This Mac mini-sized PC’s 65 W Ryzen processor nearly matches an RTX 2050 without a GPU and can also connect an external graphics card
The Minisforum X1 Lite is a compact mini PC designed to deliver high performance in a Mac mini-like form factor. Built around AMD’s Ryzen 7 255, a Zen 4-based 8-core, 16-thread APU paired with Radeon 780M integrated graphics, the X1 Lite differentiates itself through its unusually high sustained power limits of up to 65 W and extensive external I/O, positioning it as a performance-oriented mini PC rather than a low-power office box. Notably, its weight of around 0.67 kg is also very close to Apple’s M4 Mac mini, which comes in at roughly the same.
In a recent video published by the YouTube channel ETA Prime, the Minisforum X1 Lite was subjected to a series of gaming and performance tests to evaluate how the system behaves under real-world workloads. The YouTuber also unboxed the mini PC, revealing that the retail package includes a VESA mount, an HDMI cable, and a 120 W power adapter.
Separately, its synthetic benchmark results place the Radeon 780M iGPU in a similar performance range to entry-level dedicated Nvidia GeForce RTX GPUs. But if you want more power, Minisforum also offers an eGPU dock for the X1 Lite for around $98, allowing an external GPU to be connected via OCuLink.
And in case you're planning to do so, here's the kind of performance gain you can expect.
Minisforum X1 Lite benchmark and gaming performance
ETA Prime also notes that the X1 Lite uses Minisforum’s standard graphical BIOS, with selectable Silent, Balanced, and Performance profiles. The YouTuber tested the mini PC in Performance mode to extract maximum sustained performance. They also manually increased the iGPU VRAM allocation to 8 GB from system memory using the BIOS’s GFX configuration settings.
During testing, the video shows that under sustained CPU load, the Ryzen 7 255, which is essentially a rebadged Ryzen 7 8845HS, briefly peaked near 70 W before settling at approximately 64 W, closely aligning with Minisforum’s claimed 65 W operating envelope. ETA Prime also measured total system power draw at the wall, reporting around 8 W at idle and approximately 12 W during 4K video playback. While gaming at 1080p, the system averaged about 71 W, with a maximum observed draw of 83 W.
What is notable is that the Radeon 780M iGPU in the AMD Ryzen 7 255 performed similarly to the Nvidia GeForce RTX 2050 in terms of raw benchmark performance. In 3DMark Time Spy, the iGPU scored around 3,322 points, whereas according to Notebookcheck’s database, the average score for the RTX 2050 is approximately 3,461 in the same test.
In terms of gaming performance, ETA Prime reported that God of War Ragnarök ran at medium settings with FSR Frame Generation enabled, averaging around 74 FPS. Fallout 4 was tested at native 1080p on high settings, where it held a steady 60 FPS, while Forza Horizon 5 averaged approximately 82 FPS at 1080p using high settings.
The YouTuber also tested Mortal Kombat 1 and Street Fighter V in the video, along with running several synthetic benchmarks on the AMD Ryzen 7 255. You can find more details in the full in-depth video linked below.
If you're thinking of getting your hands on one, the fully loaded 32 GB DDR5-5600 and 1 TB SSD Minisforum X1 Lite is available to order from the official site for $663.90.
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