This MINI PC Is The PERFECT Home Server

[@PbPomper]

Another good reason to buy these second-hand instead of a new SBC or mini-PC: they end up being used instead of being landfill and pollution somewhere. From an e-waste perspective we could do so much more.

[@cvcoco]

The way I see the problem is that minis or others, they get a small problem like a board mosfet that probably costs 10 cents but there is nobody around to trace it and replace it, certainly not the mfrs who would rather sell you a new pc than have real repair centers. Now what? Im facing this problem right now and so im looking for a new mini extremely reluctantly. Im hopping mad.

[@esotericjahanism5251]

@@cvcoco I found a box of mini Dell optiplexes in a dumpster once the only thing wrong with them was a few of the usb ports would only work intermittently. Which was no big deal for me since I ran them all headless

[@cvcoco]

@@esotericjahanism5251 Yes but if you needed and expected the ports to work? Nobody around to fix them so you throw the unit in the dumpster and its a shame.

[@rogerwilco2]

Indeed. The CO2 pollution of fabricating these is the equivalent of running such a system for decades.

[@tictacterminator]

@@rogerwilco2 better stop using computer then

[@edtruthseeker3337]

Very well done. I am 58 years old and have seen the growth of computers. My livelihood has been with computers and electronics. Your knowledge is exceptional. Very well done.

[@philipkeeler9997]

Exceptional is very apt. You can tall when they love sharing for reasons beyond the clicks. A little camera shy but that will work itself out. Very sharp mind and his mothers heart I'm certain. Yes very well done. I just subbed.

[@serverscience]

I appreciate the kind comments, and I’m happy you liked the video! Thanks

[@eddieR-yy3sy]

For £80 I have replaced my suitcase sized box with one of these puppies, 800/G3, Perfect for everyday use, photo editing etc. Upgraded with an NVME. Whooosh!

[@ericbrearley]

I grabbed 3 G4 8700T's for $230 AUD each from Facebook Marketplace. Then added 64GB RAM and a 2TB SSD for each of them bringing the total to around $1400 AUD. They're doing pretty well as a reasonably power efficient HA Proxmox cluster. Pretty happy with it, apart form the noise under load. Maybe the lower end 35w TDP models would have been better.

[@Jonteponte71]

The "T" versions should be the 35W version. I'm thinking the the non "T" versions is a better fit for SFF versions of this model with better cooling.

[@ZeroFPV]

@@Jonteponte71 Yeah, the "T" is the 35W version. The 35W version does not have ventilation holes on the top of the case, while the 65W version has ventilation holes on the top.

[@martinzipfel7843]

These things are absolute sleepers. I "downgraded" about 3 months ago from a full-blown HP Z440 with 145W Xeon and 196GB Ram to an 800 G4 with 7th gen i5 and 32GB and that machine is performing. Runs all my media applications (iGPU passed through to Jellyfin for hardware decoding), some productivity applications, Home Assistant and Frigate (I use a Coral TPU in the Wifi slot) with relative ease. CPU is around 40% and it shredded about 100W of my energy usage, which is significant considering it is 100W 24/7.

[@MayckXavier]

How do you deal with storage?

[@NFTwizardz]

Same would love to know as most say I shouldn't use USB hhd CADDY

[@HaydonRyan]

Love the use of the coral gpu in the wifi slot. Makes for an excellent all in one server (with storage in a nas). Which model did you get?

[@martinzipfel7843]

@@NFTwizardz I used a DAS with USB-C connected to the mini PC and 4 x 16TB WD drives. Drives passed through from Proxmox to TrueNAS for RAID and sharing. Bit annying having to passthrough every drive separately but there is no space for an LSI SAS card, unfortunately.

[@NFTwizardz]

@martinzipfel7843 nice thanks for replying. I built a PC with HBA and run true nas scale as VM on proxmox passing through the HBA.

[@liqm88]

I bought the 65w version of the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini and was able to fit 2x2TB m.2 and 1 500GB sata SSD. I'm very pleased.

[@ep_dimi]

Running 2 m.2 under sata ssd doesn't get hot? Do you use it as a nas?

