I've been down so many rabbit holes today trying to find a small mini PC for a home emulation setup. Given this, I want it as small as possible. I have a ser5 pro and this is too big for what I'm looking for. However no matter what I find, every pc I look up is out of stock everywhere and I can't even find any on the used market. I would like to get a hold of the Minisforum Mercury EM780, but it's literally nowhere to be found. But the EM780 would be about the size/power I'm looking for.

Any recommendations of comparable minis?

I've been thinking of upgrading my minipc as of late, but I can't find any guides on how to install a gpu on the m910q. Any ideas or tips?

Laptop shit the bed and was considering just getting a mini pc to connect to my monitor at my gaming setup. Will only really use it for random browsing, YouTube, and occasional zoom meetings things like that. My question is whether or not to trust one of the dozens of random Amazon/ Best Buy options or go with a legit brand (Lenovo, hp, acer etc). Appreciate the insight.

I’ve been using the ROG NUC 16 for the past few weeks and finally finished testing it, so I figured I’d share my experience here since this is probably one of the more interesting mini PCs I’ve used.

My configuration has the Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX+, RTX 5080 Laptop GPU with 16GB of GDDR7, 32GB of DDR5-6400 memory and a 2TB Gen 4 SSD.

The first thing that really stood out to me is obviously the size. The chassis is roughly 28 x 19 cm and just under 6 cm thick, so compared to the full-size custom water-cooled PCs I normally use, this thing is tiny. You can literally pick it up with one hand.

What I was more interested in though was whether something this small could actually replace a normal PC for the things I do instead of just being a cool compact machine.

For gaming, I tested it at 4K in three games using the highest graphical settings with DLAA. I got 110 FPS in Forza, 80 FPS in Cyberpunk 2077 and 170 FPS in Black Ops 6.

One thing I was curious about was orientation. ASUS lets you run the NUC vertically or horizontally, and there’s actually a built-in G-sensor that detects its orientation and adjusts thermal settings accordingly.

So I tested all three games both ways.

The result was kind of boring, but in a good way: the reported FPS was exactly the same in every game. 110/110, 80/80 and 170/170.

I also ran 3DMark Fire Strike both ways. Horizontal scored 41,321 and vertical scored 41,295. That’s only a 26-point difference, or roughly 0.06%, which isn’t enough for me to call either orientation meaningfully faster.

So at least from the gaming tests I ran, I’d just position it whichever way works better for your setup. Personally I prefer it vertical.

The other big test for me was video editing because that’s actually where I could see myself using something like this away from my main desktop.

I loaded one of my real Premiere projects instead of relying only on benchmarks. It was a 4K project and I was able to scrub through the timeline, edit and export without much trouble. There were a couple hiccups when I got into a more demanding part of the timeline, but nothing that stopped me from working.

That honestly surprised me more than the gaming performance. I expected a machine this small to feel more compromised once I started doing actual work on it.

I also really like that ASUS didn’t completely sacrifice upgradeability to get the size down.

You can remove the cover and access two memory slots, with support listed up to 128GB, plus two M.2 slots. One is PCIe Gen 4 and the other supports Gen 5 and has its own heatsink. My review unit came with a Gen 4 drive, but having that second slot is especially useful to me for footage and project files.

The I/O is also kind of ridiculous for something this size. Between the front and rear you have six USB-A ports, USB-C, Thunderbolt 4, two HDMI 2.1 outputs, two DisplayPort 2.1 outputs, 2.5Gb Ethernet and a headset jack. ASUS lists support for up to five 4K displays.

Cooling on the 5080 configuration uses a vapor chamber and three fans, including a separate fan for the memory. I didn’t take controlled decibel measurements, so I’m not going to throw out noise numbers I can’t verify.

There are two things I think are important to understand though.

First, this is an RTX 5080 Laptop GPU. I wouldn’t look at the 5080 name and expect desktop RTX 5080 performance. I think the actual results are a much better way to judge what this machine can do.

Second, the PC itself is tiny, but the power supply isn’t inside it. The 5080 configuration uses an external 380W power adapter. The brick isn’t enormous in isolation, but sitting next to a roughly 3L computer makes it feel pretty substantial. If I could change one physical thing about the system, I’d want that adapter to be smaller.

And then there’s obviously price.

I don’t think this makes sense if the only goal is getting the most performance possible for your money. You’re paying for ASUS packing this hardware, cooling, connectivity and upgradeability into roughly a 3L enclosure.

For someone with plenty of room for a normal tower, I would absolutely compare what kind of desktop you could build or buy for the same money.

But after actually living with the NUC, I understand the use case more than I did before testing it. If desk space matters, you move your PC around, or you specifically want a very small gaming/creator system without moving to a laptop, there’s a lot packed into this thing.

That’s probably my biggest takeaway. I expected the size to be the interesting part. I didn’t expect to come away thinking I could legitimately edit my videos and game on something this small without constantly wishing I was back on my main desktop.

I made a full video showing the gaming tests, internals, ports, Premiere testing and everything else here:

https://youtu.be/RZqURKK70gU?is=VD306EqXBRoF-_BB

I’m curious what the MiniPC crowd thinks about this one. At what point does a mini PC get expensive enough that you’d rather just move up to a larger SFF build?

