HP Stream Mini PC owners' thread

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gbwelly

1243 posts

Uber Geek

#173531 26-May-2015 20:35

Hello all, I have taken delivery of my HP Stream Mini PC.
For those who are interested this is the device.

Now, first and foremost I would like to get my hands on a copy of the contents of the recovery partition. If you can help me with this it would be much appreciated.

Whist waiting for it to arrive I am convinced I viewed a page on the HP site with the option to download individual drivers. So tonight the first thing I did was install Windows 8.1 Pro, deleting all the partitions in the process. I can now no longer find the driver download page.

I will endeavor to update this thread as I discover more about this device. My plan is to have the unit running Windows Media Center with HD Homerun tuners and an iSCSI target for recorded TV.

So far I have upgraded to a matched pair of 4GB RAM sticks (8GB), I believe if you can locate a single 2GB stick for sale, adding one to enable dual channel (4GB) would be the price/performance sweet spot. It went pretty well with a single 2GB stick when I unboxed it.

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156 posts

Master Geek

#1312333 26-May-2015 22:20

What's better, one of these or a z64 minix?

gbwelly

1243 posts

Uber Geek

#1312434 27-May-2015 07:25

u13turbo: What's better, one of these or a z64 minix?

I think it's safe to say the HP Stream Mini PC is far superior. It's $20 USD more, but for that you get a celeron instead of an atom, gigabit eithernet and USB 3.0. You also get a system with two upgradeable RAM slots, two M.2 interfaces allowing an upgrade of the SSD and Wifi cards, and also the mount and connector are still available for a 2.5" drive as it shares the chassis and motherboard from it's big brother the HP Pavilion Mini PC. The cable to install a 2.5" drive is extremely overpriced at the moment, but it is expected that cheap clones of the cable will eventually be available.

littleheaven

2130 posts

Uber Geek

#1312484 27-May-2015 09:46

I really wanted to get one of these, but got impatient waiting for it to become available here, and I prefer to buy computer gear locally if possible for the protection of the consumer guarantees act. Also the bright blue put me off a little. I still might get one when they come out here, as I have a family member who works for HP and can get it for me at staff pricing, and relegate the Minix to the bedroom TV.

Geek girl. Freelance copywriter and editor at Unmistakable.co.nz.

robjg63

4096 posts

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Subscriber

#1312596 27-May-2015 11:13

littleheaven: I really wanted to get one of these, but got impatient waiting for it to become available here, and I prefer to buy computer gear locally if possible for the protection of the consumer guarantees act. Also the bright blue put me off a little. I still might get one when they come out here, as I have a family member who works for HP and can get it for me at staff pricing, and relegate the Minix to the bedroom TV.

The issue is $180 USD (around $250NZD) + freight if bought from the internet vs what it would be sold for in NZ.
Also - it has been on the market overseas for a few months now - cant see any signs anyone is selling it here yet though.

Being tempted by internet goodies is a bit of a modern problem I think....

Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself - A. H. Weiler

gbwelly

1243 posts

Uber Geek

#1312637 27-May-2015 11:53

robjg63: The issue is $180 USD (around $250NZD) + freight if bought from the internet vs what it would be sold for in NZ.
Also - it has been on the market overseas for a few months now - cant see any signs anyone is selling it here yet though.

Being tempted by internet goodies is a bit of a modern problem I think....

For me I got it landed via YouShop and upgraded to 8GB RAM for $316, and to be honest it drives a lot like the Intel NUCs we use here at work. For me I'm willing to take the risk on the warranty for this sort of deal :-)

nathan

5695 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#1312642 27-May-2015 12:08

I would guess that your friend buying from HP at HP staff prices wouldn't be covered by Consumer Guarantees Act anyway

littleheaven

2130 posts

Uber Geek

#1312672 27-May-2015 12:55

nathan: I would guess that your friend buying from HP at HP staff prices wouldn't be covered by Consumer Guarantees Act anyway

I'm not sure about that - I presume a sale is a sale, regardless of whether it's at a discounted rate? I can also buy HP through Acquire at discounted corporate rates, come to think of it.

$316 including upgrade is pretty good, though. Worth the risk, definitely. Looking forward to hearing how you find it when it's up and running.