[@MojoMagic977]

Same but use one of the m.2 for external pcie RX 6600 video card. Decent mini form factor gaming rig…

[@tminfidel]

I bought one of these with the i5-8500T to use for day to day computing that doesn't require the discrete GPU of my main system and to save on running costs. I'm so impressed with it that I'm considering getting another.

[@prabaharanaece]

I am planning to buy one and use it with ubuntu. just for normal day to day use at home. do you think its okay??

[@tminfidel]

@@prabaharanaece Yes, definitely!

[@Paw_Low]

@@prabaharanaecemaybe you should see what version of ubuntu will work with your mini pc before you buy it, I bought a Prodesk 400 G4 mini (i7 8700T, 8 RAM) and I couldn’t install neither Ubuntu 24.04 (desktop and server version) nor Ubuntu 22.04 (desktop and server version)

[@abunk8691]

Can you share what kind of computing do you do on the i5 8500T? I'm interested in getting a 1L PC (either an Optiplex Micro or one of the HP minis) for various tasks like file compression, photo editing, virtual machines, the usual stuff like web browsing, etc.

[@tminfidel]

@@abunk8691 I actually got another mini PC with the non-T 8500 and use that mostly now. The 8500T was good for some stuff, but the low TDP was a bit restrictive. I definitely wouldn't want to use it for photo editing or hosting VMs.

[@christafari85]

These little machines are amazing, I used to have a T630 Dell Poweredge at my place. Dual Processor 256gb of ram, while it was good the electricity costs for a few VMs running low speced services I ended up decomissioning it and opted for an i7 little 16gb ram Prodesk like this and just presented the NAS with iSCSI storage is a plenty and win on the electricity costings.

[@roryl]

256Gb of ram!?! :O

[@fgregerfeaxcwfeffece]

​@@roryl Not really difficult with 16 slots. Maybe you should look up that model. It's a dual socket system.

[@Jimmy_Boy_Kalahati]

I have this model, "HP EliteDesk 705 G4 Desktop Mini Computer - Ryzen5PRO 2400G/16GB/256GB - WIN 10" and really like it. I use it for a living room computer to stream video and play my MP3's. It came with a 256gb m.2 and also the tray/cable for a 2.5ssd

[@danwat1234]

I like the 65w Prodesk SFF boxes with an i5-8500, then undervolt by 140mV, test for stability. Only draws 60w at the wall under full BOINC load with an SSD. So much used hardware online for cheap a big surplus. companies keep on aging out perfectly good powerful computers so they are great deals

[@AlistairBrugsch]

How do you undervolt a prodesk? Hacked BIOS?

[@IAmCjcj11]

What does the full system pull at idle/low usage?

[@danwat1234]

@@AlistairBrugsch No, just an older bios from HP website you need one from late 2018 or so before plundervolt was a thing. But sometimes HP 'sure start' blocks downgrading bias that sucks

[@danwat1234]

@@IAmCjcj11 probably about 20w with an SSD not much

[@JamieStuff]

I've been collecting these "tiny/mini/micro" systems as I find them at a good price. Rather than running VMs in my Unraid server, these are on my network, turned off, until a wake on LAN "magic packet" gets set from the PiKVM, and I can log in remotely.

[@whitebeartigtig]

Seems you beat me to it, I bought a couple of these, same config too. I was also planning on making a video mainly just about what can really be done with these machines. Honestly in my situation, might be better off using one of these as my main system, it'll consume way less power and I can always use another system for more demanding tasks. My laptop is using 35W just watching this video and can use upwards of 200W under full load, which is just too much in the current economy. If you're curious, I paid £74.99 for the two machines, and another £17.98 for the two power adapters, they came with 4GB RAM and i3 7100T. I'd say I did pretty well on the pricing there, and if I ever don't need the one I'm keeping, I can always resell it for way more than I paid. One of them is going to a friend. Also, absolutely no judgement when it comes to the linux distro, Debian, even as a desktop OS works great and is super stable, and I'm sure it is even better as a server OS without the desktop environment.

[@rdsii64]

This is just what I need. All I need it to do is run the OS, NordVpn, and Qbittorent 24/7 to download "linux ISO's" . After I seed the file for 24 hours, it gets transferred to my media server.

