So rooting around on amazon I found what seemed to be a good deal;
This link includes the option I took of 8Gb RAM /256Gb ROM
Now one point, when I ordered this the price I got (including vat at Irish rate of 23%) was £162 - I ordered a couple of weeks ago. The price seems to have gone up now to over £200 which seems strange but that's Amazon I guess.
Anyway. Ordered Thursday delivered Monday.
Initial impressions
Packaging is very good with a high quality feel and excellent protection. The unit itself seems to be of a good build quality, sturdy enough with a nice finish. There is a removable lid which allows access to an expansion slot where you can add an additional ssd - but I cant see that I'll need that. The lid fits well and removes/replaces easily with a good solid spring connection
This unit has plenty connectivity options with Bluetooth and WiFI, 2 X USB2, 2 x USB3, 2 X HDMI ports, an ethernet port and a Micro-SD slot.
There is amounting plate which is intended to be placed on the back of a PC monitor and which will hold the mini-pc in place but allow it to be removed without the need for tools. I think I will attach this to the pier and hang the PC from it. I dont intend to leave the PC out so this should work fine.
Set Up and Performance
Initial start up and windows set up (Windows 10 Pro) was quick and easy. A note on the website says that one should get windows fully up and running before connecting to internet and thats what I did. There appears to be no bloat-ware on the system so only around 25Gb of the memory used at that point. Installing all the necessary programmes (Stellarium,
Performance wise it seems much much better than I had anticipated. Edge starts up only slightly slower than on my good spec, main laptop. Streaming videos from YouTube etc works seamlessly with no visible jumps or lags. Stellarium runs without jumps or lag also. I had
So I ran a full dummy imaging session - daylight and cloudy but.... needs must as they say. I had already transferred all setting from my current imaging PC (for EQmod, PHD2 and
The only problem I hit was I could not connect anything to the cameras (ASI120mm and ASI2600mc) 10 minutes faffing around then I realised that while there are drivers in
On my first actually imaging session the Mini-PC worked great. I have some minor issues with calibration and backlash but these are down to needing to tweak settings in PHD2 which apparently were not transferred as cleanly as I thought.
Overall, for what I paid for this unit I think it is an excellent buy and will definitely do the job. It seems to have no issue with running the programmes and I feel it would probably be capable of doing more but imaging is all I need it for. I would highly recommend this mini-pc particularly at the price break I got, but even at the higher £194 it is still great value.
David