I also ran the Octane 2 on Chrome which was also comparable with the Windows result albeit slightly lower which in iteself was slightly unusual given it is typically slightly higher in Ubuntu than with Windows normally. Interestingly Octane 2 has now been retired as it seems too many programs were cheating their scores all too familiar. Click to Enlarge. In terms of what works under Ubuntu it was nice to find that all the usual problem areas were fine, with working audio, Wi. Fi, Bluetooth and SD cards including Sandisk. I did encounter a problem with HDMI audio in that you must first select the audio device under Sound Settings before it works. And in Lubuntu this was impossible to do as only Headphones showed up until I plugged in some external speakers into the headphone jack and then after unplugging them the HDMI output option then appeared. But otherwise the device ran smoothly on Ubuntu. Some specifics about the hardware. Click to Enlarge. The memory is single channel and is 2x 2. GB DDR3 1. 60. 0 MHzClick to Enlarge and the e. MMC storage is CJNB4. R which is a Samsung 6. GB storage chipClick to Enlarge with Wi. FiBluetooth provided by an Intel Dual Band Wireless AC 3. Bluetooth 4. 2 as reported by inxi. Click to Enlarge. Given the kernel limitation, I found running other Linuxes rather limiting. I did get Open. ELEC to successfully boot and run from USB but installing would be an issue. I also tried Android x. Chromium OS loaders but they were also impacted and not usable. My initial Remix attempts were unsuccessful and Phoenix took too long to download to be worth waiting for another failure. Other Ubuntu based distro ISOs worked as long as they were respun with a later kernel I tested Linux. Mint, Neon and Elementary with the latest v. The only other Linux distro I tried was Debian but this was also unsuccessful due to the kernel issue, however other distros with rolling releases like Tumbleweed and Arch should be okay. Linux Mint Click to Enlarge. KDE Neon Click to Enlarge. Elementary Linux Click to Enlarge. In terms of support Beelink are somewhat lacking. Despite having released the device for nearly a month, there are still no download links for BIOS or Windows drivers. They have just added a download for the entire Windows OS, but have failed to create a forum for AP4. For the Linux issue, they did eventually respond with Sorry for that we dont allow the right of Linux now which is a somewhat unexpected response given their advert. So for a new device running Linux it is arguably hit and miss. Depending on what you want to run will rule out the device completely at this stage and if you are looking for flexibility it may also be too restrictive. It may be that a BIOS update addresses the current Linux limitations, but equally given Beelinks response it could restrict Linux even further. The price is also somewhat questionable given it has a range from US1. US2. 70 which is the current price on Amazon. In comparison a barebones Zotac ZBOX CI3. Celeron N3. 15. 0 is currently US 1. Newegg and a barebones Intel NUC NUC6. CAYS with Celeron J3. US 1. 49 on Amazon so the value for money given the level of support and current Linux restrictions is worth considering before purchasing. Gear. Best who sent Beelink AP4. PC for review somewhat sweetens the deal, as they sell it for 1. GBAP4. 2. Beside Amazon and Gear. Best, you can also purchase the mini PC on sites like Aliexpress and Banggood for 1. Guide. Table of content What does multibootusb do Minimum Requirements. Install Multi. Boot. USB Windows and Linux. Creating live linux on USB disk. Adding newadditional live Linux. Adding Persistence file. Removing or Uninstalling a distro. Write ISO image directly to USB disk. Reinstalling Syslinux. Edit Syslinux config files. Test ISO and USB with QEMU option. Using mltibootusb command line options. What if something goes wrong What does multibootusb doMulti. Boot. USB allows you to do the following Install multiple live Linux distros and other operating systems to a USB disk and make it bootable without erasing existing data. Uninstall installed OSes later. Write ISO images directly to a USB disk GUI for Linux dd command. Boot ISO images and USB disks directly without rebooting your system using QEMU. Boot USB on UEFIEFI systems through GRUB2 bootloader support limited support. Requirements Formatted USB disk. FAT3. 