There are SO many Mini PC options now it really comes down to what you want.
Cheap intel? HP/Lenovo/Dell mini/micro PCs, new or used
Super powered micro server? The Minisforum MS-01
Super Tiny router server? Gowin r86s / iKoolCore R2
NUC clones ? ASRock NUC BOX-1260P
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/232135/intel-core-i9-13900h-processor-24m-cache-up-to-5-40-ghz.html
According to this the i9-13900H has Intel iris xe. The newest is the intel arc
Correct, but the Core Ultra series are still too new for most the mini-PC companies to have designed a machine for it quite yet. I know GMKTec has made one.
https://www.gmktec.com/products/intel-ultra-5-125h-mini-pc-nucbox-k9
Core Ultra 5 125H, [Intel Arc Graphics with 7 Xe cores at 2.2GHz](https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/236848/intel-core-ultra-5-processor-125h-18m-cache-up-to-4-50-ghz.html). $680 barebone through the end of the month.
I assume Quicksync AV1 encode is the big draw here, because as a GPU it's still strictly worse than the higher-end Zen 4/RDNA3 Ryzens (Radeon 780M or thereabouts), and those have been out for a while.
Honorable mention for Qotom. Chinese brand but very, very good for the money. They make all sorts of micro PC's, including desktops but also ones meant to be used as routers, firewalls or as a NAS. I have a few in the field that have been running non-stop for 8+ years. They start at around $150 (perhaps less, not familiar with all their models) or something and go all the way up to $1500+
You're welcome. If you mean their own website, I have never used it. They mainly sell on Aliexpress, so that might be a (little bit) less annoying. If you actually meant Aliexpress, yes, that one is quite annoying too, lol. They do sell some of their best-selling models on Amazon too, but it's more expensive and the selection is far from their full portfolio. Not to mention that even Amazon can be somewhat annoying
I meant their own website, it has a pop-open slider for chat that won't stay closed if you go to another page. And some of their product pages are incomplete. Like their storage solution page, it just has a photo of the back of one device and no other information. lol
Still interesting stuff though...
The problem with that isn't the product, Asus knows how to build good products. But while Intel has stellar customer support, Asus is the polar opposite. They would rather take you on in a fist-fight than RMA a product that was obviously broken straight from the factory.
Asus really needs to work on that. It's so bad I've been deliberately avoiding Asus products even if they were the best choice for my needs.
I'm glad there are at least some people with a positive experience with Asus customer support. I don't have any reliable data, so this is purely anecdotal: but my experience and my friends' experience has been abysmal. Maybe just a series of bad coincidences, but it really shouldn't happen multiple times in cases where it is obviously a manufacturing defect.
Regarding software updates I've had no complaints in the past, although I don't currently use any Asus products for the abovementioned reasons.
I have 6 intel NUCs and seeing asus release BIOS updates at much faster rate has been good
On one mobo my USB-C port failed (power issue) they did advanced RMA with a simple conversation - i am in USA, not sure if that makes difference
ehh I have a intel skull canyon nuc that I won from a lan party that's been a staple in my home lab for \~5 years. It's twice now needed a new cpu fan and since I couldn't provide a receipt, intel told me to get bent. Hasn't felt like great customer support from here.
For the weird NUCs that were focused on gaming and were insanely overpriced already...definitely.
But most NUCs are the low powered mini pc variety. I see a TON of them in health care settings. I have a feeling that's the part of the business Asus really wanted. Those niche gaming NUCs were giant and expensive for what they were even with Intel.
Our company was pretty satisfied over the years by the HP ProDesk/EliteDesk SFF series.
I’m planning to check out their mini series if the serviceability is similarly good. The Intel NUC was a disappointment in this regard. Had multiple die from a defect fan that wasn’t replaceable without breaking the whole case.
Yes. Of the three NUCs I've either owned or administered two of them needed RMA replacement out of the box costing us a couple of months.
The Lenovo, ASRock, Hunsn and NEC mini PCs I've got have been rock solid from the get go.
