This is the world’s first Geekom mini PC to be powered by Intel’s 13th generation i9, meaning in a computer that can literally fit in the palm of your hand, you have a chip with more power than some full-sized desktops we have available in the market.
Table of Contents:
- GEEKOM Mini PC IT13 Impressive Features
- Geekom High-Speed Ports and Connectivity
- Comprehensive Connectivity of Mini Device
- Upgrading and Exploring Hardware Components
- Geekom Fast Boot and High-Performance
- Effortless 4K Video & Photo Editing
- Impressive Processing Power
- Geekom Cinebench Performance
- Gaming and GPU Performance
- Geekom Versatile Performance
- Conclusion
GEEKOM Mini PC IT13 Impressive Features
I didn’t realize that mini PCs had even better performance compared to a big one. The mini PCs that we have today, have all been pretty basic machines, but on the IT13, we have that 14-core, 20-threaded i9. Which can boost up to 5.4 GHz. The iris XE Graphics has 96 execution units, 32 GB of RAM, and 2 TB of storage with super-fast Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2, which at less than $800 is pretty good.
Compared to something like Apple’s Mac Mini, you’re getting four times the amount of RAM and four times the storage while also being significantly smaller, but what I like about the IT13 is that despite its size, it still has a ton of I certainly more than what you get with the Mac Mini.
Geekom High-Speed Ports and Connectivity
There are two super-fast USB 4 ports on the back with 40 GB of bandwidth. Not only can you connect things like 8K monitors at 30 Hz, but You can also connect to an eGPU, which I’m pretty excited about testing later on in this article. On top of that, you get two HDMI 2.0 ports, meaning technically, if you wanted to, you could run a quad display from this tiny machine for networking.
Comprehensive Connectivity of Mini Device
In addition to the Wi-Fi 6C, you also get a 2.5 GB Ethernet port and then a couple of type A ports, one of which is USB 3.2 on the left side. We have a full-sized SD slot, which is something that you don’t often see in this form factor. Even some laptops that are much bigger don’t have one, so that’s something I like to see, and then on the right side, it’s another vent with a Kensington lock upfront.
There are two more USB 3.2 ports along with a headphone jack and a power button as all these are shown in the following:
- Wi-Fi 6C (Wireless)
- 2.5 GB Ethernet port (Wired)
- Type A ports (USB)
- USB 3.2 port (USB)
- Full-sized SD slot
- Kensington lock port
- Headphone jack
- Power button
let’s take a look at the inside because Geekom mini PC has made it easy to open this thing up and upgrade the components.
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Upgrading and Exploring Hardware Components
If you need to upgrade or take a look inside Geekom mini PC, you can get all of the following:
- A 2 TB SSD from Lexar with another slot for additional storage.
- A slot for a 2.5-inch SATA drive allows for up to three different drives in the device.
- 32 GB of DDR4 RAM.
- The DDR4 RAM type.
- The processor.
- The fan for cooling
There are just four screws in total, and then this bottom lid lifts right off. You do have a little ribbon cable to be careful with, but that’s pretty much it. the 2 TB SSD from Lexar. There’s another slot for more. 2 storage for another terabyte, and then hidden away in the lid is actually a slot for a 2.5-inch SATA drive.
You can technically have up to three different drives in this thing, which is pretty wild for Ram. We have 32 GB of DDR4 in this Geekom mini pc. You know DDR4 is fine, and then if we dig in further, it’s the processor and the fan, but it does get kind of tricky to access all that.
Geekom Fast Boot and High-Performance
The booting speed is surprisingly fast. I clocked it in just 8 seconds, which is insane. It’s easily the fastest-booting computer in our setup. Now, in terms of general performance, running Windows 11 Pro, everything is super snappy. I mean, this doesn’t really come as a surprise with the Intel i9 processor and 32 GB of RAM.
