Introduction and unboxing
Should you’re in search of a robust Home windows mini PC, the Minisforum AI X1 is certainly price consideration. Coming in at simply 0.6 kg and configurable as much as a 4nm AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 CPU with 64 GB and even 96 GB of DDR5 RAM, and priced under $900/€1,000 it sounds spectacular on paper.
Minisforum is a PC maker with monitor report and a various product lineup. You will discover its merchandise on Amazon within the the US
, the UK
, and Germany, which is excellent. The AI X1 is in its flagship class of mini PCs. It ships with an HDMI cable, an influence provide, a mounting bracket (if you wish to connect it to your desk or monitor), and an optionally available OCuLink port.
This is a more in-depth have a look at the mounting bracket, full with Phillips screws.
And here is the OCuLink adapter. It plugs into the second PCIe 4.0 slot and leverages its 40Gbps of bandwidth to be used with an exterior GPU. So you may both increase this mini-PC’s graphics capabilities, or add a second M.2 SSD.
Provided OCuLink connector
Design and ports
The Minisforum A1 X1 is mild and compact. At 12.8cm large, 12.6cm lengthy, 5.2cm tall, and 0.6kg in weight, it is almost equivalent to the Mac Mini M4 (12.7cm x 12.7cm x 5.1cm, 0.7kg). The A1 X1 is usually fabricated from steel with air flow grilles on the left and proper sides, and a plastic rear the place the warmth sink and a lot of the ports reside.
Upfront, you could have a pair of stickers, the ability button, a pair of USB-A 3.2 Gen2 (10Gbps) ports, a USB4 type-C (40Gbps) port, a 3.5mm audio jack, and even a pair of microphones.
On the again, you get the ability provide port, an RJ45 2.5G Ethernet port, a DisplayPort 2.0 (4K as much as 240Hz, 8K as much as 60Hz), OCuLink port (with a rubber cowl if unused), one other USB4 port, an HDMI 2.1 (4K as much as 120Hz, 8K as much as 60Hz), and a USB-A 2.0 (480Mbps).
There is a Kensington Safety Slot on the correct aspect.
The Minisforum A1 X1 is sort of straightforward to open. Merely unscrew the 4 Phillips-head screws (that are fairly lengthy) on the backside, and also you’re in. Take note it’s good to unscrew two ribbon cables earlier than you may absolutely take away the underside panel.
This is a have a look at the second PCIe port that may both accommodate a second M.2 SSD or the OCuLink port. You will have quick access to the primary SSD and the 2 DDR5 SO-DIMMx2 slots.
Second PCIe port for both an SSD or the OCuLink port
Efficiency and fan noise
The A1 X1 we have now for assessment is the highest spec’d unit. Which means essentially the most succesful AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 processor, 64 GB of 5600MT/s DDR5 RAM, and 1 TB of storage.
The AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 chip is a part of the Strix Level household and was launched in June 2024. It makes use of the Zen 5 structure, constructed on TSMC’s 4nm course of. The processor has 10 bodily cores and 20 threads, a base clock velocity of 2GHz, and a lift velocity of 5GHz. There’s Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 help.
The graphics are dealt with by the built-in Radeon 880M with 12 cores and a peak clock velocity of two.9GHz.
We ran a three-hour stress take a look at on the Ryzen AI 9 365. The CPU was in a position to preserve a median clock velocity of three.4GHz (at round 53W). The fan was continually working to maintain the CPU at just a little over 70°C, which made the mini PC barely audible in an workplace setting however nothing too bothersome.
The outside of the machine was heat to the contact (however who touches their mini PC, come on).
Naturally, we ran a slew of benchmarks on the Minisforum AI X1 to gauge its efficiency. The Ryzen processor may be very highly effective and but environment friendly. In comparison with the 10-core Apple M4, anticipate round a 15% worse single-core outcome however as a lot as 10% higher multi-core efficiency.
The Ryzen AI 9 365 has a quicker built-in GPU than the M4 and a stronger NPU with round 50 TOPS (Trillions of Operations Per Second), vs 38 on the M4.
| Benchmark | Check | End result |
|---|---|---|
| Geekbench 6 CPU | Single Core | 2884 |
| Multi Core | 12949 | |
| Geekbench 6 GPU | OpenCL | 33559 |
| Geekbench AI (NPU) | Single Precision | 3515 |
| Half Precision | 1690 | |
| Quantized | 6989 | |
| Passmark | CPU | 34083.2 |
| 2D Graphics | 914.3 | |
| 3D Graphics | 7434.7 | |
| Reminiscence | 3083.1 | |
| Disk Mark | 42552.8 | |
| General | 8166.7 | Cinebench 2024 | Single Core | 119 |
| Multi Core | 1032 |
Gaming
The built-in Radeon 880M GPU is surprisingly competent in terms of gaming. We examined a number of video games on it, and it managed to maintain 60fps at 1440p with out a problem. We tried Grime 2.0, the penultimate title within the collection, and a reasonably demanding one at that. We bought slightly below 60fps at maxed-out settings in 1080p. It was the same story in Forza Horizon – round 56fps in 1080p with settings at medium and excessive.
Titles like Civilization VI and Age of Empires II Definitive Version weren’t an issue for the 880M with locked-on 60fps efficiency. GTA V at 1080p and excessive hovered at slightly below 70fps.
That you must cut back high quality settings at 1080p in additional demanding video games like Cyberpunk 2077 in order for you a clean expertise – we achieved round 45fps with most settings on excessive.
General, the Radeon 880M is excellent so far as built-in GPUs go and provides the equal efficiency to the Nvidia RTX3050.
A little bit little bit of gaming on the Radeon 880M
The 1TB Kingston SSD (PCIe 4.0) was very quick, managing over 6,000MB/s learn and over 5,000MB/s write velocity.
Conclusion
The Minisforum AI X1 is a superb selection for a compact computing answer. Regardless of its diminutive dimension it provides exccellent efficiency and strong port choice. Three USBs on the entrance and two on the again are nice (although we might reasonably have one or two extra type-Cs as an alternative of the three type-As).
One other plus in our e book is the straightforward disassembly of this mini PC. A PC must be accessible and upgradeable, and Minisforum has made the AI X1 good on this regard. You possibly can swap the RAM (if want be), increase the storage, and usually preserve the gadget clear!
Then, there’s the configurability on Minisforum’s web site. You will have a selection of AMD’s newest power-efficient processors – Ryzen 7 260, Ryzen 7 255, Ryzen 9 365 – and both 32GB/1TB, or 64GB/1TB. And if you wish to put your individual SSD and RAM, you will get the barebones unit.
The worth is correct too, particularly in the meanwhile, with a promo letting you save between $100 and $200 relying of the configuration.
You will discover your mini PC of selection on Amazon in the US, the UK, and Germany, in addition to on Minisforum’s personal web site.
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