Aoostar Overseas Fulfillment Store via AliExpress has
AOOSTAR MACO Barebones Mini PC (No SSD) on sale for $308.14 - $42 with promo code
MYUSDEAL42 at checkout =
$266.14.
Shipping is free.
Thanks to Community Member
thethingx for sharing this deal.
- Note: Price may fluctuate slightly with currency exchange rates. You must be signed into your AliExpress account and have your address added to add items to your cart and place an order. You may have to manually type in the promo code to apply it at checkout. This item ships from a USA warehouse. For expedited customer service, please email [email protected].
Details:
- AMD Ryzen 7 Pro 6850H 8-cores, 16-threads (3.2GHz Base / 4.7GHz
- Radeon 680M Integrated Graphics
- 24GB LPDDR5 6400Mhz RAM (Soldered; cannot be removed or replaced)
- Wi-Fi 6 + Bluetooth 5.2
- Internal Storage Expansion:
- 3x M.2 2280
- 4x PCIe 4.0
- Max 24TB
- Ports:
- 4x USB-A
- 2x USB-C
- 1x OCuLink (Does not support hot-swap)
- 2x LAN (2.5G)
- 1x 3.5mm Audio Jack
- 1x DisplayPort 1.4
- 1x HDMI 2.1
Top Comments
Essentially put the steam deck at your baseline, and increase the CPU performance, and thats where you expect this to land.
Community Reviews
This barebones Ryzen 7 Pro mini PC stands out as a strong value for buyers who already have an NVMe drive, thanks to 24GB of fast LPDDR5 memory, USB4, and OCuLink support. The 680M graphics and 8 core Zen 3 CPU are described as well above Steam Deck class performance, with enough output for emulation, Plex, and even four displays. The main catch is the missing SSD, and it is not a great fit for AI token generation workloads because there is no NPU and software support for the GPU is limited. A capable compact system if you can supply storage and do not need heavy AI acceleration.
This mini PC can be a good fit when you already own spare NVMe storage drives.
The configuration includes Oculink support and two USB4 ports for flexible external display and expansion options.
The deal value is supported by the combination of Ryzen 7 Pro performance and 24GB LPDDR5 at a relatively low barebones price.
The system can run multiple displays using dual USB4 plus DisplayPort and HDMI, with Oculink potentially enabling more.
The soldered LPDDR5 design can limit upgrade flexibility compared with systems that use replaceable SODIMM memory.
AI token-generation workloads may be a poor match because the system lacks an NPU and has limited GPU backend support.
Vulkan usage can be very slow on this platform, which can hurt workloads that rely on that graphics path.
The mini PC may be less energy efficient than an Intel CPU using Quick Sync for certain media or compute tasks.
Common Questions (4)
AI-generated summary based on comments from the community. Updated ago
Join The Conversation
Share your experience with the Slickdeals community
Share information with the community. Please follow our Community Guidelines and be kind!
36 Comments
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
slightly better than steam deck, and the lenovo legion go S (8 core zen3 over 4 core zen2/zen3), 12CU rdna2 over the 8 in the steamdeck.
Essentially put the steam deck at your baseline, and increase the CPU performance, and thats where you expect this to land.
This machine should be like 35-45% faster GPU performance and like 70-80% faster in CPU performance. + it has 8GB more of similar LPDDR5 RAM?
I wouldn't call that "slightly" better.
EDIT: on top of that, this has an oculink port for use with an eGPU. AND it has 2 USB4s. Can't do that on the steam deck.
If you have a spare SSD, this is a sure bet. It isnt Zen4, but for THIS configuration, its actually cheaper than the equivalent (with even less RAM) from summer 2025.
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
But if any of those tasks require any sort of token generation both input and output (as opposed to just initiating a command or scraping for information), you will need more power (and more VRAM), and this machine is a nonstarter for that. There is no NPU, and the GPU has middling support, even with vulcan. Most backends do not recognize the 680m with ROCm, and Vulcan usage is VERY slow on these.
To bypass this issue you can rent GPU access on openrouter and get an API key, or use a pioneer cloud model like GPT 5.5. (preferably one that does not bill per token), as well. Just dont use claude, because they will consider any of these AI agents as "additional usage" that is not billed against your sub, but as an additional charge.
You can technically use the oculink port and attach a decent GPU to do this task as well...but then the whole SD aspect of this deal is done. Once you spend enough, its just cheaper to get a mac mini.
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
it depends on how you define "run." As an AI agent, it is more than powerful enough to delegate tasks. You can even use an RPI for this.
But if any of those tasks require any sort of token generation both input and output (as opposed to just initiating a command or scraping for information), you will need more power (and more VRAM), and this machine is a nonstarter for that. There is no NPU, and the GPU has middling support, even with vulcan. Most backends do not recognize the 680m with ROCm, and Vulcan usage is VERY slow on these.
To bypass this issue you can rent GPU access on openrouter and get an API key, or use a pioneer cloud model like GPT 5.5. (preferably one that does not bill per token), as well. Just dont use claude, because they will consider any of these AI agents as "additional usage" that is not billed against your sub, but as an additional charge.
You can technically use the oculink port and attach a decent GPU to do this task as well...but then the whole SD aspect of this deal is done. Once you spend enough, its just cheaper to get a mac mini.
Join The Conversation
Share your experience with the Slickdeals community
Share information with the community. Please follow our Community Guidelines and be kind!