507€ store mini-PC vs the equivalent 380€ laptop

A store-bought mini-PC costs 507€; building one at home, 250€

The first comparison breaks all commercial logic. A compact computer, with no screen, no keyboard, no battery and no DVD drive, costs 507 euros. A laptop with the same processor —i3, 4 GB of RAM, 500 GB drive— from the same manufacturer, Asus, comes in at 380 euros. The smaller one costs 127 euros more for bringing less.

The starting point is familiar: an eleven-year-old machine with a low-end integrated GPU and Windows XP, whose mouse stutters along due to constant paging. The goal is a Mac mini-sized replacement, PC version, for browsing, watching videos and storing digital camera photos. Only the monitor and speakers survive from the old machine: not even the mouse is worth keeping, since it's PS/2.

The three initial routes: 450€, 448€ and 220€

The starting range has three branches. An Intel NUC with an i3 5010, 4 GB and a 128 GB SSD runs around 450 euros, with no operating system and assembly left to the buyer. A brand-name mini-PC with the same i3 —the HP Pavilion Mini at 448 euros with a 1 TB drive, or the HP 260 G1 at 361 euros with 500 GB— adds Windows, but offers no SSD option.

Then there's the imported route: Chinese-brand mini-PCs with an i3 4010U, 4 GB and a fanless 500 GB drive for 220 euros. The 128 GB SSD costs the same, though from sellers with no track record. The risk is twofold: installing the system yourself and trusting a stranger.

The laptop hooked up to the monitor: more for less

Here lies the paradox that throws everything off. For 380 euros —less than any of the equivalent mini-PCs— an i3 4005 laptop with 4 GB and 500 GB adds a 15-inch screen, keyboard, battery, DVD drive, camera, operating system and more ports. The thread starter's conclusion is stated bluntly: mini-PCs "are a rip-off". Buying the laptop and using it as a desktop, closed, connected to the monitor, remains on the table.

The reaction is nuanced. As another forum member points out, a closed laptop has advantages: you leave the lid down, plug it into the monitor, and gain protection against power cuts. And sooner or later the need arises to take it somewhere. The counterargument is habit: a desktop is peine, repaired and upgraded.

The tower loses the space battle, not the price one

The classic defense of the tower PC —it's repairable, there are replacements for almost everything except the motherboard, power supplies have been standardized for over fifteen years— runs into a problem at the source: the machine to be replaced can no longer be upgraded, because as soon as the motherboard needs changing, everything has to be renewed. And its power supply, with a tiny fan, makes a noise that is precisely one of the reasons for switching.

The silence argument carries more weight than it seems. As several participants point out, a mini-PC has no fan, or one so small it's barely audible, and power consumption plummets. The traditionalist reply is economic: at equal power, the tower is cheaper, because mini-ITX boards and cases get expensive and limit processors to low-power chips.

A system builder offers a gaming mini-PC for 395€

Amid the discussion, a concrete offer appears: a mini-PC with a quad-core AMD processor (APU A10), 8 GB of DDR3 RAM at 1866 MHz, SSD plus 1 TB of storage, WiFi and USB 3.1, in a mini-ITX case of "ridiculous dimensions" weighing under a kilo, for 395 euros. The graphics power, it's claimed, falls between a PlayStation 3 and a PlayStation 4. For viewing photos and browsing, it's more than enough.

The case is the size of a PS3 or an Xbox 360, which millions of people keep next to their TV without a problem. The difference is that it carries PC hardware, not laptop hardware.

The hard drive, the real bottleneck

Much of the performance jump comes not from the processor but from the SSD. According to one participant, a Celeron G1840 —a modest chip, around 3,000 points on the Passmark benchmark— boots the system in seven seconds with a solid-state drive, and that's enough for it to outpace a more powerful i5 with a mechanical drive. The bottleneck isn't in the clock, it's in the disk.

On size, usage is the deciding criterion. For office work and photos, 120 GB is enough. The trap lies in the pricing ladder: a 120 GB SSD costs 45 euros and the 240 GB one, 65 euros. Just 20 euros more to double the space, while jumping to 480 GB doubles the price. The decision ends up being psychological: whoever saves 60 GB will have to justify it.

The final solution: mini-ITX for 250€

The story ends in self-refutation: whoever ruled out the tower and the mini-ITX board ended up building one. The list: an ASRock QC5000M board with an A-5000 APU and passive cooler, 68 euros; an ITX case with a 60 W passive picoPSU-type power supply, 61 euros; 8 GB of DDR3 RAM at 1600 MHz, 33 euros; a 240 GB Crucial SSD, 65 euros. Total, around 250 euros, below the set budget and far from the 507-euro store-bought mini-PC.

The saving, then, isn't in the device: it's in building it yourself. And the power-consumption fight remains unresolved. A laptop processor is designed for efficiency; a desktop one, for raw power. The difference in the annual bill is estimated, according to one critical calculation, at around 1.50 euros a year. Sacrificing performance for that doesn't go far.

With these numbers, buying the laptop and using it as a desktop still makes sense for anyone who doesn't want complications. And building at home, for those unafraid of a screwdriver. One underlying doubt remains: if a laptop gives you more for less, why does the market insist on selling less for more?