Marketplace
ASKFOR'Z64A$120'or'Z64W$160'
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OK, hopefully others can benefit from my weekend of researching.
I was after a small PC, for a project I have in mind. I started looking at the Raspberry PI 2 and clones, before the Odroid C1 and family.
By the time they were fully specced up, with cases, storage, postage etc. it came to ~$100US, which I thought was crazy, considering I have seen atom based tablets going for that price on here.
After many wheeling and dealings with various sellers, I was able to secure the following two deals.
$120US for the Minix Neo Z64A (Android)
$160US for the Minix Neo Z64W (Windows 8.1)
(There is also a $98 option for the Wintel CX-W8 model, but I highly rate the minix build quality).
Which is a great deal considering they are using the standard x64 based CPU, so everything should work as it does on your desktop. I went with the Z64A, with the intention of putting Linux on it. It will be used to display steam stream games, a pure emulator gaming machine, a kodi HTPC, etc etc. The Minix is one of a few boxes with the x64 CPU AND an ethernet port.
How to get the deal
Aliexpress is bit more painful for these sorts of things. you will need to:
* Start a chat session with the seller (Chris Chan)
* Request the Z64A for $120, or Z64W for $160
* After he agrees
* Place the order at the advertised price - DO NOT PAY YET!
* Still in the chat session, advise Chris of you order number (which will be there, just above where it is asking for your CCdetails).
* Chris will modify the order to the correct price
* You will need to go into your aliexpress account, click on the unpaid order, confirm the price is now correct.
* Pay the discounted price using credit card :)
Man that's a lot of hoops to jump through for not that substantial a price.