this post was submitted on 02 Nov 2026
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Ummm can't you just buy a full size all-in-one motherboard for that? I mean, if you need small size sure, but I originally bought Pi's because they were cheap and small. Now they're just small.
Yeah, and a modern x86 setup will be faster and likely even more efficient under load, with better software support too.
Yep, and unless you really need the pi form factor just get a small n100 mini PC at this point. They are pretty much better in every way and are x86 so there's practically no limit to what you can run on them. I've seen n100 16gb mini PCs for as low as $60 on auction sites because some business will buy tons of them then sell them off for cheap when they upgrade.
Want something faster? Look into business small PCs they are about the size of the small ps2 and will have Intel i3s to i7s. I'd just recommend looking for one that is at least the 8th gen Intel if you care about power efficiency. If using eBay search for used auctions and use a bid sniper that uses the official api
Pick one.
Are they still available? When I looked recently, most of it was Haswell/4th gen, and/or the seller had taken nearly all the parts out, like the memory, drives, and CPU.
Yes there will still be big sell offs I recently got a 16GB n100 from someone selling a batch of around 100. You can set up eBay notifications for saved searches it is getting more competitive getting one for $60 is the absolute best case expect closer to $80+shipping.
You can also check alibaba if you can spend bit more and have some older ddr4 laying around. They have n100 mini PCs with expendable storage and ram and multiple Ethernet ports. you can normally find them if you get the versions that don't come with any ddr4
Edit: make sure it's listed as compatible with ddr4 not ddr5 there are a lot of ddr5 versions now
N100 maybe not. N150 is what it going around lately. Price would be similar to rpi5 but is much more capable x86 machine.