[@ZeroFPV]

Bought an HP EliteDesk G3 Mini with an i5-7500T, 16GB RAM and a 2TB SSD some time ago. I'm running Proxmox and several different virtual machines(TS3 Server, Pihole, OpenVPN and a Valheim server) in parallel without any problems. I also set up some vitual Windows machines but only boot them if I need them. Proxmox can also use Linux containers to save resources.

[@serverscience]

I definitely need to take a look at Linux containers. I had heard of them, but haven't used them before. Should be a good way to save on system resources.

[@therandomdot2563]

After the housing crash of 2008 in the US, laws were passed forcing fintech companies to run thin-clients that employees would use to log into virtual machines. Idea was it would keep all fintech data on servers w/o risk of employees taking it home on laptops and what-not. So, fintechs started buying these minipc's and smaller thin clients up in droves. If anything went wrong, IT person would just hand you a new one and take the old one. Plug-n-play it in, log into your VM, good to go. I worked at a fintech a few years ago, and the IT guy carried 2 around in his bag all the time. The companies go through accounting depreciation cycles to replace the things, so you see all their old kit get bought up by refurb companies that flip them on places like Amazon. As long as large companies are forced to use a thin-client model, you're gonna keep seeing mini pc's flooding the refurb market. And it's actually quite nice, b/c they're powerful enough to be a daily driver. That way you don't hve to boot up your gaming rig every day just to surf the web.

[@fabiocicm]

my first home server was a HP EliteDesk 800 G6. i5-10500t 6c/12t at 9w system idle. amazing for Proxmox.

[@ChefEarthenware]

I use these and they are great. The only drawback is the fan noise. It's silent on idle, but as soon as I do any processing the noise becomes intrusive.

[@Hombre1968]

I had a similar issue on my Dell MFF box, updated the firmware and re-pasted the CPU and all is now nice and quiet

[@sploffo]

I went down a similar route recently but went with a dell system. It's really nice and has expansion for an M.2 ssd, 2.5" ssd, socketed CPU (limited upgrade paths however), up to 32GB of DDR4 and an i5-8500T. It also has an M.2 wifi upgrade slot but I'm going to use it to add another ethernet port for opnsense :)

[@wmweirich]

Which Dell system did you use? I would like to shop them, thanks....

[@thisisnotanhandle]

Great review, thanks. I'll get it to replace my Debian headless server when it dies.

[@djgaffey2009]

A great machine I am looking into and start diving into the server world and running my own lab to learn new things, A side note if anyone buys these and have access to a 3d printer you might be able to 3d print the top cover to have ventilation like the updated versions it might help with cooling not having to work as hard to be efficient

[@r3tr0sp3ct3r]

Or you could buy another one listed for parts only and swap the vented panel and heatsink

[@otter-pro]

I have bought couple of these HP as well as similar Dell. I use one for OBS streaming and it runs 24/7 without an issue.

[@nobodynemoq]

Thanks, great video! You made me buy it 😁 Got the i5-6500T version, significantly more powerful - should be perfect for some proxmoxing 😎

[@Frisky0563]

I want one of these for MQTT server running Mosquito and Node Red in my 2nd home. These thin clients are nice solution for many project. Thank you for your video. ❤

[@therandomdot2563]

I got an hp elitedesk 800 g3, and my idea was to use it as my daily driver, but to also use it to vnc into my other computers. Problem was I'm not near my router and using a LAN cable to hook it all up was out of the question. I added an ax wifi chip to it, and updated my gaming rig to an ax wifi card, and now remoting into the gaming rig to play games is viable. I was finally able to put the KVM switch aside. Only problem is my work laptop does not allow folks to remote in. So, I still have to KVM into it.

[@thatssotrieu]

Back in my day... 2 McChickens were $2

[@BrianThomas]

You can't live off the dollar menu son. lol...😂

[@philipkeeler9997]

Yep. Munchin' shitty food at the desk (maybe whiffin' a bit) bashing DoS explaining to the ol' lady over the phone that you really were at the office at midnight.. Oh blessed was the day when the boss walked in and said 'Don't worry folks... they're coming out with this crazy new thing called Windows. And now forty years later, I'm bashing away frantically trying to escape from Win 11 TOTAL INTRUSION EDITION. Bought three of these little beauties. Wife has long given up on bitchin' while I now learn Proxmox and Kali's toolset.