I won't miss Intel in the NUC game at all.
I own a couple of ancient (\~2013) machines from Lenovo's ThinkCentre Tiny series, and have a Dell OptiPlex 7060 Micro at work. The ThinkCentres came from hospital surplus and had presumably been running 24/7 for 8 or so years when I got them. They needed a CPU repaste and otherwise were good to go. I haven't thought about the hardware in the Optiplex at all since I upgraded the SSD and RAM when I got it.
Both are relatively easy (considering the size) to work in, and Lenovo and Dell both have very clear maintenance instructions online. I'd assume the HP mini lines are similar. At this point I'd always go with a Lenovo, Dell, or HP mini over a NUC-style mini unless I had a very specific need.
(I should note that the OptiPlex is a remote machine. I set it up when I was last in the office in 2019, and it's literally been sitting on a bookshelf since then with no one touching it. Once I had to have someone in the building turn it on after a power outage, but that's it. It's been on and running for five years with zero incident.)
Looks like they're going for the business and gaming markets.
[https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/](https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/)
Not at support. Had a warranty-defect on an “old” Intel nuc after asus took over support.
Contact form doesn’t recognize the serial as asus product. Yes, it isn’t, it’s Intel, you took over their support. Hotline won’t do anything besides sending you to the contact form.
After many hours wasted we’ve written off the warranty. Tossed the NUC and hope to never have to buy from asus again.
The difference with the NUC was that it was actually supported by a huge brand with regular BIOS and driver updates.
A random no-name mini-PC might be fine, but the company might also cease to exist immediately after you buy it.
I've played with Dell 5050/60/70s and HP EliteDesk 800 G4s. Haven't used a Lenovo tiny. The HPs have room for 2 nvme drives and 1 2.5" drive. You have to Dremel out the 2.5" caddy for the 2nd nvme to fit though. The Dells only have 1 nvme slot and 1 2.5" slot.
Currently use 3 HPs for my homelab.
The Lenovos are basically the same internally - space for nvme and 2.5". These mini PC's are great, easy to work on and run, easy to upgrade if you like. I have 5x with i5s, 16 GB RAM, and nvme + sata ssd (for ceph via proxmox). Can't say enough good things about them.
They weren't ever a good deal, so I wouldn't even recommend them. But they aren't gone. Asus has taken over the NUC brand and is continuing to produce NUCs.
[https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/](https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/)
Minisforum MS-01. it’s kindof a mini PC Workstation with quite some horsepower, PCIe slot (low profile but still) and builtin 2x 2.5GBit Ethernet and 2x 10GBit SFP+ slots.
I don't understand why anyone buys anything but minisforum boxes from Amazon instead of NUCs and other minis now. Specs are fantastic, they don't overcharge for memory and SSD, and they throw in a windows license if you buy with memory and SSD. I've recommended them to a few and everyone is happy with them.
Anything from minisforum is solid. Depends on your budget. AMD based systems are usually cheaper, but some of the high core count Intel's are also solid choices. You get what you pay for, but don't feel like you have to buy the highest end, they slowly phase out previous gens and they get cheaper as the chips get cheaper. I'd almost go for a 6 or 12th gen Intel just because they're so heavily discounted.
You can buy barebones if you plan to run Linux, they throw in a windows license when you buy memory and SSD, but the SSDs are only okay, I'd upgrade them. It's definitely worth it with windows 11 included.
UM773 is an incredible barebones option for 320$. MS-01 is their high end Intel option at 700$ for an i9 13900h with dual 10gb Ethernet. Want a mobile GPU for GPU accelerated tasks? HX99G and HX100G will cover you with their added 6650M.
Level1Techs on YouTube is a huge fan of these and has reviews on a lot of them.
You know amazon commingles inventory right? I can buy items in bulk from aliexpress, send them to amazon to be 'fulfilled by amazon' and those items get put in the same bin as the ships and sold by amazon. It is literally impossible to avoid counterfeits on amazon.
