Assembly & Setup

Should you decide to go with Windows7, you will have to install an mSATA drive for the OS. You need to pull the LIVA X apart first in order to install such an mSATA drive. Doing so is actually pretty easy, but some work is required to do so successfully. The first step is to remove the four screws that are hidden inside the rubber feet.


Once that's done, you can remove the metal bottom cover, which will expose the LIVA X's large heatsink. You can then easily pop the heatsink out as it just slides into place and is kept there by the screws that hold the bottom cover on. There are nice little indentations on either side of the heatsink which facilitate this process.


That will expose the board itself, with the SoC, memory, and LAN card clearly visible. However, you cannot simply pull the PCB out at this point, although I did try to do so for a little while and failed. The trick to making this FAR easier without irreversably damaging the LIVA X is to remove the screws on either side of the D-Sub plug, at which point the PCB itself comes out quite easily.


With the PCB out of the casing, you can now access the mSATA port for the installation of some additional internal storage, since it resides on the side you cannot get to after taking just the bottom off. Having to run through all those steps is a big pain in the butt in my opinion, but it didn't take too long and wasn't that hard once I figured out that the D-Sub port screws had to be removed. Maybe I would have known... had I actually read the manual. :P