On sale for $349.
???
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This Mini PC pricing blows my mind
- Thread starter M4pro
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On sale for $349.
???
No word is more synonymous with "quality" than "Beelink"!
(???)
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Wonder how long the moulting period lasts on the top of the housing…?
Interesting as it would seem almost $200 of the $350 is in RAM and SSD. Though I am guessing the SSD behind those prices doesn't have a class-leading TBW...
Browsing their site it appears their marginal price for RAM ~ $2-3/GB. I was considering anything ~ $5/GB market for retail.
I do wonder if their quality might be more like something one would find on Temu?
Yep
Apple gouges the heck out of folks when looking at components
Apple gouges the heck out of folks when looking at components
I bought an N95 based mini PC to run some Windows 11 software for amateur radio, and came across this one for $60:
8GB LPDDR5 RAM, 256GB M.2 drive (upgradable), tons of ports including full size DisplayPort and HDMI - $60 !! its great and can run two 4K displays at 60Hz. Also came with a Windows 11 Pro license that seems legit, I was able to tie it to my Microsoft account.
I use it for some amateur radio software that doesn't have macos equivalents - runs better and cheaper than virtualization software I tried (vmware and virtualbox) considering the included OS license.
I'm a big fan of these mini PCs - but I still prefer my mac mini, because macOS.
8GB LPDDR5 RAM, 256GB M.2 drive (upgradable), tons of ports including full size DisplayPort and HDMI - $60 !! its great and can run two 4K displays at 60Hz. Also came with a Windows 11 Pro license that seems legit, I was able to tie it to my Microsoft account.
I use it for some amateur radio software that doesn't have macos equivalents - runs better and cheaper than virtualization software I tried (vmware and virtualbox) considering the included OS license.
I'm a big fan of these mini PCs - but I still prefer my mac mini, because macOS.
Don't let the folks on this forum discourage you, the MiniPC scene perfect for a lot of use cases 
Don't let the folks on this forum discourage you, the MiniPC scene perfect for a lot of use cases
So many additional folks would be using Mac Mini's in a wide range of interesting roles ... if they could simply swap & upgrade NVME & RAM
I use a headless Beelink for my home server. I have Nextcloud, Jellyfin, and Audiobookshelf running without issue. With a static IP and no connection outside of ethernet to my UDMSE, I can tunnel in easily and use remote desktop.
Lower specs than the model you linked, with a lower price bought from a friend. I was trying hardmode before, building servers with RasPi and similar, when I realized a miniPC is less headache and the price difference is negligible for my needs. (Let alone hardware video encoding with an intel processor, which arm lacks afaik.)
Lower specs than the model you linked, with a lower price bought from a friend. I was trying hardmode before, building servers with RasPi and similar, when I realized a miniPC is less headache and the price difference is negligible for my needs. (Let alone hardware video encoding with an intel processor, which arm lacks afaik.)
My 2011 mac mini was my favorite in this regard - I could upgrade the RAM and I was even able to mount a second drive inside with a kit from OWC.
To get my mac tinkering fix I'm currently stuffing all kinds of upgrades into an old SE/30
I have the SER7 and have been really impressed with the pcie4, USB4, HDM 2.1 and DP 1.4 ports. I can run a quad 4k setup with no issues.. I did add another NVme for more storage.. and it came with win11 pro already installed.. not going to find this much in the mid $500 range elsewhere
I purchased one on a lark when I heard about these being available on amazon. Looking at the specs it's one of those that sounds too good to be true, especially if it came with a legit copy of Windows (which would have been an additional $120 for me on top of a barebone Intel NUC I would have purchased).
Mine came with Crucial RAM and Kingston SSD. I checked over everything twice, ran Prime95 for couple days to test stability, then wiped and installed a fresh copy of Windows, all the drivers were provided by the Window installer package, without the need to use the manufacturer's installer package. The Windows license was tied to the hardware ID and Microsoft server had no problem re-authenticating the clean install.
Been running 24/7 over a year without hiccup, no unaccounted sleep/wake events, super silent and unobtrusive. Really amazing for the price.
