mini computers

Hi everybody, I'm new to the eleven forum. This is my first post here.
I've been on the ten forum forever.

I bought a mini computer on Amazon.
Amazon.com
It came with Windows 11 Pro installed.

Windows 11 won't install on any of my home or work computers for various reasons, mostly TPM and unsupported processor.

How can this little mini computer that I bought for less than 200 dollars be better than my tower computers? For thousands of dollars? Granted they are aging, but I have some killer computers and windows 11 won't install on any of them. Well, legally anyway. I've seen the Youtube videos but I am a little reluctant to try that, especially on a work computer.

Now I am rethinking mini computers. This mini computer is doing the job that I bought it for, but I don't know, it seems like it might be a little laggy, for lack of a better term. I bought one of the cheaper ones, not knowing the difference and wanting to experiment a little. I don't know what is what in these mini pc's. I didn't have high expectations. But really, overall, I am pleasantly surprised by how well this mini pc works.

I bought a 3018 cnc router to play with and my laptop was just too big physically for the small workspace I have around the cnc machine so I started looking for a small computer and found these mini computers. It is very small and it is working very well for me. All I really need it to do is run lasergrbl and universal gcode sender and it does both of those with no issues.

So, I am starting to rethink my office pc strategy, now I am thinking about replacing a tower or two with a mini pc. I paid less than 200 dollars for this one and I see they have them up to about a grand or so.

Does anyone here know anything about these mini computers? Are they worth it? I mean for me so far so good but what about others? Are they reliable? I've had this one running for a few days now so I don't know.

Sorry for the long first post and thanks in advance
And sorry if I posted in the wrong category. I didn't see one for hardware.

Hi there, welcome to the forum!

There are plenty of people (who will be here shortly) to tell you about mini PC’s. But I just wanted to say hi, and that there is nothing illegal about installing Windows 11 (unless you originally obtained Windows illegally). Just use Rufus and you’re all set.
Have a look around, lots of posts about installing Win 11 on older PC’s.

The mini is basically laptop parts in a box. The CPU, for example, is rated at 6W. Your N100 has 4 cores, which isn't bad. If a mini does what you need, I see no reason to get anything else. I believe Beelink has a favorable reputation. (I don't own any.)

Microsoft claims that security features in 11 require a Gen8 Intel CPU or later. (It's slightly more complex in detail, but that's basically it.) There are older, powerful CPUs which are unsupported.

The TPM requirement isn't necessarily for a hardware TPM module. There are firmware TPMs that are 2.0 compliant. Intel call theirs PTT (platform trust technology). With AMD, it's fTPM.

I have 11 installed on a laptop which meets all the requirements, except that it has a Gen6 CPU. It's not difficult to work around the requirements, but I'm not sure I'd recommend it for a PC or laptop that is owned by your employer.

sdtag said:

I bought a mini computer on Amazon.
Amazon.com
It came with Windows 11 Pro installed.

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Congrats, I too bought a a Beelink mini-pc to run Windows 11 and various Linux distrs on. It's been a great little box. I have an 8th gen Core i5 on mine, which supported 11 and has TPM support. I wasn't ready to upgrade my desktop running Windows 10 and has been rock solid and stable. So, this mini PC gave me a tinker box that I could do anything with, with no impact on my regular desktop.

sdtag said:

How can this little mini computer that I bought for less than 200 dollars be better than my tower computers? For thousands of dollars?

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It's not really that it's "better", but it has more modern hardware from a CPU standpoint that supports some additiional functionality. From a pure power standpoint, it's unlikely to be better than your tower.

sdtag said:

Granted they are aging, but I have some killer computers and windows 11 won't install on any of them. Well, legally anyway.

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It's not that it's illegal. It's just running without support for things Microsoft considers to be important. There are numerous ways around the hardware requirements, and they are not illegal.

sdtag said:

Does anyone here know anything about these mini computers? Are they worth it? I mean for me so far so good but what about others? Are they reliable? I've had this one running for a few days now so I don't know.

