Buying a mini computer, installing Windows 11, and streaming movies online

@RD Mercer

Some of us here actually remember watching that show when it first ran. Fine show; fine actors; literate scripts; no car chases or bombs.

Wisewiz said:

@RD Mercer

Some of us here actually remember watching that show when it first ran. Fine show; fine actors; literate scripts; no car chases or bombs.

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@72 years young, I definitely remember watching it.

RD Mercer said:

@72 years young, I definitely remember watching it.

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@83, I wish I could remember everything as well as I remember the TV shows of that era. Funny memory for ya: I saw Andy Griffith perform at the U of North Carolina, when he was still an unknown, doing standup comedy. His line back then, in a sketch called “What it was, was football,” “The object of the game was to get from one end of the cow pasture to the other, without gettin’ knocked down or steppin’ in somethin’.”

For just $229 (after you apply the $20 discount code on your first order), this one should do it:

badrobot said:

Amazon Firestick or Google TV should be enough for your purpose. You can add wireless/bluetooth keyboard and mouse to it for browsing.

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I own world's first Google TV. But, as my nickname suggests, I keep its Ethernet cable unplugged and its internal WiFi disabled.

Wisewiz said:

@RD Mercer

Some of us here actually remember watching that show when it first ran. Fine show; fine actors; literate scripts; no car chases or bombs.

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I have season 1 volume 1 episodes 1-20 on DVD.

hdmi said:

I own world's first Google TV. But, as my nickname suggests, I keep its Ethernet cable unplugged and its internal WiFi disabled.

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I may have not made myself clear, I was referring to Chromecast Google TV dongle.

I recently purchased a Benq GV30 projector which came with its own Android TV HDMI dongle. But I am not using it. I still prefer the Amazon Firestick with Wifi-6.

I run two Minis in my home. The one in my office I'm typing on now (Hi!) and one by my TV. I'm seeing recommendations for lower powered PCs (that aren't bad Minis) but for a similar price you can get a more robust one. This is what I use on my TV and it works like a charm --

HP mimi PC family (HP 800 mini G3-G6) offers more than what you request, Windows 11, three video outputs (VGA HDMI DP. I am using HDMI and DP. the VGA port can be replaced to HDMI, DP or USB per HP specs).

It's a powerful PC, in mini form.

on ebay, HP mini 800 G3 can be $30 to $60. (example. HP EliteDesk Mini Computer i5 8GB 320GB Drive Windows 11 Pro Desktop PC | eBay).
its latest model HP mini 800 G6, can be $150-$300.

The Pool Man said:

I run two Minis in my home. The one in my office I'm typing on now (Hi!) and one by my TV. I'm seeing recommendations for lower powered PCs (that aren't bad Minis) but for a similar price you can get a more robust one. This is what I use on my TV and it works like a charm --

View attachment 94030

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With the $50 coupon, yes, that seems more robust especially because they've upped it from 5500U to a 5560U so, about 3 times faster CPU when compared to the N100. Amazon.com

badrobot said:

I may have not made myself clear, I was referring to Chromecast Google TV dongle. View attachment 94029

I recently purchased a Benq GV30 projector which came with its own Android TV HDMI dongle. But I am not using it. I still prefer the Amazon Firestick with Wifi-6.

View attachment 94031

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What I meant was, my TV doesn't need any of that, as the TV itself is a Google TV. Yet, I don't use that feature. Connecting a Windows 11 machine through HDMI gives too many advantages for me to even want to consider using a different type of solution.

hdmi said:

What I meant was, my TV doesn't need any of that, as the TV itself is a Google TV. Yet, I don't use that feature. Connecting a Windows 11 machine through HDMI gives too many advantages for me to even want to consider using a different type of solution.

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Your purpose maybe different with the OP. The OP is asking for suggestion. I am not asking for your solution. No one disagrees that a computer is useful for its intended use. The intended purpose for this thread is streaming ang browsing.

badrobot said:

Your purpose maybe different with the OP. The OP is asking for suggestion. I am not asking for your solution. No one disagrees that a computer is useful for its intended use. The intended purpose for this thread is streaming ang browsing.

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FIY, I am not asking for your solution either, and, whether you are or aren't asking for someone's solution is completely irrelevent to the OP.

