Ryzen 7 Mini-PC makes a power-efficient VM host | Hacker News Reader

Ryzen 7 Mini-PC makes a power-efficient VM host

michael.stapelberg.ch

63 pointssigna1156 comments

Finally one can buy these! The sibling model, ASRock's DeskMeet X600, should exhibit a roughly equal power consumption profile, but offers support for proper ECC UDIMM in up to 4 slots, which makes it a premier choice for a cheap, powerful, reliable and flexible (SOHO) server platform.

Even the previous generation - with AM4 CPUs and DDR4 memory - of these ASRock offerings were easily enough for most users' needs (my wife still has a DeskMini X300 with a Ryzen 5 5600G as her daily driver).

Do you know if the motherboard has pins for a discrete TPM 2.0 module, e.g. https://www.asrock.com/mb/spec/product.asp?Model=TPM-SPI & https://download.asrock.com/Manual/TPM-SPI.pdf

Does a discrete TPM offer specific advantages over an fTPM? I suppose it'd be modular but I can't really imagine trusting AMD to run the entire operating system but then saying they can't be trusted to hold a key and being fine with that in the same system. Not that I'm saying they are therefore perfectly secure rather I'm not sure what risks profiles it really avoids so perhaps other advantages exist too?

Sadly, AMD PSP-based fTPMs emulate only a subset ("Mobile TPM" spec) of a discrete client TPM. This could be addressed with a PSP software update, since the Microsoft reference code for TPMs is open-source.

A full TPM implementation is required to use DRTM (SKINIT) for measured Linux Secure Launch, which is useful for home servers to confirm that the boot loader, kernel and optional immutable OS/VMs have not been modified. Unlike "Secure Boot" SRTM, DRTM adds launch integrity with policy defined by the hardware owner. One would typically use SRTM+DRTM.

The TPM emulation in Microsoft Pluton, which is present in some Ryzen chips, might be sufficient for DRTM. It's tragic that AMD fTPM has limited functionality, since AMD provides SKINIT on all SKUs, unlike Intel where TXT DRTM is limited to vPro.

Some ASRock 4x4 (NUC-sized) mini PCs have pins for discrete TPM.

Generally the other way, if you're paranoid -- the fact that it's separate component allows an attacker to MITM the communication.

Not according to the spec sheet or the PCB photos[0][1] they provide, no.

[0]: https://www.asrock.com/nettop/photo/DeskMeet%20X600%20Series... [1]: https://www.asrock.com/nettop/photo/DeskMeet%20X600%20Series...

Oh I clicked on this thread specifically to ask about older generation models, thanks for pointing the name.

My needs are more modest for one particular project so I don't see why I should pay for ddr5 or pcie5 ssds.

Say, do these things support setting an even lower power limit in the bios?

Afaik, that's a matter of the AGESA revision in the firmware and the CPU SKU. In ther real world, I think it actually matters little, since setting software power limits in the OS will be as effective as setting a low-power (35W or 45W) profile in the system firmware in my experience (which is limited to AM4 only so far, however).

The DeskMeet X600 looks rather interesting especially re. the ECC RAM.

You don't happen to know of anything similar with more than 2 x 3.5" drive bays per chance? I'm looking for a low powered device with ECC RAM to use as a NAS.

I've been looking at HP Microserver Gen8 boxes, which I think are fairly low power, but I believe they're rather old now.

I think you will need to go for a custom (i.e., one you buy without the mainboard pre-assembled into a complete barebone/system) case to get that. Jonsbo has a few probably interesting options for you, such as the N3[0][1]. I don't know if you could make the DeskMeet mainboards fit in that particular case - but many regular ITX boards for AM4 and AM5 come with ECC support, too.

[0]: https://geizhals.eu/jonsbo-n3-schwarz-n3-black-a3062571.html [1]: https://www.jonsbo.com/en/products/N3.html

Thanks for your links and information re. AM4,5.

> low powered device with ECC RAM to use as a NAS

QNAP has a $600 1U short-depth (11") 4x3.5 2xM.2 2x10GbE 2x2.5GbE 4-32GB DDR4 SODIMM Arm NAS that would benefit from OSS community attention. Based on a Marvell/Armada CN9130 SoC which supports ECC, it has mainline Linux support, and public-but-non-upstream code for uboot. With local serial console and a bit of effort, the QNAP OS can be replaced by Arm Debian/Devuan with ZFS. Rare combo of low power, small size, fast network, ECC memory and upstream-friendly Linux. QNAP also sell a 10GbE router based on the same SoC, which is a successor to the Armada 388 in Helios4 NAS (RIP), https://kobol.io/helios4/

In theory, ex-Apple Qualcomm Nuvia/Oryon Snapdragon boards would make a great NAS, but it may take a while for Linux support to mature. Upcoming AMD "AI 300" Zen5 Strix Point mobile chips are intended to compete with Qualcomm, so they can hopefully be configured with low (15W-54W) power consumption, and ECC support has been good on AMD devices when the BIOS cooperates. Intel Lunar Lake has low power, but Intel ECC support is market segmented to Xeon SKUs, except for the anomalous Coffee Lake Celeron G4930T (35W TDP).

