i used to think that too, but those become garbage pretty quickly and are impossible to upgrade going fwd. mini itx + small desktop cube cost only slightly more than those 2nd hand shitbox, and last much longer with upgrades and are way better value props after 3 years
I don't see how a newly built mini ITX system can cost "slightly more" than a used SFF business PC. You can literally get them for less than $100 and the only thing you need to add is a GPU and maybe a SSD although newer ones should start having those too.
A mini ITX case and power supply alone is probably $100.
I think it's impossible to make a general statement because prices of used equipment vary so much more than prices of new. For example, it is not uncommon for companies to give away old machines for free to employees or their friends. I picked up a free SFF HP machine with an i5, 16GB RAM and a Quadro card. With an SSD and one of these LP GTX1650 it would make a great machine for many e-sports titles. I agree that upgrades are more flexible with COTS parts. (Non-standard PSU connectors and motherboard form-factors of business PCs come to mind.) On the other hand, with Intel there is no longer any CPU upgrade path due to sockets and chipsets changing, so you're confined to the generation that the board supports. Unfortunately for us hardware geeks – and the environment, and miners of conflict minerals, and jobs in the repair business – not many people care about upgrading their PCs anyway.
100$? what are you talking about. yea go buy a sandy bridge shitbox which wont post with 1050 TI let alone this. and then find out the PSU randomly shuts off every once in a while if it feels like it and then spend another 100 to buy replacement PSU. good luck with your life.
I have a Core 2 SFF machine that originally came with a Pentium E2180 that I got many many many years ago. Dropped in a Core 2 Quad Q9705 @ 3.17Ghz and just upgraded GPU's every few years. (I.E. Radeon 6570 DDR3 > R7 240 GDDR5 > Geforce 1030 GDDR5) and it's been running games like Overwatch at 720P+60fps just fine.
Can't complain for a crappy old free box, it's been rock solid too.
I don't know why you're being so hostile. I picked up a HP EliteDesk 800 G2 (i5-6500, 16GB DDR4) for about $70 that had a dead hard drive, I threw in a SSD I had lying around and a GTX 1050 Ti and I was playing every title in my Steam and GOG collections at 1080p60 at medium to ultra settings depending on the game. Hardly a "shitbox", and it was indeed good luck to find a deal like that, but they are out there.
Your attitude towards people able to find deals like that is baffling; did you perhaps have a bad experience trying to do the same? It happens dude, but it's no reason to be a dick.
Yeah, sounds like one or two bad experiences really soured his attitude, which is too bad. My experiences have all been good - not a single failed machine with the ~12 I have owned over the years. I'm running several SFF machines right now, two as 4K HDR HTPCs, one as an arcade/emulation machine, one as an application server, and one as a pfsense box. I just gave one to my nephew to play Fortnite (i5-3xxx+750Ti) and he's having a blast. I still have two more I need to restore and throw GPUs into. The most I have paid is $100, but I recently scored two identical Dell SFF machines with i5-6500 CPUs, 8GB RAM, and 250GB SSDs for $50 total - the dude was just done with them. Win 10 Pro and everything! I doubt I'll ever score a similar deal, but the key is to keep looking and hold out.
So for $125 you can get a Dell Optiplex 790 from Amazon that gets you a quad Core i5 that can drive a 1050 (I have one doing so at home), and it's been stable for the almost 3 years I've had it.
Not sure it can drive a 2070, but it doesn't hurt to buy a $90 PS to try. Worst case is I buy another system, like the newer Optiplex 7020 for $300, which is still cheaper than buying a motherboard, chassis, ram, CPU, SSD, and PS along with the 2070.
A dell optiplex 7010 SFF and a 1050 TI OC 4GB gives me outstanding 1080p gaming and decent 1440 (2k) gaming for less than $500. In GTA V I get above 90 fps in all scenes with everything on very high and 2x AF 16x AA. Specs? i7 3770 4 core 8 thread 3.9 ghz cpu with 16 GB Ram, geforce 1050TI OC 4 GB video (I have this clocked at 1847 mhz core and 4104 mhz memory which stays at a temp of 53c, CPU sits at 62c) I spent $300 on the 7010 box (bought the one I unboxed and was using at work until they upgraded us to dell optiplex 5050s) and $149 on the card from Amazon.
as others pointed out, it can get dirt cheap. however, the issue with old systems is core counts versus what Ryzen offers with its 6 or 8 core Ryzens (excluding better efficiency) which recent games can now utilize. there is a rising trend with old Xeon CPUs being matched with cheap Chinese made motherboards but the performance lacking to first generation Ryzens which costs just a bit more
Lol in this price teir it does not matter having more than 4 cores. As long as the IPC is ok (ie made by intel in the last ~8 years) you should have little issues running games with a GTX 1650.
