Beelink EQi12

It suits you if your day is browsing, email, documents and video calls, or if you want a small always-on box for a home server. At 126 x 126 x 44.2 mm it takes little desk space, and Windows 11 Pro comes installed. Developers will find it workable for coding.

Skip it if you want to play recent games, run language models locally or work in heavy 3D and video tools. The graphics are integrated Intel Iris Xe, there is no card slot, and there is no USB4, Thunderbolt or OCuLink port. Anyone who needs networking faster than 1GbE should look elsewhere too.

Everyday work is well suited: a Core i5-1235U with 10 cores, 12 threads and 16 GB of memory has room for many browser tabs, office apps and streaming.

Coding is workable. The processor and 16 GB of DDR4 handle editors and modest builds, but large projects or several virtual machines at once will press against the memory.

Gaming is a poor fit. Intel Iris Xe Graphics is integrated, and there is no card slot to add a graphics card.

Homelab is well suited thanks to 2 network ports and 2 M.2 slots, which make it a candidate for a firewall or a small Docker host. Both ports run at 1GbE, and with no SATA bays, file storage lives on M.2 drives.

Local AI is a poor fit. Generation speed depends on memory bandwidth, which Beelink does not state, and the operating system keeps about 8 GB of the 16 GB for itself, leaving little room for a model.

Workstation work is a poor fit: there is no discrete graphics, no x8 or x16 card slot, fewer than four memory slots and too little memory for the job.

The retail build of the EQi12 covered here pairs the Core i5-1235U with 16 GB of DDR4, a 500 GB NVMe drive and Windows 11 Pro, and it is sold new. It is not a barebones kit, so it works out of the box, and Beelink includes a Wi-Fi 6 module with Bluetooth 5.2. As it stands, this build is ready for everyday work and a home server. If 16 GB of memory or 500 GB of storage feels tight, the removable memory and the spare M.2 slot let you grow it yourself, as the next section explains.

Memory is not soldered and sits in 2 slots, so you can replace the installed 16 GB of DDR4. Beelink does not state the maximum memory or the memory speed, so check what the slots accept before buying modules.

Storage has more room: there are 2 M.2 slots of the 2280 length, and the 500 GB NVMe drive leaves a slot free for another M.2 drive. The first slot runs at PCIe 4.0, so a PCIe 5.0 drive there would run at PCIe 4.0 speed. There are no SATA bays.

You can run 2 screens, both over HDMI, since there are 2 HDMI outputs and no DisplayPort. Beelink does not state the HDMI version, so do not count on 4K above 60 Hz, which needs an HDMI 2.1 output, cable and display together.

Networking is 2 Ethernet ports at 1GbE, plus Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2. For a firewall, the 2 wired ports let you keep the internet side apart from the home network. There are no USB4 or Thunderbolt ports and no OCuLink.

The ceiling is set by the hardware: integrated graphics, no card slot, no USB4, Thunderbolt or OCuLink, and networking that stops at 1GbE.

Beelink does not state the maximum memory, memory speed or bandwidth, ECC support, graphics memory, the second M.2 slot's PCIe generation, M.2 SATA support, the number of USB-C and USB-A ports, whether USB-C carries video, the HDMI version, the power supply, the TDP, a VESA mount or an SD card reader.

When you compare other machines, start with the facts that limit this one. Look for network ports faster than 1GbE if the box will route or serve files, a stated memory ceiling above 16 GB if you plan virtual machines, and USB4 or Thunderbolt ports if you want fast external connections. If gaming matters, look for discrete graphics instead of integrated.