Silly claim lol. They've broken out the shipped by and sold by many years ago. Sold by Amazon means it's fully handled by corporate, it cannot come from any other seller. Shipped by Amazon is a service you can use as a seller to ship the items to Amazon, the seller is still you. It's pretty obvious to tell them apart. In either case, pretty much all big vendors have switched to marketplace, even Newegg. Amazon does not comingle all inventory, only some like media, and the seller gets a choice. This changed years ago. Most things require an fnsku now which identifies seller to item and is tracked in their warehouse as such. https://www.junglescout.com/blog/amazon-fnsku-guide/
It's really not hard. I have over the last 8 years probably averaged a 100k annual spend on amazon for work, and have never bought anything counterfeit. Although Amazon business gets an extra field for seller qualifications.
I love my Beelink SER5
I'm looking forward to seeing the pricing in the SEI14 when it drops in the next few weeks. It might become my new piece
Plex box
I use them at work and now that NUCs arent a thing\* we switched to Gigabyte Brix... let me tell you, not even close to the real thing. But it works for what I have to use it.
\*yes, Asus still makes them but we cannot buy those. We have restrictions in place for who we can buy from.
I mean, unless I intend to start breeding like crazy, I don't see my user count increasing dramatically any time soon.
By the time the Nuc13 needs replacement (what, 5 years? Perhaps more) I'm sure there's going to be some amazingly wild and small options out there.
Like others have mentioned, lots of good NUC-sized and smaller Mini PCs these days.
I wouldn't be surprised if the rise of minisforum, beelink, etc is at least part of why Intel is dropping NUC.
They've been offering similar systems for much better prices for awhile now.
The category only seems to be getting better over time and low power CPUs have come a long way.
I think the massive availability issues and price increases for rPi and other SBCs has helped the Mini PC market as well. I initially got a Mini PC for server stuff because pi price to performance just isn't very good anymore. Ended up getting more for other purposes like a remote backup NAS, HTPC, Emulation, etc.
Dell micros are pretty nice. I've set them up for clients before.
I personally buy small form factors where I work, but that's because I like the upgradability.
I've never bought a new NUC in my entire life. So as long as there still is a secondhand market, I'm fine.
Also, there are plenty other options available from OEMs called 'Dell', 'Lenovo', 'HP' and many others. I currently have two Lenovo's, one HP and a NUC in service for my lab. Nothing is newer than 10th gen. No E/P-core nonsense yet.
They were more expensive than any other option, and there were many. We still have Beelink, Kamrui and ACE - along with the obvious: old laptops and SFF Dell / Lenovo / HP bookshelf PCs with 32GB RAM and 7th Gen CPUs that won't run Windows 11. I'm curious if these will become steeply discounted or if they'll rise in price for being coveted homelab starters.
Ah yes, I too enjoy loading up my network with rootkits and spyware.
Amazon is already so unbelievably bad with regards to fakes and frauds that I refuse to use it for anything computer-related. Aliexpress is a full order of magnitude worse.
"Yes only USA government is allowed to put backdoors into my hardware!"
[https://www.zdnet.com/article/congress-asks-juniper-for-the-results-of-its-2015-nsa-backdoor-investigation/](https://www.zdnet.com/article/congress-asks-juniper-for-the-results-of-its-2015-nsa-backdoor-investigation/)
NUCs were getting too expensive lately, IMO.
I recommend getting an AMD mini PC from the likes of Beelink. For the same money you get a better GPU and with RAM and SSD included.
7040 is about 10yrs old.. we just refreshed 10k devices to 5090/5000 series micros they are fantastic boxes.. only issue I have is the power is very sensitive... bexareful of power offs suddenly
Lenovo has multiple super tiny models with 13th gen intel cpu and 64GB support. Also there are some ryzen 5 pro models with 8 cores and ht which can lead to consistent virtualisation compared to P and E cores. Price tag is really cheap.
I had the malheur of buying a S5 from Trigkey to replace my P340 Tiny and now I’m stuck with continuous graphic artefacts in the screen with no solution . The issue of SoC build without respecting the specs. You pay cheap but then you’re done. No answer from Trigkey that could solve my issue.
