Posted in Products with tags Sharp on March 18, 2026 by itnerd
This is the second of two Sharp Dynabook laptops that I am reviewing this week. You can read about the firstSharp Dynabook that I reviewed here. And that was a light and reasonably quick laptop. Today I have something that is lighter than that one and faster in a lot of ways. It’s the Portege Z40L-N and it clocks in at a mere 2.11 pounds which is insanely light. In fact, if I needed a notebook to carry on the daily, this would likely be my choice.
But just because it’s light doesn’t mean that you give up anything. I’m going to start with performance based on the following specs:
Intel Core Ultra 7 Processor 258V
Windows 11 Pro
14.0″ diagonal widescreen
32 GB RAM
512 GB PCIe NVMe SSD
Fingerprint reader
2 x USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 ports
Intel ARC Graphics
WiFi 7, Bluetooth, Ethernet
56 W battery
First let’s start with the CPU and GPU performance. I did my testing using Geekbench 6 and I did one test on battery and one test on AC power as PC laptops can have radically different results in each scenario. Here’s the results:
On battery:
Single Core: 2144
Multi Core: 9292
GPU (OpenCL): 26777
And here’s the results while on AC Power:
Single Core: 2544
Multi Core: 9784
GPU (OpenCL): 24840
To put that in perspective, my M1 Pro MacBook Pro hit these numbers (both on battery and on AC power) for the CPU:
Single Core: 1762
Multi Core: 12431
So despite being a small and thin laptop, it put out pretty impressive numbers. And I had to run the GPU test three times to validate the numbers as it was odd that it had a higher score on battery versus on AC power. But the results came out the same every time so I have to assume that this is a legitimate score.
Now onto the disk test. Here’s the results on both AC and battery power:
Read: 3420.61 MB/s
Write: 2319.43 MB/s
So it’s not the fastest SSD around as my MacBook Pro posted up a score of over 5000 MB/s in both read and write tests. But it’s far from slow.
You also aren’t giving up anything in terms of ports:
The screen itself is very bright and vibrant. Though it does have issues with really bright reflections such as a camera flash. I won’t hold that against Sharp. The keyboard has a nice typing feel to it as well. I wasn’t a fan of the trackpad as using a MacBook Pro as my daily driver, I found getting used to a mechanical trackpad to be a problem as it is a mechanical diving board trackpad. But that’s a me problem. I am pretty sure it will not be a you problem.
On the left side, you get a USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 port for power and data, an HDMI port, a USB-A port, a headphone jack, and a microSD slot.
On the right side you get a USB-A port, a USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 port and an Ethernet jack along with an Kensington lock slot.
In short, This notebook is fully featured and missing nothing. Except maybe for battery life. It’s rated for “up to” 8 hours. I barely got past 5 hours. Your mileage may vary on that front. But given the overall package that’s on offer here, I will give Sharp a free pass on that one. You can pick one up for about $2600. And in my opinion, if you want a light laptop that doesn’t force you to give up on speed or connectivity, it would be money well spent.
Posted in Products with tags Sharp on March 16, 2026 by itnerd
Last week I got the chance to review not one, but two laptops from Sharp’s laptop division Dynabook. The first of these two laptops is the Tecra A40-M laptop. The specific variant that I have comes with these specs:
Intel Core Ultra 7 Processor 255U
Windows 11 Pro
14″ diagonal widescreen that is also a touchscreen
16 GB DDR5 5600
512 GB PCIe NVMe SSD
Fingerprint Reader
Thunderbolt 4
60Wh battery to give you up to 8 hours of battery life
Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2
Intel ARC Graphics
Weighs 3.18 pounds
These seem like decent specs on paper. And they are as I will highlight in a moment. But what got my attention is the build quality. This laptop felt really solid because of the fact that it is built to MIL STD 810-H. Every part of the laptop that I touched felt like it could take a beating if required. I point that out because a lot of PC laptops that I pick up do not come even close to feeling that way. In fact some laptops from some big name companies feel flimsy at times. Thus I am often concerned about how long they would last during a trip or the like. I would have none of those concerns if I was carrying this laptop.
Speaking of the laptop, you haven’t seen it yet. Here’s a few pictures:
The one thing that stands out to me is this 14″ screen. It’s sharp and clear. The other thing that stands out is the keyboard. I liked the typing feel and touch typists will really love it. I was not as enamoured with the track pad. But that’s like a “me” problem as I am used to Mac trackpads which are not diving board designs like this one. Thus the clicks on those feel consistent unlike this one. Die hard Windows users however will not care because they are used to this sort of feel.
On the left side of the laptop is the Kensington lock slot, a power connector (why isn’t it USB-C/Thunderbolt 4 to make life easier for users who want to go USB-C all the things including chargers), a HDMI port, two USB-C/Thunderbolt 4 ports and a headphone jack.
On the right is an Ethernet jack, USB-A port and an micro SD card slot.
