AMD BC-250
Hacker ApprovedConsole chip board in Computers
Cheap PS5-chip board that runs games and local AI far below GPU prices. Critics say it is hacky, needs extra cooling, and lacks sleep.
Cheap PS5-chip board that runs games and local AI far below GPU prices. Critics say it is hacky, needs extra cooling, and lacks sleep.
36 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 28
- criticize it
- 8
- approval share
- 78%
Recommended in 8 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Owned for 2 months
Median of the 3 owners who said how long they have had it.
Each square is one year.
Why it carries the badge
- 28 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 3.5 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 8 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Far cheaper than GPUs or PS5
“And the alternative of getting a gpu, cpu, ram, storage is like 5 times as expensive.”
Comment from 2 Aug 2026 in “ASRock BC-250: Building the Budget Steam Machine” “No need if you can get a BC250 for less than a PS5 these days”
Comment from 29 Sep 2026 in “PS5 Relapse Exploit” “remarkably cheaper than buying GPUs or a DGX Spark”
Comment from 3 Sep 2026 in “My BC-250 Journey (With 40 CUs Unlocked)” - Comment from 2 Aug 2026 in “ASRock BC-250: Building the Budget Steam Machine”
- Comment from 29 Sep 2026 in “PS5 Relapse Exploit”
Local AI inference for little money
“They've recently become popular for inference and they are only about $200 on ebay.”
Comment from 13 Jul 2026 in “Benchmarking 15 "E-Waste" GPUs with Modern Workloads” “This gives 16GB of high speed memory for a very low price compared to a full GPU.”
Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)” “it would be far cheaper to use the BC-250 for local inference”
Comment from 17 Oct 2026 in “Llama.cpp on a jailbroken PS5: run any GGUF model natively on the console” - Comment from 23 Mar 2026 in “Show HN: Tok/s on a 35B MoE model using a $100 AMD crypto APU and Vulkan”
Runs games well, even headless
“I have a bunch of these as headless gaming PCs in a rack running sunshine and Steam on Linux.”
Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)” “Works great for reasonably demanding games (CONTROL, Elden Ring, etc.).”
Comment from 22 Jun 2026 in “Steam Machine 512GB” “It works great if you turn the BC-250 on, play games, and turn it off.”
Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)” - Comment from 2 Aug 2026 in “ASRock BC-250: Building the Budget Steam Machine”
Fun for tinkerers, unlockable CUs
“nearly all of them can be fully unlocked for all 40CUs and 8 CPU cores”
Comment from 7 Oct 2026 in “PS5 Jailbreaks Are Escalating at an Unprecedented Pace” “go from e-waste to having mesa support and CU/CPU unlocks”
Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)” “I think this is still a good deal for the tinkerers.”
Comment from 6 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Hacky build needing extra parts
“you need a PSU, a case with a fan and a fan duct to push air through the heat exchanger”
Comment from 30 Sep 2026 in “PS5 Relapse Exploit” “It is also a very hacky build.”
Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)” Limited memory limits its potential
“it is limiting its potential”
Comment from 6 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)” “in practice the memory is way too limited for that use case.”
Comment from 5 Sep 2026 in “The "$60 Gaming PC" – AMD BC-250 (2025)”
What people said
40 of the 46 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“it would be far cheaper to use the BC-250 for local inference”
“basically reject ps5 apu’s being repurposed for all kinds of shenanigans”
“nearly all of them can be fully unlocked for all 40CUs and 8 CPU cores”
“you need a PSU, a case with a fan and a fan duct to push air through the heat exchanger”
“Costs like 1/3rd the price of a PS5”
“No need if you can get a BC250 for less than a PS5 these days”
“best e-waste redemption arc in a while”
“it is limiting its potential”
“I think this is still a good deal for the tinkerers.”
“The form factor is unfortunate.”
“I have a bunch of these as headless gaming PCs in a rack running sunshine and Steam on Linux.”
“It works great if you turn the BC-250 on, play games, and turn it off.”
“it was a riotously good deal for a long time”
“in practice the memory is way too limited for that use case.”
“The jank factor is pretty high but it does trade blows with the Steam Machine for a fraction of the price.”
“optimized around ~54mhs on ethash which was pretty good”
“go from e-waste to having mesa support and CU/CPU unlocks”
“This gives 16GB of high speed memory for a very low price compared to a full GPU.”
“those blades sit around 60-90W doing nothing, so the $60 is the cheap part”
“No graphics output. And so loud you wouldn't be able to hear your game either.”
“It is also a very hacky build.”
“This is the guide you need.”
“a solid steam machine stand in”
“remarkably cheaper than buying GPUs or a DGX Spark”
“All memory is working and doesn't flip bits.”
“Takes some work but seems cool.”
“remember this one chip. One mans trash, is anothers treasure”
“And the alternative of getting a gpu, cpu, ram, storage is like 5 times as expensive.”
“still a lot cheaper than a GPU these days”
“Yeah, too expensive now for what it is”
“I'm so glad I went with this option. Everything almost just works.”
“This is a really good card that keeps on getting better.”
“quality of life features like sleep/hibernate don't work at all on this system”
“They've recently become popular for inference and they are only about $200 on ebay.”
“Works great for reasonably demanding games (CONTROL, Elden Ring, etc.).”
“I haven't gotten the first one going”
“a very capable bitcoin miner based on the PS5”
“It's essentially a poor man's Mac Studio for Edge AI.”
“it is the PS5 but was created for mining. You can get these very cheap on eBay.”
“even at full power it's bit the best bang for the buck”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.