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Comment by n4bz0r | Hacker News Reader

Mini PCs mostly run N-series Intel CPUs [0][1] nowadays AFAIK.

The cheaper and most popular one is N150 [2] which is a replacement for N100 [3]. The newer one boosts a bit higher. The 6-7W TDP in specs is a lie, but these CPUs still have fairly modest consumption working at about 10-20W on average.

There are some low power chips from AMD, but that's mostly NAS territory. Don't see them a whole lot and don't know much about them either.

[0] https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/?f=codename_=Gracemont

[1] https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/?f=codename_=Twin%20La...

[2] https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/processor-n150.c4109

[3] https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/processor-n100.c3007

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N100/n150/n97 have similar performance. Power seems to be 6-12w at idle depending. Ram limited to 16GB usually. Low number of pcie lanes (NAS are limited). Cost used to be $100, but now it went up to $120+.

From amd side I have 4700u and 5700u, similar idle power (12w), similar cost ($200 with 32gb of ram, now more expensive). A lot more capable then n100, at a cost.

I use a whole bunch of mini pc in my lab, they are so much cheaper to run electricity wise (and cost)

While the N100 document a 16gb limit, they are known to have no problems with a 32gb module. I run one myself.

There are also higher power AMD devices that work extremely well.

If you’re willing to go up to 60W TDP and $500-1000, then they’re good enough to run recent steam games under linux at 1080p and LLM inference (if you spring for > ~32GB of RAM).

Like many others on this thread, I’ve had good luck with beelink.

I just ordered few days ago a AMD 6850U based minipc (still on it's way). 15 watts TDP, 8 zen3+ cores at 2.7-4.7 GHz. On paper very good fit for minipc. Obviously zen4/5 would be nicer, but those are more difficult to find.

Big reason why I wanted AMD is that Intel officially supports only 16GB RAM on these N series chips. Also AMD has 20 gen4 PCIe lanes vs 9 gen3 lanes for Intel.

https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/ryzen-7-pro-6850u.c276...

> Big reason why I wanted AMD is that Intel officially supports only 16GB RAM on these N series chips.

I've read reviews from people who put 32GB sticks in these boxes no problem. Not sure why they put "16GB max" in the specs, that's just misleading. But the CPU you ordered is way more powerful so no grief there.

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