What I was really interested in is how fast is this laptop. To find out I ran Geekbench 6 on it. Now synthetic benchmarks aren’t a definitive measure of how fast a computer is because how fast a computer is or isn’t is dependent on your use case. Having said that, it will give you a pretty good idea of what you can expect. I did two runs of the GPU and CPU tests. Once on power and once on battery as PC laptops perform worse when on battery to save battery. Here’s what I got. First here’s the results while on battery:
Single Core: 1750
Multi Core: 6928
GPU (OpenCL): 16747
And here’s the results while on AC Power:
Single Core: 2277
Multi Core: 8656
GPU (OpenCL): 18893
To put that in perspective, my M1 Pro MacBook Pro hit these numbers (both on battery and on AC power) for the CPU:
Single Core: 1762
Multi Core: 12431
That makes the Dynabook’s numbers more than respectable. In terms of disk speed, I ran Crystal Disk Mark both on battery and on AC power. Here’s the results that I got in both scenarios:
Read: 5280.89 MB/s
Write: 3072.29 MB/s
Whatever SSD that was chosen to be used in this Dnynabook, it’s a pretty quick one.
Finally there’s battery life. It’s rated for 8 hours. In testing the best that I did was 6.5 hours. Not bad for a PC laptop. Also give its size, it’s not surprising as you can only shove in so much batter for something thin and light.
Here’s the bottom line. The Dynabook A40-M is a well built reasonably fast laptop that is light and easy to tote around. It will survive your daily activities and come back for more while providing ample amounts of CPU and GPU power. The A40-M starts at around $1800, and in my opinion is well worth the money.
Posted in Products with tags Targus on December 30, 2025 by itnerd
Chances are that this backpack from Targus is going to my wife after this review. I’ll explain why in a minute. But the backpack in question is the Voyager EXP backpack which is intended for someone who needs to carry their tech as well as a change of clothes. Here’s a look at the backpack:
It’s basic black so it will not attract any unwanted attention. If you look at handle at the bottom, it has some reflective elements on it.
On the side, there’s an expandable pocket for a water bottle.
On the back, there’s a pair of shoulder straps that are well padded and a strap to slide the backpack through. The back is ventilated and padded.
On one of the shoulder straps there’s a hidden pocket for your ID.
Back to the front. There’s a pocket with a strap for your keys.
There’s a bigger pocket with an RFID protection pocket which protects your passport or credit cards from any nefarious activity. There’s also a hidden pocket for an AirTag which is a welcome addition.
There’s another pocket on the top for your sunglasses. I would make sure that the sunglasses are in a case though.
This compartment allows you to fit a change of clothes along with some toiletries in the mesh section.
You can put up to a 17″ laptop into the upper pocket which is suspended off the ground to protect the laptop. Other bits and bobbles can got in the lower pocket. As you can see, it is designed to fold flat so that you can keep your laptop in the pocket at airport security. I should note that a TSA compliant lock can be used to keep this section locked.
Now let’s get to the part about why this backpack is going to my wife. When she goes into the office, she tends to take her work laptop along with gym clothes for an after work workout. The second that she saw this backpack she wanted it as it fits her use case better than the backpack that she was using. So it’s her’s if she wants it. The Targus Voyager EXP is $120 CAD directly from Targus. If you need a backpack for your tech and is also good for a day or two of travel, or to carry a change of clothes for whatever reason, this is a backpack that you should seriously look at.
Posted in Products with tags Rosebud on November 19, 2025 by itnerd
I am not a journaling type of person. Likely because I have not seen the need for doing that. But I may change my mind on that after reviewing Rosebud which is billed as an AI based “interactive journal and self-care companion”. I’ve been using it for the last couple of weeks to journal my daily experiences and thoughts.
For the most part I have been using the Morning Intention and Evening Reflection to get my thoughts, feelings and experiences into the app. You can also see from the screen shot above a prompt for “What small focus can bring you joy today?” Regardless of the section that you enter your thoughts in, you’re prompted with questions like “What’s your top priority today?” and “What was the highlight of your day?” That helped me get my thoughts into the app easier. The app will prompt you to go deeper to provide it more detail. And when you’re done, the AI will presents its thoughts and insights. This is where I found Rosebud to be really helpful. The AI looked at my first week and found the following insights from their AI:
And on top of that, it give me a look at my wins for the week.
Some of this stuff, specifically that I might benefit from exploring what specifically about my work feels misaligned with my working style, is new to me. It gave me something to think about as maybe my working style isn’t working in my favour.
Now let’s go down the rabbit hole on their AI and your data. Because if you’re typing your thoughts, feelings and experiences into an app, you have to know what is going to happen with all of that. The company’s Privacy Policy does note that it has agreements OpenAI, Anthropic, and Groq to not store your data, and to not pass along personally identifiable information. That’s good. On top of that, have BAAs and Zero Data Retention (ZDR) agreements in place which forces those companies to handle data in compliance with HIPAA standards. Which is also good. The rest of the doesn’t have anything that jumps out at me as being bad or concerning, other than the fact that the company has not conducted third party security risk assessments which I found in section 5 under “Security Audits”. If I could give Rosebud a piece of advice from someone who does IT security among other things for a living, you might want to get third parties looking at your setup and report on what they find and how you remedy any concerns that they find as that will give your users that extra piece of mind. Finally, you can lock down Rosebud using Face ID if you have an iPhone. Meaning that if someone somehow gets physical access to your unlocked iPhone, your private thoughts will stay safe.
