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Comment by Dunedan | Hacker News Reader

That would be such a great system if it had an internal PSU. I'm so tired of all these ultra small cases which require an additional bulky external PSU. Apple seems to be the only manufacturer who cares about that.

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Why? Take the weight and heat out of the device, and put the PSU on the ground out of sight.

I wish I could use an external PSU for my desktop!

I can already put the device out of sight. I want a tiny case because it takes up less space in whatever nook I store it in.

To add on that- there are several other reasons why this makes sense- if you have solar power, batteries, and a regulator, it makes sense to go straight without going to AC in between- it's one less place to lose energy.

this seems like a very niche use case. I would imagine most home solar installations are wired directly into an inverter to supply AC to the house. how many people would have both DC and AC outlets in their wall?

I've been looking for a good SFF home server system but every one I find has an external PSU. It's surprising to me. I'd love an Intel NUC but I don't want a power brick the size of the computer itself.

In case you don't already know, the Mac mini has an internal PSU.

I'm like you; I want one box / lump, not two (mainly because I move the box around a lot). Consequently, I have a Mac mini. The price cheapest non-used Mac mini however has risen from $500 to $800 in about 3 years.

It also overheats if you use it for too long (e.g. keep the Simulator open for most of a work day), causing the machine to slow down to a barely usable speed.

I'd prefer an external PSU.

This seems to be a common thing with apple devices - supposedly powerful hardware with woefully inadequate cooling. iirc one of the i9 macbook models actually performed worse than the corresponding i7 model because the cooling was so bad.

Seeing as I'm being downvoted - look! I found a source: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple-MacBook-Pro-15-Core-i9-s...

I'm at work so I don't have time to do many more googles.

See https://www.sfflab.com and https://www.mini-itx.com/store/category?type=case&volume=ove.... Most cases with an internal PSU are over 4L in volume. This mini-STX case requires an external power brick: https://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Technology-Mini-STX-Compu...

There are options for building a brickless SFF system, but they all have tradeoffs or limitations. There isn't a good one-size-fits-all internal psu until you get to the SFX size psus.

I myself have been building out a brickless skyreach s4 mini system inspired by this [0] (same author as this A300 unboxing)

[0] https://smallformfactor.net/articles/feature/community-featu...

This Intel NUC compatible power supply is not that big. Plugs into the wall and barely noticble. https://www.amazon.com/FSP-Barebones-Replacement-FSP065-10AA...

Never could figure out people who actually wanted an internal PSU ... i thought big tech forced them on us for reasons of their bottom line: Ie as planned obsolescence. Eg one could easily make a svelte "phone" with a 30 second capacitor and Qi power transfer... Such would not wear out, letting one choose, swap, power backs/cases. Bigger things might standardize on wired connections like USB-C to cheap 18650 packs.

Honestly, if there was a way to attach them together (say, a clip), I'd be fine with a brick. Make the clip provide a small gap and airflow should be good enough to prevent thermal issues. If I do run into problems, I can always separate them...

Isn't that the kind of thing you could make?

Would an internal PSU somehow be smaller than an external one?

My understanding is that part of the reason this is done, is that you can buy the external PSU module pre-certified for whatever country you need to import the product into.

If you integrate the power supply into the inside of the product, then you need to certify the product itself individually once for whatever standard, and potentially for each country you import into.

Hence Apple can do it partly because of a combination of scale and margin, where-as it's a lot harder for smaller manufacturers to do so in a cost effective or reasonable way.

Having said that, I agree with you, external PSUs drive me nuts. And I love products like the Mac Mini that have it integrated.

Nice SFF cases (more steel & cooling needed) with internal PSUs may cost more than this entire $150 system.

This $150 includes a power brick, which requires no cooling. Putting that brick inside the case wouldn't change the price much. I personally prefer the external power brick.

I bought the Intel version of the DeskMini for $130 a while back. It's about the same price as a normal case + mobo + psu, which it replaces. I put an i5 8400, an M.2 SSD, and some memory in it, and in 5 minutes you have a working system. No hassle, inexpensive, and small. Highly recommended unless you need a GPU.

With the external PSY, you can much more easily and efficiently run on batteries, which can be handy.

sony, too, with ps4

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