This stylish Mini PC has a Ryzen 9 | Geekom A7

Testing the £799 Ryzen 9 7940HS-powered Geekom A7 Mini PC in AAA gaming, 3D rendering & video editing
Thanks to Geekom for supplying the review unit.
USA Official: www.geekompc.c... Discount code: IcebergA7 (US$20)
USA Amazon: www.amazon.com... Discount code: IceberGKA7 (US$20)
UK Official: www.geekom.co.... Discount code: IcebergA7 (£15)
UK Amazon: www.amazon.co.... Discount code: IcebergA7 (£15)
AU Official: www.geekom.au/... Discount code: IcebergA7 (AU$30)
AU Amazon: www.amazon.com... Discount code: IcebergA7 (AU$30)
Universal x86 Tuning Utility amdaputuningut...
Specs as provided:
AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS
Radeon 780M graphics
32GB DDR5-5600 (2x16GB)
2TB NVMe Gen 4 SSD
Music by Backing Track backingtrack.gg/
Track names: "Future Tomorrow", “Midnight Racer”, "Starstream Returns“ & "Binary Sunrise”
and as always, Unicorn Heads "808 Doorbell Chime"
00:00 Integrated Graphics
00:33 Geekom A7 & the Ryzen 9 7940HS
03:02 Ports
03:50 Connectivity & Upgradeability
05:15 Tuning with Universal x86 Tuning Utility
05:53 Gaming Benchmarks
13:22 Synthetic Benchmarks
14:56 Productivity Benchmarks
15:43 Power Consumption & Conclusion
A D S
The following links are affiliated. Everything costs the same to you, but I get a commission.
G E A R
Audio:
Behringer UM2 amzn.to/3aV17wq
Behringer XM8500 amzn.to/3nCt2WY
Generic microphone arm amzn.to/339yZRC
Video:
Fujifilm X-T3 Camera & 18-55mm lens kit: amzn.to/3nGapRY
Fujifilm 23mm f2 amzn.to/3udXvgn
FeiyuTech G6 Max Gimbal amzn.to/3nHndYs
Interfit LM8 Video LED amzn.to/2SkESJL
Neewer 120cm Softbox amzn.to/2RjlMDm
Raleno Rechargeable Bicolour Video LED Panel amzn.to/3f2l7hV
C O N T A C T
Twitter/Insta @IcebergTop10s
Email [e-mail]
#Ryzen #miniPC #Geekom

[@TotallySearch]

Imagine showing this small PC box to a scientist back in 1980 🤣

[@vasili1207]

weird ashtray

[@virtualinsanity7791]

Pc more powerful and crunch number better than you company mainframe 😭

[@vasili1207]

ermm actually probably not mainframes were beasts a 80's mainframe probably had stupid compute numbers even compared to modern pcs there were designed just to compute... pc is jack of all trades master of fuckall @@virtualinsanity7791

[@JOHNTECH112]

if you have this PC in 2010, you can run any game 60+ fps high settings.

[@a15bionic59]

@@JOHNTECH112any game in 8k 120fps+ back then

[@GEEKOMPC]

Thank you for reviewing our product. Your feedback on GEEKOM products is highly valuable to us!😉

[@CYBERJAM01-_-]

Thanks a refreshing comment to come from GEEKOM. I was literally sitting here ready to buy this A7 model before watching this review. A bit mediocre gaming stats really. I just bought 2 x Samsung G5 34" ultrawide curved monitors with a 49" slated for the centre display. All so my mates can join me in a new driving simulator/s. I want to do something different again and remember this PC purchase like buying my Amstrad CPC6128 so many years ago. That buy got me into programming and the computer industry managing networks with some of the biggest Global IT companies. What would this PC buy lead to? Maybe an Immortan Joe quote? "Mediocre". The mini PC market is really hot just now so I'll do some more market testing to find better (or any) service. Hold that "buy" button for now.

[@gamergod9182]

I might be wrong, but I think that plate at the back with the four screwholes is for a VESA mount.

[@JobeStroud]

That is exactly what it is.

[@CYBERJAM01-_-]

Now I'm really worried about his review. As I'm literally sitting here with my knob on the "buy" button. What to do? I would have already engaged my knob mode to buy this if I hadn't watched this review.

