07-13-2022 at 06:29 AM#62
Modifications possible with this build
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* The motherboard size is likely mini ITX. Meaning if you are adventurous, you can relocate the motherboard to another case, and get more bays in the process.
* System has 2 SODIMM slots. One is empty, another is occupied with 4Gig. It is possible to install 2x8Gig for a total of 16 Gigs. Regardless what Intel and Acer says, 16 Gigs (2x8) appears to work fine. This is the 8 Gig I used in mine. 8 Gig Team Memory [amazon.com]
*The system has a single SATA full length power connector. If you wish to connect a second drive that needs a full SATA power port, you will need a splicer, something like this.
SATA Power Splitter [ebay.com]
* Depends on how drives you install and what type of drives you install, the temperature in the case could be higher than desired. I modded the case to take a 140mm and spliced the 3 pin CPU fan connector. It would be useful to disable fan control in BIOS so it runs at high speed at all times. *spliced fan header [ebay.com]140mm fan [amazon.com]
* The system as shipped accommodates 1x3.5 above and beyond the DVD drive installed. If you want to change the DVD bay to accept 2.5 inch HDD< you will need something like this *a DVD caddy 3.5 9.7mm bay [amazon.com].
With all above modification, my system draws about 25Ws at peak.
Copied suggestions below for various uses.
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Desktop replacement, Rating: Medicore
This is a mediocre use case as a desktop replacement because the limited CPU capability and memory. The system comes with 4Gig standard which will mean a lot of swapping on Windows 10 in default configuration. If you can up the memory to 8Gig, I think the use case becomes fair. It is a reasonable system for lite web page browsing, spreadsheets, email, YouTube and Netflix at 1080P. ie, this is a good system for your grandparents if usage case isn't aggressive.
Gaming setup, Rating: Poor
Expansion slot is half height, power supply is 65W, there is only a CPU fan. ie, if you want to game other than minesweeper, you should look for a beefier system, such as the one with I3 and 250W power?. Again, if you go that route, maybe Acer small form factor shouldn't be what you should consider. For reference, my current game setup has a 850w ps and about 7 fans.
NAS, Rating: Good
This thing draws less power and is quieter than my Synology 2 bay. CPU will be more powerful than my Synology with more possibility of expanding via standard PC peripherals. A two bay Synology is about $200 right now which means you can use this thing at about half the cost. With this said, there are only 2 SATA ports and no additional cooling fans and will only accommodate 1 3.5" and 1 2.5" drive without additional engineering. If you are okay dropping in a 10TB 3.5 WD Red Plus and call it good, you have an excellent use case here. If you are desperate, I suppose you can always use external USB 3.0 enclosures for additional drives. Hardware transcoding via Plex for a single 4K stream shouldn't be a huge issue since this Celeron has a UHD600 onboard.
pFsense, Gateway replacement, VPN server, PiHole etc, Rating: Excellent
What this system really excels is as an always on, minimal power, minimal noise internet relay device. I listed a couple use cases above. I am thinking moving my VPN server (both up and down streams), PiHole, and Firewall server into this thing. As given the system has more than enough resource to run Debian or BSD, never sipes more than 15Ws, generates no heat, and is virtually silent, I can see this thing sitting next to my cable modem and be the consolidating gateway machine that is currently being taken up by a Synology, a number of Rasperberri Pis. For $100, this is just a bargain you can't find equivalent elsewhere. Now the only decision is to buy another one as a backup in case this breaks. :-)
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Installed this Crucial 32GB set [a.co] and did not notice any slowness. The only thing that happened was a delayed FIRST POST after installing the sticks, beyond that, so far so good. Screenshots below:
WIN10_SYSTEM [imgur.com]
USERBENCHMARK [imgur.com]
HWINFO1 [imgur.com] | HWINFO2 [imgur.com]
CPUZ_MB [imgur.com] | CPUZ_MEM [imgur.com] | CPUZ_SPD1 [imgur.com] | CPUZ_SPD2 [imgur.com]
10-min stress test with CPU Smart Fan feature turned off [imgur.com]
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Top Comments
This 88 dollar PC is not a powerful PC. That is correct. I'm not being duped into thinking this is a POWERFUL PC!
This is a laptop PC who's motherboard has been placed in a tiny tower case and can run windows 10/11, and you can add more ram, and comes with NVMe, with external power supply that laptop's use! So very, very low power 24/7 machine 6 watts idle.
It has bluetooth/wifi,ethernet port, 4 usb 2 ports, 2 usb 3 ports. 2 year warranty, intel 600 internal graphics, hdmi and vga port,
You know that Walmart currently is selling this at 299 dollars with good user review average.
I object to the word "duped" in your post. There are 2-3 threads on this device on slickdeals , with things people are doing with it.
Like the Raspberry Pi, it is hobby device, and cheaper than Pi,( if you were to buy Pi plus all the extra's you need to buy to complete Pi package).