Geek girl. Freelance copywriter and editor at Unmistakable.co.nz.

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reven

3743 posts

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Trusted

#1312692 27-May-2015 13:11

going through amazon checkout, total for standard version (no ram upgrade) is NZD$294.34 delivered from amazon delivered within 9 to 12 business days :)

nathan

5695 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#1312782 27-May-2015 14:35

littleheaven:
nathan: I would guess that your friend buying from HP at HP staff prices wouldn't be covered by Consumer Guarantees Act anyway

I'm not sure about that - I presume a sale is a sale, regardless of whether it's at a discounted rate? I can also buy HP through Acquire at discounted corporate rates, come to think of it.

$316 including upgrade is pretty good, though. Worth the risk, definitely. Looking forward to hearing how you find it when it's up and running.

CGA only applies to consumers purchasing from a retailer.

Its not clear to me who the retailer would be in your scenario.

richms

28168 posts

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Lifetime subscriber

#1312825 27-May-2015 15:27

littleheaven:
nathan: I would guess that your friend buying from HP at HP staff prices wouldn't be covered by Consumer Guarantees Act anyway

I'm not sure about that - I presume a sale is a sale, regardless of whether it's at a discounted rate? I can also buy HP through Acquire at discounted corporate rates, come to think of it.

$316 including upgrade is pretty good, though. Worth the risk, definitely. Looking forward to hearing how you find it when it's up and running.

You will generally find that any account you buy thru will have had the person creating it agree that all purchases are for use in the business so no, you would not get CGA cover.

Its a great way for companies to get out of the act. If you then try to CGA them over something they will say that you are using the account improperly and that will put you back on the bad prices.

Richard rich.ms

littleheaven

2130 posts

Uber Geek

#1313115 27-May-2015 21:22

Thanks for the clarification. In that case buying through Acquire looks more attractive, assuming it becomes available.

Geek girl. Freelance copywriter and editor at Unmistakable.co.nz.

gbwelly

1243 posts

Uber Geek

#1313238 28-May-2015 07:37

OK, the new HTPC build is progressing well. So far I have tested recording two shows to the iSCSI volume concurrently, playing back one of them and skipping forwards and back like a maniac, and playing a third recorded show back as well. It handled it fine. The video library and Plex server are also installed on the same server box but have a dedicated drive. This was a good decision because copying a 2 gig file to or from the iSCSI volume makes TV very choppy so the drive hosting the iSCSI lun does need to be dedicated to the task.

In terms of video decoding the HP box is very capable, even whilst recording two shows and watching a third I was able to playback a bluray rip concurrently without any issue. I will just need to install a MKV splitter next and I should then be sorted for codecs.

Installing the Pro version of windows rather than the Bing edition does consume considerable amounts of disk space. I have about 13GB free now after using powercfg to remove the hibernation file. I also have reduced the page file to 1GB.

So far the project looks set to be successful. I will be getting a dedicated network adaptor for the iscsi traffic on the target, so when I am importing significant amounts of content into the video library I don't upset the apple cart for any shows recording.

I was also pleasantly surprised to see the iSCSI initiator connection is instantaneous when the HP box wakes from sleep, this was concerning me as it will need to be present before recordings start.

Next up is shortening the USB cable on the Microsoft IR receiver for tidiness purposes.

One unknown is whether I will have issues with HDMI audio, I have not been able to test this in my lab, I will only find out when the little beast is allowed into the lounge tomorrow.

u13turbo

156 posts

Master Geek

#1313664 28-May-2015 19:13

What's the pros from having windows 8.1 pro over 8.1 Bing?

k1w1k1d

1519 posts

Uber Geek

#1313668 28-May-2015 19:29

This should answer your question;
http://www.howtogeek.com/195934/what-exactly-is-windows-8.1-with-bing-do-i-have-to-use-bing

gbwelly

1243 posts

Uber Geek

#1313673 28-May-2015 19:45

u13turbo: What's the pros from having windows 8.1 pro over 8.1 Bing?

In this situation basically only because Windows Media Center can't be added to Bing/standard editions. If you were to use Kodi/Plex you would only need Bing edition plus perhaps LAV filters for codec support.

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