I'm almost positive I'm going to get this thing; I just can't resist. Retails at $179.99 but New Egg has it for $119.99. Watching the video on it it performs much better than one would expect. It is a micro computer with 128GB storage with a slot for up to 1TB, 6GB RAM and a 4 core Celeron CPU. Has HDMI out and 2x USB3 and will do 4K video streaming. It also has a USB-C port but that is power in only for the power adapter. The thing measures in at 2.4 inches square by 1.7 inches high.

https://www.newegg.com/p/2SW-003Z-00006

<edit>
Just ordered.

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Retails and 299... Sold out. Should be a fun addition to your tech collection!

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stephen boots
Microsoft MVP 2004 - 2020
"Life's always an adventure with computers!"

You can get at New Egg or Amazon for $119.99.

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New Egg shows "currently sold out." I'm not looking to buy one, just followed your link to New Egg to look.

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stephen boots
Microsoft MVP 2004 - 2020
"Life's always an adventure with computers!"

Hmmm, Mayhaps I got the last one.

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While I didn't think there was a problem I was a bit concerned about the "currently sold out." thing even though my bank account was hit for the amount. I was relieved today when I got a tracking number. I don't think that New Egg will let you purchase an out of stock item anyway.

As an aside I swear that I'm a computer magnet. Two more laptops sitting here. One is redone to Windows 10 and the other doing Windows 10 updates. Both will be donation systems.

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According to tracking it is estimated that the HDMI cable should be here Thursday and the micro computer on Friday.

Can't wait to receive the computer and take it apart... well, open the case. Since it has an expansion slot for an M.2 SSD I would imagine the case should be easily opened. I want to see how it is built to fit in such a small space. I imagine that I'll find a few small boards layered and linked. Actually layered boards is old tech. Years ago I had a mother board that would accept an add-on linked card for a second CPU; basically the same concept.

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Haven't tried any games or anything on this thing as I'm doing updates. It did come with Windows 11 Home. Considering changing the key code to Pro but don't really know that it matters.

Just doing normal setup and update the thing is surprisingly responsive. I'll give more of a review later. So far I'm pretty impressed. Oh, did try some streaming videos and the display quality is REALLY good.

Since it only has 2 3.0 USB ports, and 1 is taken by my mouse/keyboard dongle, I ordered a powered 7 port hub that is basically the same as the one I have on my main system. Wish I would have thought about that when I ordered the system.

Didn't open it up. I just wanted to see what it would do and get it setup.

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OK... Does updates faster than my Microsoft Surface 3.

Does my PS1 console emulator flawless. Have not yet tried my N64 or SNES emulators. Since it does fine with the PS1 emulator I'm sure that the SNES emulator will be fine but the N64 is still a question mark as it is more demanding than the PS1.

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Now that I know that the thing works and performs well I went ahead and ordered the 1TB M.2 2242 SSD. Looks like it will be a SATA connection instead of PCIe but the storage is needed as the included 128GB drive is too small.

Without opening it seems that I was right about linked layers making up the thing. Here is a crude diagram. I'm not going to open until the 1TB drive gets here. Don't know if I'll bother with the 128GB micro SD card but doubt it.

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Very interesting!

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stephen boots
Microsoft MVP 2004 - 2020
"Life's always an adventure with computers!"

Yes, it IS interesting and I have no clue how they pull this off. I just timed it and from power on to the log in screen is ~18 seconds.

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Just tried a new utility specifically for testing disk drive speed.
https://crystalmark.info/en/software/crystaldiskmark/
For what it does it is pretty nice and is stand alone without needing an install.

Anyway I found that the drive speed is terrible.


If the SATA M.2 2242 1TB drive on order is faster I'll see if I can clone the OS over.

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Looks like some of the supplied info on this system isn't quite accurate. It is at least implied that the micro SD slot can only handle 128GB but I just tried the 256GB card from my Surface 3 and it was seen without issue. With adding the 1TB M.2 drive that is supposed to be here 6/15 I doubt that an SD card will be in the picture in any major way but this is nice to know.