That said, especially for streaming and browsing, a computer hooked up to a TV through HDMI gives too many advantages for me to even want to consider using a different type of solution. Take YouTube for example. Trying to stream YouTube videos with the official YouTube app from Google is the superlative of Sado Masochism when compared to streaming them on a Windows computer in Firefox browser with uBlock Origin. As for the browsing part. If there exists anything worse than watching YouTube on Google TV, browsing on Google TV must be it.

Wisewiz said:

I still think what you need is a Lenovo Tiny refurb. They're almost always from businesses, and well taken care of, and you won't be able to tell the diff between a refurb and a new one. Again, though, watch to make sure the model you choose has an HDMI port.

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I looked them up and refurbed units tend to hide key specs. After reading what I could from some of the units suggested here, I think I need at least a 3.4 GHz rate and either 8 or 16 gigs of RAM, SSD for sure. 250 gigs seems to work for memory. Found for the first time flash computer drives but they did not get very good reviews. The last hurdle is trying to evaluate name brands. They're all made in China, the cheaper ones tend to lie about brand name parts, cooling is a potential issue, slower speed ports also creep into the discussion. The Lenevo refurb I found has an Intel quad i3, which is under 3GHz speed. Never bought a refurm vacuum, appliance, computer or tv. I hear enough horror stories about new stuff but perhaps I am too ignorant about the whole area.

One thing I have not tried figuring out is maximizing the picture quality. Right now, I clearly have a better picture using the bluetooth connection instead of a cable box. ( I still have a cable box becuse of routing wireless issues and, strangely enough, I can only transmit audio to my outdoor speakers through a cable connection for Spotify. Great speakers but they are not wireless). As for the mini computer, I have no idea what, if any, graphics card will be necessary.

This is the beelink model that I am using. It's an 8th gen core i5, 8279u CPU with 16GB of RAM and 512GB NVMe. It's my primary windows 11 computer at my house that I use for all my daily tasks, watching netflix and other streaming services, using as a DAW with Audacity and it's what I run my audio interface into for my bass guitar. i bought it in September of 2021, and it's run primarily Windows 10 Pro, Windows 11 Pro and Rocky Linux.. I paid $475 for it back then, it's available now for $279

For my usage, I did add a second 16GB RAM chip to take it to 32GB, and I had a 500GB SATA SSD laying around which I also put into the box. Here is a picture of it, under my monitor stand, with my mouse as a comparison as to the size of the device.



Here is the link to my exact model which is currently $279 at Amazon.

pparks1 said:

This is the beelink model that I am using.

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Hi PParks (and Rec),

Nice little setup you got going there, especially with the 32GBs, but I believe your Mini may need a little more room to breathe? More of a question than a statement.

UPDATE: I did a little test on mine, where I put a box of tissues on top. The side vents were still open and that bumped the temp up 9 degrees Fahrenheit. No crisis, mind you, but I can sleep better if the Mini is in optimal cooling potential.

The Pool Man said:

Hi PParks (and Rec),

Nice little setup you got going there, especially with the 32GBs,

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Yeah, the 32GB was more of an accidental upgrade. When I ordered the beelink, it had 2 x 8GB chips in it. But I had some problems with it bluescreening and isolated it down to bad RAM. I got a replacement Beelink, and this time it came with a 1x16GB chip in it. So, I actually added a 2nd 16GB chip....not really to get more RAM, but rather have dual channel support to my RAM. The 16GB chip was only like $49....so I figured why not.

The Pool Man said:

but I believe your Mini may need a little more room to breathe? More of a question than a statement.

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I built that little monitor stand/shelf with the plan of putting my Beelink and my Mac Mini under there. I had analyzed both of their temps and found that neither ever got the slightest bit hot. My Beelink has an active fan and it's extremely rare for me to ever hear it kick on. So, i didn't put a lot of extra space under there, as I didn't feel the devices needed it, and I didn't want my monitor too high. Also the backside of the shelf is open just like the front, so their is airflow through the front to the back. The mac mini was later moved to the other side of the room on it's own monitor (rather than the KVM) to make room for the audio interface instead.

Typically, the beelink isn't pushed right over to the right edge as shown in the picture. As I plug in USB cables to it, or use my audio interface, the beelink shifts around a bit. So, i have about a quarter inch gap above the beelink (which doesn't vent on the top, only the sides), and I usually have a few inches of space on the right and lots of space on the left. Again, the fan only kicks on every infrequently. Rest of the time, it's 100% silent. So, I don't think I have any real problem with heat.