At least one manufacturer been caught with malwares came preinstalled that I'm aware of - so have to watch for that. As I'm only using the machine for TV watching and nothing else am still leery why these machines are being dumped on Amazon at cost essentially - haha.
Mine came with Crucial RAM and Kingston SSD. I checked over everything twice, ran Prime95 for couple days to test stability, then wiped and installed a fresh copy of Windows, all the drivers were provided by the Window installer package, without the need to use the manufacturer's installer package. The Windows license was tied to the hardware ID and Microsoft server had no problem re-authenticating the clean install.
Been running 24/7 over a year without hiccup, no unaccounted sleep/wake events, super silent and unobtrusive. Really amazing for the price.
At least one manufacturer been caught with malwares came preinstalled that I'm aware of - so have to watch for that. As I'm only using the machine for TV watching and nothing else am still leery why these machines are being dumped on Amazon at cost essentially - haha.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
It's quite simple actually. All of the many PC makers are extremely competitive with each other, resulting in small margins. That means much of what you are paying for such a PC is actually paying for the product itself instead of being redirected away to vault #126 at Apple HQ.
On the other hand, Apple is an island, the LONE maker of Apple stuff with no competitors making any kind of Apple product clones. As such, Apple's margin is nearing 50%, growing there from the long-term (sky high) goal of 38%-40% throughout this inflation/covid/supply chain period.
At 50%, half of every dollar you give them is not buying the product or all of the stuff related to making the product, marketing the product, etc. Instead, almost a full half of each dollar paid flows off to the vaults... much like the "30% right off the top" with apps in the Apple App Store aren't paying the developer or making the app.
PC maker margins are thin, so most of every dollar you spend on their products are actually paying for stuff in the product, making the product, marketing the product. As a result, you can get a tremendous amount of hardware value by buying a PC... which will also run far more software apps than available on Mac. PC basically rules the tech world while Mac is only a niche player.
Fans will beat it all down and let on like it's junk, etc, but I bought a little PC when Silicon basically ended "full Windows support" in the former Bootcamp and that PC has been performing just fine all this time. I didn't buy this cheap but opted to spend an Apple-like budget on it. I spent less than Apple charges for only the 8TB SSD upgrade in a Mac (not including the Mac itself) and got a fairly loaded gaming PC with 32GB of RAM and 10TB of fast SSD. That's VALUE!
If you want good value for your money, buy a PC. If you want Apple, you have to pay a hefty premium and be satisfied with whatever the one seller chooses to provide.
Personally (and objectively), I don't see one as significantly better than the other- just different. I lean Mac but certainly enjoy many benefits of that PC not available on Mac. I miss when key parts of Mac like SSD and RAM could be purchased at PC-driven competitive rates instead of from the lone company store at 3X-5X market rates. We gained some nice "brains" with Silicon but lost the whole competitive-driven pricing for 'the rest' at the same time.
But hey, Apple is now richest in the world and for many of us, that's seemingly all that matters.
On the other hand, Apple is an island, the LONE maker of Apple stuff with no competitors making any kind of Apple product clones. As such, Apple's margin is nearing 50%, growing there from the long-term (sky high) goal of 38%-40% throughout this inflation/covid/supply chain period.
At 50%, half of every dollar you give them is not buying the product or all of the stuff related to making the product, marketing the product, etc. Instead, almost a full half of each dollar paid flows off to the vaults... much like the "30% right off the top" with apps in the Apple App Store aren't paying the developer or making the app.
PC maker margins are thin, so most of every dollar you spend on their products are actually paying for stuff in the product, making the product, marketing the product. As a result, you can get a tremendous amount of hardware value by buying a PC... which will also run far more software apps than available on Mac. PC basically rules the tech world while Mac is only a niche player.
Fans will beat it all down and let on like it's junk, etc, but I bought a little PC when Silicon basically ended "full Windows support" in the former Bootcamp and that PC has been performing just fine all this time. I didn't buy this cheap but opted to spend an Apple-like budget on it. I spent less than Apple charges for only the 8TB SSD upgrade in a Mac (not including the Mac itself) and got a fairly loaded gaming PC with 32GB of RAM and 10TB of fast SSD. That's VALUE!