Rosebud is free to download. But if you really want the full experience that I had, you can sign up for $12.99 USD a month or $107.99 USD a year. I have to admit that this was an app that was worth it for me to use. And I will continue to use it to see what sort of additional insights about myself that I can gain from from it. If you’re looking for the same thing, I say give it a try.
Posted in Products with tags Ford on October 16, 2025 by itnerd
The tech In the Ford Expedition is something that Ford Canada was eager to have me try. And I now get why. Even though most cars are rolling computers, Ford has created a pretty compelling package of tech for drivers to leverage.
I’m going to start with the boring stuff before I get to the really cool stuff that you want to read about.
Safety: The Expedition comes with the usual safety systems such as Reverse Brake Assist, Pre-Collision Assist with Automatic Emergency Braking, Forward Collision Warning, Pedestrian Protection and Dynamic Brake Support, and an array of sensors and cameras to keep you safe. That’s along with this handy feature:
Besides blind spot monitoring, when you hit the turn signal, the cameras on the mirrors get displayed on the 24″ screen. Top marks for Ford thinking of coming up with this feature.
Ford BlueCruise: Ford BlueCruise enables hands-free highway driving that helps make driving easier and more enjoyable. Let BlueCruise accelerate, brake, and handle curves, all with the touch of a button. It can even help you change lanes hands-free. I tried this about a year ago on the Mustang Mach-E but that was a very limited test. Having tried it off and on for a week on the Expedition in a variety of traffic scenarios, I can say that this is a handy feature to have. I will say that you really need to get your seating position right and be wearing the right sunglasses to make BlueCruise work properly. I say that because the system is meant to be a driver aid which means that you are required to keep your eyes on the road at all times. If you don’t, or the system can figure out if you are paying attention to the road, it gets very unhappy.
Having said that I tried it out on open roads as well as rush hour traffic. The latter is where I found myself having to jump in and take control on three occasions due to people trying to cut in front of me on the 401 or the QEW which are two of Greater Toronto’s busier highways. Could BlueCruise have handed that scenario on its own? I have no clue and I wasn’t about to find out as that might have gotten expensive.
The flip side is that on open highways the system worked flawlessly. While I wasn’t able to use on the entire drive from Toronto to Owen Sound to do hiking, I was able to use it on the first quarter of the drive out, and the last quarter of the drive back which made life a bit easier given that it was a 2 hour drive each way. The reason why I wasn’t able to use it for the full two hour drive is that this system only works on physically divided highways. Thus if you’re expecting this system to work on the school run on city streets, that’s not going to happen. If you want to go into the weeds on BlueCruise, this review that I did a year ago will help you. But keep in mind that between the time that I wrote that review to the present day, it’s gotten better and in my mind is worth having. It’s available as a one time purchase that is tied to the car, or as a yearly or monthly subscription.
Bang & Olufsen Sound System: I will just give you the specs. This vehicle came with Bang & Olufsen sound system with 22 Speakers including a Subwoofer. And my wife who is a classically trained pianist summed it up this way:
“Every musical note is crisp and clear. There is no distortion. And there is perfect clarity when it comes to vocals. Ford nailed this stereo.”
Clearly this sound system impressed my wife. It will impress you too as I can confirm that this is an amazing sound system.
Ford Digital Experience: Now this is where things really get interesting. While this vehicle does come with wireless Apple CarPlay (which is one of the better implementations of CarPlay that I have seen lately) and Android Auto, Ford also included the Ford Digital Experience which is based on Android Automotive. But with a lot of work put in by Ford to make it unique. For starters, it has 5G connectivity that allows you to not only get WiFi inside the vehicle, but you can roam in Canada and the US without an issue. Speaking of WiFi, you know that I had to do a speed test. The best speeds that I got was 56.3 Mbps down and 78.9 Mbps up. Before anyone says “my home Internet is faster than that”, consider that I did this in suburban Toronto and I might have gotten faster speeds someplace else. Also, these speeds are fast enough to allow three people to stream a 4K HDR show on Netflix and have speed for others left over to surf the Internet. I base that on this article that I researched a couple of years ago. In short, kids on their iPads on a long road trip will be just fine watching K-Pop Demon Hunters or something like that leaving mommy and daddy in peace.
Next up is the fact that it has the Google Play Store embedded in the system. While the apps are tailored for Android Automotive, which means that the apps that you want like Netflix might not be present. There’s plenty of apps for you to choose from. And you can use your existing Google account to download apps. This gets followed up by Google assistant that allows you to not only navigate using Google Maps, but it allows you to change the cabin temperature, or turn on the heated or cooled seats. All by using your voice. I guess that this segues into the fact that everything is driven from the screen and there are not many physical buttons other than some steering wheel controls that incorporate a touch pad as well as a physical press.
