Minisforum, Gmktec, Beelink

[roccles]

Looking to pick up a mini PC for running Linux—mainly for learning and tinkering, not to replace my main gaming rig. Probably something with a Ryzen 7 and 32GB RAM.


Minisforum, GMKtec, and Beelink seem to get the most love on YouTube and Reddit, but I know a lot of those are review units. Just after some real-world feedback—reliability, noise levels, thermals, that sort of thing. Anything worth knowing before I buy?

 

[lsg1r]

I have a minisforum um560xt, AMD mobile 5600h cpu based, upgraded ram to 64gb from 16gb (which made quite a difference imo) and added a 1tb sata ssd to go with the nvme 512gb - not particuarly noisy imo, huge ass external power brick considering it's size (it's basically half the pc). No less stable/reliable than any other pc I own, no obvious issues with thermals, if anything it likely has more cooling than if it was in a laptop. Only real negative, port positioning maybe and the plastic used is a bit on the cheap side imo.

 

[roccles]

I have a minisforum um560xt, AMD mobile 5600h cpu based, upgraded ram to 64gb from 16gb (which made quite a difference imo) and added a 1tb sata ssd to go with the nvme 512gb - not particuarly noisy imo, huge ass external power brick considering it's size (it's basically half the pc). No less stable/reliable than any other pc I own, no obvious issues with thermals, if anything it likely has more cooling than if it was in a laptop. Only real negative, port positioning maybe and the plastic used is a bit on the cheap side imo.

Thank you that is very useful

 

[oweneades]

I have played around with a couple of mini PC's from GMkTec and Minisforum (MS-A1) and currently own both a MS-01 and a BD790iX3D MB/CPU combo from MinisForum in my current "Desktop".

The GMKTec system was based around a Ryzen 6950HX and had room for dual M2, up to 96GB DDR5 and also had a OccuLink port on the front. It was a great little system but didn't have all the features I wanted at the time. The A2 had the party piece of a full blown AM5 socket along with 4 x M2 slots. It also had OccuLink which was the achilles heel of the unit as everything else was really nice paired with a 7900 and 32GB DDR5.

My current MS-01 is basically a homelab / server / tinkering build and does the job perfectly.

All units have / had large laptop power bricks and are functionally silent in general use. Can't say I had any specific issues with the units themselves (only the OccuLink problems) but I would recommend buying through a large retailer rather than direct for support reasons (seen mixed reviews for all of the brands when it comes to support).

 

[Rroff]

Minisforum, Beelink, Trigkey and MeLE have at least some kind of support and reasonable record for security - both being clean of malware and security vulnerabilities. Many of the other mini PC brands, including GMKtec, have either a poor track record or are an unknown in this respect with quite a few shipping with dodgy stuff in Windows or have done in the past or having security vulnerabilities that likely aren't by accident, or just poor software/driver maturity and no updates.

 

[Philtor]

I have a GMKtec G5 mini and very happy with the build quality.

I did do a clean install out of the box and their support seems to be somewhat lacking, but the machine performs flawlessly.

Oh and it’s the size of a drinks coaster

 

[roccles]

Cheers guys, ended up picking up a Gmktec M7 as it had a nice offer on it while ordering. Pretty impressed so far, I booted into Windows just to check it was working and then installed Linux over the top.

 

[meandu229]

Cheers guys, ended up picking up a Gmktec M7 as it had a nice offer on it while ordering. Pretty impressed so far, I booted into Windows just to check it was working and then installed Linux over the top.

I have heard they cheap out on the nvme drives but since I bought lowest spec one I could I just switched the drive anyway everything else seems great in my g3 mini, very please with it.

 

[roccles]

I have heard they cheap out on the nvme drives but since I bought lowest spec one I could I just switched the drive anyway everything else seems great in my g3 mini, very please with it.

I think will probably end up swapping out the nvme drive and memory fairly soon as its only 512gb and 16GB as potentially going to be running quite a few VMs on there

 

[Fonz-Valo]

I have a GMKtec G5 mini and very happy with the build quality.

I did do a clean install out of the box and their support seems to be somewhat lacking, but the machine performs flawlessly.

Oh and it’s the size of a drinks coaster

I just looked that model up and I'm tempted to get one as an emulation device, what do you use yours for?

 

[Philtor]

Nothing too demanding really. Web browsing and Netflix etc however I believe it is capable of light gaming also (I have the Intel N97 model).

Really pleased with it. Much faster than my old machine it replaced!