GMKtec is a brand we tested a mini PC for back in the summer. As a reminder, GMKtec is a sub-brand of Shenzhen GMK Technology Co., Ltd, based in China, which started operations in 2019, and according to their own website, their Mini PCs are sold in over 70 countries with official distributors and service networks established in 35 of them. Looking online, and from the point of view of end users on places like Reddit, GMKtec appears to have the mindset of "a cheaper Beelink" equivalent, which is not a bad place to be, really!
They contacted me again asking if I was interested in taking a look at the M7 Ultra, you"d be forgiven in thinking that the name must be promising something truly spectacular, however at first glance it follows from my experience with the NUCBOX N10. The specs aren"t cutting edge, but it has a few surprises up its sleeve to make it a worthy contender in the saturated Mini PC space.
Before we get underway, here is a disclaimer: GMKtec provided a free sample without any review pre-approval. Below are its full specifications.
| GMKTec M7 Ultra | ||
|---|---|---|
| Dimensions | ||
| Weight | 604 g | |
| CPU | AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U (8C/16T, 16MB L3, 2.7-4.3 GHz, TDP 15W) TBP: 54W | |
| Graphics | AMD Radeon 680M (12 CU"s, 2000MHz, Boost: 2200MHz) 12 RDNA 3 Graphics Cores 768 shading units / stream processors (12 CUs) 48 texture mapping units, and 32 ROPs | |
| NPU | No | |
| Memory | 16 GB / 32 GB Dual-channel DDR5 4800 MT/s TWSC SODIMM | |
| Storage | 1 x M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 3x4, TWSC 512 GB / 1 TB (PCIe Gen 4x4 slot) 1 x M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 4x4 slot (unpopulated) | |
| Expansion | OCuLink (PCIe 4.0 x4) | |
| Operating System | Windows 11 Pro 25H2 | |
| Bluetooth | Bluetooth 5.2 | |
| Ethernet | Dual Intel I226-V 2.5G LAN | |
| Wireless LAN | Wi-Fi 6E (RZ616, up to 2.4Gbps) | |
| Rear I/O ports | 2 x USB 2.0 (480Mbps) 1 x HDMI 2.1 (8K@60Hz) 1 x DisplayPort 2.0 (8K@60Hz) 1 x USB4 (PD 3.0 100W input/DP1.4 4K 60Hz/USB 40Gbps) 2 x RJ45 LAN (2.5Gbps) 1 x DC IN 1 x Security lock hole | |
| Front I/O ports | 2 x USB 3.2 Gen2 (10Gbps) 1 x 3.5mm audio jack (CTIA, 4-segment headphone with MIC support) 1 x OCulink (PCIE GEN4 X4) 1 x USB4 (PD 3.0 100W input/DP1.4 4K 60Hz/USB 40Gbps) Power / LED button (white indicator) | |
| (Bio) Security | No | |
| SD Card slot | No | |
| Kensington Lock | Yes | |
| Power | DC IN (5.5/2.5mm) 19V/6.32A, External PSU / built-in CMOS battery | |
| MSRP | $469.99, $539.99 $649.99 | |
As you can see this has pretty decent specs, even for its MSRP. The M7 Ultra is available as Barebone (No OS, memory or SSD,) or in 16G+512G, or 32G+1TB configurations with Windows 11 Pro preloaded.
Despite its almost four year old CPU our variant comes with 32 gigs of DDR5 memory and two full USB4 ports supporting power delivery at up to 100W. Unfortunately it also ships with a 1TB PCI 3.0 X4 SSD, however both NVME ports are capable of PCIe 4.0 X4 so you could swap it out for something quicker.
Introduction
The M7 Ultra is powered by the in Q2 2022-released AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U which is a mobile CPU targeted at enterprise devices. The 6850U features 8 cores (16 threads thanks to SMT support) running at up to 4.7 GHz, along with the now aging Radeon 680M iGPU. There is no NPU here.
On the graphics front, the 6850U includes a Radeon 680M integrated GPU with a max GPU frequency of 2200 MHz across 12 cores. It has been said that the iGPU is equivalent to the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 3050 mobile iGPU in gaming and synthetic benchmarks and suited to 1080p gaming. Other highlights include DDR5 memory at 4800 MT/s, Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2, and a Kensington Lock.
AI PC?
Nope.
The packaging is a standard affair for Mini PCs. Once the box top is lifted off it reveals the M7 Ultra sitting in a foam cushion wrapped in a protective plastic sleeve, below that is an envelope full of documentation. On the bottom there are two cardboard boxes with the other components such as the power brick and lead, HDMI cable, and the VESA mount plate with screws.
What’s In The Box
- GMKTec M7 Ultra Mini PC
- HDMI cable
- VESA mount and bag of screws
- Power adapter
- Warranty card
- 1 x User Guide
Instead of a link to the online user manual, GMKtec has a web page with tens of "how to" videos on various things and different Mini PCs. Anyway I could not find a digital version of the user manual.
Design
The M7 Ultra is a familiar square design, the just over 600 grams of weight retains a good heft to it; while not being heavy. It definitely gives off a premium and balanced feel to it. All the edges and corners, except for the bottom edges of the Mini PC, are rounded, so it is comfortable to hold and move around; it"s essentially an all-metal frame and housing with the top "lid" being made from plastic.