The problem is you're talking about someone buying a 1650; 6 or 8 cores probably aren't that big a deal if they're buying a budget GPU. I have a quad core powering a 1050, I didn't need anything more powerful.
Not sure about nowadays, but the HP Gen8 Microserver was pretty solid, and available *new* for ~£130 after rebate a few years ago. You can put up to 200W of stuff into the European version. Obviously you might want more than Ivy Bridge today, but I suspect there are similar options.
**Since the TU117 graphics processor supports hardware-accelerated decoding and encoding of HEVC (H.265) and VP9 video at 4Kp60 as well as HDR10, both cards can be used for HTPCs.** _______________________________
Uhhhh ...
I don't think the GTX 1650 supports GPU-accelerated HEVC encoding.
the Problem that we cant find a GTX 2060 in low profile is that the companies who make cards dont want to go beyond specs and make the card longer ... that is stopping at 165 length...
While any low profile case can take at least 245 length card with ease because the micro atx motheboard is 245x245 ...
and yet no one is making longer low profile cards.
I just want to add these type of low profile cards are made with smaller pre-builts and severs type systems in mind. Normally these types of systems normally don't have standard size MBs and even if the Mbs are 245x245 the space above the motherboard normaly used by other parts of the computer. For instance Dell only sells a few towers bigger than my mid tower dell yet it still has the PSU above the CPU (full ~ATX MB) and a drive cage blocking a good part of close to the PCIe slots.
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nathanddrews - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
Fantastic - I love these little GPUs. Toss 'em into a second-hand SFF business PC and you get yourself a super cheap gaming machine.azfacea - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
i used to think that too, but those become garbage pretty quickly and are impossible to upgrade going fwd. mini itx + small desktop cube cost only slightly more than those 2nd hand shitbox, and last much longer with upgrades and are way better value props after 3 yearspeterfares - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
I don't see how a newly built mini ITX system can cost "slightly more" than a used SFF business PC. You can literally get them for less than $100 and the only thing you need to add is a GPU and maybe a SSD although newer ones should start having those too.A mini ITX case and power supply alone is probably $100.
AdditionalPylons - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
I think it's impossible to make a general statement because prices of used equipment vary so much more than prices of new. For example, it is not uncommon for companies to give away old machines for free to employees or their friends. I picked up a free SFF HP machine with an i5, 16GB RAM and a Quadro card. With an SSD and one of these LP GTX1650 it would make a great machine for many e-sports titles.I agree that upgrades are more flexible with COTS parts. (Non-standard PSU connectors and motherboard form-factors of business PCs come to mind.) On the other hand, with Intel there is no longer any CPU upgrade path due to sockets and chipsets changing, so you're confined to the generation that the board supports.
Unfortunately for us hardware geeks – and the environment, and miners of conflict minerals, and jobs in the repair business – not many people care about upgrading their PCs anyway.
azfacea - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
100$? what are you talking about. yea go buy a sandy bridge shitbox which wont post with 1050 TI let alone this. and then find out the PSU randomly shuts off every once in a while if it feels like it and then spend another 100 to buy replacement PSU. good luck with your life.StevoLincolnite - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
I have a Core 2 SFF machine that originally came with a Pentium E2180 that I got many many many years ago.Dropped in a Core 2 Quad Q9705 @ 3.17Ghz and just upgraded GPU's every few years. (I.E. Radeon 6570 DDR3 > R7 240 GDDR5 > Geforce 1030 GDDR5) and it's been running games like Overwatch at 720P+60fps just fine.
Can't complain for a crappy old free box, it's been rock solid too.
Samus - Wednesday, June 26, 2019 - link
Damn, 720P NO WAIkaidenshi - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
I don't know why you're being so hostile. I picked up a HP EliteDesk 800 G2 (i5-6500, 16GB DDR4) for about $70 that had a dead hard drive, I threw in a SSD I had lying around and a GTX 1050 Ti and I was playing every title in my Steam and GOG collections at 1080p60 at medium to ultra settings depending on the game. Hardly a "shitbox", and it was indeed good luck to find a deal like that, but they are out there.Your attitude towards people able to find deals like that is baffling; did you perhaps have a bad experience trying to do the same? It happens dude, but it's no reason to be a dick.