I was able to have a bunch of common apps like Chrome and Excel open and even a game and then multitask between them without any issues, but I wanted to see how this i9 could perform under heavy loads on Geekom mini PC. The first thing I tested was opening up some of our own 10-bit 8k videos. We’re talking about some massive files and the IT13 didn’t have any issues playing them back.
Effortless 4K Video & Photo Editing
Jumping into Adobe Premiere. We don’t have a dedicated GPU, but I could still scrub through and edit this 4K project without any issues. It’s not the most intensive project, but it does smoothly perform all the following things:
- Multiple layers
- Scrubbing
- Playing back
- Applying effects
The only area where I noticed that performance took a hit was when it was a GPU-intensive task like exporting. At this point, the integrated graphics became the bottleneck, but for light and occasional editing, this is fine.
Now in Photoshop, which is more CPU-based. Performance is great. Importing a 50-megapixel raw photo. Doing a bit of color grading, and doing tasks like object selection all worked flawlessly with the full-size SD slot. This is also a nice little setup for editing photos.
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Impressive Processing Power
I want to see the power of the i9 in this Geekom mini PC. We have a custom Excel sheet that calculates trillions of operations as soon as you open it. With the i9 and its 14 cores and 20 threads, the IT13 was able to complete the task in just 19 seconds, whereas, on Apple’s M2 Chip with eight cores, it took 29 seconds to complete, so it was a clear win for the i9.
Geekom Cinebench Performance
In Cinebench, though the results weren’t as impressive. We got a score of just under 12,000, which for the 13th generation i9 does seem a little bit lower than you’d expected.
I think that’s because Geekom mini PC tuned this thing for power efficiency and to help keep that i9 running cool. I did try tuning the CPU with Intel’s tuning utility to remove some of the TTP limits, and after running the benchmark again. We got a massive improvement with its scoring over 2500 points higher. I really wouldn’t recommend doing this since you don’t want to damage the chip and cook it, it’ll most likely void your warranty.
Gaming and GPU Performance
This wasn’t necessarily designed for gaming, I still wanted to see how it would do. It kind of surprised me with it getting an average of 127 frames per second, and this was at 1080p. It was on the low settings. Only integrated graphics getting over 120 FPS, which is impressive in a more taxing game like GTA 5.
We were getting a playable 60 FPS. This was at 1080p on normal settings, so obviously, the visuals aren’t going to blow you away, but I don’t know. I think it’s pretty cool that you can still run an AAA title on this thing, but obviously, not all games run as smoothly.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider only got around 30 frames per second, but that was with Intel’s scoff. If you turn on XSS, which uses AI to upscale the graphics, the average jumps up to 38 frames per second, which isn’t bad, but of course, if you want to take gaming and any GPU-related tasks to the next level, that’s the point. You take advantage of that USB 4 port on the back of this Geekom mini PC and connect it to an eGPU, and all of a sudden this thing becomes a gaming PC.
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Geekom Versatile Performance
At our monitor’s max resolution of 1440p. We were seeing an average of 45 FPS in GTA 5. With everything maxed out. Still getting 136 frames per second, and even in Tomb Raider, with everything turned up. We were getting around 98 frames per second.
In an app like Premiere Pro, those GPU-intensive tasks I was talking about earlier. Around five times faster. Having that option for an eGPU, even if it’s somewhere later down the line, is nice, but for most workflows. I don’t think you’d even need it. The i9 and the iris XE Graphics are more than capable, as we’ve already seen. For everyday stuff, it’s just a blazingly fast experience.
Conclusion
I would say that having an Intel i9 processor might be overkill, and companies have options with the i5 and the i7 for the Geekom Mini PC ITI3. You could save some money there if you want. However, keep in mind that those models do come with less storage.
Even if you go with the most powerful i9, you’re still getting a better deal than something like Intel’s Nook, which currently goes for nearly $1,000 while only having the i7, and with Intel also announcing that they’re exiting the Nook business. entirely, this Geekom mini PC could just be your next beast.
