Testing a $100 Mini PC: The Bmax B1 Plus

Does Hasbro know that it has a Decepticon insignia?

Thanks for your very useful and informative reviews of the Bmax. I have just bought one of these and they are impressive value for money ( at £100 with an Amazon offer). The power consumption is comparable to RPi 4 and I am setting up a media server using Logitech Media Server which I will probably leave running for most of the day. The current model comes with slightly improved components and Windows 11 Pro. I found that even after being fully updated Microsoft's background processes continue to swamp the (wired) network and slow the machine down to a crawl so I have had to stop the update services.

Thanks for this useful video. In it you mention removing surplus windows software and using disk cleanup to get back more space. What is safe to remove?

How about an htpc, own cloud, or Nas applications? Any thoughts or criticisms?

How long do these last before breaking down? Can they be used for streaming frequently? Also, what's the deal with what it was saying on the wrapper about NOT connecting to the Internet or Wi-Fi on the first boot? What'll happen if you do?

"Windows is now updated, which took 3 hours..." 🤣🤣🤣I wouldn't run windows on a 8gb ram system, it claims it can handle2 4k monitors, I'de be surprised it that was remotely possible...even 2 1080p ones...

It's a good concept but that CPU it's just too old, even the official support ended. It's from back 2016

I always let these set themselves up and get activated, then wipe the drive and reload them with the latest downloaded from Microsoft. Be sure to change your password first, let the machine record activation to your Microsoft account, then you can change your password back after reloading (wise precaution even if you use two factor authentication like I do).

There's a registry fix that enables the Automatic Windows Update

HKLM/Software/Policies/Microsoft/Windows/WindowsUpdate/AU - Change the vales to 0 and restart, Windows Update will now work

With Windows 10 Pro installed you can access RDP servers which is what something like this is good for. Anyone who works from Home could use this if your company does everything from a remote server.

Would it be wise to move the back up Window recovery on a thumb drive before removing the patrician?

Could you do a review of the ClockworkPi uConsole, I would be interested to hear what you think.

there was a 10 off for some reason so i just picked this up right now for 80 quid

As many have said, I bought one for my father and it is a nice device. For what I do, it is slow. I have the minis forum B550 and it is a montar, several times biguer and very fast without a external graphic card, but for a wroser, check the news, some videos etc is perfect. Very good deal, 77 euros is fair price.

Hi :
does it work with smartphone technology?
Best wishes
Jakob

Just got the b1+ today it runs hot/warm CPU 100%, 75%memeroy use, numerous hard faults/sec ?

Always great reviews thanks, I was just thinking about buying it.
Anyway...it's Chinese, I wonder how many backdoors they have installed... I may be paranoid but now I don't trust their stuff anymore, above all from the latest events of the Android box.
One thing is for sure I wouldn't leave the system pre-installed, a bios check wouldn't hurt, and a nice firewall as a filter.

perfect timing again. heheh. i've been looking at this exact model to replace my aging android media player. I am glad its not locked down. But can you change the OS on the EMMC?

A very clear and interesting review - also learned something new about useful software and hardware issues (USB 3 - external SSD). You could have reported a few more of the very common benchmarks such as Geekbench and Cinebench.

Where you able to make the audio chipset ESSX8336 work on Linux? It seems it is not officially supported yet.

As Windows 10 nears the end of life, I wonder how much cheaper these mini Windows 10 computers will get. Just so we can install Linux.

can i use this on a laptop using laptop screen for display ?

Your review is truly awesome !!!
Confirmation that Linux Mint works OK on BMAX B1plus has definitively convinced me to buy it ;-)
I think that having automatic updates turned off helps this system run Win10 smoothly. Windows Update is resource-hungry and a dual-core processor is likely to suffer from that.
In fact, CPU was almos at 100% and temperature of the box skyrocketed.while completing manual updates.
After Windows 10 is tested and updated, I have made a CloneZilla image ot current eMMC installation and I most likely will install Linux Mint, Debian or Ubuntu on the M.2 SATA disk.for everyday use.

I never thought a USB 3 port would be the fastest storage option on a machine. Leave it to a Celeron-based system to surprise me in one way or another. It was once in a good way. The Celeron 300A through the Celeron 400 MHZ range was actually as good as if not better for gaming than the Pentium II range at the same clock speed range back in the day. Oh, and the Celeron 300A most of the time could be overclocked to 450MHZ to take on Intel's flagship... Well, the Celeron D almost killed any thought of that line of processors ever having any respect in computing again, so here we are...

This would be pretty much ideal for someone trying homeserver stuff. Really small powerconsumption, but well enough power to run like HomeAssistant, NextCloud or like small home fileserver for devices on network. This is actually why I stumbled into this. Ordered 1L refurbished vastly more powerful mini computer to run Proxmox, but this was the cheapest option when browsing category. I actually have old Intel NUC that is very similar to this with Celeron N2820. It's even slower but powerconsumption wise almost identical. It ran like + 2 years 24/7 OpenMediaVault really, really well. But now I'm planning to run multiple servers and it just doesn't make sense to power this NUC and plethora of Raspberry Pi 4's 24/7. My time is to migrate them to low powered, but very much more powerful server.