nathanddrews - Wednesday, June 26, 2019 - link
Yeah, sounds like one or two bad experiences really soured his attitude, which is too bad. My experiences have all been good - not a single failed machine with the ~12 I have owned over the years. I'm running several SFF machines right now, two as 4K HDR HTPCs, one as an arcade/emulation machine, one as an application server, and one as a pfsense box. I just gave one to my nephew to play Fortnite (i5-3xxx+750Ti) and he's having a blast. I still have two more I need to restore and throw GPUs into. The most I have paid is $100, but I recently scored two identical Dell SFF machines with i5-6500 CPUs, 8GB RAM, and 250GB SSDs for $50 total - the dude was just done with them. Win 10 Pro and everything! I doubt I'll ever score a similar deal, but the key is to keep looking and hold out.michael2k - Friday, June 28, 2019 - link
So for $125 you can get a Dell Optiplex 790 from Amazon that gets you a quad Core i5 that can drive a 1050 (I have one doing so at home), and it's been stable for the almost 3 years I've had it.Not sure it can drive a 2070, but it doesn't hurt to buy a $90 PS to try. Worst case is I buy another system, like the newer Optiplex 7020 for $300, which is still cheaper than buying a motherboard, chassis, ram, CPU, SSD, and PS along with the 2070.
https://smile.amazon.com/Dell-OptiPlex-790-MiniTow...
bchiemara - Monday, August 19, 2019 - link
A dell optiplex 7010 SFF and a 1050 TI OC 4GB gives me outstanding 1080p gaming and decent 1440 (2k) gaming for less than $500. In GTA V I get above 90 fps in all scenes with everything on very high and 2x AF 16x AA. Specs? i7 3770 4 core 8 thread 3.9 ghz cpu with 16 GB Ram, geforce 1050TI OC 4 GB video (I have this clocked at 1847 mhz core and 4104 mhz memory which stays at a temp of 53c, CPU sits at 62c) I spent $300 on the 7010 box (bought the one I unboxed and was using at work until they upgraded us to dell optiplex 5050s) and $149 on the card from Amazon.zodiacfml - Wednesday, June 26, 2019 - link
as others pointed out, it can get dirt cheap. however, the issue with old systems is core counts versus what Ryzen offers with its 6 or 8 core Ryzens (excluding better efficiency) which recent games can now utilize.there is a rising trend with old Xeon CPUs being matched with cheap Chinese made motherboards but the performance lacking to first generation Ryzens which costs just a bit more
Skeptical123 - Friday, June 28, 2019 - link
Lol in this price teir it does not matter having more than 4 cores. As long as the IPC is ok (ie made by intel in the last ~8 years) you should have little issues running games with a GTX 1650.michael2k - Friday, June 28, 2019 - link
The problem is you're talking about someone buying a 1650; 6 or 8 cores probably aren't that big a deal if they're buying a budget GPU. I have a quad core powering a 1050, I didn't need anything more powerful.GreenReaper - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
Not sure about nowadays, but the HP Gen8 Microserver was pretty solid, and available *new* for ~£130 after rebate a few years ago. You can put up to 200W of stuff into the European version. Obviously you might want more than Ivy Bridge today, but I suspect there are similar options.Samus - Wednesday, June 26, 2019 - link
They're cute but for a SFF\ITX case they really need to be blowers, not top down fan coolers.timecop1818 - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
They should fuck off with that DVI socket while they're at it.Notmyusualid - Tuesday, June 25, 2019 - link
@ timecop - lol, agree, and I like how you put it so eloquently.PeachNCream - Wednesday, June 26, 2019 - link
Yes please and thank you for pointing that out. DVI is stupid.AlyssaPatterson - Wednesday, June 26, 2019 - link
<a href="http://www.google.com/">Hello</a> ,http://www.google.com/
Smell This - Thursday, June 27, 2019 - link
**Since the TU117 graphics processor supports hardware-accelerated decoding and encoding of HEVC (H.265) and VP9 video at 4Kp60 as well as HDR10, both cards can be used for HTPCs.**_______________________________
Uhhhh ...
I don't think the GTX 1650 supports GPU-accelerated HEVC encoding.
samerakhras - Thursday, June 27, 2019 - link
the Problem that we cant find a GTX 2060 in low profile is that the companies who make cards dont want to go beyond specs and make the card longer ... that is stopping at 165 length...While any low profile case can take at least 245 length card with ease because the micro atx motheboard is 245x245 ...
and yet no one is making longer low profile cards.
Skeptical123 - Friday, June 28, 2019 - link
I just want to add these type of low profile cards are made with smaller pre-builts and severs type systems in mind. Normally these types of systems normally don't have standard size MBs and even if the Mbs are 245x245 the space above the motherboard normaly used by other parts of the computer. For instance Dell only sells a few towers bigger than my mid tower dell yet it still has the PSU above the CPU (full ~ATX MB) and a drive cage blocking a good part of close to the PCIe slots.michael2k - Friday, June 28, 2019 - link
There is a 2060 double slot card: Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2060 Mini ITX