Beelink Mini PC Tips

[Tom Saurus]

With the set up my Sister has we bought a used monitor at a second hand store. Well anyway this monitor doesn't have the sound built in. So what we have been doing is plugging some speakers into the headphone slot on my Sister's computer to output the sound. This works fine until it doesn't work. The solution I eventually found by searching the internet and a person had a reddit thread and had asked the question and the answer is while the computer is off unplug the power adapter from the back of the computer and then plug it back in. This seems to reboot the drivers to export the sound again via the headphone jack output.

Another thing that has been happening on my Beelink Mini PC is that suddenly the ethernet even though it shows it is working browsers and other programs can't access the internet. From my search on the internet for the problems seems to be that the solution is going into Device Manager and finding the ethernet and making sure that you untick the box that says "allow the computer to put this device to sleep to save energy". So I have done this and I hope it works.

The last time this happened the only thing that seemed to be able to access the internet was the Microsoft Edge Browser. Before I could reconnect with activating my Eset VPN but this last time even that didn't work.

The Windows 11 Beelink Mini PC have been wonderful and I am considering on getting one more to replace my Windows 7 Desktop for surfing the internet. My current one I use for my Mom's media center for her non smart TV.

[Subtitles]

Thanks for the tips. It will surely help anyone who has problems like these.

[Tom Saurus]

Thank that is my intention. I have been waffling about getting that other mini pc as I have an important project that I am saving up for. I did notice another Beelink with twice as much ram and twice the amount of hard drive space as the ones we have now for around the same price. I might just buy it as the another brand that has a 1 TB hard drive has went up in price.

I have a question I will float here. Now when a Mini PC says it has Blue Tooth built in does that mean you don't have to put that receiver dongle for a wireless keyboard in a USB slot?

Also a warning about the Mini PC I have. Even though it has 4 USB slots don't plug any more than two large USB hard drives in as I believe it is too much of a power draw. I have plugged in three 2 TB hard drives that get their power from the USB and one will start beeping and not work. I have been able to plug a thumb drive into the third USB slot. My wireless keyboard with track pad takes up a USB slot with its receiver.

[Tom Saurus]

I have found that one can get the blue screen of death a fair bit if you are watching your videos through Kodi and you were doing something else like downloading a video stream or such task. So now I use VLC to watch videos and bsod happens much less.

[johns0]

When blu-tooth is built-in there's no need for a dongle.

[Tom Saurus]

When blu-tooth is built-in there's no need for a dongle.

Thank you for this information. It is certainly nice not having to use up a USB slot for the dongle.

I am thinking to when it comes to USB Hubs and I don't even own one yet that when it come to such devices that one would be best to go with a powered hub as I could easily see the USB being too taxing on the power supply in the mini pc.

Something I am wondering though is I wonder if the blue tooth being built in would one have to be careful how close you have other mini pcs as you wouldn't want them interfering with each other when it comes to using your keyboard.

I personally went Logitech K400 wireless keyboard with trackpad and I was worried as I thought it would have a cramped feel but thankfully it doesn't and I appreciate the media keys such as the play / pause button.

[Tom Saurus]

One of the biggest reasons I went with a mini pc was I had been using Android Boxes for playing .mp4 files and some streaming video. However even though I was paying 75 bucks or so I would end up frustrated as they wouldn't function the way the should as they had phone operating systems on them.

So I took a chance and bought a Beelink Mini PC with Windows 11 and Windows 11 hasn't been as horrible as I thought it would be. I had watched a lot of YouTube videos for Raspberry Pi and was going to go that route but realized that even though the OS was cool I felt one got more bang for the buck going with a Beelink Mini PC.

[Tom Saurus]

I set up my new Mini PC today. I had the network cable unplugged and I don't have WIFI activated and I was prepared to input a command to bypass setting up a Microsoft Account but I didn't need to it allowed me to set up a local account.

This is a NucBoxG3_Plus with a 1 TB Hard Drive and 16 GB of Ram. It has the Intel R 150 processor. So far I haven't noticed a speed boost but it is a nice computer and it doesn't make much noise. Hopefully it lasts for many years to come.

I plugged in the Logitech Wireless Receiver Dongle into a USB slot. I was hoping to be able to unplug that and the built in bluetooth would pick up the keyboard and I would have that USB slot free.

[jagabo]

I recently bought a GMKTec mini PC (Ryzen 7 7840HS, Radeon 780M graphics, 32 GB DRAM, 1 TB SSD) and it also allowed me to set up Windows 11 without a Microsoft account, no hacks necessary.

[Tom Saurus]

This is a GMKTec Mini PC as well but when I went to my computer specs it referred to itself as NucBoxGS_Plus. It is really neat not to have ha to do the hack to set up just a plain user account.

[jagabo]

Ah yes, Under This Computer -> Properties it shows this PC is named NucBox_K6 in addition to the other specs I listed.

[TreeTops]

That thing is made in China. Aren't you worried? Is there a way to find out if there are any issues like hidden malware?

[johns0]

Sounds like it was tested and user name wasn't deleted.

[Tom Saurus]

I scanned it with Eset Nod 32 several times now and nothing has been found. I suppose I should get the free version of Malwarebytes and do a deep scan. I did the scans because I put Pysol Solitaire Fan Club Edition on the new computer and some say it has spyware but thankfully it installed and the scans are not revealing anything. So much is made in China these days.

[davexnet]

jagabo, Tom, did you get 11 home or Pro?

[Tom Saurus]

My Mini PC has Windows 11 Pro on it. One of the reasons I got it is that my Windows 7 Desktop is really taxed by using web browsers and such these days. It is quite common for it to freeze up. It has been a terrific machine though to have lasted all these years.

[jagabo]

Mine came with Windows 11 Pro.

[Tom Saurus]

I noticed on Amazon Canada that the price had dropped another five bucks for the Mini PC I bought and the logitech keyboard with mouse dropped in price as well about four bucks or so.

I just looked at the specs for your model jagabo; that is a powerful machine. Hopefully it holds up for quite a while and works well for you.

If anyone has tips please share them it doesn't have to be confined to Beelink. You can mount these Mini PC's to the back of a monitor. What stops me from doing that is that I don't have such a monitor for that yet and I have a lot of 2 TB portable hard drives and no way am I going to dangle that from the Mini PC as the cables are very short on those hard drives. I have thought about buying a powered USB Hub but I have read those can cause damage to hard drives; at least the hubs without power.

[Tom Saurus]

I forgot in my experience with my Beelink Mini PC that if I was watching my videos via the Kodi Player and was doing lets say some downloading at the same time that I would fairly regularly get the blue screen of death. I then switched to watching my videos with VLC and it very rarely ever happens with that video player.

You might want to consider a lower end Mini PC to use as a media player. They usually come with at least two or three USB slots and those quite often are USB 3.0. Also with the HDMI output you can plug it into most TVs and they are so small it wouldn't be too much of a burden to pack one up and take one with you if you were to visit friends or family. I would imagine you could even set it up to have duel boot and Libre Elect the Linux Kodi barebones interface.

Android Boxes do have their uses but also their drawbacks and Raspberry Pi can be quite appealing but also they do have limitations as well.

[jagabo]

I just looked at the specs for your model jagabo; that is a powerful machine. Hopefully it holds up for quite a while and works well for you.

I wanted something that had enough CPU and GPU power to do some video work but more for playing games at 1080p. This isn't my main computer, mostly for when I'm away from home -- which is quite a lot these days..