Normally, the fact that this vehicle lacks a lot of physical buttons would usually earn Ford some critical commentary from me as that forces people to do everything in via the screen which is tough to do at highway speed for example. But with the Ford Digital Experience, I really can’t criticize them too much. The standard stuff that you would need to do while driving can be done by voice. On top of that, Ford simply didn’t bolt this on and do the minimum work required to call it an infotainment system. They clearly worked hard to create a cohesive system that made the driving experience better and not worse. While I am not 100% sold on giving up on Apple CarPlay for this, Ford has made a compelling argument to at least consider doing so seriously. Your Ford dealer can guide you through what your subscription options are.
Fun Fact: A lot of Canadians worked to create this. So kudos to them as they have come up with something that left me impressed.
So I’ve come to the end of this review of the 2025 Ford Expedition King Ranch. While I am not the target audience for this vehicle, those who are will find a vehicle that is very capable, as well as offering a lot in terms of carrying people or storage. The interior in the vehicle that I drove this past week is top shelf. And the tech is amazing. While I did complain about the lack of buttons being a problem for me as I could not adjust HVAC controls while driving, that was it for the complaints. Ford has really knocked it out of the park with the Expedition.
Now this version of the Expedition is worth $109,955. Not cheap by any means. But Ford has versions that start at $84,815. And they have trims for every use case possible in between. Besides, the target audience for this vehicle will have no problem spending this kind of cash to get a vehicle like this. So I suspect that Ford will have no problem moving the Expedition off dealer lots.
Before I go, I should point out that a lot of the stuff that you’ve seen in this review is either in or coming to vehicles that are at price points that most of us would buy. So you can expect to see things like the Ford Digital Experience, and Blue Cruise popping up in Escapes and Explorers soon…. If they haven’t already. And that’s a very good thing for Ford buyers at all price points.
Posted in Products with tags Ford on October 15, 2025 by itnerd
Interior wise, the Ford Expedition King Ranch is something else. Let me walk you through it and you will see why that is very quickly.
Let’s start with what the driver has to work with. And I will get this out of the way very quickly. Yes the steering wheel is oval. It was done to enhance the visibility of the driver when it comes the the upper screen of the two screens that this vehicle comes with. But this shape works as your hands are basically in a 10 and 2 position. Turning the wheel is a non issue as well. In fact, if you try this wheel out, you’ll find that you won’t be thinking about it after 15 minutes into your test drive. The driver display which is the upper screen is 24″. Meanwhile the lower display is 13.2″. Back to the steering wheel for a bit.It’s wrapped in Mesa Del Rio leather with Kingsville Stitching. Not to mention that it is heated.
The transmission is controlled by this knob on the left that has a manual mode. Said manual mode is controlled by the plus and minus buttons to the left of that knob. There’s a volume knob in the middle. And then various buttons to the right. For the record, that’s real wood and aluminum. And this is one of the few places that you will see shiny hard plastic. The fact that there is a minimal amount of shiny hard plastic earns Ford some bonus points as I truly feel that shiny hard plastic is massively overused in cars these days and is also impossible to keep clean.
There’s a cluster to the lower left that has the buttons for the different 4 wheel drive modes as opening and closing the rear hatch and the parking brake.
Now let’s move to the centre console. There’s two cupholders on the right that will hold Venti sized Starbucks coffee cups with ease. To the left, you have the control for trailer functions, a wireless charger on the right side, as well as a USB-A and USB-C port. You will notice an up and down arrow in the middle. Press the up arrow and you get this:
It slides the entire centre console and that does a bunch of things:
It moves the cupholders further back for second row passengers.
It creates extra storage space for front seat occupants.
It offers a semi secure space to put a bag or purse into that you can close by moving the centre console forward. And it’s only accessible when the car is on. My wife used this to put her purse into when we went on a hike in Owen Sound on the weekend.
The armrest has a rather deep storage area with a tray to hold change for parking or a pen or two.
The second row passengers have a pair of cupholders. Above those cupholders is a slot that you can put an iPad into.
The doors have pretty deep pockets in them. A water bottle will easily fit into them.
This specific trim level comes with captain’s chairs in the second row that are heated and have Del Rio Leather. They move forward and back and easily flip down. More on the flip down part in a bit. I didn’t take a picture of the front seats, but they have the same leather and are heated and cooled and are power adjustable.
There’s a pair of USB-C ports on the back of each front seat.
Between the captain’s chairs are HVAC controls for the second row passengers along with a 110V AC outlet. For the record, this vehicle has three zones for climate control.
Above you is an insanely massive sunroof.
The third row actually fits adults. I acted as the designated driver for pub night and was able to bring five people back to the respective homes with no complaints. You have to duck your head to get back there. But once you’re back there, you’re good. The seats also split 40-20-24 to allow you maximum flexibility when it comes to cargo.
The liftgate is actually in a clamshell configuration. Again, giving you the maximum amount of flexibility when it comes to cargo. Plus you can sit on the lower part as well.
Storage space behind the third row is decent but not huge. However there’s some buttons on the left side of the cargo area that can help you with that.