[@OldPoi77]

Sound quality for this dudes videos is perfect, A lot of youtubers could learn a few lessons here ;) videos are always spot on too. Iceberg deserves more subs he's criminally underrated.

[@LukeTheJoker]

Totally agree! I have hearing and focus issues and Iceberg is always not a problem.

[@Vews]

I think you got kicked out of Fortnite for using AFMF, it's enabled by default in the Radeon software. Turn it off and maybe it would work. The anti-cheat is notorious for forcing AMD users on their knees most of the time... Edit: I was corrected that it was Anti-Lag+ and not AFMF in the replies to the comment so I'm adding it here for visibility as suggested by another commenter.

[@ZeroHourProductions407]

Getting kicked from Fortnite feels like a badge of honor now. 😂

[@Khloya69]

Rare Fortnite W

[@KJTD]

Using motion frames for me on a 6700xt doesnt do anything. Although my cpu is an old intel. Maybe the cpu is what causes the anticheat to kick in?

[@dudeonlygamingandotherstuf7791]

That would mean these results were achieved with AFMF...?

[@AlexWinExperiments]

I used AFMF on fortnite on my 6750xt and I didnt get kicked so thats wrong

[@bfbunny]

For those weird 1% lows after prolonged gaming sessions, I wonder if it is the CPU hitting the temp limit and throttle way down to an insanely low clock speed, which cause the game to stutter for a while. If this is actually the case, using some Control Panel Power Options "Max CPU Frequency" setting could help alleviate this issue (a limit to 3GHz could work just fine for the iGPU), alongside some further tuning in UXTU. Besides decreasing the CPU temperature, it may free up some extra power headroom for the 780M graphics, which could in turn help out performance. On the side note, I noticed my 7945hx laptop keep on crashing when I use the undervolt preset I set prior to limiting the CPU clock speed after I locked it to 4GHz max, and have to redo the per-core undervolt. It could also be the case with the 7940hs if you were to limit its frequency.

[@Palaman2122]

Its not that, after hours of testing i have found out that the problem doesn't happen if you limit the power to 22W. if you go up to 23W the problem resume even that its on 60c. something maybe wrong with the algorithm and how it handles clock speeds and power. perhaps a future bios or graphics card update could fix it. i have tested so many possibilities and i just cant use all its APU power without the frame time going crazy, even that i get very good temps below 80c. However, at 22w it actually losses only 10-15% fps so for now its the best solution. i will contact geekom about it.

[@bfbunny]

@@Palaman2122 The behavior you mentioned could be related to STAPM, which is designed for laptops using these CPUs so that they don’t burn the user’s skin. If this is actually the case, I wonder how AMD will disable STAPM on mini-pcs while not making it available for laptops to do so.

[@Palaman2122]

@@bfbunny Its not that, mostly likely its because the NVME is too slow. i did a test with very low vram usage and problem does not happen. i'm returning this garbage.

[@snuuuuupy]

Geekom has a history of overcharging for their products. I get that you have sponsors, but for the rest of the community, a 7840HS barebones minipc is $350 in China. 32GB DDR5 5600 MHz is ~$100, 64GB $200. A 2TB SSD is ~$130. A 7840HS/32GB RAM/2TB SSD config should go for $350+100+130 = $580, (Geekom charging $850 for this), a 37% diff. They have to make a profit margin somewhere for all these free minipcs they're giving out to content creators on youtube.

[@Davinmk]

get that then, this is clearly something made for aesthetic and warranty is much better

[@TotallySearch]

This is literally Dropshipping lol

[@BonusCrook]

Or take that $850 and build a way more powerful pc

[@TotallySearch]

@@BonusCrook For $850 you could literally buy a whole monitor, pc, keyboard, mouse and gaming chair LOL

[@filipshinigami7263]

In my country this will cost about 950$...

[@samserious1337]

Is there no BIOS option to set the VRAM allocation? This should improve the performance in some games!

[@GewelReal]

It doesn't matter, it's in the RAM anyway

[@samserious1337]

@@GewelReal It does matter, windows has its problems with dynamically allocating the VRAM. Just look up some benchmarks.