Hopefully, people read YOUR post, and read posts from others that discuss the positive aspect of this device, so they know what they are buying and not buying. Alert heard, sir. . Your mission is accomplished. Torpedoes away. Next target!
Where to mount the disks? As previously mentioned, there's space for a 3.5" disk and a 2.5" disk if you removed the optical drive. Alternatively, you could remove the entire cage and replace it with something that'd accept two 3.5" disks [amazon.com] (I haven't actually tried it because I haven't received the computer yet, but it should work). Similarly, it should not be too difficult to put four 2.5" disks in the case. Use a cage if you want to be fancy. Velcro or duct tape if you just don't gaf. Or get a bigger case, but then you'd lose the cute little form factor.
Where to get the power? Y-splitters. Just don't overload the power supply.
Where to connect the data cables? Ah, now this is the fun part. See previous post regarding the limitations of the PCIe bus. If the goal is to install as many disks as possible, one way would be to put SATA controllers in the Ć16, Ć4, and Ć2 slots. Yes, the M-keyed M.2 slot and even the E-keyed M.2 slot could probably be used for PCIe modules, including SATA controllers and Ethernet controllers.
Each lane of PCIe 2.0 provides 500 MB/s of bandwidth, just barely sufficient for SATA III's 600 MB/s. This is obviously not a problem for HDD, but could limit SSD performance. You might want to be... creative... with port selection, if you plan to use SSDs and HDDs together. For example, if you put a 2-port SATA controller in the Ć2 slot, you might want to pair an SSD with a HDD on that same controller to optimize bandwidth usage.
Also remember the limitations of the DMI link. If you're using this machine as a NAS, your disks might be sharing PCIe bandwidth with your NIC. You could potentially install many disks and a lot of other stuff, but they'd compete for bandwidth. Proceed with caution.
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655 Comments
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I was thinking of upgrading the ram and seeing if I could add a 1050 ti or something to this for encoding and streaming with a capture card. Is that feasible with this machine, given the upgrades that I will add with ram and GPU?
What is streaming mean to you? This celeron has no problems streaming stuff, like netflix, amazon prime videos, youtube 1080p60 videos without studder for me. This celeron does have INTEL 600 graphics built in, which works to watch basic stuff. Acer has 2 more expensive refurbs (the i3-10th gen 199 dolars and the i5-11thgen 299 dollars) you might want to get instead if you want to get graphics cards because 300 watt power supply (low profile cards only).
Others can comment, but anybody that puts a 1050TI into this Celerson is playing with FIRE!
Basically, look at sound settings, there are a lot, or click on the speaker ICON on bottom right, and open it up, and it also opens other OPTIONS. My HDMI is main sound, but I use bluetooth speakers as option too, and you can switch between speakers, explore that speaker ICON, and look at all the options. I could be you have setting that if speakers are plugged in, it turns off Internal speakers on hdtv. You can also watch youtube videos on getting sound to work in windows 11. I sometimes have 3-4 bluetooth speaker options (depending how LOUD I want to be or soft.)
Basically, look at sound settings, there are a lot, or click on the speaker ICON on bottom right, and open it up, and it also opens other OPTIONS. My HDMI is main sound, but I use bluetooth speakers as option too, and you can switch between speakers, explore that speaker ICON, and look at all the options. I could be you have setting that if speakers are plugged in, it turns off Internal speakers on hdtv. You can also watch youtube videos on getting sound to work in windows 11. I sometimes have 3-4 bluetooth speaker options (depending how LOUD I want to be or soft.)
So you got bluetooth speakers working.
You got GT710 sound working.
Unplug the external speakers from back of hdtv. Does it get sound through your hdmi speakers?
Are there settings on your hdtv itself about sound, mine has lots of options too. Sounds like you are good at trouble-shooting. If you remove any sound outputs from back of your hdtv, and still no sound from hdtv internal speakers? Maybe restart pc, and turn on and off your hdtv. Or try different hdmi port. I'm just trouble-shooting things I would do.
p.s. Maybe remove gt-710 card and see if you get sound back on hdmi. I have gt-710 cards too, but they are in my hp 8300 elite PC's. I would be too scared to use them in this 88 celeron PC (because of stress it puts on components in this tiny PC. Also, in testing since it's such a old card, is gaming any better than INTEL 600 graphics, since intel has much newer tech level. It is good you are experimenting with that. ( got off the subject of speaker issue, sorry).
So you got bluetooth speakers working.
You got GT710 sound working.
Unplug the external speakers from back of hdtv. Does it get sound through your hdmi speakers?
Are there settings on your hdtv itself about sound, mine has lots of options too. Sounds like you are good at trouble-shooting. If you remove any sound outputs from back of your hdtv, and still no sound from hdtv internal speakers? Maybe restart pc, and turn on and off your hdtv. Or try different hdmi port. I'm just trouble-shooting things I would do.
p.s. Maybe remove gt-710 card and see if you get sound back on hdmi. I have gt-710 cards too, but they are in my hp 8300 elite PC's. I would be too scared to use them in this 88 celeron PC (because of stress it puts on components in this tiny PC. Also, in testing since it's such a old card, is gaming any better than INTEL 600 graphics, since intel has much newer tech level. It is good you are experimenting with that. ( got off the subject of speaker issue, sorry).