[@BrianThomas]

@@philipkeeler9997 very nice!!!

[@TechWizTime]

Nice to see another Aussie Tech Channel 😊 Would be great to see a homelab run down/tour video. Low Power is 100% more sustainable especially in Aus with power and cost of living. I'm running an N100 as a router (1000/50) using PFsense as a VM within Proxmox. That was fun 😅 And then 3x WAX206 with OpenWRT as a mesh for WiFi 6 coverage. 2x Synology NAS for storage/redundancy with portainer for services on each. 2x low power mini pcs for Portainer docker instances (Automation & AI on one plus a testing unit segmented on the network). And ive shifted from Ububtu server to Debian myself so no judgement here 😅 Great video and Ive subbed!

[@oscarcharliezulu]

How have you found the move to Debian?

[@TechWizTime]

@@oscarcharliezulu From Ubuntu server, debian was pretty easy to get started. I had a few teething issues but nothing a little googlefu didn't solve

[@f1aziz]

How's your experience with pfsense on VM? I am running it on a low powered machine with two NICs, it's used as fw + reverse proxy to a bunch of applications I am hosting on my homelab. Oh my Poxmox cluster is all based on Dell and HP tiny PCs with maxed out memory. Right now I am running Kubernetes cluster on the VMs in Proxmox cluster hosting my applications. Thinking of setting up Ceph storage cluster to feed into Kubernetes pods to provide efficient shared storage, backup, recovery solution. I also have a Synology box, but I am heavily under-utilizing it as NFS server, I suppose I could run Dockerized apps on here, but I am too focused on getting deep and dirty with Kubernetes instead. Just a humble software developer, not a network engineer, all of this has been super over-engineered and super fun to learn.

[@spyware1100]

you can buy an N95 powered 8gb ddr4 mini system for around 140$ brand new, which is a ~1.5 times faster cpu than the i3-7100T while consuming only around 6-10W, and the form factor is even smaller than the g3 mini. Definitely worth to check out!

[@0xKruzr]

I need 10G networking for Ceph under Proxmox, otherwise something like that would be very tempting.

[@ZeroFPV]

@@0xKruzr take a look at the CWWK CW-MBX-AS12N-35. It has 2x 2.5G LAN from the go and does support 2 Intel 82599ES dual 10G optical port expansion cards.

[@hcjkruse]

Some models allow you to add two NVMe SSDs but then the Data SSD will not fit. Watch out for the 65 watt TDP models. The Sata SSD cradle comes with an extra fan onder the cradle. removing the cradle for an extra NVMe will result in making the main fan become noisy. The 32 Watt TDP models are more useful here. I own a Prodesk 400 and 600 mini. I also own the 65 Watt TDP 800 mini elitedesks model. The sweet spot in pricing is the 4th gen and 5th gen model. You might want to repaste them. I will combine mine in a desk shelve with 3 official under desk sleeves. Getting a replacement PSU was harder last year. Remote management is not present in some models. Be aware of cheaper Pentium offers. I would replace the option serial or vga port with an USB-C port. They officially support 32 Gb memory but 64Gb memory does work.

[@LatitudeSky]

Just got one of these from ebay for about US$40 plus another 40 spent on more memory and an M.2. It will replace a I5 2nd gen notebook and I am really happy with what I got. It lacks nothing. In fact, I was l looking at a new Pi 4 or 5 but the cost versus performance was always discouraging. But this HP mini is just so much more powerful and flexible for the cost while not being too much bigger. And it can easily handle Windows 11 if I decided I needed to run that. Best of all, this G3 Mini used the same power adapter as the old HP notebook it replaced so I was able to plug and go, after adding a monitor, of course.

[@lukaspechar]

Very interesting video. Very good tips for my future home network. On a different note I’d suggest looking into the camera lens rather than the monitor. Helps connect to the audience more. Subbed

[@TomK32]

I was lucky enough to upgrade my 400 G2 Mini from a 6100 to a 6700 CPU that I found separately with, funny enough, a hp prodesk SFF mainboard I had no use for. That little 8-core machine is a beast now for my proxmox and docker needs.

[@dj_paultuk7052]

Good little machines. I have two of the EliteDesk versions with i7's. A lot of power in a tiny box.