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1TB drive showed up today. Initially it stalled the system drastically but, once it was setup all is now good. 7 port USB3 powered hub also showed up and connected without issue.

The 1TB drive is MUCH faster than the built in 128GB drive. Below images show the difference. The first image is the 128GB with the second being the 1TB. Enough of a difference to see about changing the 1TB to be the system drive with Windows.

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Yep, that is a pretty substantial difference!

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stephen boots
Microsoft MVP 2004 - 2020
"Life's always an adventure with computers!"

Ya, but being an M.2 SATA interface it is a snail compared to the M.2 PCIe interface on my main system. Here is the same test on that drive. The SATA 564.81MB/sec does not even compare to the 3705.26MB/sec from the PCIe interface and even that is slow in relation to what the PCIe drive can do. My PCIe is gen 3 and the drive is gen 4. If my PCIe was gen 4 the drive would be ~5000MB/sec.



<edit>
Sigh, I may have sort of kinda messed up. The BIOS for this thing has a fast boot function that is fairly normal and I enabled. The problem is that the fast boot bypasses the ability to get in the BIOS so I'm locked out which means that I can't set the boot order to launch a USB Windows 11 installer to try an install on the faster 1TB drive. OOPS! I'm sure that I'll find a way back in. I just sent a request to support. Fast boot on my main system does the same thing but I have a utility that I can run that causes a reboot directly to the BIOS. If that fails there is a button on the back that resets the BIOS. I may try the utility that reboots to the BIOS from my main to see if it will work.

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BIOS lockout already solved. I just went to the recovery options and selected advanced startup options. From there I could select to enter the BIOS.

Changes already tested and have successfully booted to the Windows 11 USB install but exited. Booted to Windows and partitioned the 1TB drive to 390GB for Windows and the rest for data. I was actually going for 384GB for Windows but 390 is close enough. Really does not matter as when the 1TB micro SD card I ordered gets here it will become my data drive and the system drive will be expanded back to the full 1TB.

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All complete and fine so figured that I'd finish this up. System and data drives are each 1TB with the original 128GB drive designated as a working or scratch drive which boils down to the fact that I have no real use for it.

The thing performs really well and impresses me. Not going to do high level gaming but that isn't its purpose even though it does games better than expected.

Here is an image of everything together. Components include the computer, a 7 port USB hub and a slim line DVD burner. The SD card is for size reference.

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nice!

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stephen boots
Microsoft MVP 2004 - 2020
"Life's always an adventure with computers!"

Ya, the whole thing IS pretty nice. If one wanted the micro computer could be mounted on the back of a TV and used for streaming, mild gaming and browsing without even being visible. Actually it comes with mounting hardware to do just that.

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Ran into something I totally detest with this micro system that I have seen before. Did my first image backup using the Linux version of an Acronis boot CD. Everything went just fine but I hate it when screen resolutions don't work. Such boots just don't work as to displaying everything. Just makes it weird to do some stuff as you can't see all the displayed info.

All in all a good experiment as I did something before doing the image backup. I had a concern with my main system as my preferred backup is actually cloning the drive rather than doing an image. Since I went from 500GB system drive to 1TB system I found that my second M.2 PCIe port was only gen 2 and the new drives require at least PCIe gen 3.Boils down to the fact that I could not do my clone backups.

Enter this USB M.2 SSD 2-bay enclosure.
https://www.newegg.com/orico-bm2c3-enclosure/p/0VN-0003-002A5?Item=9SIA1DSJGY9642
I will definitely be able to do a clone backup with this enclosure for the micro system. We will have to see if the enclosure works with the drive intended for my main system's clones.

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Jay I didn’t read your topic before posting. Sorry for encroaching into the neutral zone. Besides the Mini-IT8 they also have models with AMD processors. Cost is higher. Just for conversation anyway.

[url]geekompc.com[/url]

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Terry

It just goes to show you, it's always something. If it's not one thing it's another!
_Rosanne Rosannadanna

No worries. The little things are starting to come out more and more.

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