These buttons can help you to flip down both the third and second row. Plus there’s a lighting button on the top in case you need some extra light. And there’s a storage area there as well as some tie downs to keep you cargo from rolling around.
Flipping down the seats opens up all sorts of room for your cargo. Given that this SUV is huge, that’s a lot of cargo space that you have access to.
On the right side of the cargo area you get two USB-C ports, a 12V outlet along with a 110V outlet.
This interior is impressive. I can’t find any area where I could criticize Ford for anything. It’s truly impressive and it’s a highlight of this vehicle. But let’s see if Ford is so lucky when it comes to the tech. That’s the next part of this review and I will have a fair amount to say about the tech that the Expedition rolls up with.
Posted in Products with tags Ford on October 14, 2025 by itnerd
Over the years I’ve reviewed a lot of vehicles. But I have to admit that this is the most difficult vehicle that I have ever reviewed. Before I get to why it was difficult to review, let’s take a look at the vehicle.
Meet the Ford Expedition. This vehicle is simply huge. And I am not the target audience for it. Why is that? This is for someone who wants a a huge vehicle that carries a lot of people, or stuff, or both. And tows a lot. That’s not me. Sure I could get my wife and I along with both our road bikes in it. But we can do that in an Explorer or even an Escape as well. Thus to properly review this, I need to climb inside the head someone who would use this vehicle for what it is intended to be used for.
This is the King Ranch edition. Which I always thought was a F150 trim level. But clearly not. You see the King Ranch influence everywhere. Including:
The wheels
The interior:
And the door sill plates. There’s more places where you see this influence, but we’d be here all day if I were to point them all out. And for what it’s worth, King Ranch is a real ranch in Texas.
A big vehicle needs a big engine. Right? Well sort of. This Expedition comes with Ford’s 3.5L V6 EcoBoost Engine. It’s mated to a 10 speed automatic transmission. This combo is good for 400 horsepower and 480 pound feet of torque. So while a lot of these body on frame SUVs come with a V8, this one has a V6. And I don’t think that this is a downgrade. Because you can tow 9000 pounds with this setup. And at no point did I feel that I lacked power to merge onto a highway or pass anything. What’s even more impressive is the fact that power is easily modulated with your right foot. The only gripe that I had was that it took me a bit to get used to braking which is able to bring this rather huge SUV to a stop very quickly should the need arise. But I suppose this is a non issue if you daily drive it.
When it comes to fuel economy, it’s not as bad as you might think. The Expedition is rated for 15.4 L/100 KM city, 10.7 L/100 KM highway, and 13.1 L/100 KM combined. I hit 13.1 L/100 KM during my week with the Expedition which was better than I was expecting.
Now this vehicle as I said is huge. And this took me some getting used to as I am coming from an SUV that is much smaller. I will not call it agile, but it had a surprisingly decent turning radius. You can also get it to change lanes in a hurry if needed on the highway without it complaining. Having said that, condo owners like me should take this vehicle off your shopping list as the height of this vehicle is close to the maximum limit of my garage. And parking it in my parking spot was to be frank, comical. I say that because what is normally a 1 minute exercise is 5 minutes with this vehicle as I was taking care to make sure I didn’t hit anything. Thus I spent a lot of time shuffling this vehicle back and forth to get it into my spot without hitting the pillar to my right, or the car to my left. Good thing that it has an array of sensors and cameras to warn you if you are getting too close to an object. That helped immensely. In terms of noise, vibration, and harshness, the Expedition is generally quiet except for tire noise. And while it does bounce if you hit a bump that a bit too big, it wasn’t anywhere near as bouncy as I was expecting it to be.
One other note:
Because this vehicle has about 9″ of ground clearance, this trim level comes with retractable running boards. And if you’re anything shorter than 5′ 5″ tall, you will need them to get in and out of the vehicle.
Tomorrow I’m going to walk you through the interior of the Expedition. But here’s a spoiler alert, it’s on another level.
Posted in Products with tags EnGenius on September 8, 2025 by itnerd
What if I told you that you could get the following access point with the following specs for just $189 USD:
5,800 Mbps on 6 GHz
4,300 Mbps on 5 GHz
700 Mbps (2.4 GHz)
2.5 GbE port with PoE++ support
2×2 MIMO suppor
You may think that’s not possible. But it is possible as EnGenius has done this with the ECW520. Here’s a look at it:
EnGenius has brought an access point that is on the slim side, as well as having rounded edges. Thus for those who care about design, this access point will likely fit in with any office decor.
Underneath is a 2.5 GbE port with PoE++ support. Which is great as one cable will give you fast uplink/downlink as well as power. I should note that this does not come with a power adapter. Though it does have a 12V barrel jack and EnGenius does sell a power adapter for the three people on Earth who would need that.
Setting things up is laughably easy via the EnGenius Cloud app which is available for iOS and Android. Anyone can get it set up and running in under 10 minutes which is another plus for this product.
But here’s the real question. How fast is this? Well I had to borrow some WiFi 7 devices to properly test this as I don’t run anything with WiFi 7 at the moment. But once I secured said devices and ran my testing, here’s what I got.
