The Beelink Mini ME Is Blowing Up… But Is It Worth It?

Beelink Mini ME might be one of the best budget homelab options and micro NAS's on the market.
Alright guys, let’s be real. You’ve probably seen the Beelink Mini ME all over YouTube lately. It’s the hot new little box everyone’s talking about. And honestly? I almost didn’t want to review it because the hype was that strong. But you know me — I don’t do hype, I do truth.

So here’s the deal: nobody sent me this thing. I’m not sponsored. I bought it with my own cash so I could give you the uncensored, straight‑up review.

Product Links
Beelink Mini ME - https://tinyurl.com/2xfz3s6e
My HomeLab Buying List - https://www.amazon.com/shop/hillphantom

The Beelink Mini ME packs an Intel N150, 12GB DDR5 RAM, onboard 64GB eMMC with Windows 11 preinstalled, and slots for up to seven NVMe drives — one at Gen 4 speed, the rest Gen 3. On paper, it sounds like the perfect budget homelab or NAS. And honestly? For $209, it kind of is.

Here’s what surprised me most:
👉 It’s whisper quiet. If you’ve been watching my channel, you know I can’t stand loud fans. This thing runs so quiet you’ll forget it’s even on.
👉 The form factor is tiny — like, it could hide behind a picture frame tiny — and yet it still stays cool thanks to solid thermal design.
👉 For Plex, Docker, retro gaming (up to PS2 comfortably), and a bunch of daily tasks, it absolutely delivers.

But it’s not perfect. Let’s be real:
The RAM and CPU are soldered, so forget about upgrades.
Only one Gen 4 NVMe lane — the rest are Gen 3, which means speed bottlenecks if you’re filling this thing up.
NVMe drives aren’t cheap, so by the time you max it out, the cost stacks up quick.

Chapters
00:00 - Not Sponsored Review
01:07 -Beelink Mini ME Specs
02:00 - My Overview
02:30 - Some Downfalls
04:00 - Tradeoffs
04:30 - What can you do with it?
05:30 - Dual Booting and My Set Up
06:50 - Virtual Machines?
07:39 - Better than Raspberry Pi Cluster
08:27 - N150 has limitations
09:41 - Real World Examples and Gaming
10:40 - Impressed but some drawbacks
11:20 - All in One Homelab is a buy

Still, I was impressed. In my setup, I kept the free Windows license on the eMMC (why waste it?) and installed UNRAID on a USB thumb drive. That gives me redundancy, Docker hosting, and a couple of smooth‑running VMs without breaking a sweat. It’s simple, flexible, and just works.

Could you get more power from a beefier system or a Synology/QNAP box? Sure. But not at this size, this price, and definitely not this quiet. For someone starting out in the homelab world, or anyone wanting a silent, energy‑efficient server they can just tuck away and forget about — the Beelink Mini ME is a game changer.

So the question is — would you buy it? And if so, how would you use it? Drop your thoughts in the comments — I love seeing how you guys put this tech to work.

If you want to support the channel, I’ll have a link down below. Costs you nothing extra, but it really helps me as I push toward full‑time YouTube. Smash that like, subscribe if you haven’t, and stick around — because I’ve got way more homelab deep dives coming your way.

My Other Homelab Videos
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Until next time —
I’m HillPhantom.

#BeelinkMiniME #Homelab #NAS #Docker #UNRAID #HillPhantom #TechReview