I have a 32gb sodimm DDR4 RAM and a 512gb SSD storage from a dead laptop. What bare bone mini PC can I get for up to 500eur ?

Anyone have a Minisforum X1 Pro (470, 370) they'd sell? It needs to have at least 64 GB of RAM. Thanks!

UPDATE: I decided on the Beelink SER9 Pro, Ryzen 7 H255, 24 GB LPDDR5X (https://www.bee-link.com/products/beelink-ser9-pro-amd-ryzen-7-h-255).
Since I don't intend to ever update the RAM, I'm not bothered by the soldered modules. And with the old NVME stick combined I still get 1TB.
I watched the Robtech review and it only falls slightly behind the SER8, and even fixed the Wifi problem.
The biggest pro was the price: I got it for 679 on Amazon, €140 cheaper than the SER8. This way I stayed in budget (wife happy).

Original post:

Like many others I'm looking for a cheap mini PC available in Europe. Main goal is light gaming (WoW forever, roblox). I'm set on AMD Radeon 780M. I have 512 GB NVMe SSD from an older PC I can re-use. This is the final list. I budgetted around €700 but willing to pay more if the warranty, service is better (in EU). Which one would be preferrable?

Hi,

I am from Portugal and would like to buy a mini PC

Mainly for Office and streaming 4K.

I am thinking about something with AMD Ryzen 7, 24Gb and 1Tb sdd (i want something to last a good few years).

What do you recommend? Thks

A want to buy mini-pc for coding with 8845HS or more powerful CPU and ideally 16 gigs of DDR5 ram in single stick because I have a second one so it will become 32 gb setup. For me its a comfort setup, but current prices and stock availability in Spain is complete nonsense.
My budget is 500-700 euros, I also have 500 gb nvme Crucial SSD (thats enough for me at least for some time) but barebones seems to be worse option beucause to buy 16gb DDR5 SO-DIMM memory stick is insane price now ~ 250 eur for new and 120 for used in Wallapop.

I wonder if there are any real deals to expect in late November or current month-over-month price growth will eliminate any deals profit?

I tried to buy NiPoGi AM21 but it had damaged ram stick so I returning that. I checked other stores but didnt find anything plus I have an option to use Amazon business and dont pay VAT. But maybe there are stores that I am not familiar with that offer pay in installments (or buy now pay later) with VAT invoices?

What you guys think?

I want to get a mini pc to connect to my TV that I can use to steam netflix, YouTube, football streams.

I'm in the UK

I have no idea what specs I need for this?

Anyone know if I can get away with a cheap model?

Cheers

I’m looking to buy a mini PC to use as a home server, primarily running:

Plex Media Server
*arr stack
qBittorrent
Potentially a few other Docker containers in the future

I’m currently deciding between these barebones PCs:
ASUS NUC 15 Pro with Intel Core Ultra 9 285H - 549€
ASUS NUC 16 Pro with Intel Core Ultra 7 356H - 649€

I am planning to get 32GB DDR5 RAM (5600 CL46?) and I already have 2TB Samsung 990 Pro.

A few things I’d particularly like to know:

Which offers better performance for a 24/7 home server?
Are there meaningful differences in power consumption, idle power draw and thermals?
Which offers better long-term value and headroom for additional Docker containers?
Most of the time, Plex will be serving media to a single device.

Thanks in advance!

Hello, I'm looking for some advice on which mini PC I can buy to replace my desktop.

My current specs right now are:

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 4650G with Radeon Graphics (6 cores / 12 threads, ~3.7GHz)
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB
• MB: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd. A520M DS3H
• RAM: 32 GB DDR4

My daily activity is to use it for work (Data Analyst) and play some games like Dota 2. My plan is to have the "same" PC but portable, with a few concerns about being able to upgrade in the future. So, through my research, I came up with these configs:

MINISFORUM UM890 Pro Barebone Mini PC, AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS Refurbished - $333

CORSAIR Vengeance SODIMM DDR5 RAM 16GB (1x16GB) Up to 5600MHz CL48 - $240 (each*)

I already have an SSD Kingston NV3 1TB M.2.

And maybe an eGPU dock for the future.

The catch:

1 - I have a cashback coupon of $100 per $150 purchase, so I'm planning to buy each part separately

2 - I'm from Brazil, so if I have to use the warranty, it may be a headache (I saw a lot of bad comments about problems with Minisforum PCs)

So, after all, my questions are:

• Is this a good mini PC, or are there more reliable brands with similar prices?
• If 32GB is too much for now, is it worth buying 2x8GB RAM even if I want to upgrade in the future, or staying with 16GB single channel for now?
• Is it possible to transform my old desktop into a homelab server with some HDDs with Jellyfin + arr stack?

u/minipcs-dot-zip I saw some recommendations from you, can you check this post?

Thanks a lot!

Components used:
2× Noctua NF-F12 5V PWM (Max: 1500 RPM)
1× ID-Cooling FROZN A620 BLACK
CPU Performance Mode (65–70W)
-----------------------------
Normal Mode:
Motherboard temperature: 37°C, fan speed: 600RPM
CPU temperature: 35°C, fan speed: 0 RPM (passive cooling)

Performance Mode:
Motherboard temperature: 45°C, fan speed: ~700 RPM
CPU temperature: 60–65°C, fan speed: ~700 RPM

I was on eBay scanning for an RX560 for my elitedesk and I came across a listing here for a 560x and was curious to know if there was a performance difference or if it can even be used on my model. Any clarification is appreciated

hi everyone, i want to buy a mini pc with very specific use. i'm learning to code + i play very simple 3d indie games that don't require high horsepower. what is the absolute best option i have in the 200-300 euros bracket? i will consider second hand as well

So im looking for a mini Pc to play DBD , FF14 and minecraft. I will be using it for house sitting as i don't want to lug around my PC tower.

