Lenovo ThinkCentre
Hacker ApprovedRanked 8 of 18 mini PCs by recommenders
Cheap used mini PCs that run home servers, NAS, and routers on low power. Critics note quality varies between machines.
Cheap used mini PCs that run home servers, NAS, and routers on low power. Critics note quality varies between machines.
23 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 20
- criticize it
- 3
- approval share
- 87%
Recommended in 10 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 20 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 6.7 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 10 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
Cheap, especially second-hand value
“Bought a ThinkCentre M910q with an internal SSD and 16 GB of RAM for €200 a couple years ago... Right now I got it chugging along”
Comment from 8 Jul 2026 in “How to Build a Minimal ZFS NAS Without Synology, QNAP, TrueNAS” “Second hand SFF office PCs are super good for this. Machines like Lenovo Thinkcentre or Dell Optiplex.”
Comment from 9 Aug 2026 in “My server is a phone now” “older ThinkCentre Tiny series, or even base brand new M4 Mac Minis for that kind of money”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “An ARM Homelab Server, or a Minisforum MS-R1 Review” - Comment from 28 Dec 2025 in “OrangePi 6 Plus Review: The New Frontier for ARM64 SBC Performance”
- Comment from 2 Apr 2026 in “DRAM pricing is killing the hobbyist SBC market”
- Comment from 24 Dec 2025 in “I didn't realize my LG TV was spying on me until I turned off Live Plus”
- Comment from 30 Jul 2026 in “Read This Before You Buy That TV Streaming Stick”
- Comment from 29 Jan 2026 in “Clawdbot Renames to Moltbot”
Runs home server workloads
“The little Lenovo ThinkCentre's being used seem to chug along without crashing on driver issues”
Comment from 15 Sep 2026 in “GEFS on OpenBSD: A Early Preview” “I've been running it on a stand alone Lenovo Thinkcentre running inside docker.”
Comment from 27 Feb 2026 in “Don't run OpenClaw on your main machine” “I route my home 10G internet on a ThinkCentre Tiny with a 2018 Core i3-8100T.”
Comment from 20 Jul 2026 in “HomeLab #1: MikroTik as a Home Router” - Comment from 8 Jul 2026 in “How to Build a Minimal ZFS NAS Without Synology, QNAP, TrueNAS”
- Comment from 26 Aug 2026 in “Run OpenBSD on DigitalOcean for $4/month”
Low power draw and quiet
“They run at around 10watts, and plenty of compute for what i need.”
Comment from 5 Jan 2026 in “A History of My Homelab” “it idles at 14W, routing 10gbit full bore, 24W”
Comment from 9 Aug 2026 in “My server is a phone now” “they are so low profile and quiet”
Comment from 8 Jul 2026 in “How to Build a Minimal ZFS NAS Without Synology, QNAP, TrueNAS” Upgradable with cooling and storage
“with the benefit of it actually coming with the cooling and storage it needs to run and is upgradable”
Comment from 2 Dec 2025 in “1GB Raspberry Pi 5, and memory-driven price rises” “M910q tiny with Kaby Lake Core i5-7500 t , 32GB. Whoosh! Zoom! Motion blur!1!!”
Comment from 4 Mar 2026 in “Bootc and OSTree: Modernizing Linux System Deployment”
Other mini PCs people recommend
The four most recommended other mini PCs, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Mac mini | 390 | 160 | 71% | 13 | 2 yrs42 owners | Approved |
| NVIDIA DGX Spark | 170 | 121 | 58% | 12 | 6 mo16 owners | — |
| AMD Strix Halo | 130 | 83 | 61% | 13 | 11 mo8 owners | — |
| Framework Desktop | 93 | 26 | 78% | 12 | 3 mo9 owners | Approved |
| Lenovo ThinkCentreThis page | 20 | 3 | 87% | 10 | — | Approved |
What people said
25 of the 28 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“It also creates problems. The biggest is that it's another computer to maintain.”
“The little Lenovo ThinkCentre's being used seem to chug along without crashing on driver issues”
“Some of it was good machines, some of it was crap.”
“a cheap Lenovo Tiny box to host from my house”
“it idles at 14W, routing 10gbit full bore, 24W”
“Second hand SFF office PCs are super good for this. Machines like Lenovo Thinkcentre or Dell Optiplex.”
“It fits behind a TV, you can get it second hand for around $40”
“I route my home 10G internet on a ThinkCentre Tiny with a 2018 Core i3-8100T.”
“Toss the rtx into a cheapo optiplex or thinkcenter”
“So it has the potential to even look and work like an actual NAS!”
“they are so low profile and quiet”
“Bought a ThinkCentre M910q with an internal SSD and 16 GB of RAM for €200 a couple years ago... Right now I got it chugging along”
“grabbing a think client desktop like a ThinkCentre”
“WAY better value than the RPi4 at the time which was in short supply due to COVID”
“M910q tiny with Kaby Lake Core i5-7500 t , 32GB. Whoosh! Zoom! Motion blur!1!!”
“I've been running it on a stand alone Lenovo Thinkcentre running inside docker.”
“not guaranteed to be reliable”
“older ThinkCentre Tiny series, or even base brand new M4 Mac Minis for that kind of money”
“$40 used ThinkCentre Tiny is also plug and play”
“small enough and powerful enough for C++ dev”
“They run at around 10watts, and plenty of compute for what i need.”
“It's a bit sad that this Lenovo ThinkCentre ain't using ECC”
“It was under $100 and makes me question why any hobbyist bothers with SBCs like these.”
“you can buy a more capable used ThinkCenter micro for less money”
“with the benefit of it actually coming with the cooling and storage it needs to run and is upgradable”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.