Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 50 posts

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#31

Post by smoldesu »

firefalcon222 wrote: post #22
syspec wrote: post #13

The fine folks over at /r/minipc Reddit forum keep a whole spreadsheet tracking nearly all the best options with columns for various features. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1IjCpi4_z_WfO0G53E_mW... Personally I purchased a beelink ser7: - AMD Ryzen™ 7 7840HS - Radeon780M (RDNA 3) - 32Gb ram All for about 700 IIRC

Having recently been in the market for a mini pc myself (my use case were slightly different), I have arrived at the conclusion there is nothing similar to Mac Mini/Mac Studios on the market at the moment. These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical. That being said you might like AsRock's offerring for a more DIY customization - ht…

> These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical.

That... sounds like you're describing the average Ryzen APU? My 8-core 5800u feels pretty similar to an M1 Mac Mini in most respects, besides the fact it's in a laptop.

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#32

Post by leetharris »

firefalcon222 wrote: post #22
syspec wrote: post #13

The fine folks over at /r/minipc Reddit forum keep a whole spreadsheet tracking nearly all the best options with columns for various features. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1IjCpi4_z_WfO0G53E_mW... Personally I purchased a beelink ser7: - AMD Ryzen™ 7 7840HS - Radeon780M (RDNA 3) - 32Gb ram All for about 700 IIRC

Having recently been in the market for a mini pc myself (my use case were slightly different), I have arrived at the conclusion there is nothing similar to Mac Mini/Mac Studios on the market at the moment. These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical. That being said you might like AsRock's offerring for a more DIY customization - ht…

I've been trying every SFF concept I can get my hands on.

The only thing I've found similar in size + capabilities to a Mac Mini is a Steam Deck or Asus ROG Ally.

The base Steam Deck is $350 now and the base Ally is $399.

My Ally with the Z1 Extreme is my primary gaming desktop. I got a nice USB C dock and it runs great on my setup. Anything more demanding than what the handheld can do I just stream through GeForce Now.

Outside of hardcore gaming, I primarily use an M1 Pro laptop (that I got after selling my Mac M2 Mini). Got it refurb, it is still insanely fast, works great for streaming games on GFN, uses basically no power, no heat, great battery, etc.

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#33

Post by gumballindie »

This sounds like the perfect use case for Linux. Regardless, there are plenty of options outside the mac world. I also recommend: beelink ser7. Particularity since it supports USB4 which is compatible with Thunderbolt. It means you can expand it in the future with external PCI cards. Also it supports ddr5, which is quite neat. Linux will let you play old games via steam and then more.

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#35

Post by leetharris »

smoldesu wrote: post #31
firefalcon222 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having recently been in the market for a mini pc myself (my use case were slightly different), I have arrived at the conclusion there is nothing similar to Mac Mini/Mac Studios on the market at the moment. These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical. That being said you might like AsRock's offerring for a more DIY customization - ht…

> These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical. That... sounds like you're describing the average Ryzen APU? My 8-core 5800u feels pretty similar to an M1 Mac Mini in most respects, besides the fact it's in a laptop.

They aren't even close to performance per watt.

M2 Mini maxes out at 50w and when I do full loads it usually doesn't go above 40w.

It gets a Geekbench score of 2633 single core and 9750 multicore.

5800u is 1641 single core and 6451 multicore.

Significantly more performance at half the power draw. Likely 4x the performance per watt.

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#36

Post by smoldesu »

leetharris wrote: post #35
smoldesu wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical. That... sounds like you're describing the average Ryzen APU? My 8-core 5800u feels pretty similar to an M1 Mac Mini in most respects, besides the fact it's in a laptop.

They aren't even close to performance per watt. M2 Mini maxes out at 50w and when I do full loads it usually doesn't go above 40w. It gets a Geekbench score of 2633 single core and 9750 multicore. 5800u is 1641 single core and 6451 multicore. Significantly more performance at half the power draw. Likely 4x the performance per watt.

The 5800u is a 25w chip, though.

The MX chips are ARM so the idle draw is probably better on the Mac, but for most tasks I don't understand how the Ryzen would be disqualified. It's probably the best low-power x86 solution on the market right now; you're missing out if you haven't seen what the Steam Deck can do at 10w.

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#38

Post by goosedragons »

beschizza wrote: post #14

The hidden pitfall in this question is that the most obvious answers come with external power supplies. Some are half the size of the computer. e.g. https://www.servethehome.com/lenovo-thinkcentre-m920x-tiny-r... Some models can be powered over USB-C, allowing them to run off compact GaN chargers, monitors, etc. https://www.amazon.com/MINISFORUM-7940HS-Radeon-USB3-2-PCIe4...

Yeah, but most SFF computers are considerably smaller than Mac Mini. Most are easily VESA mountable too so you can stuff them on the back of monitor to get them off the desk. The Mac Mini is huge by comparison and disappointingly even though the base M1/M2 models are basically half empty lack any sort of storage expansion. So while a random SFF PC can have a couple SSDs in the case, the Mac Mini needs external drives eating up space and ports.

Re: Ask HN: What alternatives exist to a Mac mini but for Windows?

#40

Post by firefalcon222 »

barkingcat wrote: post #30
firefalcon222 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having recently been in the market for a mini pc myself (my use case were slightly different), I have arrived at the conclusion there is nothing similar to Mac Mini/Mac Studios on the market at the moment. These devices take 10W idle & 80W while running compute heavy tasks like stable diffusion/LLM using it's unified memory - magical. That being said you might like AsRock's offerring for a more DIY customization - ht…

It's kind of disingenuous to criticise minipc's for "limited upgrade-ability" when the Mac Mini has everything soldered on and is completely non-upgradable (no storage, no memory, no cpu upgrades), and the Mac Studio has memory slots, but non-upgradable and proprietary components. If you want to judge a small serverlike device for being non-upgradable, the Mac Mini and Mac Studio would completely fail this criteria.

I did not criticize MiniPCs just for it's limited upgrade-ability though. My criticism was that limited upgrade-ability of certain MiniPC makes it a bad "investment" over the years as new hardware comes in since they are essentially laptops without monitors/peripherals. The same cannot be said for Apple devices since they have been known to hold their re-sale value compared to other devices (while being non-upgradable) - i think you will fine an article posted here recently that dives into this.
Post reply on HN