To decouple storage enclosure logistics from the NAS CPU, a mainboard with Thunderbolt or USB4 enables an external NVME enclosure with DIY bridge of multiple SATA ports or PCIe HBA to JBOD.

Thanks for that information re. the ARM based QNAP device. I'd not heard of that before. Would you mind pointing me to the u-boot code you mentioned?

I think I'm right in thinking https://ukstore.qnap.com/catalog/product/view/id/215 is the machine you meant?

Yes, TS-435XeU, forgot to link it.

I've not yet built uboot myself, but these repos claim to have code for CN9130.

https://github.com/SolidRun/cn913x_build/

https://github.com/SolidRun/u-boot/tree/u-boot-v2019.10-marv...

https://solidrun.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/developer/pages/3...

This sounds good for a home server if you need to do CPU-intensive things, like transcoding video, or running an ML model on CPU.

But if you only need to do lower-compute things (e.g., file serving, serving static/dynamic Web pages, home automation, running simple other server processes), some other home server options include:

* SBCs (like Rasberry Pi).

* Intel NUCs, and those mini-PCs that are marketed as corporate thin clients, and which can be gotten used for what you'd pay for a modern RaspI plus the required duct-taped supporting accessories.

* "NAS" boxes that people who want to plug&play lots of RAID storage buy, and who sometimes run additional small server stuff on on the "NAS" box.

* Retired datacenter and office rackmount servers, if you can make them quiet enough. I've eyed the Dell R210 II and later versions (1U, short-depth), but ended up going with...

* Retired short-depth 1U rackmount Atom servers. These has been my favorite, and I converted them to fanless, except for retrofitting the Flex-ATX PSU with a Noctua fan. Sometimes I'd buy retired enterprise appliances that I knew were just Supermicro hardware with different bezel or paint, but my current servers are more hand-picked parts. They draw more power than a RasPi, but have a lot less misc. fragility.

Also, if you need a GPU compute server, or a big CPU, you could do a lot worse than building it around a gaming PC that's already designed to cool big GPUs without being too loud. Personally, I squeezed a 3090 into a 4U rackmount chassis, with 3 Noctua fans, which also works, but was harder. (And if I wasn't already married to the PlayStation ecosystem for gaming, I probably would've made the GPU server double as a Steam box that happens to loan out its GPU for occasional ML crunching jobs.)

what is the appeal of having any of this compared to DigitalOcean droplet(besides playing with new toy..)?

  - hacking (news) hw/sw to fit local purpose
  - own hardware vs rent forever
  - some cloud resources require KYC
  - speed of light / low latency at edge
  - order of magnitude cheaper storage

Plus:

- The principle of being able to use your own computer, control your data, etc.

- Educational value of being able to do things, like, make your own K8s cluster from whatever level of masochism you desire (rather than the necessarily higher-level options with cloud and VPS provider offerings).

- Applications like home automation not dependent on Internet being up.

- (Like the cost of data storage) GPU compute cost, and also "reserved" guaranteed availability.

Personally, I also run some external services in AWS or Linode now, but in the past have run those from home servers and from colo boxes.

I don't know that the form factor (mini PC) has much to do with power consumption. If anything, a small case probably obstructs airflow and makes heat dissipation worse. This person had to add another fan.

And that's 10W at idle, which is high compared to any laptop or tablet. It's more energy consumption than leaving a LED bulb on 24/7, and that's when it's not even doing anything. Even among desktops, it's more a matter of power supply efficiency (80 Plus or similar cert) and the ability of the CPU itself to throttle down a lot and/or use efficiency cores.

If power really is a concern, having a more powerful server (like in a data center) split up among multiple tenants will be far more power-efficient. Serverless funcs or hosted CI/CD pipelines even more so. At home, things like a Raspberry Pi or BeagleBone or old laptop/tablet will use less power. Even a Mac Mini will use less power (about half at idle, much less at max).

If you just want a small-chassis desktop, well, this fits the bill. It's gonna use a lot of power as soon as any work ramps up, though. That CPU has a TDP of 65W and maxes out at 150W.