[@GewelReal]

@@samserious1337 literally 0 difference

[@yarost12]

​@@samserious1337it doesn't.

[@flamingscar5263]

​@@GewelRealthe difference shows itself only in specific games For some games if the game is told there's only 1GB of VRAM than for some stupid reason they skip caching the excess textures to RAM and go straight to the pagefile

[@pvtcmyers87]

Love the review man. I hope you get better soon!

[@samserious1337]

Since the Z1 Extreme is the same chip with different cTDP (which can be edited with Smokeless), the ROG Ally has a great price/performance ratio. I would like to see these Geekom PCs with either faster RAM (if possible) or better latency modules!

[@HunterTracks]

I'd argue Legion Go is even better value, since you're getting a bigger and arguably nicer screen, bigger battery, built-in kickstand and detachable controllers. Really, the only thing lacking is VRR.

[@vasili1207]

but all them devices you hardly can play on the move just use a console or pc ........dont understand so called mobile gamers...aka loners@@HunterTracks

[@BonusCrook]

The rog ally and legion go are both stuck with 16GB of lpddr5 that has to be fought over between windows cpu and graphics, both will be unusable in 5 years.💀

[@chriswright8074]

​@@BonusCrooknot true as they can be modded

[@BonusCrook]

@@chriswright8074 ok but almost nobody is going to do that lol

[@magcs6233]

From what I've seen, when the 780M is doing its best, its on par with my GTX1650M, which is very impressive, I wonder if in the future they will dedicate a small amount of memory on die for the iGPU, if they dont already do that.

[@pro_gemer]

Tiny pcs are the coolest thing ever

[@MoultrieGeek]

Sure it's small and stylish but I'm struggling to find a market niche for this at its current price. A low-end gaming rig can be built for less that would smash this in every way but power consumption and space requirements and can be upgraded at a later time. Mini PCs need to be as cheap as possible to justify their limited capabilities which this is not.

[@joelwylde]

I agree. At this price I don't see a reason to buy it over a gaming PC. They sure look pretty cute but that's about it.

[@BonusCrook]

Not to mention people don't realize just how slow and pathetic the 780M is. It gets curb stomped by the near 8 year old GTX 1060

[@user-xe6sm4jv8f]

​@@BonusCrook Well why don't you stick a GTX 1060 in a mini-pc then?

[@BonusCrook]

@@user-xe6sm4jv8f what does that have to do with anything

[@user-xe6sm4jv8f]

@@BonusCrook I'd say it's pretty clear why exactly I mentioned that. This video is a review of a mini-pc.

[@Wendysburger-xz5bt]

because of the price i personally think this is a mac mini killer

[@waynesworldofsci-tech]

Not really, the Mac Mini is aimed at a different market.

[@vasili1207]

rich with no sense of value for money?@@waynesworldofsci-tech

[@christianmino3753]

Great video as always, and I love this little IGPU gaming rigs. As a PC Build Technician, it's fascinating to think that you're basically gaming on a non ARM raspberry pie with socketed ram. Like that's crazy and in my opinion so much cooler than a raspberry pie lol. I just don't understand why we are aiming for 30 FPS. Half of time you still could have lowered settings down from medium to try and raise the frame rate. We play on PC. I would be willing to wager quite a lot that most of us would do anything within our power, including lowering resolution to 900p or even 720p low settings to achieve a bare minimum of 45 FPS. I understand most people focus on the 30/60 fps numbers, but 45 is SO much nicer than 30. Sure it's nice to get a locked 60, but if you can't at least 45 is still playable. 30 just looks like a slideshow. Dropping resolution to 720 might not be the best move for the e-sports games, but most of those seem to run above 60 (due to the nature of e-sports games) anyway, so I don't understand why we are trying to stay at 1080p for these AAA games. 720p really isn't THAT BAD for AAA games that have a really nice art style anyway, and 900p Is fine. It's not 1080p/1440p, but it's FINE.

[@GewelReal]

Get your hands on the RTX "3050" 6GB

[@BonusCrook]

Probably top 10 for worst GPUs in the past few years.

