Was hoping for PoE without the need for a hat :p
That would have been a big improvement for homelab uses, but it’s probably considered a niche feature overall, hence the PoE Hat.
I’m wondering how it will work now they are pushing a dedicated cooler however. The PoE Hat has a little fan but doesn’t allow for heatsink. Perhaps there will be a new Pi5 PoE Hat.
EDIT: The PoE header on the Pi 5 has been moved, so a new PoE HAT will be required, but has not been announced yet.
I’ve just been buying old CN62 chromeboxes off of ebay, flashing them for a normal bios and putting Linux on them. I can usually pick them up for around $30 with an intel x86 processor, an M-key PCI-e slot, along with all the low power states, gigabit ethernet, and they’re like 3x faster than a Pi 4. They come with 2gb of ram, but it actually is upgradable, so some of the boxes I have laying around have got 8gb in them. No PoE though :(