[@jesses7244]

This is a great video. I realy appreciate how in-depth you went, without over-complicating things. You've done a great job here, man. Thank you very much!

[@real_adv512]

when i moved into my appartment i went from having a full atx tower running truenas scale running a nas, survaliance, minecraft and CSsource servers. i learned that truenas SCALE has USB support. for shits and giggles i plugged in a HDD toaster and sure enough they showed up. so when i went from this big 5 bedroom house to a studio i didnt need the same thing (mostly cause it wasnt mine i just ran it) and i improvised with a mini dell like yours and plugged in another toaster and thats what i use as my nas now. (minecraft and CS are still hosted on the old server)

[@real_drops]

I love those HPs, 2x M2 + 2.5 drive, very low power consumption - even perfect as small fileserver :)

[@iMrAnMiRzA52]

I am considering to buy one of these mini PCs for using as an internal, small server. I first considered AWS ec2 but 4 vcpu which I think is minimum I need is expensive (around 30 AUD per month) Then I considered raspberries but they are very limiting as you also stated. I recently found out about these mini pcs and I am going to order soon. Thanks for the nice content!

[@dahuar2006]

For me is the clear winner for a home and simple nas server using no solid state discs

[@jeffreyplum5259]

You can swap in the 95 watt vented outer shell for the solid 35 watt cover.. Please be very careful if your unit has a standard 2.5 inch drive caddy. The tiny ribbon cable for SATA power and data is very easy to disconnect. MY Elitedesk 800 gen 3 had both a 2.5 inch SATA drive caddy and a PCIE m2 ssd connection. The ribbon cable can loose so now i can only use the M2 drive internally. I have no AC so the hard shell covers can restrict cooling. I have removed the PCIE M2 drives to external cases with tiny fans on my EliteDesk Gen 2 systems with solid un-vented top covers. These have 35 watt I7s in them. I am waiting for a similar Lenovo m700 tiny system with an i3-6100t chosen as a lower power 4 thread option. The Elitedesks have Wake-on-Lan as standard, so your servers can be booted remotely. I have not used this feature yet, but this video may help me set up an I7 as a Proxmox server. I find these 1 Liter form factor systems are addicting.

[@maniacusgames3621]

have 2 600 G1's as HTPCs, turning a 600 G3 into a suitcase computer rig, and just bought an 800 G3 to turn into a home cloud server. in fact I'm watching this video from one of my 600 G1's projected onto my bathtub tiles from my Nebula Mars Lite projector. I've become quite the fan of these Elitedesk mini pc's but I also just bought a dell equivalent mini PC to experiment with.. lastly I wond up with a barebones 600 G3 last year that has a bad motherboard i kept as a parts donor machine..

[@JuhaKona]

the way you connect with us viewers is just amazing!

[@gkjester]

I ended up up with 2 400 G1’s, and I think one will end up as a small server for my house camera. I don’t need anything fancy or with massive storage.

[@ytxzw]

I love those small PCs. I have them 2 pieces with 6500T but planning more 😄😄😄

[@Jbzy3000]

I buy the Lenovo versions of these machines. I keep saying I was going to try my hands at cluster computing. I end up giving them to college kids that need a cheap computer. Now I need one for a little project.

[@Dmee33]

Great video! I have a question - why not a brand new Intel N100 system for the same price with faster NVME, DDR5 and about twice more energy efficient? It would also have modern codec and instruction support, as well as much more modern wireless. Any thoughts?

[@kevinlsims7330]

I Like The Bigger Optiplex 7070 SFF As It Is Large Enough To Hold An Internal 3.5 HDD! I have A 16TB In Mine! An I9 9900 And Full Size DDR4 2666 Ram! The Power Supply Is Internal As Well! It Has A DVD Writer And SD Card Reader! It Fits On The Shelf Below My TV And With My 1650 I Can Play Some Games! M.2 Gen 3 I Have A Sabriant Rocket 1TB Gen 4x4 In It!

[@MaineLander]

This price comparison to McChickens made me laugh

[@ADesertVoice]

For a home server, i saw these and saw something like Beelink Ser Pro 5 that has much better specs and are still pretty competitively priced and couldn't justify getting this for something like that Beelink for more cores and more threads and much better overall performance.

