If you need to upgrade a home computer to run Windows 11, there are an amazing number of cheap mini-pc alternatives that might work for you.

Last winter, I wrote about needing to upgrade my radio room computer for Windows 11. My current machine is an i5-4670 which does not have TPM 2.0. I wrote “With Windows 10 approaching its end, many of us must consider what we will do with our radio shack computers”.

My first thought was to replace my eleven year old radio shack computer with a new gaming machine, probably with a 10th generation i5. So, I did a quick search on Amazon to check models and prices. While there, I discovered that a lot of folks were now using mini-pc models for low end gaming.

At the cheap end, were models like the Kamrui AK1 Plus (above left) and Beelink S12 Pro (center). Selling for just over CDN $200, these came with Celeron N95/N100 CPU, 16 MB RAM and 500 MB SSD storage. Amazingly, these CPU benchmarked at about the same level as my old i5-4670.

Moving up the scale a bit, I found the Bosgame P4 Plus with a Ryzen 7 CPU for around CDN $450 (above right). Performance looked like about 40% better than my old i5, which has been more than fast enough for SDR software.

These lower cost mini-pc alternatives have limited or no upgrade paths, but provide all of the interconnectivity I need with USB, HDMI, LAN and other connectors.

Mini-PC Alternatives Bundled with Windows 11

So, not only are these machines cheap and fast, they come with Windows 11 already installed. I decided to do an experiment and ordered the low-end Beelink S12 Pro for CDN $215. I will start off by using it to replace an old office computer running (slowly) on an Intel Core 2 Duo E8400. This should give a 3X performance boost.

Then, I will test out the Beelink with some SDR software. I don’t think it will be great, but we will see. Specs say it should perform similar to my current radio computer, but the real world will be different!