Chris (I THINK thats your name?!) I have huge problems with data transfer. One time I can hit 120MB/s, the same drives can drop to 8MB/s... Any idea what I am doing wrong? Its an MSI 450 Tomahawk II Max with AMD 5600X, 32GB 3000 Ram, running either 7200rpm Seagate Barracuda's (internal) or Seagate USB 3 externals - I'm assuming 5200rpm on them. No SSD's. But the lack of SSDs does not explain the data transfer discrepancy. All drivers are fully up to date, but this is a persistant problem across many builds - I think I am setting things up wrong. Any advice? (anyone!) My job is moving data... if I can do it 10x faster.... well... my life would be better....

Chris, with the Windows 10 Pro volume licence installed in this mini PC, I'm wondering if that is a legitimate licence? I've had an instance where someone brought me their PC to get Windows reinstalled due to things like speeding things up, including getting their old hard drives updated to SSD, etc. and then not being able to reactivate Windows afterwards. So obviously, the licence in there has been blocked by Microsoft.

Thank you my dear sir. You gave us what most of us wanted in a review without showboating about how smart you are (when you are indeed highly intelligent), and you mercifully avoided all that gamer nonsense that others bore us with.

Look, I love the gaming aspect, but I have PCs and consoles for this, and other PCs and rigs for other stuff like HD video encoding, etc. If you want high end stuff for this you really do have to spend more than $100, which is something too many folks don't want to understand.

All I wanted was just another little PC to kick around the house for some smaller tasks without spending much more cash, and wanted a real review of it without having to sludge through seemingly endless footage on fighting or racing games, or whatever.

Thanks so much. I picked one up since because of this review, and absolutely love it for what it's meant for.

Just wanted to share that I found you since I was looking at this computer on AliExpress for $46.21! I'm only looking for a dedicated computer to run SDR software and 2 way radio programming software besides all of the essentials. The fact that it runs 12 volts is great as an alternate battery power source as well as the bracket to mount it since I'm planning on using a 24" HDMI TV as a monitor on my work bench. Lastly, I own all the USB external drives and CD/DVD hardware and powered hubs. Oh yes, I have an extra 512GB M2 SSD. Looks like it will serve its purpose. The only thing I was unclear of, is can you reinstall Windows 10 on the expansion SSD? Thanks for the video, you've gotten a new subscriber tonight. Now onto your GPIO video. 😊

Lately, I've been getting into these more and more. I just picked up my 3rd and 4th mini from AliExpress. Both are N100 and I was a bit surprised by the performance on them. One of them is now a very overpowered pi-hole running ubuntu, but leaves me some room to add other things I may want to later. I just built a 13900K system, but I'm wondering how much longer it will be before I don't bother with that anymore and just use a mini on my desk (which is already possible to do).

Hi I don’t know if you’ve ever had a question like this. I’m into AI text to image. Have you ever head of automatic 1111. Can you run stable diffusion on a mini pc. Which ones would do it

Thanks! for the help on the M.2 and the added information.

It's a real shame they biffed the deal with only a 64GB drive. You really can't do anything substantial with this device, until you add external drives. Geez. Thanks for showing this.

homie out here looking like he was just unboxed

What do you think of GEEKOM Mini IT11 i7-11390H?

Hi Christopher, I just got one of these little PC's based on your recommendations in this video. What type of M.2 SSD is compatible with NVMe? I can't seem to find any documentation on the M.2 Slot!

I just ordered one and it should be here in about 10 days. I plan on hooking mine up to a TV in the living room and using it as a stream box for hulu/netflix/hbo, etc.

This is much better thought out than the Beelink T4 Pro, which has basically the same specs, size and even price, but comes with only 4 gigs of soldered RAM, no SSD slot (just the soldered 64 gb no-name emmc module), and no apparent way to install a 32-bit OS to squeeze out more out of the 4 gigs of RAM.

This is a short review of the Beelink T4 Pro:

Games you can run, after debloating to get some RAM back, are Starcraft (1.16.1), GZDoom with OpenGL ES rendering and texture upscaling, EDuke32, Quake (Mark V), Quake 2 (Yamagi), Diablo 1 and 2, Wacraft II BNE, Warcraft III 1.31.1 at 1080p without shadows, and even Zombie Shooter 2, if you frame-limit to 47 frames per second.

Browsing can be done with a 32-bit browser to save RAM, such as Brave and Firefox. I couldn't really find any other modern browser for Windows with a 32-bit build. I also couldn't find a way to install and boot a 32-bit Windows 10 LTSC version, so we're stuck with 64-bit Windows and corresponding increased memory usage.

You can also use ThrottelStop to permanently bump the CPU to 2.33 ghz (up from 1.1 ghz base frequency)

love the dual boot method sans grub

At least now I know what happened to Prince Valiant

Can this run C&C General?

Am I confused? It looks like 2 m.2 slots on that machine. One accessible thru the access panel on the bottom and one accessible under the top cover. maybe that is the bottom cover and not the top.

I was thinking of buying this and putting fydeos on this as my lounge/entertainment pc, i wonder how the performance would be

I can now finally watch streaming services, like YT from actual websites, therefore BLOCKING COMMERCIALS!...its virtually impossible (for me anyway) to block any ads on android apps..Being able to do this alone, is worth the 100 bucks.

Is there a Linux Version. How can i get sponsorship. nice. product. just stumbled on your blog.

Can you add a CD Burner to this device for I tunes download this video is awesome its got what I need .👍👍

cool vid