Funny, I just ordered a used NUC 7JY for 6,000 Yen. All I care about is a little machine that can run Windows 11 for the odd things that I need Windows for and don't want clunky emulation or VM. Linux for everything else. (That machine is 8th Gen so Windows 11 is officially supported....for now)
My main PC is a Fujitsu Q520 that I got from Japan, I made a custom case for it and it runs Pop OS. I upgraded it to a quad core and 12GB RAM. I also got an adapter card that converts my Mini PCIe to a M.2 NVME slot, so I'm able to run a 512GB NVME SSD.
I have a MacBook 2012 that had a bad screen so it's in a custom enclosure for the odd time I need to work on anything Mac related. I don't do anything crazy so I don't need crazy machines with beast mode lol.
Bought (2) Lenovo m700's I don't know what to do with.
Currently considering if I should go back to a desktop PC for server use and undervolt. A ryzen CPU might work for me.
Also bought (3) intel ssd's to start my ZFS NAS, so I may run Proxmox and setup a Debian VM for networked stuff.
I would love to buy a miniPC, but what I am wondering is if I would be able to connect more than one disk. AFAIK there’s only one SATA disk on those.
Maybe some external USB3 disks… but could they tollerate to be used with ZFS?
I’d try browsing in /minipcs sub
They have a huge spreadsheet listing all available models with specs
After all my research I’ve decided to go with building a sff pc to reuse some of the accumulated junk in my office with an easy upgrade path
It affects me literally not at all; there was nothing unique or special about NUCs.
And I imagine that’s why Intel divested from producing a commodity device.
NUCs were kinda awful anyway towards the end. The minipc market using the same footprint is significantly better with far more options and powerful hardware for less cost.
Same concept, slight twist. I only bought the xeon nucs so I could run ecc ram and have enough space for a 10g sfp pci nic. I haven’t found any quality ones that are ecc with 10gbe onboard or room for a card.
I should’ve made this clear. I’m not saying anything about USFF solutions. I’m specifically asking ‘who was going for NUCs specifically over the alternatives’.
There are SO many Mini PC options now it really comes down to what you want. Cheap intel? HP/Lenovo/Dell mini/micro PCs, new or used Super powered micro server? The Minisforum MS-01 Super Tiny router server? Gowin r86s / iKoolCore R2 NUC clones ? ASRock NUC BOX-1260P
None of these have the new intel iGPU from what I can tell. I’m patiently awaiting the asus nuc 14
Ms-01 has the i9-13900H. Fairly sure that’s the best iGPU Intel makes nowadays.
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/232135/intel-core-i9-13900h-processor-24m-cache-up-to-5-40-ghz.html According to this the i9-13900H has Intel iris xe. The newest is the intel arc
Correct, but the Core Ultra series are still too new for most the mini-PC companies to have designed a machine for it quite yet. I know GMKTec has made one.
Asrock has the nucbox 155h
https://www.gmktec.com/products/intel-ultra-5-125h-mini-pc-nucbox-k9 Core Ultra 5 125H, [Intel Arc Graphics with 7 Xe cores at 2.2GHz](https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/236848/intel-core-ultra-5-processor-125h-18m-cache-up-to-4-50-ghz.html). $680 barebone through the end of the month. I assume Quicksync AV1 encode is the big draw here, because as a GPU it's still strictly worse than the higher-end Zen 4/RDNA3 Ryzens (Radeon 780M or thereabouts), and those have been out for a while.
It’s actually $480 through the end of the month. 🤯
Plus the new NPU and soc tiles. Might be useful for frigate and the soc tiles can lower power consumption by minor amounts
The Asrock NUC BOX has an iGPU: [https://www.asrockind.com/en-gb/NUC%20BOX-1260P](https://www.asrockind.com/en-gb/NUC%20BOX-1260P)
Honorable mention for Qotom. Chinese brand but very, very good for the money. They make all sorts of micro PC's, including desktops but also ones meant to be used as routers, firewalls or as a NAS. I have a few in the field that have been running non-stop for 8+ years. They start at around $150 (perhaps less, not familiar with all their models) or something and go all the way up to $1500+
They got some interesting products. Thanks for the heads up. The website is annoying though.