> I don't know that the form factor (mini PC) has much to do with power consumption. If anything, a small case probably obstructs airflow and makes heat dissipation worse

They're usually related - small form factor means suboptimal cooling and not a lot of space for a very powerful power supply, which means you won't put a Threadripper inside.

It's not that you can't put an extremely power efficient setup in an ATX case; it's that usually, a small case means a power efficient setup.

Everything you compared either has less processing power (rpi, lightbulb), worse thermals (laptop, tablet), dogshit reparability (Mac mini), or some combination of all three.

These things can go up to 64 GB of RAM and 12 TB of storage at probably half the price you'd pay for your soldered down / on-die Mac mini. And what happens when a drive fails, or a memory module fails? Throw out the whole 3k board and start over? Not to mention the pain of getting proxmox or something similar running smooth.

Sure. But the title and article are about a "power-efficient VM host", not a powerful general-purpose repairable desktop. This is probably not the best (or worst) way to host a VM using minimal power.

You didn't suggest a better way (for at home). I explained why. VM hosts need processing power, good thermals, and reparability.

I thought I suggested many? I think it depends on what you're using the VM for. A used laptop or Mac Mini can easily host a dev environment. A hosted cloud CI/CD pipeline is better (power-wise) for compiles. A simple shell environment can be on anything. NAS etc can run on Raspberrys or routers.

On the other hand, if you're doing constant 24/7 GPU-intensive training, this thing is going to get loud, hot, and power-hungry, and it will be difficult to find GPUs to fit in there. If you're gaming, GeForce Now is going to be more power-efficient (datacenter cards with shared tenancy) than having your own on hot-standby all the time but most idling.

Maybe there is some in-between use case that really calls for a local desktop CPU? But usually I think using a recent laptop CPU would provide sufficient performance with a much lower power consumption.

Repairability was not a concern discussed in the article, but yes, it's a good thing to keep in mind if you're DIYing it. I was more concerned about the power usage scenarios.

It may be different for Intel, but at least this AMD CPU (actually an APU) is pretty much identical to the equivalent laptop chip, when you restrict power to it (which can be done in UEFI on my older deskmini). And again I'll point out the improved thermals of asrock's deskmini case vs a typical laptop, and now that I have the chance the lower cost!

I bought one of these boards a few weeks ago, it uses the mobile version of the CPU, great performance and low power usage. https://cwwk.net/products/cwwk-amd-7735hs-7840hs-8845hs-7940...

I put it in a fanless case (https://streacom.com/products/fc9-fanless-micro-atx-case/) with mellanox connectx-4 nic, now I can route/NAT my internet connection in silence at line rate (25Gbps)

I run a small home-built NAS (N100, JBOD) and the thing that surprised me* was how much power the spinning rust draws. I would love to replace it with SSDs, but I've got ~20TB and the cost would be insane right now. I'm hoping that something magnificent will happen to SSD prices in the next year or two. Until then, it's 48W @ ~€0.35/kWh.

*because I'm an idiot. I could've read the disk specs before I bought them. I'm using shucked WD MyBook 3.5" drives.

If the data isn't changing often, could you use an SSD read cache to keep the 20TB array mostly spun down?

Depending on your exact usage profile, adding a couple of smaller SSDs (in a mirrored configuration) for the OS and anything which changes a lot might enable you to set your NAS to spin the HDDs down for a lot of the time - they draw a lot less in that state (c1W each) until you need them. ZFS generally seems to handle the longish delays in spinning up before returning data in my experience (though annoyingly it will spin disks up one after the other instead of in parallel, extending the wait time by quite a bit - I keep meaning to write a simple shell script to detect if one drive is spun up and spin the rest up to fix this - openSeaChest is worth knowing about for stuff like this).

You’ll also need to do some sleuthing work to find out what background stuff is likely to keep using them though (don’t forget stuff like ZFS auto snapshot tools) - it took me a while to find everything when I did this (I had to keep a few instances of fatrace running and watch the timing of file accesses for a couple of weeks to find everything).

Instead of installing tailscale in all VMs, the author should instead advertise the whole subnet using --advertise-subnet flag from a single VM

--advertise-subnet is a dream

I disagree. You lose out on granular permissions and magicdns.

I run a tailscale instance per service, even if the services are colocated in the same VM. This lets me take advantage of tailscale serve, and I can also move services between VMs without changing access or dns.

I use a mixture of --advertise-subnet on a dedicated tailscale VM to act as an exit node for when I'm away and ephemeral sidecars for everything I run in containers, this gives me magic dns but doesn't work with everything. I.e. I couldn't get a transmission-torrent container to download reliably with this setup and I have no idea why.