2, NTFS, ext. Btrfs filesystem. However, FAT filesystem is recommended and ext. Btrfs filesystems will only work under Linux. Keep single partition primary to avoid later problems. ISO file of live Linux distro of your choice. Latest release of Multi. Boot. USB. Installation On Windows. The windows version of multbootusb is not a standalone program. You need to install it after download. Download the latest. The installation is fairly simple. Double click on the executable and follow the on screen instructions. On Linux Pre packaged Packages for various distros available hereor from source code The install. Assuming that you have downloaded the archive named multibootusb. Creating live Linux on USB disk Adding additional live Linux distros You can follow Step 1, Step 2 and Step 3 mentioned above for adding a new distro agan. Adding persistence file Only distros based on Ubuntu, Fedora and Debain are supported. Once you complete the step 2 Choose an ISO, multibootusb will detect the type of. Multi. Boot. USB tab. The maximum size of the persistence also automatically calculated according to the USB disk filesystem. Choose the desired persistence size by dragging the slider to right and follow the Step 3 as usual. Once distro installes successfully, you will find the additional persistence file under distro install directory. Reboot your system to choose your favourite distro as persistence menu will be added automatically to menu entry. Note Few users have reported that Debian persistence option doesnt work properly. Removinguninstalling distro You can only uninstall distros installed by multibootusb. Select disto from the list and click Uninstall Distro. You will be notified after successful uninstallation. Writing ISO directly to USB disk Be warned that this method will destroy all data on target USB disk. ISO file directly to an USB disk. You can choose this option if any of the above method fails to create live usb disk. You can think of this method as a GUI to the famous dd program under Linux. In fact, it actually uses dd. To write to USB disk, you need to choose, the USB disk, ISO image and click on the. Write image to disk push button available under Write image to disk tab. A review window will appear for confirmation and select yes to proceed. Once selected, ISO writing will start and progress will be indicated in progressbar. Please note that you need to select the whole disk devsdb and not he device partition devsdb. You need to format the USB disk if you have to revert back to original state and start using nondestructive method. Reinstalling Syslinux There may be a situation when you want to install syslinux for various reasons e. In such cases situation you can reinstall syslinux from the Install syslinux tab. First, choose an USB disk partition eg. Benefits Of The Barbell Hack Squat History. G, then choose method and click Install. This will install syslinux in the multibootusb directory on the selected USB partition. Edit Syslinux config files Please perform this action with caution. Any change in the path will make your distro install completely useless. View and edit syslinux. Install syslinux tab. This action will open syslinux. Test your ISO and USB with QEMU option Test your downloaded ISOs and USB disks without rebooting your system. QEMU binaries are shipped with Windows setup file by default. For Linux you need to install qemu package to enable this feature. Booting ISOGo to Boot ISOUSB Browse ISO Choose RAM size Click on Boot ISO. Your ISO will boot in a separate window. Maximum RAM size is currently limited to 2. GB. Booting USBGo to Boot ISOUSB Select USB Disk Choose RAM size Click on Boot USB. Your USB disk listed in the combobox will boot in a separate window. Linux You must select the whole disk e. NOT the device partition e. Using mltibootusb command line options. You can invoke command line options using multibootusb c. Windows users must use source code to avail this option. Here is the text retrieved using multibootusb c h command and. An advanced multiboot live usb creator which can be used from the command line. Usage python. 3 multibootusb options. Print this help message and exit c or command Invoke command line usage. This option is required if omitted, the GUI will be launched. Path to ISO files. If many ISOs are supplied. Path to target USB device partition e. Default yes for user input during install. Will not wait for user. List and uninstall distro from an USB disk. Enable debug messages very verboseExample for making a bootable USB from the command line Linux. G. Example for uninstalling a distro from a USB Linux. G. Example for installing multiple distros without user intervention Linux. G. What if something goes wrong Check if your issue is addressed in the Frequently Asked Section FAQ here. If not raise an issue at Github Issue Tracker.