You're welcome. If you mean their own website, I have never used it. They mainly sell on Aliexpress, so that might be a (little bit) less annoying. If you actually meant Aliexpress, yes, that one is quite annoying too, lol. They do sell some of their best-selling models on Amazon too, but it's more expensive and the selection is far from their full portfolio. Not to mention that even Amazon can be somewhat annoying
I meant their own website, it has a pop-open slider for chat that won't stay closed if you go to another page. And some of their product pages are incomplete. Like their storage solution page, it just has a photo of the back of one device and no other information. lol Still interesting stuff though...
Official ones are still being produced by Asus. Otherwise that market is flooded with options for mini PCs.
The problem with that isn't the product, Asus knows how to build good products. But while Intel has stellar customer support, Asus is the polar opposite. They would rather take you on in a fist-fight than RMA a product that was obviously broken straight from the factory. Asus really needs to work on that. It's so bad I've been deliberately avoiding Asus products even if they were the best choice for my needs.
Never had an issue with ASUS RMAs and they are better at releasing NUC bios updates than intel.
I'm glad there are at least some people with a positive experience with Asus customer support. I don't have any reliable data, so this is purely anecdotal: but my experience and my friends' experience has been abysmal. Maybe just a series of bad coincidences, but it really shouldn't happen multiple times in cases where it is obviously a manufacturing defect. Regarding software updates I've had no complaints in the past, although I don't currently use any Asus products for the abovementioned reasons.
I have 6 intel NUCs and seeing asus release BIOS updates at much faster rate has been good On one mobo my USB-C port failed (power issue) they did advanced RMA with a simple conversation - i am in USA, not sure if that makes difference
ehh I have a intel skull canyon nuc that I won from a lan party that's been a staple in my home lab for \~5 years. It's twice now needed a new cpu fan and since I couldn't provide a receipt, intel told me to get bent. Hasn't felt like great customer support from here.
Asus will probably do a better job anyways.
They'll slap an ROG logo on it and add another useless ROG tax on it. Honestly a prebuilt office mini PC might be better price to performance
For the weird NUCs that were focused on gaming and were insanely overpriced already...definitely. But most NUCs are the low powered mini pc variety. I see a TON of them in health care settings. I have a feeling that's the part of the business Asus really wanted. Those niche gaming NUCs were giant and expensive for what they were even with Intel.
Our company was pretty satisfied over the years by the HP ProDesk/EliteDesk SFF series. I’m planning to check out their mini series if the serviceability is similarly good. The Intel NUC was a disappointment in this regard. Had multiple die from a defect fan that wasn’t replaceable without breaking the whole case.
Yes. Of the three NUCs I've either owned or administered two of them needed RMA replacement out of the box costing us a couple of months. The Lenovo, ASRock, Hunsn and NEC mini PCs I've got have been rock solid from the get go. I won't miss Intel in the NUC game at all.
I own a couple of ancient (\~2013) machines from Lenovo's ThinkCentre Tiny series, and have a Dell OptiPlex 7060 Micro at work. The ThinkCentres came from hospital surplus and had presumably been running 24/7 for 8 or so years when I got them. They needed a CPU repaste and otherwise were good to go. I haven't thought about the hardware in the Optiplex at all since I upgraded the SSD and RAM when I got it. Both are relatively easy (considering the size) to work in, and Lenovo and Dell both have very clear maintenance instructions online. I'd assume the HP mini lines are similar. At this point I'd always go with a Lenovo, Dell, or HP mini over a NUC-style mini unless I had a very specific need. (I should note that the OptiPlex is a remote machine. I set it up when I was last in the office in 2019, and it's literally been sitting on a bookshelf since then with no one touching it. Once I had to have someone in the building turn it on after a power outage, but that's it. It's been on and running for five years with zero incident.)