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I just turned on my other celeron 88 and it's attached to 24 inch hp monitor, and the sound comes from the speakers on my monitor, and sounds good.
BUT none of my 88's have a graphic card in them. I'm not sure where the conflict comes from , get pc back to stock and remove 710 and remove any external sound outputs from monitor. If you can sound back on monitor , then the problem is some conflict with gt-710 or the external sound device.
I just turned on my other celeron 88 and it's attached to 24 inch hp monitor, and the sound comes from the speakers on my monitor, and sounds good.
BUT none of my 88's have a graphic card in them. I'm not sure where the conflict comes from , get pc back to stock and remove 710 and remove any external sound outputs from monitor. If you can sound back on monitor , then the problem is some conflict with gt-710 or the external sound device.
p.s. ... other option is plug your celeron 88 into another hdtv or monitor and see if you get sound and if you do, then check monitor settings. You are on the right track, you are trouble-shooting like a pro.
I could be wrong if someone can locate another low profile GPU available in the market.
someone mentioned 3050TI that it doesn't work for me
I could be wrong if someone can locate another low profile GPU available in the market.
someone mentioned 3050TI that it doesn't work for me
I'm not saying that the gt1030 would not work (short term) , but over time, it would put too much stress on conponents.
Here is the specs for the GeForce GT 1030!
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/gefo...fication
notice how it states that 20-30 watts power
BUT it also says, Minimum Recommended System Power 300 Watts
... this is why I recommend the 2 other ACERS because they do have 300 watt power supply!
Why take a chance on blowing resistors/capasitors/power supply, etc. Not worth it in my opinion. Now if this device had 225 power supply ... then provided that pc generally has low powered chip, and not water cooler (
But 65 watt laptop power supply. I'm shaking my head from left to right.
I'm not saying that the gt1030 would not work (short term) , but over time, it would put too much stress on conponents.
Here is the specs for the GeForce GT 1030!
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/gefo...fication
notice how it states that 20-30 watts power
BUT it also says, Minimum Recommended System Power 300 Watts
... this is why I recommend the 2 other ACERS because they do have 300 watt power supply!
Why take a chance on blowing resistors/capasitors/power supply, etc. Not worth it in my opinion. Now if this device had 225 power supply ... then provided that pc generally has low powered chip, and not water cooler (
But 65 watt laptop power supply. I'm shaking my head from left to right.
Actually, I have bunch of GPU cards around, I use the 88 PC to drive my external 4x GPU for mining with external 1000w PSU
Also the wireless chip Network Card: Atheros/Qualcomm QCA9377 is a very capable Wi-Fi/BT combo chipset
Nonetheless, it looks like this GPU has plenty of untapped power, and the 90w power brick that I am using does not seem to be breaking a sweat.
Absolutely excellent computer all in all. There are still a couple areas of untapped power that I haven't tried out yet.. One is getting the GPU to run 4 lanes via the replacement of other devices, and second is trying out my 32GB G Skill RAM kit in this box (higher clock spd as well).
Attached is my Unigine Heaven benchmark at the highest overclock I could achieve, then I dialed it back a pinch for long term stability ;-)
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I'm not saying that the gt1030 would not work (short term) , but over time, it would put too much stress on conponents.
Here is the specs for the GeForce GT 1030!
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/gefo...fications/ [nvidia.com]
notice how it states that 20-30 watts power
BUT it also says, Minimum Recommended System Power 300 Watts
... this is why I recommend the 2 other ACERS because they do have 300 watt power supply!
Why take a chance on blowing resistors/capasitors/power supply, etc. Not worth it in my opinion. Now if this device had 225 power supply ... then provided that pc generally has low powered chip, and not water cooler (
But 65 watt laptop power supply. I'm shaking my head from left to right.
The general recommendations are for the highest powered systems these cards will typically encounter. In other words, if they say 300w, it's because they're allocating 30W on top of a 250W minimum required PSU size. And 250w is a fairly standard minimum in the industry. We don't need 250, we need 65 (apparently much less, load reports of 25W seem to be the norm). so add the same 30w figure to that 65W, and you're at 95W.
Can you run a 1030 on this machine? In all likelihood probably yes, HOWEVER, I don't expect the performance to be much higher than my 730 (which runs at pcie 2.0 already). I would highly recommend getting ahold of the 90w power brick that ships with this unit when upgraded by acer (or compatible acer alternative). My POWER brick from my laptop is a LITE-ON 90W 19.7V unit.
And by the way, I decided to try the included 65W PSU, and it booted fine. Now that's not to say I'm going to jump into 3d mode with my overclocks on with this power brick, but the system will boot with the 65 W unit and a GT 730 (28W TDP?)... Honestly, it can probably run 3d mode, but I'm going to measure the wattage on the 90W before I go burning up this power brick
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