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Mine has a core i5-8279u, which is a 4 core 8 thread 8th Gen Core i5. I have 32GB of RAM in mine, I have a 512GB NVMe and an additional 512GB SATA SSD installed in the chassis. Mine was about $475 and came with 10 Pro. For my general purpose tasks with Windows 11, it's been great. I have no qualms. Now my 12 Core/24 thread Ryzen 5900x, with 64GB of RAM, and PCIe Gen 4 storage space running an Nvidia 3080 FTW3 Ultra crushes it from a performance standpoint and a gaming standpoint, but I don't always need crazy high performance. I love the super small size of the mini and I love the crazy low power consumption of the mini. For many of my tasks, this is absolutely perfect.

I do have a mini PC too, a Minisforum UM790. It acts as a 2nd PC to test stuff and for portability haha.

It is definitely pricier at $519, but the processor and iGPU are solid. AMD 7940HS + RDNA3 780M. I can game on it without issues.. a caveat is that I do not play AAA games at 4K

Lacvuzrus said:

I do have a mini PC too, a Minisforum UM790. It acts as a 2nd PC to test stuff and for portability haha.

It is definitely pricier at $519, but the processor and iGPU are solid. AMD 7940HS + RDNA3 780M. I can game on it without issues.. a caveat is that I do not play AAA games at 4K

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These mini PCs are competing with the Intel NUC which has been sold for a number of years now. For many people these new mini PCs are a lot more affordable than the NUC.

I don't think that $519 is pricey for a computer of that capability. Could you buy a equivalent regular desktop computer for less?

On the other hand you have to decide what you use your computer for. If you just browse the Internet then these mini PCs should be more than enough. I play a lot of games so I need a more powerful GPU than these mini PCs have.

BTW, I have 5 desktop computers and 4 laptop computers. Replacing some of these desktop computers with mini PCs might make sense in the future. In any case I would save a lot of space.

For anyone interested you can find reviews for mini PCs from several manufacturers on the YouTube channel CareyHolzman - Live. For example, here are links for two of them:
LIVE: $199 Beelink S12 N95 - 12th Gen Intel N95 Mini PC with Windows 11 Pro
LIVE - Beelink EQ12 - N100 Intel 12th Gen, 4 Cores @3.4 GHz, DDR5, WiFi 6 - $239

According to Moore's Law every two years power doubles and prices are halved. So an entry level system of today, as your $200 mini, is equivalent or more powerful than a mid range system of the past. Of course your desktop is more powerful, but an average PC of the same era was much slower than your desktop. Also Microsoft requirements are 8th generation Intel, no matter if it is the slowest model, and TPM 2.0 It is certainly not illegal to bypass hardware check and upgrade your desktop to Windows 11. Just take a full backup (or clone) of your disk and read all the tricks in the respective threads. I have installed Windows 11 on my main PC (2nd system specs) which is a 3rd generation Intel without TPM 2.0 and I have seen no issues, apart from the known ones that also affect the Windows 11 compliant systems. I didn't like UEFI creating its 3 small system partitions and taking valuable space on my then 250GB SSD, so I even installed Windows 11 on MBR Legacy mode (which is of course not supported, Windows 11 officially demand GPT UEFI disk). I have seen no difference in performance or any other compatibility issues whatsoever. And of course don't expect to find Windows 11 drivers for all your older hardware. Fortunately you can use any earlier 64-bit Windows drivers, such as Windows 10 64-bit, Windows 8/8.1 64-bit, Windows 7 64-bit and even Windows Vista 64-bit drivers for very old systems! The known exception are the Intel graphics drivers for Windows 7 that are locked to Windows 7 only, they won't install on 8 or higher. But again some folks have hacked some of those to install on Windows 10 64-bit and 11. I am using the respective hacked driver for Intel Mobile 4 (aka GMA 4500) graphics in my test laptop (1st system specs) and it is actually faster than the generic WDDM 1.0 Microsoft driver for Intel Mobile 4. I even have access to Intel Graphics Properties to tweak performance which Microsoft driver doesn't provide.

