New Raspberry Pi CM5-compatible fanless mini PC case released with affordable price tag, dual Ethernet

Waveshare has introduced a CM5-based mini PC, dubbed the CM5-DUAL-ETH-BOX-B. Uninspiring naming aside, the product packs a compact case fitted with a carrier board, which is where the customer is expected to snap on their Raspberry Pi CM5 compute module.

At just 101 x 62 x 23.4 mm or around 4 x 2.4 x 0.9 inches, the Waveshare CM5 BOX is impressively compact, which is hardly a surprise considering just how compact the CM5 itself is. Like any I/O carrier board, this grants a Raspberry Pi CM5 a surfeit of input and output options. The details list can be found below:

• USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A, USB 2.0 Type-A
• USB 2.0 Type-C
• Dual 4-lane MIPI
• M.2 M-key, TF card socket
• HDMI
• Dual Ethernet (1G, 2.5G)

There is no wireless networking support, which should not be that big of an issue considering that many CM5 boards are available with built-in wireless. Moreover, the entire system has been designed for fanless operation, which is also quite common for such low-power systems.

Courtesy of the video output, the CM5-powered BOX can be used as a normal mini PC for lightweight tasks. The quad-core CPU with Cortex A76 cores is obviously far from a powerhouse, but should still be able to pull off respectable performance in day-to-day tasks. In Geekbench 6, for instance, performance comes close to older dual-core Intel CPUs from the Skylake and Kaby Lake generations.

The Waveshare CM5-DUAL-ETH-BOX-B is already available for purchase, priced at just under $100. As mentioned earlier, customers will have to supply their own CM5 module.