With more folks than ever working remotely, the classic desktop PC market continues to shrink as the more flexible laptop grows. However, more people need to know that you really don’t have to compromise if you want the power and comfort of a desktop without the big box. Mini PCs are plentiful, and the Asus ExpertCenter PN52 (starts at $669, $968 as tested) is a fine example. The model we tested offers acceptable performance for its size and can be upgraded substantially. It works equally well as a workaday desktop PC, as the driver of a video display with an included VESA mount, or as a media streaming box. In fact, save for a less-than-stellar matchup against Apple's latest Mac mini, we find very little to complain about with this mini PC, earning it a solid four-star rating.
A Little More Girth Means More Upgrades
The benchmark in the mini PC world is the Intel NUC family. Typical NUCs measure a scant 4 or 5 inches square and between 1 and 2 inches high, depending on the model. Available with CPUs ranging from an Intel Celeron to a Core i9 (the latter in a select oversize model), you can pretty much work up your own configuration. In fact, with NUCs bought as single end-user units, you may have to add memory and a solid-state drive, as well as an operating system.
While this roll-your-own approach appeals to some people, others will appreciate the ExpertCenter PN52’s "take-it-out-of-the-box, plug it in, and go" appeal. The PN52 we tested is just a touch larger than a typical NUC, measuring 2.3 by 4.7 by 5.1 inches (HWD) and weighing in at a feathery 2.4 pounds.
The PN52 is unusual for a mini PC in that the CPU installed in our test unit was an AMD Ryzen 7 5800H, a mobile CPU with integrated Radeon graphics. (Intel chips tend to dominate the mini PC world.) You can also get the PN52 with a Ryzen 5 5600H or Ryzen 9 5900HX processor. Mobile CPU notwithstanding, we are pleasantly surprised with just how well the PN52 did on many of our benchmarks.
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The PN52 Parts Rundown
Not only was our review unit boxed up with a keyboard and mouse, it is also nicely configured. The PN52 has two RAM slots, and our test unit sports laptop-style 8GB SO-DIMMs in each of these for a total of 16GB. The RAM sockets are easily accessible by removing four screws on the bottom of the PC and lifting the top off. You'll just need to be careful not to dislodge the connector to the holder for an optional 2.5-inch SATA hard drive/SSD drive. (The drive bay is in the bottom half of the case.)
The PN52 can support up to 32GB of RAM should the apps you wish to run, such as content creation, require more memory. Also contained in our review unit was an M.2 NVMe PCI Express 3.0 SSD. If we were to use this as a production machine, we might want to upgrade this from the 512GB model that our PN52 had, though Asus states the largest M.2 and 2.5-inch drive supported is limited to 1TB each. If you need more than this, a second M.2 socket is located on the top cover near the SSD slot.
Still, for a very small PC, this provides a great deal of upgradability, and access to the upgrade locations is easy. And Asus offers many of these upgrades as options if you special-order the computer. Our review PC also came with Windows 11 Pro installed, though it’s available, again on special order, without an OS if you want to use a different operating system.
As well as being easily upgradable, the PN52 offers a multitude of ports, equal to that of some much larger PCs. The front panel contains the power switch, two USB 3.2 Gen 1 ports, a USB 3.2 Type-C port, an audio jack, and an LED that indicates power-on and drive activity.
Both sides of the case have vents to keep the PC cool, and the case never felt more than slightly warm even after many hours of use. The rear of the PC is also generously loaded with ports, including two full-size HDMI ports, two USB 3.2 Gen 1 ports, an additional USB 3.2 Gen 2 port, and a second Type-C port. There’s a 2.4Gbps RJ-45 Ethernet jack, as well as a space for a configurable port.
Our test machine had a DisplayPort port located in the configurable spot, but you could also opt for another HDMI port, a second LAN port, or a VGA or COM port in that space, all of which have to be special-ordered. Also look out for a Kensington lock notch on the rear panel, which makes it harder for anyone to just slip the tiny PC into a pocket or purse if you lock it down with a security cable.
With the configuration we received, it’s possible to drive four 4K monitors, or one 8K-resolution display, though we performed our benchmarks with a single standard 4K-resolution display. Also included are Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 hardware support. Asus utilities included with the PN52 include MyAsus, which makes it easy to connect the PC and a mobile device; switch between performance and quiet fan modes; activate two-way AI noise cancellation when used with a microphone-equipped headset; and view onboard hardware diagnostics.
Testing the ExpertCenter PN52: The Competitive H Series on Display
We subjected the ExpertCenter PN52 to our standard desktop benchmark suite. In our tests, we compared the ExpertCenter PN52 to several other recommended mini PCs: the Apple Mac mini (2020), the Asus ExpertCenter D500, the Geekom IT8 Mini PC, and the Intel NUC 11 Pro Kit.
All of these, except for the PN52, have Intel CPUs ranging from Celeron through Core i5 levels of performance. Of course, the Mac mini runs on Apple's Arm-based M1 system-on-a-chip, and therefore isn't represented in some tests here. You can see their basic specs in the table below.
Note that the H-series chip in the PN52 is the kind of CPU intended for gaming and other power-user notebooks. Only the ExpertCenter D500 uses a "true" desktop CPU; the Geekom and NUC CPUs employ lighter-weight mobile chips. Let's see how that plays out.