1 Meter from the access point: 1.9 Gbps per second
5 Meters from the access point: 1 Gbps per second
10 Meters from the access point: 680 Mbps per second
All of this was within line of sight of the access point. If I compared it to the ECW526, it’s somewhat slower than that access point. But not by enough for me to care. Especially since the ECW526 is a whole lot more expensive. For my clients who are looking to get access points, the ECW520 may be my go to in terms of what I recommend. The price is right and the speed is better than good enough as far as I am concerned. Plus the setup is easy enough that anyone who buys one or more of these won’t have to pay someone like me to set them up. Just get an electrician to string up PoE to the right places and you’re good to go.
Posted in Products with tags Ubiquiti on June 20, 2025 by itnerd
As frequent readers of this blog will be aware, I recently upgraded my network to fully leverage my fibre connection with Distributel who is my current ISP. By putting in a better performing router, specifically the ASUS RT-BE86U, I was able to get my speeds to 1 Gbps up and down from roughly 1 Gbps down and roughly 600 Mbps up. That was good. But the next step in my mind would be to replace that router with a dedicated wired router as the WiFi 7 functionality in that ASUS router was being wasted as I disabled it due to the fact that I have no WiFi 7 devices. And I was instead using the ASUS ZenWiFi XT8’s that I have had for a while in access point mode to provide WiFi.
That’s where the Ubiquiti Unifi Cloud Gateway Max comes in. This is a very affordably priced “router” that has a lot of headroom regardless of your use case. I use the word “router” in quotes because this does more than route traffic to and from the Internet. But more on that in a second. First let’s look at the device itself:
The front of the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max has a display that is just under 1″ in size. It shows what your speeds are both up and down as well as other information like alerts for example. From the party tricks department comes the fact that you can set it to automatically turn off at night to reduce light pollution which my wife really appreciates. And if you place the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max on its side, it will automatically rotate the screen into that orientation. That’s a thoughtful touch.
The back has a bunch of 2.5 Gbps ports. None of which are PoE ports which given that Ubiquiti has a ton of products that use PoE is odd at first glance. But I am guessing that it helps to keep the price down for those who would never use PoE as you can always buy a PoE switch if you need one. Again from the party trick department comes the fact that you can define any of the four LAN ports as a secondary WAN port for failover or combining two Internet connections together. That’s welcome if you want to give yourself the ability to stay online no matter what. I may leverage that in the future with another Internet connection. The USB-C port on the left is for power. And it only sucks 16 W of power maximum which isn’t a lot of power.
On the side is a slot where you can stick an NVMe hard disk into it. Why would I want built in storage on a router you ask? Well you can use this as storage for Unifi Protect which is their surveillance system which uses this storage for an NVR. Or for Unifi Talk which is their VoIP system which can use this storage for things like voice mail for example. That’s kind of the “secret sauce” of the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max. It is capable of running the whole Unifi Application Suite if you want to dip your toe into the Unifi ecosystem. Now Unifi says that it supports “30+” Unifi devices. That doesn’t sound like a lot. But realistically, for a home or a small business, that’s plenty. For the record the company says that it supports “300+” devices in total.
One other note is that this product is tiny measuring 5.6 x 5 x 1.2″. So it will not take a whole lot of real estate regardless of where you put it.
I should note that the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max also comes with one of those famous Etherlighting cables. Basically, these are really thin Ethernet cables that light up if you plug them into a Ubiquiti switch or router that has the ability to light up the cables. I guess it’s a way to give your network rack some flair. Now the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max doesn’t have this ability. It’s also pretty short which means that you may not use it at all. So the fact that Ubiquiti included it is a curious choice.
Now setting this up should should be easy. But depending on your ISP, that may not be true. Let me illustrate by describing what happened to me.
Ubiquiti wants you to power on the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max and download their app to your phone to configure it over Bluetooth as this product has a Bluetooth radio in it. So I started there, but the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max kept saying that I didn’t have the WAN port plugged in via the display at the front of the unit. Which wasn’t the case as I had the WAN port plugged into my optical networking terminal with a known to be working Ethernet cable. As a result, it couldn’t configure itself when I walked through the setup wizard.
That took me to the second option. I got my MacBook Pro and plugged it into the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max via Ethernet and went to its default IP address to use the web based configuration. But that had exactly the same result. Which is that it didn’t think that the WAN port was plugged into my optical network terminal.
That took me to the final option which is to set up the console offline. Basically, what this option allows you to do is allow you to enter your configuration that your ISP needs and then you can save it to the Cloud Gateway Max. At that point the device will reboot and connect to your ISP. Then you proceed with the rest of the setup. Which is exactly what happened in my case.
What I can conclude from this experience is that if you have an ISP that plays nice with the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max, I can see the setup of this device taking minutes. But if not, it will take longer as you will have to puzzle through what the issue might be as I had to. Which means that if you decide to look at this product, you should be aware that the setup may not be straightforward and take some technical know how to get things working.