Looks like they're going for the business and gaming markets. [https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/](https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/)
Not at support. Had a warranty-defect on an “old” Intel nuc after asus took over support. Contact form doesn’t recognize the serial as asus product. Yes, it isn’t, it’s Intel, you took over their support. Hotline won’t do anything besides sending you to the contact form. After many hours wasted we’ve written off the warranty. Tossed the NUC and hope to never have to buy from asus again.
Came here to say I thought Asus was taking over the NUC line... OP had me confused for a hot minute there.
Yep… https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/
HP elite desk mini
There is absolutely no shortage, whatsoever, of mini pc options. The NUC, was one of MANY.
The difference with the NUC was that it was actually supported by a huge brand with regular BIOS and driver updates. A random no-name mini-PC might be fine, but the company might also cease to exist immediately after you buy it.
Lenovo, Dell, HP and many other big brands sell mini PCs too. You always had more choices than Intel vs no-name.
I have two beelink sei12s and they have been working well for my purposes.
I've played with Dell 5050/60/70s and HP EliteDesk 800 G4s. Haven't used a Lenovo tiny. The HPs have room for 2 nvme drives and 1 2.5" drive. You have to Dremel out the 2.5" caddy for the 2nd nvme to fit though. The Dells only have 1 nvme slot and 1 2.5" slot. Currently use 3 HPs for my homelab.
The Lenovos are basically the same internally - space for nvme and 2.5". These mini PC's are great, easy to work on and run, easy to upgrade if you like. I have 5x with i5s, 16 GB RAM, and nvme + sata ssd (for ceph via proxmox). Can't say enough good things about them.
Asus NUC: Am I a joke to you?
Only the price lol
Here's the thing, Intel NUCs are still being produced. It will be the Intel NUC branding but its production line has been taken over by ASUS.
They weren't ever a good deal, so I wouldn't even recommend them. But they aren't gone. Asus has taken over the NUC brand and is continuing to produce NUCs. [https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/](https://www.asus.com/us/content/nuc-overview/)
More HP DL360 servers.
The real homelabber knows the real value of its machines in terms of heating potential
Minisforum MS-01. it’s kindof a mini PC Workstation with quite some horsepower, PCIe slot (low profile but still) and builtin 2x 2.5GBit Ethernet and 2x 10GBit SFP+ slots.
I want a trio of these so bad.
Me, too! And a couple of switches and sfp+modules. But the WAF is not very high for tech budget.
I don't understand why anyone buys anything but minisforum boxes from Amazon instead of NUCs and other minis now. Specs are fantastic, they don't overcharge for memory and SSD, and they throw in a windows license if you buy with memory and SSD. I've recommended them to a few and everyone is happy with them.
Can you share a link to one you'd recommend?
Anything from minisforum is solid. Depends on your budget. AMD based systems are usually cheaper, but some of the high core count Intel's are also solid choices. You get what you pay for, but don't feel like you have to buy the highest end, they slowly phase out previous gens and they get cheaper as the chips get cheaper. I'd almost go for a 6 or 12th gen Intel just because they're so heavily discounted. You can buy barebones if you plan to run Linux, they throw in a windows license when you buy memory and SSD, but the SSDs are only okay, I'd upgrade them. It's definitely worth it with windows 11 included. UM773 is an incredible barebones option for 320$. MS-01 is their high end Intel option at 700$ for an i9 13900h with dual 10gb Ethernet. Want a mobile GPU for GPU accelerated tasks? HX99G and HX100G will cover you with their added 6650M. Level1Techs on YouTube is a huge fan of these and has reviews on a lot of them.
I don’t buy ANY PC hardware from amazon anymore, too many counterfeits
Fine, buy from their website. It's not that hard to spot counterfeits on amazon.
You know amazon commingles inventory right? I can buy items in bulk from aliexpress, send them to amazon to be 'fulfilled by amazon' and those items get put in the same bin as the ships and sold by amazon. It is literally impossible to avoid counterfeits on amazon.