[@AlbertScoot]

Yeah, I got one of those recently but the slightly bigger version with a pci and pci-e port. It's great.

[@dazealex]

Which one is the bigger version?

[@Matthew_A_N]

Got one for $50. But just put Debian on it baremetal instead of a hypervisor. its great, low power consumption for running 24/7, low noise, low physical space usage.

[@jamesstewart5005]

I use one of these for a Plex client on a CRT. Total overkill but it was handy and cheap. Nice little machines. They make a good OpenSense firewall if you stick an M.2 NIC into it.

[@kotgc7987]

Imho, the best affordable home system could be a mini pc with 2 RJ-45 ports for a vm router WAN and LAN, with LAN to a switch, then switch to as many Cat6-HDMI extensions as rooms in a house. Cat6-HDMI connec to 3 monitors, mouse and keyboard. Mini-pc runs vms for whatever the room's user uses. Maybe a USB for Zigbee coordinators for Home Automation. Imho, VMM > Proxmox, as you can run the mini pc on and OS, then run VMM to run whatever KVM you want like a router or OS per room.

[@g120957au]

Whilst you have it open it would be wise to change the backup battery, that one shown is starting to swell which means it is on it's way out, and don't just buy a cheap one get a higher quality brand name one as they do last longer

[@Bthaman69]

I'm liking the mini pc content!

[@ricardog2165]

It can be a Docker server, then you can add an external USB Hard Drive and run a UrBackup container to turn it into a Backup server as well. You can also use a UPS monitor on it.

[@jkarra2334]

no redundancy...adding disk pool to these machines is more expensive than just buy cheap home server... also 2 cores in this HP is just not enough for decent file system like ZFS

[@serverscience]

@jkarra2334 Two cores is completely adequate for ZFS. I used to run it on an AMD A4 3400 and got excellent performance.

[@jkarra2334]

@@serverscience yes, ZFS itself uses very little CPU. It should remain I/O bound most of the time, even with compression and/or encryption, though compression is POISON for low cpu count cpu's. Yet again, Samba burns CPU, but I think it's pretty much constrained to only using 1 core per file transfer. More than few cores is only going to have effect if you regularly have on big or multiple hig throughput I/O to multiple disk array(s) but still, lower clocked 2-core cpu's are just painfully slow . yes, you can play with them as hobby but for actual use like own redundant file server with decent transfer speeds i rather invest for more cores and plenty of RAM instead only few cores (even if higher clocks) and plenty of RAM, speed is king, even at home workflows and loads.

[@blakecasimir]

I just picked up a SFF version of this for under £30, bare bones. I hope that version also has a low idle wattage.

[@valkaielod]

They have been in the 20w range in idle since the 2nd i generation at least. My 2nd gen sff HP has 4 2.5 hard drives and a larger 3.5. I should be able to add another 4 ssds. Lovely little proxmox hosts :)

[@blakecasimir]

@@valkaielod 6th gen is supposed to have an even lower idle wattage. I'm going to try an i3-6100t, no HDDs, just one SSD and see how low it goes ...

[@ravagingwolverine]

@@blakecasimir From what I have seen, the sixth-generation Intel chips did get a nice improvement to idle power draw over fourth-gen as you alluded to. I saw a comparison where it was about half the draw at idle, so they're a good generation to target. I saw someone had a video showing a system with the regular 6100 to be at 17w idle total. That might be on the better end of things, but that seems to be roughly where the idle would be. The T version should be similar at idle, and lower overall. I have a regular 6100, but keep procrastinating on getting a watt meter. I'm rather curious how much it's drawing, though I'm not worried about it, which is probably why I never get around to buying the meter.

[@dzmelinux7769]

I like your videos, encouraging people to use some used stuff with good performance and save money while benefitting, win win situation 👍

[@galen__]

Great video and impressive use of flat head driver 😅

[@prob17]

Have similar. Added m2 2.5gbe nic and running proxmox with home assistant etc. Must try unvolting.

[@Jackson_Zheng]

Speaking from experience, these little guys are wayyy better than Raspberry Pi's.

[@jaspercas]

The ones with 6th gen i3 is sold for around 150$ here in the Philippines, it's fairly expensive

[@jnhkx]

I got 400 G3 with 6600T for $130 last year in Thailand, there is a lot of em around here.