Another thing that I should note is that using the offline mode skips past the need to create a Unifi UI account to set things up. Which to be clear is optional, but Ubiquiti recommends that you do it. Now I will mention that while having a Unifi UI account will allow one to manage Unifi devices from anywhere, give them ability to back up configurations to the cloud, and easily deploy new Unifi devices among other functions. But the other side of that is that anytime you expose something to the Internet for any form of remote access, there’s a risk that you could get pwned. Maybe I am being paranoid on this front. But given the fact that Ubiquiti was kind of pwned via an insider a few years ago, maybe I am not being paranoid. You’ll have to weigh the perceived risk of setting up a Unifi UI account for yourself and your gear and proceed accordingly based on that risk. In my case, this Cloud Gateway Max is never going to have remote access. And that works for my security focused nature.
Once the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max was online, I ensured that the Unifi OS was updated along with the Unifi Network app. The latter being the app that allows you to control all aspects of your network and monitor things. I also set up a weekly check for any updates for both the OS and the Network app, and automatically install updates if required. Now that does break my rule of not allowing things on my network to automatically update themselves. But I went this route because I want to make sure that this device is always up to date with minimal effort as I hear that updates from Ubiquiti are often frequent which is a good thing from a security perspective. The next step for me was to have a look around the management console to see what it offered. Let me get right to the point. This device will allow you to monitor and observe all aspects of your network with incredible levels of detail. Here’s three examples of what I mean:
This is the main screen. From here I can monitor what speeds my ISP is giving me so that I can fully ensure that I am getting what I am paying for via automated speed tests that are configurable and live speed monitoring. That’s on the left side. Speaking of speeds, I have gotten speed tests as fast as 1.1 Gbps up and down which makes this the fastest router that I have tested at the time of writing this review. And that was with intrusion detection and prevention turned off. With that security feature turned on, I was consistently getting between 1.06 and 1.08 Gbps up and down. That’s not much of a penalty. Given that Ubiquiti rates this device to do 2.3 Gbps with intrusion detection and prevention turned on, that gives you a fair amount of headroom depending on how fast your Internet connection is.
Now if the stock intrusion detection and prevention doesn’t work for your needs, Ubiquiti offers a subscription to a more enhanced version that is powered by Proofpoint. The core difference between the two is that the signatures that the system uses to detect threats are updated weekly when you choose the paid option. More frequent updates means you reduce your chances of being pwned. And there are way more signatures at play. As in roughly 95K for the paid option versus roughly 55K for the stock option. The $139 a year per cloud gateway cost for this might be worth it for those who really want to protect themselves. In my case, I didn’t go that route as the stock intrusion detection and prevention system is likely going to be good enough for me. Though I may re-evaluate this decision at a later date. I do have a minor gripe about this, I kind of wished that Ubiquiti bundled this service into the price of the Cloud Gateway Max and made it subscription free. Basically what ASUS does with their Trend Micro intrusion detection and prevention product on their routers. But by not doing so keeps the price down for those who would never use it.
You’ll note that my uptime with my ISP its 99.8% when I took the above screenshot. That’s because I had a roughly 10 minute outage with Distributel which is highlighted by an orange dot on the green line below the graph in the middle of the screenshot below:
You can monitor the types of traffic that is coming and going from your network, as well as where it is coming from. That can come in handy if you’re trying to identify a device that may be too “chatty” for example. Here’s a look at what this looks like:
You can also get insights as to where your “bad” traffic might be coming from. As evidenced by this screenshot:
There’s a lot more and I am only truly scratching the surface with these examples. But the sorts of insights that you can get from this device easily rivals the enterprise grade gear that I usually play with. Now all of the examples above were via the device’s webpage. But you can get the same insights from the app as well which is available on iOS and Android. And what’s really cool is that you can manage all your Unifi gear from a single console. That’s something that is appealing to me as I am thinking about upgrading to Unifi WiFi access points in the future.
Now let’s go to the price. If you want to get the exact version of the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max that I have. Which is the base model with no storage, you can expect to pay $269 CDN. If you want storage, then there are 512 GB to 2 TB versions that start at $379 CDN. On top of that, there is a $25 CAD option that allows you to buy your own storage and install it into a Unifi Cloud Gateway Max that doesn’t have storage.
I consider the Unifi Cloud Gateway Max to be Ubiquiti’s “gateway drug” into the Unifi ecosystem. I am pretty impressed by it and I would recommend it for a variety of use cases. Be aware that setting it up might be a bit challenging as this is a device that is a significant step up from “consumer” level networking gear. But once it’s set up, it performs well and gives you a ton of options in terms how you can use it. All at a price that won’t break the bank.
Posted in Products with tags OWC on May 16, 2025 by itnerd
When I did my last office setup, I got this monitor and I ran a lot of my USB devices through it. While it was functionally fine, there were three things that I was not a fan of:
This monitor only charges my MacBook Pro at 65W.
The USB ports were limited to 5 Gbps in terms of speed.
The USB ports were limited to a max of 7.5W depending on the port.
Now I did highlight these in my review of the monitor. But I did want to address that and add some convenience to my setup. Thus after some research, I went to OWC’s website and ordered this.