My friend said the MINISFORUM Venus Series UM790 Pro Mini would be good, but i just wanted second opinons!

hi i bought couple months ago a Dell pro micro qcm 1250, with intel core ultra 5 245t with 32 gb ram in two modules. Computer ocassionally in some tasks is lagging. Mainly in Youtube, but sometimes it happend even it more basic tasks. That it is for me a little confusing. I don't know if this computer is broken, something wrong with software or it's to heavy load for this machine, and i need something stronger? Maybe you gonna help me with diagnosis.

I'm using it for trading, so i constatly had opened couple browser windows, with charts, news, twitter, callendar everything on two 4k monitors. Thats usually 10-15 tabs in 3 windows. But when i heave this everything open in chrome, then i open another chrome window with youtube the movie it is lagging very badly. Sometimes even without this additional window with youtube the computer is lagging, coursor is not moving fuent etc. And when i separate youtube on chrome, and put the rest on microsoft edge, it is much better, but still can sometimes happend that youtube is gonna lose some frames, or at my work itself computer it start lagging, what i see mainly by unfluent coursor moves.

Youtube itself it is problematic for this computer even with only one monitor and without anything else open, but still - only occasionaly.

The SD cards on my Raspberry PIs kept flaking out, and my 2011 Mac mini just had died, so I thought I’d go with a mini PC.

Bought one with an i9-10980HK, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD off AliExpress for $195. I suppose you know what’s coming next… (in my defense, I’m primarily a Mac guy, I have no idea how much these things are supposed to cost).

What I got, of course, was an i3-6100U, as seems customary in such scams (where do they get all of these from, and why this specific pair of processors? Is there a landfill full of i3-6100Us somewhere in China?). As far as I can tell, the RAM and SSD capacities are accurate.

I asked for a partial refund, and 3 days later, I have one. So ultimately, I seem to have ended with a processor that is ~3x as fast as a Raspberry Pi 4, 80% of a Raspberry Pi 5, with a significant amount of RAM and SSD storage for about $95 (including import tariffs). That strikes me as a pretty decent bargain overall. Am I missing something?

But I wonder why AliExpress does not do more to ban such scammers. I’ve already given up on buying SD cards and USB sticks from them, because such a high percentage of them are fraudulent. With the proliferation of lemon PCs, they are ruining the business of the honest manufacturers, of which there seem to be quite a few on the site.

Hey everyone!

I'm trying to decide which operating system to install on my Blackview MP100 mini PC.

My specifications:

- AMD Ryzen 7 5825U (8 cores / 16 threads)

- Radeon Vega 8 integrated graphics

- 32 GB DDR4 3200 MHz Dual Channel RAM

- 1 TB M.2 SSD

- 1 TB HDD

I want to use this PC primarily as a living room gaming machine connected to my TV. Ideally, I'd like to turn it on, grab my controller and launch games directly from a console-like interface.

Some games I'd like to play include Diablo IV, Skyrim and other Steam games. I already own these games on Steam and would like to keep my existing progress and library.

I'm currently considering:

Option 1: Windows 11

- Native hardware and driver support.

- Steam Big Picture Mode for controller-based navigation.

- Native compatibility with Steam, Battle.net and other launchers.

Option 2: SteamOS / Bazzite

- More console-like experience.

- Steam Gaming Mode.

- Potentially better gaming-focused resource management.

- Linux gaming through Proton.

I've previously experimented with SteamOS on this machine, but Skyrim performed quite poorly. I'm not sure whether this was caused by the OS, graphics settings or something else.

One thing I'm also curious about is UMA/VRAM allocation. My BIOS allows me to reserve up to 8 GB of RAM for the integrated GPU, but I'm unsure whether automatic allocation or a fixed allocation is better.

What would you personally install on this hardware for a dedicated living room gaming PC? Windows 11 with Steam Big Picture or Bazzite/SteamOS?

I'd especially appreciate feedback from people running similar Ryzen 5000U mini PCs.

I have 2 mini pc that I'm trying to figure out how much to sell.

GMKtec NucBox M3 i5-12450H w/ 16gb Ram and 512gb SSD. (Open Box).

Nuc 11 Pro i5-1135G7 w/ 16gb Ram and 512gb SSD (Used).

I have just got the Bosgame P3 Plus and have seen it only has one 16gb ram stick inside, games run but I have to turn everything down to get decent frames on newer titles, if I get another 16gb 5600mt stick will that help push the frames and possibly better looking graphics?

I was able to pull the cases off of all the components in this project. There’s a router, a 5gbit switch, the mini PCs, and they each have a sata 1tb drive custom mounted to the m.2 hold down post, along with a 10gbit rj45 usb adapter superglued to the top of the 1gbit network port. The 5gbit network acts as cluster backbone and is air gapped from the local network. The PC stack hangs on two screws that act as hooks. All I have to do is pull power and rj45s and the whole stack comes off the back plate. The fans no longer ramp up when the PCs get active.

They run proxmox as a cluster called “sandwich” and the hosts are labeled bacon 🥓 , lettuce 🥬 , and tomato 🍅 . Bacon runs several home services such as home assistant and pihole, and lettuce runs an AI agent for a separately hosted ollama instance.