ram suggestion - Aliexpress N5105 mini pc

[Skeptical]

I got one of the smaller aliexpress mini pc box without ram & storage. I got a smaller chassis to save desk space. From what I've seen the smaller chassis runs a little hot. I have a low power drive to go in it but I was wondering if it was worth even considering power usage ram wise with these boxes.

I have cheap power so the only notable interest in power usage I have is thermal output. It would be nice to get away with no moving part (i.e. no fan) with this footprint. Else I’ll just put in a 40mm fan and move on.

The box is will run OPNsense & Pi-hole. - BTW I did see a forum thread for these mini pc let me know if there is one and I missed it.

I was thinking about something like this
2666MHz (8GBx2) CL19 1.2V SODIMM
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B8NTKC19/

ModelC Celeron N5105
https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256803804266682.html

 

[oneplane]

> The box is will run OPNsense & Pi-hole

Unless you are running 4 single threaded programs at 100% all the time, you'll be fine regardless of what you stuff inside the box. Devices that *can* generate a lot of heat usually only do so when pushed hard. Two network appliance-ish applications won't do that for a home or small office network so that's fine.

There is one scenario in which you may need to think harder about temperatures: if the out-of-box temperatures are too high, it indicates bad thermal transfer (be it bad contact or bad positioning of a shim, if any). This applies to all hardware, not just small computers ;-)