Minisforum EliteMini UM700 review: a pint-sized powerhouse PC

T3 covers every type computing device you can imagine, ranging from the best lightweight laptops, to the best tablets and onto the best desktop gaming PCs, so when the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 landed on T3's reviews pile I was intrigued, as it didn't fit into one of our established categories.

This is a PC that isn't just microATX small, but tiny small. The UM700's official dimensions are 128×127×46mm and the whole thing weighs just 500 grams. So we're talking crazy small, light and portable. Indeed, while testing I've even manged to carry this PC around in my pocket.

The truly remarkable thing about the UM700, though, is that it is this small while also delivering buckets of computing power. And, even more astonishingly, that power is contained in terms of noise and heat remarkably well, too.

For those who just want a short review, it's safe to say I've been very impressed with the UM700 and if you're in the market for a new compact PC you should absolutely consider it, as well as the wider Minisforum range. For those who want more detail then read on.

Minisforum EliteMini UM700 review: price and availability

The Minisforum EliteMini UM700 is available right now in three different configurations.

There's a 8GB of RAM and 256GB SSD config that costs $569.00.

There's a 16GB of RAM and 256GB SSD config that costs $599.00.

And there's a 16GB of RAM and 512GB SSD config that costs $659.00.

Each one of these systems is available with a choice of power supply, including US, UK, EU, AU and JP, and can have its RAM and storage upgraded.

To view the full range of Minisforum EliteMini UM700 PCs head on over to the official Minisforum store.

Minisforum EliteMini UM700 review: what is in the box

Open the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 box and you're greeted with the system itself along with its power supply and instruction manual, as well as a mounting plate for if its owner wants to mount it to the back of monitor or desk, as well as a both a HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort cables.

This is a comprehensive package in my eyes and all the owner needs to do is connect it their screen of choice and plug in their mouse and keyboard. Done.

Minisforum EliteMini UM700 review: design and setup

The design of the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 is basic but effective and, at least to my eye, aesthetically pleasing. It's a small square silver box that has a vented black base. On the front of the system is a power button, 3.5mm headphone jack, paid of USB Type-A ports and a single USB Type-C port. The front is also home to a digital mic and reset hole.

Move to the top of the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 and you're faced with a branded top plate, which is pressed down at the two front corners, pops up and then can be slid off. This is how you can gain access to the mainboard of the system as well as its components. So, in the future if you wanted to upgrade its RAM or storage, for example, then doing that is very straightforward. The lid then just clips back in place with a gentle push down.

Around the back of the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 you get the system's main air vents, as well as a brace of USB ports, HDMI port, DisplayPort, two RJ45 Gigabit LAN ports, the system's power port and a Kensington Lock.

I was very pleased to see the wealth of ports on offer on the Minisforum EliteMini UM700, and especially the choice I was given for display and LAN. Indeed, the UM700 is technically capable of powering triple 4K displays, as you can power one on the HDMI, one on the DisplayPort and one on the USB Type-C port.

The Minisforum EliteMini UM700 comes with a Wi-Fi 6 Intel AX200 module onboard, but the dual RJ45 ports are still great to see as they offer so much for hardwired enthusiasts and those in a business setting that need much more network usage on a daily basis.

The sides of the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 are clean. The silver part of the casing is cool to the touch and made of lightweight metal, which imbues the system with a premium feel ergonomically, while the vented base is sturdy plastic.

Minisforum EliteMini UM700 review: performance and features

In terms of hardware you get an impressive package for you money in Minisforum EliteMini UM700. The CPU is an AMD Ryzen 7 3750H, which comes with 4 cores and 8 threads. It has a base clock of 2.3GHz, but that can scale up to 4GHz. This CPU is joined with 16GB of RAM on the model tested, a 256GB SSD, and most interestingly a Radeon RX Vega 10 GPU, which as frequency of 1400 MHz.

Naturally, as a PC gamer, I was very keen to see just what the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 was capable of, so as well as running T3's usual Geekbench 5 benchmarking tests on the system, I also ran our gaming-orientated 3DMark benchmarking tests on it too. And, as can be seen in the boxout nearby, while you certainly can't say the UM700 is a gaming powerhouse, it certainly can play PC games.

As can be seen from the nearby pictures, I installed and ran Cyberpunk 2077 on the UM700 and on low settings I got a just about playable framerate. To be fair, though, Cyberpunk 2077 is a very demanding AAA game that hasn't been optimised much yet, but despite the less than optimal results, the game was playable, and for a system that is so small I thought that was pretty impressive.

My testing of Doom Eternal on the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 was more even more successful, with the game 100 per cent playable with smooth framerate on medium settings. Again, this is a AAA PC game released within the last year that was playable on the UM700. I think this shows this system is definitely imbued with some gaming chops, and will be more than powerful enough to play any sort of slightly older PC game without issue.

What I would say, though, is that it was when running these games that I heard the UM700 at its most vocal. We're talking a consistent low hum from the fan rather than deafening whir, though.

When it came round to our Geekbench 5 test, performance was impressive. The UM700 returned a single-core CPU score 778 and a multi-core score of 2,985, as well as an OpenCL compute score of 10,626. These scores aren't the absolute fastest I've seen this year, with for example the 2021 LG Gram 17 laptop posting higher, but then again a system like that costs over twice the price of the UM700.

This impressive scoring led to very fast and fluid real-world performance. Everything from booting up the system (I timed power button press to Windows home screen as 10 seconds flat) to loading games and applications, to switching between programs and accessing Windows 10 menus was rapid, and I can safely say that unless you start asking this system to process things like RAW 8K videos, it's going to deliver for you.

And I think this all-round versatility is very much another bonus point for the UM700. From the home office to an actual office, through to the core of a home entertainment system, workstation for creatives and even on to a family computer that offers decent gaming power on the side, this system felt to me equipped to deal with it.

Minisforum EliteMini UM700 review: verdict

Reviewing the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 has been one of my highlights of the year. Here at T3 I review a lot of the best laptops and best gaming laptops on the market today, so I am very comfortable with the form factor that, truth be told, the vast majority of people opting for today.

I personally have still got a desktop computer attached to my main TV, but that is because I am a PC gamer and want to ensure I have a system with the very latest, full-powered GPUs on the market inside it, but away from gaming the desktop form factor has been dead to me for years.

So the Minisforum EliteMini UM700 has been a really nice change of pace and, crucially, has shown just what is possible today in terms of non-laptop PC form factors. I mean, the fact that his system comes with a mount so that it can be easily attached to the back of a monitor says it all. From a minimalist point of view, the UM700 absolutely kills.

I think like most people I was a little sceptical of the size of the system, not so much in terms of it packing the hardware inside, but from a noise and cooling point of view, as well as an upgradeability one. I can safely say though that the UM700 is barely audible at all unless you are asking it to run a AAA PC game like Cyberpunk 2077 or Doom Eternal, and even then we're taking a low hum rather a deafening whir. Meanwhile, the system's storage and RAM can both be upgraded easily.

When more people than ever are finding themselves working from home, and also trying to bring some sort of zen and order to their home office, the fact that the Minisforum range of these tiny systems is a really great thing in my mind. And among them the EliteMini UM700 is one of the most impressive.

Hardcore gamers can't be served by the system, and yes enthusiasts will likely still want to spend more on their PC setup, but in terms of families, professionals and creatives looking for minimal-footprint system that has serious power under the hood, the UM700 is a great choice and impossible not to recommend.

To learn more about the EliteMini UM700 head on over to the official Minisforum store.

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