Small quiet PC for basic usage by wife and kids

Participant

Participant

Participant

Caporegime
Joined
13 May 2003
Posts
34,506
Location
Warwickshire
Hi all

I'd like to build a small PC in a spare bedroom. This will be used mainly by the wife for her teaching work (so mainly Word and PowerPoint) while I'm gaming or whatever on the main PC.

It'll also start to be used more and more by our little ones (2 and 4) as they get older and begin to use it for educational purposes.

It'll need to be VESA mountable so I can hide it behind the monitor. Ideally it would be able to accommodate a Q6600 and some DDR2, however this is secondary.

Budget is the least I have to spend to satisfy the requirements.

Many thanks.
 
I'm assuming gaming is not a concern, then?

If you are OK with dual core Celerons or Atoms, then there are plenty with £100-150 price range. Even OcUK has one model in stock: Gigabyte Brix GB-BXBT-2807 (Cel N2807)
It's also what they use to build the above mentioned OCUK's Nano range.
Another low cost option would be Zotac ZBOX MA320 (A4-5000).

Then there are few more interesting options at the £150-200 range:
Zotac ZBOX nano AQ02 (A8-5545M)
Zotac ZBOX ID45 (i3-3227U)
Gigabyte Brix GB-BXA8-5545 (A8-5545M)
Gigabyte Brix GB-BXi3-5010 (i3-5010U)

ALL of these still require you to purchase the memory and storage separately. So that's about £100 extra. If you need a new Windows license, that's £80 more. In other words, you'll be looking at spending £300-400 in total. I would personally opt for the Zotac ZBOX nano AQ02, as that seems to have most bang for buck. But apparently I'm not the only one, so you might have trouble finding it in stock.

If you want something VERY low cost, then there's also the Intel Compute Sticks. They come with Atom Z3735F and Windows 8.1. Low performance, so might be unbearable to use. But £100 in total.
 
There is a newer version of the Intel Compute Stick out -
BOXSTK1AW32SCR
Quad-Core Intel Atom x5-Z8300 Processor
Windows 10 (32-bit)
Intel HD graphics
2 GB DDR3L 1600 MHz soldered down single-channel memory
Integrated Wireless 802.11ac (Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7265)
One USB 3.0 and One USB 2.0
Bluetooth 4.0

Reviews seem more favourable than the previous version:
liliputing.com

Engadget Review

I guess OCUK will be stocking them soon.
 
is the newer atom any good at all ? had a chromebook with one in and it felt slow even just in chrome :(

looking for something similar
 
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