Beelink SER8 Gaming Mini PC, Ryzen 7 8745HS (up to 4.9GHz) Mini Computer, 24GB DDR5 5600MHz & 1TB PCle4.0 x 4 SSD, AMD Radeon 780M, Supports 4K Triple Displays, USB4, 2.5G LAN, Dual Audio

A sleek, good-looking performer
This mini PC is sleek in appearance, and powerful in performance. My biggest struggle with my last mini PC was that it ran warm, and I wanted a high-performance system that would also run cool. I realize that both of those criteria are in opposition to one another, but I decided to try this PC based on various reviews around the web and some good experiences in the past with Beelink mini PCs.Another criteria for me was more than one USB 3.x or 4.x port on the back. Many mini PCs are designed with high-speed USB ports only on the front, but I also want to be able to connect a high-speed hub with some external hard drives attached to it, and I don’t want that cabling coming off the front of the PC on my desktop. The SER8 has three USB-A ports: 2.0 (x2) and 3.2 (x1), along with a USB-C (4.0) port all on the rear. There are also two high-speed USB ports on the front as well.Additional major considerations for me were performance, heat and noise. This PC is a great performer. I don’t game so I can’t speak to its ability to run games, although there are some video reviews on the web that talk in detail about gaming performance if that’s your intended usage. I am a web developer, so most of my time on this computer is spent in a text editor, web browser, or email client. I do also produce some video tutorials which includes video recording and editing. For all of these tasks, this PC is more than capable. My configuration has 32GB of RAM, and that seems to be enough for all of this activity, and in most cases no more than half of the RAM is ever in use.The PC also stays cool — really cool. I was constantly fighting with my last mini to keep it cool. It wasn’t going to burn up, but I did everything I could improve its ventilation by adding an additional fan and upgrading its SSD heat sink. It managed to hold reasonable temps, but I wanted one that was designed to stay cool from the start. The machine delivers big time in that regard. The CPU package stays in mid-30s C most of the time with occasional short bumps into the 40s or 50s during intensive application loads.Best of all, in spite of the high performance and outstanding thermal design, it remains quiet. You might think in order to maintain these low temps, the fans would constantly be running in turbo mode. But instead, passive cooling does a large part of the heavy lifting inside this box. The SSD is typically a major source of heat in a cramped mini PC case. And I upgraded the stock drive with a faster SSD that also runs a bit hotter. But the SSD heat sink provided in this case is massive. It clamps down over top of the SSD(s) and has a mass at least three times that of most standard SSD heat sinks. No doubt this is a big factor in maintaining the low temperatures inside the case. But of course, that hot air needs to be moved outside the case for the system to stay cool, and the fan in this system does so very efficiently. It not only removes heat from the interior, but does so in a way that its inaudible during most activity, and only barely audible during high-performance activity. I believe the BIOS has a higher “performance” mode setting that uses more power for the CPU and likely generates more heat and fan noise, but at the default settings, the machine is silent and perfect for use on a desktop in a quiet office.The only negative I have found to date with this device is its internal wifi adapter and antennas. They work, but the system was unable to achieve throughput speeds close to my ISP’s provisioned speed. When wired directly with ethernet, speeds were as expected around the maximum my ISP provides (600 mbps). But when running on wifi, throughput dropped to about half of that (200-300 mbps). I realize that wifi will never match wired speeds, but it should come much closer, especially in my home where I have a gigabit router and two gigabit (ax) access points, leaving the SER8 only about 10 feet from the closest one. Still, it wasn’t able to achieve a better transfer rate than 300 mbps on most occasions. Since wifi depends on many factors, I decided to disable the internal wifi card and use an external USB wifi adapter/antenna from TP-Link to rule out an external factor, and I was able to achieve speeds between 400-500 mbps); a nearly 30% increase is speed. Beelink was responsive and did send a replacement card/antennas to check if the stock card was somehow defective, but the replacement provided the same results as the original. I believe the issue is related to the metal case attenuating the internal antennas, and may simply be a design issue that is difficult to overcome with the stock hardware. I also tried a different internal M.2 wifi/bluetooth card (Intel AX210), but it also made no difference. While I don’t routinely need to have 500+ mbps throughput for my daily activities, it would be nice to be able to use the full capacity of the internet service I’m paying for when needed for large downloads. According to Reddit users of the SER8, the wifi issue does not appear to be an anomaly as a number of users have reported the same disappointing results when using the device wirelessly. One also reported the same increase when using an external adapter, reinforcing the idea that this is a design issue perhaps related to the internal antennas and metal case or other internal interference.Overall, I’m very impressed and happy I bought this mini PC. It met all of my criteria and performs better than I expected in most cases. I can’t imagine it wouldn’t meet the needs of almost any business user or for casual gaming or entertainment. Unless your primary requirement and use case is high-speed wireless connectivity, most users will find this PC to be an excellent performer and meet all of their computing needs.

Great little computer with a small body and a big presence
To be fair to anyone ordering this product, I have to say the first one I received was compromised. However, I sent it back without any issue, had good customer service, and I re-ordered another one that is performing very well indeed. Another disclaimer is that I am not a “gamer” so I cannot speak to that. However, I am a professional programmer and data person, and I am just delighted with how this machine functions FAST and CLEAN. It is very quiet, and I have had no overheating problems, WIFI or Bluetooth issues or really anything else. If you already have a good monitor, keyboard and mouse, you should have no trouble using this ingenious computer.