Can anyone tell me wtf happened to SSD prices in the last ~year? I've seen some prices almost double.

E.g. crucial 1 TB SATA SSDs went from a low of 45 to now 90 $.

https://camelcamelcamel.com/product/B078211KBB

I wanted to add a couple of 4 TB drives to my mini PC but now the price is ridiculous.

The prices were in the toilet previously because of oversupply. Manufacturers announced they were reducing production last year and the prices seemed to steadily climb in late 2023 until now. About one year ago was pretty darn close to the lowest point IIRC.

Darn. I guess I missed my chance.

Same thing happened to big capacity spinning rust drives. I have 2 20TB exos and want to buy 2 more, but they climbed from ~280 moneys to 360 moneys in a few months and it feels dumb to bite now. I read that AI rush is to blame, dunno.

I've been using a Beelink GTR6 (Ryzen 9 6900HX) as a single-node K8s server/homelab to replace a hilariously overpowered Dell M1000e blade server. It works great, and doesn't even register on my power bill (unlike the blade server). No comments about long-term reliability though, I've been running it for ~six months.

I have been down this road a couple of times:

https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2023/02/18/1845 - Intel form factor equivalent https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2024/04/13/2100 - Ryzen mini-PC

…and yes, if it were today I’d likely go the all Ryzen route in a DeskMeet case, although the kind of mini-PCs you can get today will suffice for most people.

I'm not trying to sound dismissive or overly critical, but in what way is a $1000, GPU-less computer with 32GBs of RAM considered a "mini-PC"?

The price point seems insane too high to be considered "mini" imo.

Mini means small. Not inexpensive.

The size? No snark, but seems pretty obvious mini refers to physical size.

Word "mini" is used , which usually signifies total volume of the case containing the components is approx. 1 litre.

Interesting, I've always thought the "mini" designation was more a commentary on size rather than price. When I think of a "mini" I expect it to be in a very compact case that makes it a lot more difficult to work on/upgrade/repair than a typical desktop, but be physically compact and able to fit in a small space.

Especially considering for most people home servers rarely need more than a used g1 elite slice or one of the other thin-pc's that run intel 6700-8700s for like 50$ total upgrade ram, add a bigger ssd if you want, works great for 99% of self hosted shit.

No ECC RAM and no quicksync for Plex and frigate.video are the downsides I can see, but I'm not sure this CPU doesn't have an APU for Plex/inference so speculating on that part, can anyone confirm? I'm personally running an R230 with a P400 quadro, it idles at 45 watts with 4 SATA SSDs and is dead silent. I know that's a stretch from the claimed 10W idle Michael gets but that's not bad for me either.

Btw, thank you Michael for running a solid speedtest host which cleared my doubts about the Zyxel router init7 gave me, it's adequate enough :)

I've been using a Minisforum UM790 Pro recently for my Ubuntu desktop. My old Ubuntu desktop is now my Proxmox server.

I maxed out the memory and the storage on the new system myself. At idle its 9W and when I did stress testing to max out the CPU and GPU, it was 70-80W. Even then the fan noise didn't bother my family which are very sensitive to fan noise.

https://store.minisforum.com/products/minisforum-um790-pro

The only problem with these is 2.5g is ass, especially if you want more than one for a ceph cluater (ethernet over usb4 is also ass)

I didn't find it so "mini", at least not compared to other mini Intel offerings on Amazon. Sure, this is Ryzen 7, but let me know when there is something as small as a Mac Mini.

That's just a choice by ASRock, plenty of Mac Mini/Apple TV sized offerings from Beelink. I'm personally rocking a SER7 which has a 7840S for hosting modded Minecraft servers among all my other selfhosted apps. It's excellent and actually capable unlike the N100 chipset which was mostly a Jellyfin box.

Sure but for this price.... you can ACTUALLY get a mac mini lol

With 16 GB of RAM and 512 GB of storage. Both non-upgradeable / replaceable.

That's true, but you can't install Proxmox on it... Typing this now on the last Intel mini, and it was very tricky to upgrade its RAM to 32GB (worse than almost any laptop I can remember). So I can see the appeal of a nice empty box I can swap components around in.

Unfortunately, that is very, very far from true.

That mini pc has 32Gb of ram and 2TB of storage. You simply cannot get that in a mac mini and a mac studio with these specs costs 3000 aka 3 times as much.

https://store.minisforum.com/products/minisforum-um790-pro?v... ?

lmao I did almost the exact same thing with my old Threadripper 2950x and now it's my VM-host for a Windows Server 2022 instance and the main proxmox install I use for playing with different AI models from ollama (with my old RTX 2080)

The tiny form factor is great and almost silent. I think the case is almost the same too

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