Blicube BliKVM V4: Is This the Best Linux IP KVM Yet?

38 thoughts on “Blicube BliKVM V4: Is This the Best Linux IP KVM Yet?”

• This thing looks awesome!

• If blikvm came up with a 4/6 port hdmi/ATX switcher to pair with this then it would be a great combo

• Those rack ears are useless, right? Do they make 3" racks or something that I'm unaware of?

• Sigh… no USB 2.0 forwarding?

• Ordered one of these a week ago to replace my BliKVM v1 CM4 version! Should be here in a week or so. The built-in HDMI mirroring pass-through is what sold me on the upgrade, and the ATX board is a nice to have also.

• Tom, good video. I ordered one of these little boxes about a week ago. It arrives around January 9. I have a couple of questions, if you'd indulge me. What are the full-height and short brackets for? I am looking to use the device with a bunch of 1 liter tiny/mini/micro machines, which have vPro built in, but I find are impossible to fully manage with just that.

  Regarding using the device with multiple machines, I saw that you could use the BliKVM to front a KVM switch. I saw one YouTube video where a pushbutton KVM switch was used. Can I use an IP KVM? Would you recommend one? I have seven total of these small 1 liter machines (four are a vSAN cluster, and three are a second/remote vSphere site to a pair of primary site PowerEdge servers).

  Thanks for your time and guidance over the years. Have a peaceful and prosperous New Year.

• $150 is fine. A decent ip kvm from Raritan, the connectors for the server cost $200 and thats after you spend $2k-$5k on the controller.

• Any power consumption results?

• Chinese? pass

• neat and not super expensive, odd little rack ears though

• Thank you for mentioning the ATX cables as a pass thru and that you can still use the case controls. I could not tell from their website, or I just missed it.

• I'm curious, how does it control the keyboard & mouse? I don't see any type B ports on the back of that thing, only a type A port.

• This video intro is the gold standard of what review videos should have every time. Thank you

• Nanlite pavotube over your left shoulder glowing orange?

• Does this allow firmware access like commercial server BMC?

• How well does the hdmi out work? Is it a physical actual loop out or going through some software processing chip and then outputted

• So this is for a single computer? Not at all worth it. Just walk over to it and hit the power button. I mean let along if you have a couple or more machines, this will get expensive real quick.

• would love to see some future work with a KVM switch. To cycle through different systems. (maybe in addition a custom switch for the ATX managment?)
  Adding to this maybe a multimount rack kit to mount 1-8 side by side into a rack to manage different systems similar to what mikrotik is doin with their 10 inch mountable switches

• Sold out on AliExpress at 5:30PM PST

• You can't even buy it!

• so its idrac/ilo for a single device. nothing wrong with that but if i'm paying that much i'll just license what i already got on my server… if i wasn't using a box that had its own solution maybe.

  Can ebay a multi device ipKVM for less but probably have to get the cables separate and probably have to fiddle around to get the software to work since what you would buy there at this price point is probably pretty old.

• As an independent IT&T tech in the MSP/MSSP space, I have added two to my shopping list, and that is in Australia where former prime minister/pig farmer Paul "Cheating" Keating referred to Australia as "like a pimple on the backside of Australia" – so the exchange rate & freight nearly doubles the price here.

  Being able to do the following appeals a mighty strong argument to support investing in at least one or two of them for a workshop.
  – senior technicians continue service (ie: rebuilding/restoring) a machine out of hours from home office with full control over it; or
  – oversee the technical service delivery from the comforts of your office desk;
  – share access with other technical staff to collaborate (such as a higher level technician or technical support from manufacturers who integrate MSP technical support agreements for those curve-ball problems);
  – use OBS to record the footage without the need of those gaming recorders (which cost approximately the same amount) to CYA ;

  For clients who have remote VPN access for technicians, I would carry one in my kit for those situations that occur above where it may not be an option to take the machine into custody for workshop service. It would be nice if these units had an option to be cloud platform accessible or integrate as a managed device to a managed services cloud platform (an agent installed into the OS of the device customized to function with it, assuming it has the computational power to handle this as well).

  From a six-sigma perspective, I see this product being added to best practices, increasing the productivity and reducing time to resolution of problems & completion of tasks.

  From a marketing/sales/customer relationship perspective, this product combined with competent technicians and vendor support can significantly enhance the value of quality service that appeals to prospective clients and strengthen client relationships. I think we have all experienced new prospective clients who have cut corners by not purchasing corporate grade equipment and in desperate need of the sort of technical support that would move their minds to a better way of doing IT&T which would possibly transform them into a viable client. A tool like this can compensate for their mistakes and show them better planning & design, best practices and wiser investment gives them access to more efficient solutions.

  From an accounting perspective this can increase operational margin, give you more headroom to compete or monetize that efficiency to support higher fee-for professional service rates making your elite technicians more profitable. The additional cost of these units in comparison to the existing costs of employing a quality technician and kitting him/her out with the tools to do the job barely quantifies.

  It seems to me, it would be a no-brainer for motherboard manufacturers to come up with a universal shared standard for an expansion module that can be installed on workstation, server and upper-end desktop motherboards that does this. More advanced versions could provide a universal version of HP-ILO/IBM-IMM/Dell-iDRAC functionality. Ideally, hot-installable/removable/swap. Selfishness/greed seems to be the only barrier to this as intellectual property licensing for any patented technology is only a matter of negotiation, as they did with RAID.

• Great video.

• I DID SAY:
  There will be a FAIRLY priced ARM KVM at some point, didn't I?

• Any chance of getting a review of the new Geekworm 4PC PiKVM? I've been thinking about it but there are absolutely no reviews (I can trust) around! Also I think that BliKVM supports also 4G connectivity, not just wifi with that antenna, or am I wrong?Did you manage to test that?

• is this working with a kvm switch?

• Aliexpress is the only problem I have with it, I'll stick with Geek Worms version which uses PiKVM V3 and does 90% of this and I don't have to give a credit card to China

• I have been using in it for the last 2 months. While it is a nice concept, it's not that well executed. Updates need to be done via command line, uploading an image for the mass storage drive to allow the remote computer to boot from it takes forever and often fails. They have good support via email. There is still some items on the user interface that are written in Chinese. On the plus side, the web interface is very responsive and the remote image drawing latency is very low. Considering the price, I guess it is not bad.

• nice but what about the software? Can you reinstall it? Where to download it? Does it use an SD-Card? or separate storage (i.e., SSD)?

• No auto update feature out of the box? I mean I guess you could set up a cron job to check and install but still. My home lab is getting large enough that having auto updates is pretty critical for me at this point.

• Also, what software does this need on the target computer being controlled? VNC? RDP?

• It's tempting, but $150+ just for IP KVM…. 🤔 I'll keep the tab open for a couple months, glancing at it and pondering from time to time, then probably forget about it.

• Rack mount ears… but it's not the full 19 inch rack width?

• Good video Tom !!

• $160 USD vs 400 for the TinyPilot is the only argument I need to hear.

• "Besides those screws being a little bit missing"

  😂

• 4K30 input is a nice feature over the other options on the market

• Tinypilot has some competition

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