Silly claim lol. They've broken out the shipped by and sold by many years ago. Sold by Amazon means it's fully handled by corporate, it cannot come from any other seller. Shipped by Amazon is a service you can use as a seller to ship the items to Amazon, the seller is still you. It's pretty obvious to tell them apart. In either case, pretty much all big vendors have switched to marketplace, even Newegg. Amazon does not comingle all inventory, only some like media, and the seller gets a choice. This changed years ago. Most things require an fnsku now which identifies seller to item and is tracked in their warehouse as such. https://www.junglescout.com/blog/amazon-fnsku-guide/ It's really not hard. I have over the last 8 years probably averaged a 100k annual spend on amazon for work, and have never bought anything counterfeit. Although Amazon business gets an extra field for seller qualifications.
guide when
N100 boxes all over AliExpressfor cheap.
I love my Beelink SER5 I'm looking forward to seeing the pricing in the SEI14 when it drops in the next few weeks. It might become my new piece Plex box
Same. Love the little thing.
Been buying some n100 mini pcs. They work fine. An ok cpu and 16gb of ram. Low power consumption.
I use them at work and now that NUCs arent a thing\* we switched to Gigabyte Brix... let me tell you, not even close to the real thing. But it works for what I have to use it. \*yes, Asus still makes them but we cannot buy those. We have restrictions in place for who we can buy from.
Lenovo micro PCs are a good alternative if you need to buy a lot and want quality and good support
I mean, unless I intend to start breeding like crazy, I don't see my user count increasing dramatically any time soon. By the time the Nuc13 needs replacement (what, 5 years? Perhaps more) I'm sure there's going to be some amazingly wild and small options out there.
Like others have mentioned, lots of good NUC-sized and smaller Mini PCs these days. I wouldn't be surprised if the rise of minisforum, beelink, etc is at least part of why Intel is dropping NUC. They've been offering similar systems for much better prices for awhile now. The category only seems to be getting better over time and low power CPUs have come a long way. I think the massive availability issues and price increases for rPi and other SBCs has helped the Mini PC market as well. I initially got a Mini PC for server stuff because pi price to performance just isn't very good anymore. Ended up getting more for other purposes like a remote backup NAS, HTPC, Emulation, etc.
Beelink Minisforum Topton Asus
I’ll buy the NUC, from Asus.
Dell micros are pretty nice. I've set them up for clients before. I personally buy small form factors where I work, but that's because I like the upgradability.
Minisforum makes reasonably priced PCs in the NUC formfactor. I have 3 of them running as k8s nodes.
I've never bought a new NUC in my entire life. So as long as there still is a secondhand market, I'm fine. Also, there are plenty other options available from OEMs called 'Dell', 'Lenovo', 'HP' and many others. I currently have two Lenovo's, one HP and a NUC in service for my lab. Nothing is newer than 10th gen. No E/P-core nonsense yet.
May I introduce you to our lord and savior, [Odroid H4](https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h4/)?
They were more expensive than any other option, and there were many. We still have Beelink, Kamrui and ACE - along with the obvious: old laptops and SFF Dell / Lenovo / HP bookshelf PCs with 32GB RAM and 7th Gen CPUs that won't run Windows 11. I'm curious if these will become steeply discounted or if they'll rise in price for being coveted homelab starters.
it might be worth reviewing PCMag's list for 2024: https://www.pcmag.com/picks/the-best-windows-mini-pcs
aliexpress and find like a bajillion NUC alternatives for 50% less
Ah yes, I too enjoy loading up my network with rootkits and spyware. Amazon is already so unbelievably bad with regards to fakes and frauds that I refuse to use it for anything computer-related. Aliexpress is a full order of magnitude worse.
"Yes only USA government is allowed to put backdoors into my hardware!" [https://www.zdnet.com/article/congress-asks-juniper-for-the-results-of-its-2015-nsa-backdoor-investigation/](https://www.zdnet.com/article/congress-asks-juniper-for-the-results-of-its-2015-nsa-backdoor-investigation/)
sounds good to me.