[@ren3059]

Got Optiplex 7070 i5-9500T for 6500 pesos

[@edfx]

I wonder if intel processors with e-cores gonna be proxmox beasts? 7500T 4 cores, 14500T 14cores.

[@matthewthedude146]

i have a couple Dell OptiPlex 3050's to replace my old dell PowerEdge server and reduced my power bills almost in half

[@PoliticalFacts-NoMAGA]

Thank you. You are a pleasure to listen to, and very informative. Great Job!!

[@fexpexanthony559]

Been scrolling for home lab projects and yours is very informative with detail, any advice on what to do with an M720q with an Intel Core I5 and 16 GB RAM?

[@theminer49erz]

I was just looking at one of those builds with a AMD 3400g and 16gb for $155 USD but it said it would not ship for a month or two. I may just order one or two and see what happens. Reviews go from "perfect" to "this thing wasn't even looked at let alone refurbished". I'm sure theynwere just bought used in bulk and they are just crossing their fingers they will work I agree the Pi is way too much now for what they do and not being x86. At times that's ideal, but always. If I needed to only use as much power as absolutely nessasary, I may go with one, but for home servers/labs/"IoT"/Media I think something is like this is prob ideal. You can always run in a efficiency mode and undervolt the CPU a bit depending on the bios.

[@helloukw]

Cool channel! I'm looking for a reliable alternative for my rPI3, which is getting old now. I keep looking for old systems and thin clients, but the truth is I've set my eyes on N100 Cpu, which has plenty of power and its so much more power efficient than anything I could find and it comes with the motherboard as well. Now the price is kind of high, but given that its new its not all that bad. Is this a good alternative for starting a home server?

[@newtlab]

Great video, we are waiting for more on that topic

[@llothar68]

Is it better to buy a 2nd hand notebook or this home server and a UPS ? I live in the Philippines where blackouts are daily happening.

[@szookk]

This + cheap UPS with exchangable battery. Be aware that UPS also consumes energy.

[@LinuxLoader1287]

Yeah they're OK but lack the space for large drives (not solid state)

[@bobh5261]

thanks for this. I always look for energy efficient pc for my everyday use. had a detailed video. its around $90ish in USA with power supply and HD.

[@techscience1480]

I would call this "honest review" :) How much noise is there, at 50% or 100%, would you notice it in living roum under the tv, so few meters distance? You mention it has much noise at 50% cpu usage

[@jos4564]

Is this PC fully supported by Linux/Ubuntu? E.g. does Ethernet etc work out of the box, or does this require 'difficult' install such as kernel modules etc?

[@rafing2163]

Hey bro i just bought one of those pcs for my Minecraft server and everything seems fine but i worried about the temperature i was thinking is it possible to add a normal desktop pc cooler on those?

[@ericjbowman1708]

12:25 Get yourself a plastic implement, I cringed at bridging mobo contacts with a flat-hed metal screwdriver for prying. :)

[@jameshastings6538]

What one would be better for a Jelkyfin server? This one or the Raspi5 one?

[@MnemonicCarrier]

How much are the later generations that have 8 cores and 16 threads?

[@serverscience]

I believe the cheapest to get 8 cores (but only 8 threads) would be a system with the i7 9700t, at roughly $300 USD. To get 8 cores 16 threads, you would want a system with either an i9 9900t (I didn't find any for sale), or an i7 10700t, which would cost roughly $350 USD. It's a lot more than I paid, but probably a better price for the performance.

[@MnemonicCarrier]

@@serverscienceWhat about those little mini PCs with Ryzen 7 CPUs (like the 5700u etc...)?

[@serverscience]

The beelink ser5 with the 5700u is also $350 USD

[@ContagionIsAnIllusion]

Yes! I just set up a bitcoin and lightning node!

[@shtfvan8084]

Can the mini 600 g3 be a gaming pc? If so, what parts are needed?

[@MasterYoshidino]

You are not kidding. These computers are EVERYWHERE at work places. Even mine.😂

[@galihpa]

Can this mini pc be turned on automatically after a power outage ? For a home server, this feature is very important

[@serverscience]

Yes, most modern HP computers have that option in their bios.