This is the OWC Thunderbolt 5 Hub. I picked this hub because I wanted to future proof myself for when I replace my M1 Pro MacBook Pro with a newer model that supports Thunderbolt 5. Pictured above is the hub at the top. The power brick on the left along with a AC power cable at the bottom. Finally there’s a Thunderbolt 5 cable that’s 0.8M long and appears to be of very good quality. I do have a minor gripe about the power brick though. I would honestly have preferred that OWC took the approach that they did with the Thunderbolt Go Dock to integrate the power brick into the device. That would have made cable management a whole lot easier for me as I have a standing desk. Ideally, I would like to only to deal with cable managing one long cable as opposed to cable managing one cable and a power brick. But in the case of this hub, I had to account for the brick in both the standing and sitting positions that the desk offers. I eventually found a location on my desk for the hub, which in turn facilitated a route underneath my desk for the cable that allowed the brick to sit on the floor when the desk was in the sitting position, and have the brick slightly off the floor in the standing position. That’s not ideal, but it’s the best that I could come up with and I may revisit this at some point in the future to see if I can do better. Having said that, OWC might want to either rethink the brick as a whole, or make the cable with the barrel end connector that goes into the hub another foot longer to accommodate use cases like mine.
One thing that you will notice on the bottom of the power brick is a QR code that goes to OWC’s website where you will find any instructions that you need. There’s another just like it at the bottom of the hub itself. Bonus points to OWC for doing that as it reduces the chances that someone won’t RTFM and get into trouble as a result. Another thing that you will notice is that while the sides of the hub are aluminium, the top is made of plastic and is a bit of a fingerprint magnet.
On the back of the hub, you get a Kensington lock slot, the barrel connector for AC power, and three Thunderbolt 5 ports that do 80 Gbps bi-directionally, or 120 Gbps one way for video to say a 6K or 8K monitor. The one on the left goes to your computer and can charge it at 140W. The port next to it is where I plugged my monitor into which has this webcam, this light, and this card reader plugged into it. The port on the right is where I plugged in these speakers which allowed me to get rid of an audio cable and a USB power adapter in the process as the Thunderbolt 5 ports provide power. Plus because the speakers are now plugged into a Thunderbolt 5 port, the sound that they produce is marginally better. That’s a win right there as I get better sound and I have to deal with one less cable to manage along with having to use one less power adapter.
When it comes to monitors, the hub supports:
Up to three 8K monitors @ 60Hz
or two 8K monitors @ 120Hz
or three 4K monitors @ 144Hz
All of that assumes you have a Mac or PC with Thunderbolt 5. But I had no issue running my 4K monitor at 144 Hz or at an adaptive refresh rate of up to 120 Hz on my MacBook Pro which has Thunderbolt 4. In case you’re wondering what the holes are above the Thunderbolt 5 ports, they’re for OWC ClingOn cable stabilizer mounts which you can use to help prevent accidental cable disconnections. Those need to be purchased separately.
Now to the front of the hub where you get a USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 port that does 10 Gbps and a Thunderbolt 5 port. By having these ports on the front makes life easy for me in terms of when I need to plug in a device like a hard drive. Speaking of hard drives, I tested the speed of this hub by using this OWC hard drive. Here’s what I got:
These speeds are pretty close to the speeds that I got when I tested the same drive directly connected to my MacBook Pro. Thus I have no complaints here.
On the left side is a power button that’s flush with the rest of the hub’s case. Thus the possibility of accidental presses is basically eliminated.
On the bottom are lights that indicate the power status and Thunderbolt connectivity. It’s cool that they put these lights on the bottom as they don’t add to the light pollution that exists in my home office because of my various devices having LED lights that I can’t easily disable or hide.
Setting up the hub was pretty easy as I literally plugged everything in and was up and running in minutes. The only thing that I did not do was install the OWC Dock Ejector software. Now while I do have an Apple SuperDrive kicking around, I have not used it to burn a CD or DVD in years other than to test an OWC product. I should note that the Dock Ejector software has been completely rewritten to address what I had noticed when I reviewed the Thunderbolt Go Dock. Also, you don’t need to have an OWC dock or hub to use it as it will eject anything (disks and the like) from any vendor. More details on this latest version of OWC Dock Ejector can be found here.
Here’s the hub in place and in operation. Yes I will get around to cleaning up the cabling as I am not a fan of it either as it looks messy.
In daily usage, the hub never got anything other than warm to the touch, and I have had no issues in terms of plugging devices in and having them available for use. And I guess I should answer why I went the hub route rather than getting a dock with even more ports. Simply put, it was overkill for my needs as docks typically have things like Ethernet, card readers and the like built in. I already have a card reader and none of my computers use Ethernet. So the hub is the best way to go for me. While it would have been nice to have one more Thunderbolt 5 port on this hub, I could always daisy chain another hub with this one to get more ports.
The OWC Thunderbolt 5 Hub goes for $189 USD. Though I will note that OWC does put them on sale from time to time. This hub is a welcome addition to my office setup and frankly, I should have gotten it sooner as it solved a number of irritants that I had with my setup. Thus making my setup much more functional for me.
