MNT Reform 2 upgrade
====================

As I  mentioned before I  have got final delivery  of new parts  for my
"big" MNT  Reform 2 laptop. I  have upgraded the smaller  Pocket Reform
previously so I thing I should summarize all these things.

The MNT  Pocket reform: I described  the changes in my  previous posts.
Basically, I have replaced the  CPU board, the charging/audio board and
the WiFi  card. I also  have tried to replace  the batteries but  I did
something wrong here. SO I'm now running the old batteries with smaller
capacity. So far the device behaves better - much lower discharge rates
when off,  lower CPU/chipset  temperatures (under  60C,; if  woas often
over 70C with the older CPU) and  it also seems that the WiFi reception
is MUCH better now.

Now the "big" machine: I already replaced the CPU with the RockChip one
some time ago.  So the machine has  a better (and cooler)  CPU and also
16GB of RAM (the same as the  Pocket has now) with no measurable change
of battery life (4~5 hours).

The  current changes  were  the new  trackball (I  have  had the  first
version installed - it has no rollers  and it easily get dirty and thus
non-working). I hoped taht the new  on will be also quieter (because of
limited plastic-to-plastic friction) but  there is no measurable change
in noise level. It works better anyway).

The  main  change  was  the  new  (V3)  mainboard.  There  are  several
improvements over  my V1 one  but the biggest  change is the  new USB-C
port for  charging. The previous  solution used a massive  brick shaped
charger  with  barrel  jack.  It  was  robust  and  working  but  quite
impractical  for travelling  - the  charger was  useless for  any other
device  and it  was quite  big and  heavy (and  it also  was relatively
expensive), Now I  can use the same  USB3 charges as I  have been using
for the smaller Pocket Reform and for my phone.

The  other thing  is the  prospect of  auto-detection of  audio headset
insertion. This does not work with the current software - maybe if will
be fixed at some point. I still have to change audio outputs "by hand".

There is  also a new  port for  the WiFi/BT card  (and a new  card). It
seems that WiFi reception is better than before but I have to test this
feature more.

The device runs cooler than previously  and the battery life is less or
more the same.

If  I summarise  the  changes:  now I  have  two  devices with  similar
computing  power and  features. The  difference is  that one  has 12.5"
screen  and  big,  comfortable,  keyboard (with  maybe  a  bit  unusual
layout).  The  smaller one  has  8"  (or  so)  screen, a  smaller  (and
orthogonal) keyboard and  is a bit lighter and the  device is much more
portable (~A5 size).

Interestingly, for some kinds of computing the "bigger" reform is up to
2x  faster than  the "small"  one.  Even if  the  CPU and  the RAM  has
identical specifications. I will need to investigate this more.

The only problem for now is that the integrated GPU on both machines is
OpenGL  ES (or  whatever the  OpenGL  for is  calles) and  this is  not
sufficient for some apps like the latest versions of the Prusa Slicer.
But this is something I can live without.