[@sonicphoenix7]

3010

[@BonusCrook]

@@sonicphoenix7 more like a 3040

[@GewelReal]

@@BonusCrook apart from misleading name and 50$ overpriced, it's fine

[@BonusCrook]

@@GewelReal yea, apart from being awful its fine lol

[@ThatGuyTechs]

Thanks!

[@SamPat-ew1xp]

Just one word for the upcoming small PCs , Noice 👌

[@akin242002]

For those that want to do coding, some 1080p gaming, and light video editing it is arguably the best mini-PC on the market. Only the Beelink SER7 is as good. My only issue is the ports. I prefer Intel NUCs or Geekom IT12/IT13 ports.

[@waterfelon]

That square anomaly in the frame timing makes me think something is not right with power delivery

[@GeForce210]

comeon bounce back do it gt 710 2gb vs hd 630

[@ZeroHourProductions407]

Eh, it's only a ryzen 9 in name only. No mobile part yet from amd has more than eight cores. If i was in the market for this thing, unless the gpu was also different? There would be almost no reason to get the ryzen 9 over the 7. The added thermal headroom afforded by the 7 suould keep the cpu performant for longer, right?

[@Azureskies01]

The worst thing about APUs is RAM speed. Can't wait for them to start putting HBM on either the APU chip itself or on the small motherboard. (I know this wouldn't happen as it would cost too much money but I can dream ok)

[@ivangerginov5648]

16k in R23 is absolutely insane. Nice review

[@mr.clorox8198]

Nice review but once I heard the benchmarks for your Allen Wake in the games after I decided not to even get it

[@selohcin]

Oh, shoot! Iceberg's got a new benchmark theme! Watch out, internet!

[@XeonProductions]

I wonder if the diminishing performance over time is due to VRMs, RAM, or NVMe drive overheating, I had another system behave similar to that. I also had a Beelink system that basically cooked the NVMe drive to death because it had no ventilation or thermal pads.

[@2641kcarson]

Thanks for posting. Would you recommend purely for video editing and nothing else? Thanks

[@matthewhanson498]

The question is how old is this perform against the 4790 and 1660 super once undervolted

[@AdjointGaming]

is the quality of Geekom as good as Beelink and Minisform are ? I am not talking about performance. I am talking about quality of device and know that I can have it for a few years and do my job. I hear that some of mini pcs die after a few days or weeks :(

[@DavidLacombe86]

Thanks for reviewing this mini pc...I am shopping between this A7 and the it13 for video editing. Which would you recommend?

[@IcebergTech]

Probably the A7. Quicksync is nice to have, but the Ryzen will throttle less in renders, and both seemed about equal on the timeline in my experience.

[@Valueshooter]

considering the cost, unless you travel a lot, or you just wanna save desk space, you don't need this. you can get a better performance gaming laptop for traveling, in my opinion.

[@CYBERJAM01-_-]

GEEKOM launched the A7 mini-PC, the most impressive mini-PC available... without warranty support. Oh, it's mentioned on their web pages but it isn't real. At least not in Australia or via the US or China. Warranty = Fail. With a new market segment in mini-PCs & the gaming market open to a new hardware segment, AMD & Intel are hedging more than a bit on all this to jump start their cloud gaming future and expand their chip presence in the IoT. I wonder if AMD & Intel know what GEEKOM are doing to their brands. Maybe our KZbin reviewers should include warranty when reviewing "exciting" new hardware?

[@OpsMasterWoods]

Very close to my 7600x in benchmarks

[@S己G]

Since UXTU was used in this video, I think this would be a good place to ask this, so, would using this have any form of potential of harming hardware, or voiding warranty? (For the first one, I mean when used responsibly.)

[@waynesworldofsci-tech]

You have to start testing DCS.

[@johnanthonyalberola6252]

not RELEASING RNDA 5 BORDERS ON CRIME

[@Rmm1722]

Nice 👍

[@machaoverlord5925]

the rise of mini pcs

[@andrewmutavi590]

Curious how it'd perform with a dGPU via oculink

[@TrusteftTech]

With temps reaching 99C, with the AMD CPUs throttling I believe at 95C and their GPUs at 85C, doesn't this mean this little beauty is throttling like crazy when doing anything very demanding? I really really really don't understand why they don't make these mini PCs a couple cm taller to allow for better cooling. The situation is even worse than laptops where at least there they have the (fake) excuse that the laptops need to be extremely thin and light for portability reasons. What's the excuse for these mini PCs? *sigh* Thanks for another very good video. Edit: I almost forgot lol@starfield "optimizations".