[@graxxor]

This is why the Raspberry Pi 5 at its ridiculously inflated price is absolutely no match for a second hand SFF system for the average Joe..... I have three Pi 4B 8GB I bought back in the day when they were reasonably priced. but ever since Corona, I have bought second hand SFF Dells and Lenovos because they are so much higher cost performace contenders. When the Pi goes back to beining $35 to 50 then I'll start to consider them viable 24/7 units for my network.

[@AlgoBasket]

amazing video, love it

[@realdeal7002]

So I could turn this into a home nas?

[@colinmaharaj]

I want that cassette player

[@showmytime9177]

where the fudge do you take out those prices? In my country that PC is 250EUR minimum.

[@serverscience]

The purchase price was a conversion from AUD to USD. These systems are cheap here in Australia as they are very popular with large businesses and the government.

[@showmytime9177]

@@serverscience you're not the only one who claims unrealistic prices, STH claimed 100$ or less for these, at that time they were 500€ in my country

[@DmitryLavrinenko]

What about N100 based system? It coud be more power efficient and even fanless and noiseless.

[@echoecho-rt5xj]

N100 have a Poor stability.

[@jellyjenn12291]

do you have any recommendations for Small Formfactor PCs that would be good for a NAS and JellyFin server?

[@serverscience]

The HP Elitedesk 800 SFFs are decent, because they’re cheap and have space for two 3.5” drives. I’ve taken a look at one in another video.

[@notfunny3397]

Is that really 1litre? Thats pretty insane

[@kevinoneill2170]

You can find similar machines in this 1litre form factor from Lenovo (called Tiny), HP (called Mini), and Dell (called Micro). The KZbin channel ServeTheHome (STH) has an entire 50 video playlist covering these types of machines over the last 3.5 years, called the STH Project TinyMiniMicro, where you can learn more about the different variations available and how you can use them.

[@alexandrustefanmiron7723]

Works wonders!

[@therevoman]

Great video!

[@egokhanturk]

How do we use this pc as a router, firewall etc. It is have only one rj45 port. Any tutorial?

[@serverscience]

You can get an ethernet NIC for the M.2 Wifi slot (A+E key). I've ordered one but haven't been able to test it yet.

[@egokhanturk]

@@serverscience Thank you im so happy right now because i have lenovo mini pc included wifi. Now it is time to replace with the ethernet NIC

[@burhanbudak6041]

Can the expansion bay be turn i to a PoE port? Then you cam add a AP and have external WiFi transmitter.

[@baptisteperdriaux588]

Using a dell wyze thin client 3040 2g ram 8gb emc get for free at work and 250 usb 3 ssd for home assistant docker compose stack. It run fine but I'm storage limited on the wyse for os / package update. I think I going to move to a used Intel processor n or j based pc to get a perf improvement and because it's running h24 don't want higher tdp cpu. Currently the atom x5 is 5w looking for something similar, cheap and reliable for now I can get a MSI n3150i with celeron n3150 for 60 also a Chinese mini pc aero 2 pro with n5105 for 80€ temptation is high for the last one but not sure it will be reliable do you have any other idea?

[@rexxx927]

is HP bios updates not only tru windows now and you can't see what it really is??

[@strife711]

They make the best hackintosh systems

[@YannMetalhead]

Good video!

[@edwardpackard5557]

I bought one. Its brilliant. The vendor, less so. The damn BIOS is locked, cant access it. Cant add more memory, cand change the hdd. Vendor wont answer emails. So... I cant set the thing to reboot after power loss. Que sera sera. I am running Valheim with lots of mods and Satisfactory. It has had linux installled. Grrrrr

[@serverscience]

There should be a jumper somewhere on the board to reset the password, but not all models have it. Depending on the model, it might be under the fan, or somewhere near the back of the board. I hope that helps.

[@jamescaiquep3794]

i think all i3 are not vpro compatible nor does it support overclock unlike i5 and i7

[@jada1173]

I don't call consumer hardware great for proxmox, yes it works very well but proxmox with all it's logging chew up cheap home nvme disc in no time, even worse if the vm's also doing much writing. You should use expensive consumer hard drives and have a possibility to make backups.

[@Hwkman4]

Why doesn't he use usbc?