Jay Chapel said:

I looked them up and refurbed units tend to hide key specs. After reading what I could from some of the units suggested here, I think I need at least a 3.4 GHz rate and either 8 or 16 gigs of RAM, SSD for sure. 250 gigs seems to work for memory. Found for the first time flash computer drives but they did not get very good reviews. The last hurdle is trying to evaluate name brands. They're all made in China, the cheaper ones tend to lie about brand name parts, cooling is a potential issue, slower speed ports also creep into the discussion. The Lenevo refurb I found has an Intel quad i3, which is under 3GHz speed. Never bought a refurm vacuum, appliance, computer or tv. I hear enough horror stories about new stuff but perhaps I am too ignorant about the whole area.

One thing I have not tried figuring out is maximizing the picture quality. Right now, I clearly have a better picture using the bluetooth connection instead of a cable box. ( I still have a cable box becuse of routing wireless issues and, strangely enough, I can only transmit audio to my outdoor speakers through a cable connection for Spotify. Great speakers but they are not wireless). As for the mini computer, I have no idea what, if any, graphics card will be necessary.

Click to expand...

Having a CPU with a clock frequency of 3.4 GHz says absolutely nothing about the performance. Back in 2006, I had an Intel Pentium 4 3.4 GHz on an Asus P5LD2 Deluxe motherboard. Just to give you some idea of how it compares to the AMD Ryzen 5 5560U that is inside that Mini PC from TrigKey that @The Pool Man has: AMD Ryzen 5 5560U vs Intel Pentium 4 3.40GHz [cpubenchmark.net] by PassMark Software
That's it... the Ryzen is only about 50 times faster than the Pentium.

For streaming video content online, GPU hardware acceleration is very common nowadays. Even though any discrete GPU worth its salt still knocks iGPUs (integrated GPUs) out of the water, video decoding with GPU hardware acceleration is not a particularly GPU intensive task on any CPU that has an iGPU feature, at least if the CPU that we are talking about is half decent, or modern enough by today's standards. So, a modern iGPU should be able to handle decoding of video in 4K resolution with ease. However, the task of decoding video still consumes power, which generates heat. So, the noise of the cooling fan may be an important factor to also want to consider. Then again, if you are able to put the Mini PC behind the TV and you sit at a far enough distance away from the TV, then the fan noise becomes somewhat less of a problem.

That said, some people put a thick sheet of rockwool insulation in a wood frame that sits in front of the PC in such a way that it doesn't block the PC's airflow, but still helps to absorb some noise. What's more, having no room acoustic treatments of any kind can make a $1,000 pair of loudspeakers sound like a $100 pair of loudspeakers, anyway in the first place. So, because panel absorbers and corner bass traps are fairly easy to DIY, it makes sense to put at least one extra panel in front of the PC, i.e., if you're already going to build some panels anwyay. If you do that, and you also choose a PC with an aircooler that makes it run almost silent, then it's possible to make it completely silent. Alternatively, you could consider to use noise cancelling headphones in lieu of loudspeakers. I can't, as they start to irritate my skin before the movie ends. That plus the fact that the superior soundstaging of big floorstanding, quality loudspeakers makes listening through headphones feel like a true gimmick IMNSHO (and does so no matter what all the headphone addicts keep saying...).

hdmi said:

Having a CPU with a clock frequency of 3.4 GHz says absolutely nothing about the performance. Back in 2006, I had an Intel Pentium 4 3.4 GHz on an Asus P5LD2 Deluxe motherboard. Just to give you some idea of how it compares to the AMD Ryzen 5 5560U that is inside that Mini PC from TrigKey that @The Pool Man has: AMD Ryzen 5 5560U vs Intel Pentium 4 3.40GHz [cpubenchmark.net] by PassMark Software
That's it... the Ryzen is only about 50 times faster than the Pentium.

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I'm not the processor guru, but I have often wondered how to decide on the performance of a processor. I see some processors today that have a base frequency of for example. 2.7 GHz but a Max Turbo Frequency of 4.5 GHz. I have an old socket 1150 i3 4170 that's 3.7 GHz 2 cores 4 threads, and it's really performs pretty well. I think you had to step up to the i5 4450 to be able to watch anything 4K. Maybe we should have a class on processors, because they can be confusing when it comes to performance. I still use the 4790K, it's base is 4.0 GHz and 4.40 Turbo, with 4 cores and 8 threads, and it still performs very well, for all my needs.