If you want good value for your money, buy a PC. If you want Apple, you have to pay a hefty premium and be satisfied with whatever the one seller chooses to provide.
Personally (and objectively), I don't see one as significantly better than the other- just different. I lean Mac but certainly enjoy many benefits of that PC not available on Mac. I miss when key parts of Mac like SSD and RAM could be purchased at PC-driven competitive rates instead of from the lone company store at 3X-5X market rates. We gained some nice "brains" with Silicon but lost the whole competitive-driven pricing for 'the rest' at the same time.
But hey, Apple is now richest in the world and for many of us, that's seemingly all that matters.
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Serious question here — what do you mean by “less headache” than a Raspberry Pi? They seem about the same to me, but maybe I’m missing a trick.
For one thing, using a full fledged AMD processor is a positive sign
the MiniPC scene perfect for a lot of use cases
Yeah.
I purchased a direct-shipped CWWK N305 unit last year.
8 eCores; 3TB Pciex4 NvME; 48GB DDR5; Proxmox mini-Server; 15W
She's a right Beastie
Not OP, but:
One thing I appreciate about my rPi4b is that I could singularly task it with a duty, and remain calm, knowing that it will perform.
One of the many things that I enjoy about these higher-performant, low-power units, is that I can--basically--create multiple instances of rPi-capable operants in a virtual space.
I tried virtualization on the rPi4, but it just wasn't really designed for such.
My n305 unit basically replicates everything I could do on the pI, but xXxxx.xy
Virtual performance is phenomenal
But twice as much still won't get you 32 GB, a TB of storage and a second SSD slot. The base mini should be 16/ 512 for $350, and Pro mini 32/ 1TB for $650 to compete with the Ryzen 7840HS variant.
Apple's advantage on battery life doesn't apply to desktops. AMD has matched them performance wise (they use the same TSMC fabs) Qualcom is coming up fast and even Intel isn't that far back.
And no you don't have to use Windows.
What are you doing that requires virtualization that you can't (or don't want to) do with containers?Not OP, but:
One thing I appreciate about my rPi4b is that I could singularly task it with a duty, and remain calm, knowing that it will perform.
One of the many things that I enjoy about these higher-performant, low-power units, is that I can--basically--create multiple instances of rPi-capable operants in a virtual space.
I tried virtualization on the rPi4, but it just wasn't really designed for such.
My n305 unit basically replicates everything I could do on the pI, but xXxxx.xy
Virtual performance is phenomenal
I'm asking because I'm planning to buy something mainly for Homebridge and Pi-hole, and I think I could get away with doing that containerized on a baby Pi Zero 2 W (512MB) for $15, although I know it would be slow on restarts. The Pi4b like you mentioned is $35 at 1GB. But then there's the slippery slope of "well, for only $15 more, I can get 2 gigs on a Pi5," etc.
The big downside I've read about with some mini PCs is that getting Linux distros on them is unsupported by the manufacturer, so you might run into issues because of that. Was that your experience at all, or was it smooth sailing?
I'm happy with the base mini pricing. If it had 16/512 in it I agree with you. It's a premium device with software support that lasts years so it's going to be more expensive than something from aliexpress.
The desktop I disagree with. The Mac desktop uses a lot less power. This does factor heavily into cost over 3-5 years. In fact my old base M1 (at 22W peak) would outrun my old Ryzen 3700X (at 220W peak) on most things I do.
I would rather not use Windows and I would rather not use Linux for ref. I spent 25 years using both and I don't have the time or energy for it.
As for Qualcomm they are now completely dead and irrelevant in this space. ARM just pulled their IP license over a legal dispute.
A few years ago, I purchased a ThinkCentre Mini. It still runs Windows 11 flawless to this day and is superfast and super easy to upgrade. That said, I do own multiple Mac Mini's and will buy the base model M4 Mini if/when it's announced next week.