Opinions on price vs performance on:
Minisforum UM890 pro Ryzen 9 8945 32/1TB $989
GMKTec Evo-X1AI 9 HX 370 32/1TB $1099
Minisforum AI X1 Pro AI9 HX 370 32/1TB $1199

Hey everyone! first post here and just wanted to get an idea on what my options might be for a mini pc that can handle the games and such that I want to play. For a while now I've been thinking about getting back into gaming, mainly just to play some couch co-op with my partner as well as jumping online to play some COD warzone and other FPS games with some friends. I also want to start trying out some of the games that looked great when they came out and never got the chance to play because I stopped gaming (e.g. red dead redemption 2, legend of Zelda Breath of wild, rust, the Witcher, sea of thieves, Hogwarts legacy, borderlands 4, battlefield, oblivion remastered). I'd love to play some old favorites that I use to play on my PS4 (Borderlands, Skyrim, destiny, assassins creed, halo, far cry) as well as emulations for the more vintage type games (N64, gameboy, playstation 2). I understand that most of these can be quite demanding games and so whatever I get I'm hoping to be able to play all these games with pretty decent specs (like console level). I originally was thinking I could get a powerful handheld, but I'm only really wanting to just play it on my tv and maybe in my study on the monitor. I thought of getting a console like a Ps5/Xseries but my understanding is that you need to buy the games for those exact consoles and at this stage I think I just want to keep my games on PC so that I can play them easier in the future if I upgrade. I also like the idea of how small these mini PCs are and that they could just be stored in a draw instead of forever living on a cabinet. I cant really go over 1000 USD and so I might be asking for a lot here with performance.. I understand that PCs are pretty expensive these days, but if theres some sort way I can find something that gives me the performance to play more demanding games and isn't really big and bulky and can be moved around easily, please let me know! I haven't ever built a PC before but could be keen to try it if it means I'd get more performance and spend less money. Any advice would be much appreciated! Thankyou!

Hello everyone,

I recently set up an HP G4 800 as an always on box.

After some initial crashes from the i915 driver in debian things seem to work fine.

There is a power on quirk that i've noticed.

After I shut down the machine:

1. I leave the machine plugged in, starts on with a single push of the power button
2. I unplug the machine, and it won't power on until the third press, OR, a single 2 to 3 second press. Trying to figureout if this is a quirk of my machine, or a normal behaviour.

I've done quite a bit of trouble shooting. Seems that the when i turn on power recovery after power loss, that works just fine.

But, trying to figure out if i have a fault, or "normal" behaviour.

Note: the only thing i haven't done is replace the CMOS battery. Journalctl, suggests that the timer is working fine.

Thank you in advance.

EDIT: I posted this question over r/homelab

Someone responded that these things can take 5 to 10 seconds from a cold boot. I tested it. That's exactly what's happening. Seem probably wasn't 3 presses. It was 1 press, and then it took 5 or so seconds to start up which conicided with my 3rd press.

I have Linux USB thumb drive in front USB port for boot. It says Secure Boot Violation when I boot. Invalid signature detected. I set admin and user password in bios, I am in Administator access level. Secure Boot is grayed out and I can’t disable in bios. How to fix this? I even tried resetting it and it still shows the violation.

Edit: resolved by pressing del key to get in bios which allows editing Secure Boot settings. When Secure Boot Violation occurs it goes into bios automatically but Secure Boot settings are locked.

If you have one of those can you tell if the fan works during low to average load? For example, I'd like it to rest while browsing, reading, youtube and watching movies

I'm just trying to get some help/advice to know if these cables will work for connecting a 4-pin PWM fan to a 4-pin JST connector.

I have a GMKtec M5 Ultra and was looking at replacing the top stock 80mm fan. I have a spare Noctua NF-A12 fan, so want to try replacing it with that.

I can get a 3d printed part for the top so that the Noctua fan will physically fit onto the M5, I just don't know if I can get it connected to the mobo.

My problem is that the top fan is connected to the mobo via a 4-pin JST connector, which I've only just now learned about, and I'm not sure if the cable adaptors I found will work or not.

After a bit of looking around, there are two cables on Amazon that I think will work for connecting the Noctua fan to the M5, I'm just not sure.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/EK-Water-Blocks-Adapter-PWM-Noir/dp/B01MQOGCFV

and

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Create-idea-Splitter-Graphics-Extension/dp/B0CZLDWJPY

The EKWB cable is 50cm which is way to long, the Create Idea is 3 cables but are only 15cm they do not however say "JST" connector anywhere but visually looks right?

Im buying this PC and i was wondering if i could do some light gaming on it on the side ( I probably wont be playing any heavy AAA games on it)

🔥 HP Pro Mini 400 G9 — 12th Gen i5

💻 Intel Core i5-12500T

🧠 16GB RAM

💾 256GB SSD

🎮 Intel UHD Graphics 770

🪟 Windows 11

✅ Very good condition

⚡ Fast, compact & reliable

Great for school, work, browsing, streaming and everyday use.

💰 $330 negotiable

📍 Jamaica

📩 Message me if interested or if you have any questions.

How do you like it so far and how long have u had it

amd driver already updated with amd software-adrenaline edition - this screen would flash off when had very little on my pc new and when I had of ton of tabs heavy use

The cpu fan for my bosgame p4 light gaming mini pc ryzen 7 5700u died. Model #qbaa8012h05h. I am having a hard time finding a replacement for it. And contacting Bosgame did not help at all. Right now I have a fan straped to the top of it and removed the dust screen to help air flow from the fan. I still think it may be still having heat issues as it will just vanish form my network and I need to restart it for get it working again. The PC is headless used as a server for various games. Any suggestions on finding a replacment?

Minisforum UM790 Pro — Ryzen 9 7940HS / Radeon 780M

• Refurbished: €270
• New: €350

Which one would you buy?