Bosgame N100 Mini PC and Every Other N100 Brand

The N95 matches the N100's four cores and 3.4GHz boost. It differs in two places: a 15W base power rating against 6W, and 16 graphics execution units against 24. In a mini PC with a fan, the CPU side feels the same; the graphics side is a little weaker for light games and multi-screen video.

• Keep the N95 Bosgame if it costs less and the job is office work or a media player.
• Pick an N100 for Plex transcoding, a three-screen desk or anything that leans on the GPU.
• Pick an N150 if the price is the same as either.

For an N100 in Bosgame's class today, the PELADN and the TUREWELL are the direct matches. Both carry 16GB of DDR4 and a 512GB SSD; the PELADN adds a USB-C display output and the TUREWELL has three HDMI ports and Wi-Fi 6.

The N100 vs N95 comparison goes deeper on the two chips, including where the extra graphics units show. On power, the N95's higher rating mostly shows under sustained load; at idle the two chips are close.

Reviews of the Minisforum UN100L still circulate, and most of what they describe is the N100 itself: quick enough for office work and streaming, frugal at idle, limited in 3D. Those points apply to every N100 box, so an old review remains a fair guide to any current one.

The CHUWI LarkBox X was one of the smallest N100 desktops, with soldered memory in a very compact case. Trigkey's boxes sat at the budget end with socketed memory. All three brands shared the same N100 performance, so the choice among them came down to size, memory type and price, and the same three questions pick a replacement now.

• Read an old UN100L review for the chip, not for the warranty or the current price.
• Check memory type on any replacement: soldered LPDDR5 cannot be upgraded.
• Expect the same performance from any of the three stand-ins.

The R1 appealed because it put two 3.5-inch drive bays, 2.5GbE networking and an N100 in one small case. There is no current US N100 version, and a two-bay NAS on this chip now means building one or choosing a board.

The HKUXZR NAS board is the flexible route. It fits any Mini-ITX case and carries six SATA ports, two M.2 NVMe slots, two Intel i226-V 2.5GbE ports and a PCIe 3.0 x4 slot. Choose its N100 version, since the board also comes with the N150.

For Topton's firewalls, the CWWK 4-port box is the like-for-like choice: four Intel i226-V 2.5GbE ports, a DDR5 SO-DIMM slot, a PCIe x4 M.2 slot and AES-NI for fast VPNs.

• NAS with two drives: HKUXZR board in a two-bay Mini-ITX case.
• OPNsense or pfSense router: CWWK 4-port, or a six-port UDPTCP box.
• Both in one: Proxmox on the CWWK, with the drives on a separate NAS.

Both jobs are covered in depth in the N100 homelab guide and the N100 firewall guide.

For a big-name N100 box with a business feel, the fanless ZOTAC ZBOX CI337 Nano is the closest match. It is a barebone: the buyer adds memory, an SSD and an operating system. In return it gives two HDMI 2.0 ports, DisplayPort 1.4, DisplayPort over USB-C, two gigabit ports, Wi-Fi 6, an M.2 slot and a 2.5-inch bay.

ACEMAGIC and Cybergeek sold budget N100 boxes in the same class as NIMO and RUPA. Neither has a current US N100 model, and the budget N100s still on sale cover the same ground. Those boxes differ mostly in memory size, SSD type and wireless generation, all of which show up plainly on the spec sheet.

• ACEMAGIC stand-in: TUREWELL, with 16GB, 512GB, three HDMI ports and Wi-Fi 6.
• Cybergeek stand-in: NIMO with 8GB and 512GB, or the RUPA HSI-N100 with 8GB and 256GB.
• ASUS stand-in: ZOTAC ZBOX CI337 Nano for a silent, name-brand box.

MOREFINE is the clearest case of a brand that kept faith with the chip. The M9 was its earlier compact N100; the M10 carries on with 12GB of LPDDR5, a 512GB NVMe SSD and 2.5GbE. PELADN sells its N100 in 8GB and 16GB versions.

• Desktop boxes: Beelink, MeLE, MOREFINE, PELADN, TUREWELL, OUMAX, Azeyou, NIMO, RUPA, ZOTAC.
• Fanless and industrial: MeLE, FANPEEC, HISTTON, VENOEN.
• Firewalls: CWWK, HEIGAOLAPC, MOGINSOK, oaknode, UDPTCP, Dozlzyp, Montvfieto.
• Mini-ITX boards: ECS, HKUXZR, UDPTCP.

Brand matters less on the N100 than on most PCs, because the chip, the graphics and the memory controller are identical everywhere. What differs is memory type, ports, cooling and warranty. Judge each box on those four and the name on the lid becomes a tie-breaker.

Support is the one place brand still counts. A maker that publishes BIOS updates, drivers and a clear warranty process saves hours when something goes wrong, and the established names do that more reliably than one-model brands.

The two biggest names on the list have pages of their own: Beelink's N100 range and MeLE's fanless N100s.