[@BonusCrook]

They boost until they hit 95C+ because AMD engineers are brain damaged and think that it is the most effective way to handle power draw even though it's insanely inefficient and likely harmful to run a cpu at those temps.

[@StormHawksHD]

This is still VERY expensive for what you are getting

[@rexrecio8304]

Can it be powered from the monitor via USB C?

[@p3drot1ktok]

saiu por quando pra enviar pro brasil, gostaria de comprar como faço, pode me ajudar?

[@IcebergTech]

I've spoken to Geekom, and they said: "We are working hard to develop Brazil market. At the moment, the biggest problem for us in Brazil is transportation and tariffs. When we solve it, we will launch the Brazilian station as soon as possible."

[@p3drot1ktok]

good, but i'ld like do buy this mini pc, my dreams.. thanks@@IcebergTech

[@redhoodedduke9967]

Possibly stupid question, but how did you get the msi overlay to show up in cs2?

[@IcebergTech]

There's a command line argument that enables it. -allow_third_party_software, I think. It negatively affects your trust factor, so I wouldn't use it unless you really need to.

[@Uomodargilla]

GMTEK K8 is way less expensive

[@ZERARCHIVE2023]

Only benefit : size and tdp. Change my mind

[@reeveho1384]

Isn't size the entire point of a mini pc though?

[@ZERARCHIVE2023]

Size and performance it is @@reeveho1384

[@CrossingRover]

I mean yeah, that’s exactly the point. For those who want or need a tiny pc with respectable performance it fits the bill

[@BonusCrook]

​@@CrossingRover"respectable performance" usually slower than the 8 year old 1060 6GB

[@reeveho1384]

@@BonusCrook it's relatively speaking

[@Bilal.Hussain.Shaikh]

Emulation test?

[@theinktician]

i keep getting disappointed with older low end (and mid level) cards due to current iGPUs. The price on the older budget cards should be dropping off a cliff by the summer but they won't. Not for the next 5 years - or perhaps ever

[@BonusCrook]

What have you been smoking? The 780M can barely keep up with a 1050 Ti. Just look at Tech Yes City's review of the 8700G

[@spacechimp5141]

returned my mini pc because it overheated. this is a huge problem with all mini pcs. either these Chinese companies give you a bad pc with overheating issues or they install Spyware or ports don't work or CPU is lower then described. all this happened to me. get a real desktop.

[@skemmy215]

Me with an alton p360 laptop

[@deadpain2483]

Why video memory shows 500mb?

[@IcebergTech]

APUs share system RAM, and reallocate it automatically. Usually there’s an override to allow more RAM to be allocated, but this PC didn’t have one. It didn’t seem to make a difference.

[@deadpain2483]

ok. so this don't have one. got it. tnx@@IcebergTech

[@deadpain2483]

one more thing though. does it makes any difference in performance ?@@IcebergTech

[@IcebergTech]

@@deadpain2483 No, I don't think so. At one point I did think that maybe having a bigger pool of "VRAM" might help with games like RE4 remake, which I've known to crash when it doesn't have enough memory, but that wasn't the case.

[@BeefLettuceAndPotato]

Just commenting for your algo. Get your money bro lol. I'll be back when more old AMD stuff shows up. 😅 (First gen Ryzen, A10 7850k, HD 7970 in 2024 👀)

[@BonusCrook]

Ancient garbage

[@dabigbadwolf5081]

Pls no! I had a A8 APU and it was awful, even new 😂

[@IcebergTech]

Got an R9 390 and a Titan X lined up, but I’m steering clear of reviewing stuff that can’t run DX12 or AVX2 in the future. Sorry!