Wow thanks everybody for all the great info. Sorry if I didn't search first but this is great info to have.
I just hope that we don't find out a year from now that Beelink sends everything we do back to China.
I may be paranoid but this is the times we live in now. And oh yeah how can I fit a covid mask over the air vents lol
Thanks again everybody.

I have one very small computer, bought for less than $250, but it's not called a "Mini". Acer called it a "Netbook".
It came with Windows XP/x86 running on a small HD.
In this pic, the little Netbook is sporting a USB WiFi dongle with a 7db gain antenna.

I've replaced the old HD containing Windows XP, with a new 120 GB Crucial SSD containing Windows 8.1. Runs just fine!
This little guy has become my #1 Traveling Companion.

I once had an Acer Aspire One A150 (Intel Atom, 2GB RAM, Intel 945G graphics, 120GB SATA 2.5" hard disk). It was running Windows XP but then I upgraded to Windows Vista 32-bit and then to Windows 7 and 8 32-bit. It had WDDM graphics drivers for Windows Vista/7, so it had Aero effects and was as fast as in XP. I had even dual booted with Apple Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard! Pity that I needed money and I sold it to a friend before I had the chance to test it with Windows 10 or 11! If I still had it, this would be my ultimate test laptop. If I could install Windows 11 on this, I would have no problems installing Windows 11 anywhere, even on my microwave

spapakons said:

I once had an Acer Aspire One A150 (Intel Atom, 2GB RAM, Intel 945G graphics, 120GB SATA 2.5" hard disk). It was running Windows XP but then I upgraded to Windows Vista 32-bit and then to Windows 7 and 8 32-bit. It had WDDM graphics drivers for Windows Vista/7, so it had Aero effects and was as fast as in XP. I had even dual booted with Apple Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard! Pity that I needed money and I sold it to a friend before I had the chance to test it with Windows 10 or 11! If I still had it, this would be my ultimate test laptop. If I could install Windows 11 on this, I would have no problems installing Windows 11 anywhere, even on my microwave

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I still have my Acer Aspire One AOD270. It's a little newer than yours, it came with Windows 7 Starter. It's my 'miner's canary' and I've had it running W11 22H2.

Bree said:

I use this little old netbook as my 'miner's canary', if Windows 11 can install and run on this then it should work on anything.

To recap its specs, it fails on every single count except the bare minimum of having a 64-bit processor with more than one core. There is no TPM of any sort, it has a legacy bios (so no secure boot and MBR boot only). It's Intel Atom N2600 has no working 64 bit display drivers available (so only the Microsoft Basic Adapter can be used). The maximum memory a Cedarview Atom like this one can address is specified by the OEM as 2GB, and by Intel as 2.44 GB. It can in fact, when there's a 4GB RAM in its single slot, make 2.99GB available to the OS.

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Let's install Windows 11 on incompatible hardware - post #1.386

I also have an HP Stream 7 tablet (Intel Atom Z series, 1GB RAM, 32GB internal storage) but I could not install Windows 11 on that because it is locked to UEFI 32-bit only, cannot boot a 64-bit system. It runs Windows 10 22H2 32-bit fine, albeit slowly with a lot of patience. Damn HP! If it could boot in 64-bit mode I would have tested Windows 11 on it! Yes, I know it would be too slow for everyday use, but I would do it as proof of concept. Any workarounds to boot in 64-bit welcome. I have already read about Grub 32-bit boot loader but this is to boot Linux 64-bit, as far as I have read, not Windows 64-bit.