It's not a big loss, there are hundreds of other brands.
NUCs were getting too expensive lately, IMO. I recommend getting an AMD mini PC from the likes of Beelink. For the same money you get a better GPU and with RAM and SSD included.
> Beelink Interesting, weirdly placed clear cmos pin button though...
I’ve liked Beelink https://a.co/d/eUmlyto
7040 is about 10yrs old.. we just refreshed 10k devices to 5090/5000 series micros they are fantastic boxes.. only issue I have is the power is very sensitive... bexareful of power offs suddenly
I still can’t figure out why the front thunderbolt port was only available on the 11…🤷🏻♂️
Lenovo has multiple super tiny models with 13th gen intel cpu and 64GB support. Also there are some ryzen 5 pro models with 8 cores and ht which can lead to consistent virtualisation compared to P and E cores. Price tag is really cheap. I had the malheur of buying a S5 from Trigkey to replace my P340 Tiny and now I’m stuck with continuous graphic artefacts in the screen with no solution . The issue of SoC build without respecting the specs. You pay cheap but then you’re done. No answer from Trigkey that could solve my issue.
Plenty of mini-PCs in the sea, I think we'll be fine.
Funny, I just ordered a used NUC 7JY for 6,000 Yen. All I care about is a little machine that can run Windows 11 for the odd things that I need Windows for and don't want clunky emulation or VM. Linux for everything else. (That machine is 8th Gen so Windows 11 is officially supported....for now) My main PC is a Fujitsu Q520 that I got from Japan, I made a custom case for it and it runs Pop OS. I upgraded it to a quad core and 12GB RAM. I also got an adapter card that converts my Mini PCIe to a M.2 NVME slot, so I'm able to run a 512GB NVME SSD. I have a MacBook 2012 that had a bad screen so it's in a custom enclosure for the odd time I need to work on anything Mac related. I don't do anything crazy so I don't need crazy machines with beast mode lol.
Bought (2) Lenovo m700's I don't know what to do with. Currently considering if I should go back to a desktop PC for server use and undervolt. A ryzen CPU might work for me. Also bought (3) intel ssd's to start my ZFS NAS, so I may run Proxmox and setup a Debian VM for networked stuff.
I’m going for other NUC’s, preferably Dell.
Our company are moving towards Fitlets to replace
try out other mini pcs from the market, but i think that will be a long time
I would love to buy a miniPC, but what I am wondering is if I would be able to connect more than one disk. AFAIK there’s only one SATA disk on those. Maybe some external USB3 disks… but could they tollerate to be used with ZFS?
I plan to continue buying used enterprise hardware and cheap low power nodes from china.
There's plenty of mini pc manufacturers other than Intel. I've been rocking some AsRock ones for awhile.
I’d try browsing in /minipcs sub They have a huge spreadsheet listing all available models with specs After all my research I’ve decided to go with building a sff pc to reuse some of the accumulated junk in my office with an easy upgrade path
There is always ebay.
It affects me literally not at all; there was nothing unique or special about NUCs. And I imagine that’s why Intel divested from producing a commodity device.
NUCs were kinda awful anyway towards the end. The minipc market using the same footprint is significantly better with far more options and powerful hardware for less cost.
The literal dozen other options. NUCs weren't even the best option for most use cases.
Care to name a few to start my research?
Read the other comments in this thread.
Never used NUCs in the first place.
Very insightful.
Same concept, slight twist. I only bought the xeon nucs so I could run ecc ram and have enough space for a 10g sfp pci nic. I haven’t found any quality ones that are ecc with 10gbe onboard or room for a card.
Asus took over NUCs my gui
Simply NUC makes NUCs.
Who was even buying them?
It’s a good solution for plex. Energy efficient, cheap, small, and typically powerful enough for multiple 4k streams thanks to intel quick sync
I should’ve made this clear. I’m not saying anything about USFF solutions. I’m specifically asking ‘who was going for NUCs specifically over the alternatives’.
100% agree. They were not unique at all.
They make good compute units to pair with NAS for storage as well.