[@BonusCrook]

@@IcebergTech Next he was gonna ask you to review the GTX 260 lol

[@BeefLettuceAndPotato]

@@IcebergTech no worries brother. You know I'll be here regardless lol

[@TomiWebPro]

How much did Geekom pay ya😂, really missing the "normal" videos

[@IcebergTech]

Nothing buddy, I just get to keep the mini PCs afterwards. As for “normal” videos, I made 5 in January! Every Friday was a regular video, with the exception of the Pixio monitor review. That was a reshuffle because I had to cancel another video idea. I kept mini PCs to Mondays. If it helps, I only have one mini PC left to review for the time being, so unless anyone has something new and exciting to send for me to test, next week will be the last Monday video for a while.

[@TheDezmen3]

No fan in SSD room? Bye.

[@GeForce210]

GT 710 2gb vs HD 630

[@houdini329]

These mini PC videos are getting a bit redundant and boring tbh. And they don't seem to get many views compared to almost everything else. I'm not sure this is the way to go mate. But you do you.

[@IcebergTech]

Hopefully when some interesting new models come out, the contacts I've made from producing these reviews will send me early samples, and the next videos won't feel so redundant.

[@YasirHabib93]

U didnt apply fsr 3 mod

[@teddymckinney1654]

💖 'Promo sm'

[@BonusCrook]

These mini PCs are dreadfull. You would be better off getting a small machine with upgrade options like a pcie slot.

[@S己G]

Many people want something low power, and often, do not buy these for their graphics performance, so in such a situation it would be perfectly reasonable even without a PCI-E Slot.

[@BonusCrook]

​@@S己G If someone wanted a PC for basic tasks they aren't going to pay for this overpriced pile of laptop components. They're gonna use their laptop or something

[@Beany2007FTW]

"Why are you buying a VW Golf to move a few people and some shopping around, a used Ford F-150 can carry over a ton in the bed, it's CLEARLY BETTER! (if you ignore literally every other factor involved in a purchasing decision)

[@BonusCrook]

@@Beany2007FTW Garbage analogy. Gaming PCs and cars aren't really analogous lol. Your entire point is super vague here due to the wacky analogy. Are you trying to say that a more upgradable system would be huge? Not really. Are you trying to say that a more upgradable system is expensive to operate? Not really. Like wtf are you trying to communicate here, Stay in your lane.

[@Gatorade69]

​@@BonusCrook"Stay in your lane." God, you sound so cringe.

[@Khloya69]

It’s aluminum, not ‘aluminium’ learn to speak English.

[@S己G]

It's aluminium, not "aluminum" learn to speak English.

[@Khloya69]

@@S己G might wanna check the dictionary

[@S己G]

@@Khloya69 I'm joking, however it is both, it depends on where you're from. (Edit: Oh btw I'm pretty sure he is from the UK, so if anything that's the more correct way to say it.)

[@Beany2007FTW]

Not if you're from the UK, it's not. Learn how to tell accents apart.

[@Khloya69]

@@S己G British English hasn’t been correct since 1776.

[@Palaman2122]

I have this pc. in order to avoid these stutters you got, you need to cap your FPS so the APU will not exceed 95% utilization.

[@MarkyD91]

Thanks for the heads up. Have you got any otther suggestions for improving peformance during your own testing?

[@Palaman2122]

@@MarkyD91i had to return my a7 because of this problem. i have found out that it happens every time the GPU draws more than 21w. if you limit it to 21w than it wont stutter but you lose 25% fps. the problem is most likely because of slow nvme or ram that cannot keep up with the gpu and feed it vram in time. it does not happen if you benchmark it with 500-700mb vram utilization. i am building a second pc on NR200 case instead of a mini pc and that's it.

[@MarkyD91]

Thanks for the response, I have read similar issues from various sources. Some mixed saying they did not experience the problem. My order will arrive this week, I am tempted to return without even opening as it stands.

[@Palaman2122]

@@MarkyD91before you return i suggest you to load a game like god of war and let it run for an hour or two even without playing. just load the game on some location and see if after some time it stutters. because sometimes it could take 10 minutes+ to start stuttering. once it does its like a snowball and stuttering gets worse quickly.

[@MarkyD91]

Ok that’s a good suggestion and I will absolutely do that once it’s arrived. I’ll update here my findings 👍