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used mini pcs

CPU generation

Intel 8th Gen (Coffee Lake / Whiskey Lake / Kaby Lake-R) mini PCs

This is the generation where used tiny PCs got interesting. Desktop Coffee Lake T-series chips moved the Core i5 from four to six cores at the same 35 W. The media engine matches Kaby Lake, with HEVC 10-bit and VP9 decode. And 8th gen is the oldest Intel Core generation on Microsoft's Windows 11 list. That combination makes 8th-gen 1-liter PCs a practical baseline for Windows 11 desktops, Plex or Jellyfin servers, Home Assistant and small Proxmox nodes. Watch the naming, though: Kaby Lake-R and Whiskey Lake laptop chips also carry the 8th-gen label but are 4-core U-series parts, not desktop Coffee Lake.

Released
2017
In mini PCs
Desktop T-series chips move to 6 cores (Core i5 6c/6t, Core i7 6c/12t) at 35 W; laptop-class Kaby Lake-R U-series chips are quad-core.
Windows 11
On Microsoft's supported list. 8th-gen Core i3/i5/i7 and Pentium Gold G5000 are on Microsoft's supported lists, so chips like the i5-8500T, i3-8100T and Pentium Gold G5400T qualify. TPM 2.0 and Secure Boot must be enabled in firmware.
Media engine
Quick Sync: H.264, HEVC 10-bit, VP9
Frigate OpenVINO
Supported on the Intel iGPU
Memory
DDR4

13 models with Intel 8th Gen (Coffee Lake / Whiskey Lake / Kaby Lake-R)

Deciding between generations? See Windows 11 eligibility by CPU generation and Quick Sync transcoding by generation.

Other CPU generations