Looking to buy a Mini PC
Budget is $600-$700 and so far I shortlisted these
https://www.amazon.com.au/MINISFORUM-6900HX-Threads-Type-C-B…?
https://www.amazon.com.au/MINISFORUM-7735HS-4-75GHz-PCIe4-0-…?
My needs are some office work, some gaming and some streaming of videos.
Any others should I be considering or are my choices overkill?
Many thanks team
Thank you for your comments. I just want to get away from a tower format. I will check out M1 Mac mini. Can windows be installed still on Mac? I haven’t had one for a while
Nah, can't install Windows, it'd be MacOS only. So there's that migration problem.
It would be worth considering an ITX build, like in this deal - https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/847778 - it's still technically a "tower" but it's a very tiny one. For gaming purposes it would blow away the systems above, but then it has less storage and less RAM too. So it comes down to what gaming you want to do.
These ITX builds don’t come with wi-fi / Bluetooth?
Agree with this comment 👍
If you're not set on this micro kind of form factor, if you wait for a deal like this you'd have much better gaming performance with an ITX build with a dedicated graphics card like a 4060.
MacOS not great for gaming but depends on what you're after, there is some support depending on which games. Mac Mini goes hard for the price but support is nowhere near as broad as PC for gaming.
Doubtless there will be reviews of both on Youtube showing what they are capable of gaming wise. I recommend Robtech.
It has always seemed to me that mini PCs like these are more than you need for office/internet stuff, and less than you want for gaming. If the former is all you want, you don't need to pay this much. If its the latter you have to be willing to pay for more graphics power. They are laptops without the portability, but with laptops you had no choice but to choose to sacrifice performance or pay a huge price for it.
Get this instead (though it is barebone only, also need low profile gfx card for better gaming).
https://www.mwave.com.au/product/intel-bxnuc9i7qnx-nuc-9-ext…
Thanks, but by the time I add 1tb ssd, 32gb ram and windows, it is closer to $1k than my budget is
If you don't mind buying second hand keep an eye on ebay for good second hand minisforum pc's. I snatched up a fairly decent one recently
Do you mind sharing what you got and at what price for reference please?
Basically comes down to what "some gaming" means. Most office work, unless you have a very specific process that is hardware demanding, you can generally get away with any modern computer.
Of those two, look at the 6900HX. While the higher number, the 7735HS is just a rebranded 6800HS and is actually a tad slower. I can't see any other real difference between the two (I didn't look very hard).
If you want to play 1080p of games that are a few years old (witcher 3 kind of era) on low settings, it'll be great. Any more, I'd move away from these sort of laptop in a box kind of systems to look at a budget ITX system with a dedicated GPU. If it's just factorio (must feed the machine) then a 9th-10th gen Intel refurb would probably be enough, although the 6900HX is quite a nicely rounded chip in a small machine.
Also worth looking at a used/refurb M1 mac mini around this price point.