TechnoMage2021 said:

I have one very small computer, bought for less than $250, but it's not called a "Mini". Acer called it a "Netbook".
It came with Windows XP/x86 running on a small HD.
View attachment 69608 In this pic, the little Netbook is sporting a USB WiFi dongle with a 7db gain antenna.

I've replaced the old HD containing Windows XP, with a new 120 GB Crucial SSD containing Windows 11. Runs just fine!
This little guy has become my #1 Traveling Companion.

Click to expand...

I'm certainly showing my age here, but a "mini-computer" used to refer to quite a powerful machine pre-dating PCs but a step below a mainframe. In fact they predated Windows itself. You might be able to buy one somewhere today, but they would be worthless for Windows in today's environment. Just saying.

I'd love to be able to run Win-11 on my Acer One Netbook, but alas, it only has a 32 bit CPU.
Windows 11 is available in 64 bit only, requiring a 64 bit cpu.
So mine is pretty well maxed out at Win-8.1/x86. But that's OK... Win-8.1 properly installed, tweaked and tuned is one heck of an OS.
And don't overload it with a bunch of junk.

I've got a coupe of Intel Nucs, the Beelink mini pc, a 2020 Mac mini with the M1, and I have a raspberry pi 4 at home. I like these small form factor machines.

Legally, you CAN install Windows 11 even on older hardware:


The size of the computer is irrelevant - if the components are recent enough to fit the official requirements. IT hardware tends to loose both value and performance - faster than any other industry. Since for the past 100 years - it's constantly evolving at a very fast rate. A lesson learn the hard-way for anyone who dared to invest in bleeding tech hardware or even high end.

Last but not least: reworking the layout here and there, adding couple of new features (which could have been added with an update - just the same) and rebranding it as a New Operating System - as in - new hardware requirements + tens of millions of new licenses for the upcoming system which are bound to integrate the latest Windows OS.... is the most common business model used by Microsoft. So yeah, your older yet expensive system which is probably more than capable at running Windows 11 - is also castrated for financial reasons (profit). The less one knows about computers and operating systems - the more likely is one inclined to invest in a new system.

TechnoMage2021 said:

I'd love to be able to run Win-11 on my Acer One Netbook, but alas, it only has a 32 bit CPU.
Windows 11 is available in 64 bit only, requiring a 64 bit cpu.
So mine is pretty well maxed out at Win-8.1/x86. But that's OK... Win-8.1 properly installed, tweaked and tuned is one heck of an OS.
And don't overload it with a bunch of junk.

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If it can run Windows 8.1 32-bit, it can also run Windows 10 32-bit, but as far as I remember you don't like Windows 10. I just wanted to let others with similar hardware know it can take Windows 10 32-bit.

martyfelker said:

I'm certainly showing my age here, but a "mini-computer" used to refer to quite a powerful machine pre-dating PCs but a step below a mainframe. In fact they predated Windows itself. You might be able to buy one somewhere today, but they would be worthless for Windows in today's environment. Just saying.

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Yes, according to Wikipedia 'The term "minicomputer" is seldom used today; the contemporary term for this class of system is "midrange computer" '. The O.P. however, is unwittingly referring to a "Mini PC", which is a small form factor device.

sdtag said:

I just hope that we don't find out a year from now that Beelink sends everything we do back to China.
I may be paranoid but this is the times we live in now.

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Only the regime that has jurisdiction over you can toss you into the gulag or worse.

iko22 said:

Yes, according to Wikipedia 'The term "minicomputer" is seldom used today; the contemporary term for this class of system is "midrange computer" '. The O.P. however, is unwittingly referring to a "Mini PC", which is a small form factor device.

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Yes these "mini computers" of the past (huge by today standards) were much smaller than a typical computer of the era that occupied a whole room. That's why they were called mini. Our modern desktop computers are in fact "micro computers" which are smaller than the past "mini computers". Mini PCs by today standards or SFF PCs, could be called "nano computers" but this term today implies tiny invisible units.