Productivity and Content Creation Tests
We put the ExpertCenter PN52 through our battery of benchmark tests to see how it compares with other mini PCs of similar configurations, The first of these is the PCMark 10 Suite, which simulates a variety of Windows apps to give an overall performance score for office-centric tasks, such as word processing, spreadsheeting, web browsing, and videoconferencing. This test is particularly important as these are the apps most likely to be run on a PC this size and configuration.
With this benchmark, we run both the main test and PCMark 10’s Full System Storage subtest, which measures the program load time and throughput of the boot drive (these days, almost always a solid-state drive).
Other tests we run include Handbrake, an open-source transcoder for converting multimedia files to different resolutions and formats. This test will give you an idea of how well the ExpertCenter PN52 will perform on tasks such as video editing and converting video into different formats. We record the time it takes, rounded to the nearest minute, to encode a 12-minute 4K video file (the Blender Foundation movie Tears of Steel) to 1080p.
Maxon’s Cinebench benchmark is similar to Handbrake in that it's focused on the CPU, testing the company’s Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene. We use the multi-core benchmark, which fully exercises all of a processor’s cores and threads. Then we have Primate Labs’ Geekbench, another benchmark that runs a series of CPU workloads designed to simulate real-world applications ranging from PDF rendering to speech recognition to machine learning. Finally, PugetBench's Photoshop 22 benchmark simulates a number of common and intense functions within the photo-editing app to test the CPU and its integrated graphics.
On PCMark 10, the PN52’s 6,000 score on the main benchmark and 1,535 on the storage benchmark ace out the comparison PCs, even with one (the D500) boasting a desktop CPU. This is impressive, but things look less rosy once the Mac mini is allowed to play, and when multicore processing comes to the fore (in Handbrake and Cinebench). The PN52 landed second to last in the Handbrake test at 14:27, whereas the Mac mini shoots straight to the front of the race with a time of 8:00. On Cinebench, the PN52’s score of 2,961 was last of the bunch. The Mac mini scored highly on this test once again, but is bested ultimately by the desktop CPU in the other Asus ExpertCenter. Again, rendering is generally a CPU- and core-intensive process, and the desktop chip has an intrinsic strength here.
In our other CPU-intensive benchmark, Geekbench, the PN52 performs well enough in the multi-core tests, but again the Mac mini cuts to the front of the line with a lead of more than 3,000 points. As for the Photoshop test, the PN52 does take the lead, but several systems either couldn't be tested for compatibility reasons, or wouldn't run it.
The Ryzen 7 5800H inside the Asus PN52 is a decent processor most often used in mid-to-higher-level laptops. Given these results and the fact that these type of applications would likely be the most popular use of the PN52, most users would be pleased with the performance of the system. However, the Mac mini simply seems more powerful for close to the same price, a trend we'll see continue to play out in the visual rendering arena.
Graphics Tests
UL’s 3DMark is a graphics test suite for Windows that contains a number of benchmarks for different GPU functions and software APIs. We run two DirectX 12 tests on all PCs: Night Raid, which is appropriate for PCs with integrated graphics (such as the ones benchmarked), and Time Spy, which is more demanding and more suitable for higher-end PCs with souped-up graphics cards and GPUs.
We also run two more tests from the GFXBench 5.0 benchmark. These tests are done "offscreen" to level the display resolutions while carrying out several different OpenGL operations.
On these two benchmarks, the PN52 actually breezes through Time Spy, with the highest score by a few hundred points. Two of the other systems were either incompatible with this test (Mac mini) or would not run it (the NUC). The exact reverse is true of the Night Raid test, with the PN52’s score the lowest of the bunch, and Intel's NUC 11 Pro Kit on top.
However, when it comes to GFXBench, that is Apple's game. The Mac mini beats all of its competitors by a country mile in both of the benchmark's subtests. Even as a pre-built machine, the Asus PN52 is a competitive-enough mini PC. However, the Mac mini's graphics processing appears to be more powerful, regardless.
Verdict: A Competent Mini PC With Ryzen Muscle
We can’t find much major to criticize about the Asus ExpertCenter PN52. Our biggest complaint is that it has "only" two USB-C ports, though plenty of USB 3.2 Type-A ports are available. Plus, it’s easy to get a USB Type-A-to-C adapter or an inexpensive dock if you really need more Type-C ports.
Our only other criticism is that, for the same price or less, Apple's 2020 Mac mini consistently outperforms the ExpertCenter PN52 on productivity and graphics tasks. However, if macOS simply isn't an option for the apps you use, or you're Windows-loyal, that's a red line; we probably can't convince you otherwise.
One possible quibble: Many Intel NUC models have a handy SD card slot on a side panel, whereas this mini PC doesn’t. That said, we would be happy using the Asus ExpertCenter PN52 as our main light-production machine if we were space-strapped. This is an ideal mini PC to run the Microsoft Office suite of apps (and maybe some do light work in Adobe's Creative Cloud suite) for a decent price.
The Asus ExpertCenter PN52 is a potent mini PC built on Ryzen mobile silicon, with a generous selection of ports and above-average upgradability.
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