Transcription
The Mini Forum M890 Pro was the most requested Mini PC for review in 2024, so I bought it and here we are. It's definitely an interesting Mini PC, and we're going to take a balls-deep dive into it. Oh yeah, big thanks to my community for helping offset a portion of the cost by contributing to the review fund and making it happen. PayPal link in the video description if you want to pitch in.
Oh, and you know what else helps contribute to the review fund? This message right here. The EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard app is very simple to use and can help you recover your lost data, whether it's on your internal drive, USB storage, or SD card. It also has support for repairing damaged photos and videos. Check out the free trial in the video description to find out what it can recover on your storage drives.
The Mini Forum M890 Pro is made from a mix of metal and plastic casing, and it's taller than your classic NUC Mini PC. The midbody section is very solid, and there's a bit of flex on the top and bottom plastic lids. Overall build quality is pretty good.
Inside, it is AMD's Ryzen 8945HS, which is an 8-core, 16-thread mobile chip with Radeon 780M graphics. The 890 Pro is available on the official website as a barebones starting from $479 US, or with 32GB of RAM, 1TB storage, and an NVMe for $649, which is the same price on Amazon.com. I bought the pre-build for this review.
Where the UM890 differs from most is the port selection. Oh, and before I continue, I just want to point out that just like the Mini Forum UN100D I reviewed previously, this one has an annoyingly bright blue LED on the power button.
Port-wise, there are a couple of USB 3.2 10Gbps along with USB 4, and you'll also find these exact ports on the back, along with DisplayPort, HDMI, and Oculink, which we'll cover later. There's also dual Realtek 2.5Gbps LAN. Both USB 4 ports support power delivery and worked fine with my USB-C monitor, but if it shuts off on you, you might need to drop the power limit, as this mini used above 100 watts during my tests.
A MediaTek Azide 616 is used for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Mini's Forum claims the four display outputs can support up to 8K 60Hz or 4K 144Hz, but unfortunately, I don't have the hardware to test this claim.
As always, I did check out a twist range, starting with Bluetooth. My portable audio speaker worked without issue at 4 meters or 13 feet, which is a decent result. And happy to report, there weren't any issues with Wi-Fi. I played Valorant, and no connection issues popped up during my game session. The distance between the mini and the router was 12 meters or 39 feet using the 5GHz band.
In the box is a compact 120W power supply, VESA mount, HDMI, and the M.2 Oculink add-on you need to slot in manually if you plan to use it. To open it, lift the magnetic lid, then remove the four screws. Watch out for the fan cable while lifting it, and you'll need to disconnect it. There's no other way, but as always, watch out for the wireless cables. And here we've got the dual M.2 Gen 4 drives, and I'm just going to add the Oculink add-on card right now.
Most of the time, Windows 11 Home is included with the Mini Forum units we've looked at, but with the 890, it's Windows 11 Pro, and it passed the malware scan no problem. Linux works fine on the mini straight off the USB without any messing around.
Okay, then, let's see how it holds up in the benchmarks. In single-core Cinebench, it's within the margin of error compared to the other 8945HS we've tested. Multicore is very impressive, a new AMD winner for performance out of the box. And if you change the power profile in the BIOS from Balance to Performance, you get an even better result, a nice improvement over the other 8945HS I've tested, and the best AMD result, only being beaten by the power-hungry Intel Core Ultra 9 CPU.
Another good single-core result in Geekbench. Multicore almost mimics Cinebench, although it's much closer to the Core Ultra 9. This high CPU performance does translate into video encoding, with the A890 Pro again in second spot. While it didn't take second spot with the Balance mode in AV1, it does with a Performance profile, although the Core Ultra 9 is still comfortably ahead. AV1 hardware video match the other AMD best results. Intel is far ahead if you're interested in this particular workload.
Okay, integrated graphics time. An average result for a mini with Radeon 780M graphics, both in DX11 and DX12, where it failed to smash past the 3000 mark. But the differences aren't big enough to really matter. The Steel Nomad Lite benchmark came back with the lowest 780M score recorded so far.
The Gen 4 NVMe drive in the UM890 Pro has okay sequential read and write speeds, not close to saturating Gen 4 bandwidth, but I haven't seen many drives that do. It should be fine for most.
There are three ways to game on the UM890 Pro: use the integrated graphics, an eGPU with a USB 4 port, or the best option, plug in the M.2 Oculink stick and use an Oculink eGPU at the expense of a second storage drive. It's just not practical to keep removing it after you switch back to integrated graphics. I've already done a video on the differences between USB 4 and Oculink, and I'll link that one at the end of this video.
And after spending over an hour trying to get it to work, my UP4 V2 dock just refused to work with the Mini Forum 890. The eGPU was never detected. I tried with a couple of GPUs, set the switch M.2, turn the dock on first, and then the mini, but nothing. I'll recommend using the Mini Forum Oculink dock if you plan to use it, since that should work. So, we'll check out the integrated graphics results instead.
To make it more interesting, the usual game tests are now being run at high detail settings to see how they hold up. Usually, I test at 1080p low. Esports games hold up pretty well, it depends what frame rate you're looking for. Some of the older AAA titles work well at high detail as well. Might be a little bit of traffic ahead with the new ones. You'll need to use something like FSR 2 or 3 upscaling for a decent gaming experience.
[Music]
You should not have come here, child.
I also tried Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2, this time at 1080p low with FSR 2 enabled. The frame rate isn't exactly high, but you can play through it no problem. The higher-end emulators can play most games at 1080p using the integrated graphics. A USB 4 GPU allows you to have a second SSD but provides less bandwidth than Oculink. Here I'm using my Razer Core X GPU with an RTX 3070.
The Mini Forum 890 Pro performs well in video editing. It powers through my 4K project without too much trouble.
Mini Forum includes a visual BIOS, and you can go to Advanced Power Configuration and set your mode. ACPI settings has a couple of options you might be interested in if you're looking for the power loss options. It's an AMD CBS FCH common options. If your UM890 Pro is turning off underload when using USB-C, then you'll need to go to Advanced AMD CBS SMU common options and lower the maximum wattage.
Starting with 45W, idle power draw from the wall at 10W, as average, and the maximum went up slightly with a Performance profile enabled. When it comes to maximum CPU temp, the UM890 Pro is one of the better performers. Fan noise is nice and low using the default Balance mode, although the pitch of the fan is a bit whiny. Changing it to Performance allows the fan to ramp up much more. This nets you better multi-core performance, although I prefer lower fan noise, so I'd stick to Balance. As with the previous Mini Forum UH125 Pro we looked at, the SSD drive temp was nice and low, even with the thrash test.
Okay, so when it comes to CPU performance, the Mini Forum UM890 Pro is one of the best minis I've tested. Low fan noise is low using the default Balance profile. Wireless range is good. Port selection covers many usage cases, and the UM890 Pro even supports Oculink, but with the Oculink installed, you're limited to one storage drive. And I couldn't get Oculink to detect my Ocup P4 V2 dock. I recommend getting the Mini Forum dock if you plan to use Oculink. Opening the mini is a pain and makes removing the M.2 Oculink for a second storage drive not really practical. Overall, there's little to complain about, and the Mini Forum M890 is a very nice Mini PC.
Thanks for watching. Affiliate links in the video description if you're interested in the Mini Forum 890 Pro. And if you want to see how Oculink compares to USB 4, check out this video. Or if you want to see the Intel variant of this mini with even more impressive features, check out my review right here. Cheers.