The M7 Ultra also includes two USB 4.0 ports (Type-C) on the front and back of the Mini PC. Regarding ports, on the front from left to right there is an OCuLink, Type-C USB port with PD 3.0 100W input/DP1.4 4K 60Hz/USB 40Gbps, two USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports (10Gbps), and an audio jack and the power button.
As far as looks go, it has a two tone grey exterior, and it"s not a fingerprint magnet. GMKTec does not say what materials are used for the exterior on the product page or specs. Like other Mini PCs I have tested, it"s physically possible to directly attach four screens to the M7 Ultra using the two full HDMI (2.1) and DisplayPort (2.0) ports, along with the two USB 4.0 ports, both of which have Power Delivery to power an external portable monitor.
Regarding connectivity, around the back, from left to right there are two USB 2.0 ports, the full DisplayPort 2.0 and HDMI 2.1 ports, two 2.5 GbE Ethernet ports, a USB 4.0 port, and a barrel port for power. You can also affix a Kensington lock on the back side, below the DC jack port.
Teardown
No review I do would ever be complete without some sort of teardown.
Opening the M7 Ultra is a bit different than what I am used to:
- Twist the top plate anti-clockwise and lift off;
- Remove the four screws in each corner;
- Lift off the fan plate (be careful not to pull the fan lead);
- You now have access to the NVME and memory slots.
As you can see from the above images, which can be enlarged when clicked on, I only removed that top plate once, and it is already scratched up. You have to sort of feel your way back into the locking position. This plate also has a dual function, since it is not flush with the chassis it creates around 3 millimeters of space for the fan to expel hot air through the top. The rear, sides and bottom plates allow air to be pulled in to assist cooling.
There is ample room to manage the SODIMMs and 1 TB SSD, so you can swap them out for something else if you want, or add in a second SSD in the unpopulated M.2 slot. As I previously mentioned, although the SSD that ships with the M7 Ultra is PCI 3x4, both M.2 slots support up to PCIe 4x4.
Usage
BIOS
The M7 Ultra includes an AptiBIOS, which is not completely locked down; the Advanced tab is available, and you can also manage the Security and Boot order. However it"s not possible to take screenshots with the F12 key.
Setting up the M7 Ultra
On first boot, you are prompted to complete the setup of Windows 11 Pro, meaning you do not have to fork out for a license, which is nice. After the setup is finished, I am happy to report that it does not come with any bloatware installed. The OOBE also installs several updates to Windows 25H2 26200.7171.
Before starting with benchmarks, I checked Windows Security, which gave several alerts, which ended up being because OneDrive was not set up and because I was not logged in with a Microsoft account (unsure how these two things affect PC security but hey ho,) after dismissing them the Windows Security dashboard was green across the board. Memory Integrity was already enabled.
I also disabled Copilot and Edge browser Startup boost so that Edge wasn"t running in the background during benchmark tests, and I disabled OneDrive from startup programs via Task Manager.
Benchmarks
With that out of the way, and because people like that sort of thing, I ran some benchmarks and compared them with a couple of other Mini PCs, one with a Ryzen 9 HX370 Mini PC, and the other with a Ryzen 9 8845HS. The M7 Ultra is running Windows 11 Professional 25H2 build with the latest (November 2025) updates, and the latest AMD Graphics and Chipset drivers (25.12.1 and 7.11.26.2142).
For the benchmarks, I used Cinebench 2024, 7-Zip, AS SSD, and CrystalDiskMark. 3DMark, PCMark 10, Procyon (Windows ML for CPU and GPU) was provided to Neowin by UL Solutions; Primate Labs Inc. provided us with commercial versions of Geekbench 6, and Geekbench AI.
3DMark Time Spy tests gaming capability with DX12 graphics performance. PCMark tests are a mix of CPU and real-world productivity tests, such as using an office suite, web browsing, light photo/video editing, and making conference calls. Cinebench stresses the entire CPU as it is a multi-threaded rendering test. Geekbench is a synthetic benchmark that is great for a quick look at the potential performance across a wide range of workloads.
I also used HWiNFO to monitor hardware sensors and temperature readings.
| GMKTec M7 Ultra Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U | GMKTec A9 MAX Ryzen AI 9 HX370 | Geekom AE8 Ryzen 9 8945HS | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3DMark: Time Spy Steel Nomad Light Steel Nomad Fire Strike Wild Life | 2,542 2,187 364 6,479 14,273 | 3,732 3,293 518 8,579 20,773 | 3,343 2,915 499 |
| PCMark 10: Standard Extended test | 6,767 6,841 | 7,762 7,675 | 7,488 7,423 |
| Procyon: Windows ML CPU | 99 187 - | 129 255 788 | 125 219 - |
| Geekbench 6: Single Multicore Compute (OpenCL) | 2,087 9,752 27,913 | 2,885 15,196 39,233 | 2,662 13,468 31,707 |
| Geekbench AI | Single, Half, Quantized | Single, Half, Quantized | Single, Half, Quantized |
| ONNX CPU ONNX DirectML OpenVINO NPU | 3333, 1529, 5226 5889, 8590, 4545 3969, 3746, 6037 | 4229, 2100, 7774 7596, 12469, 5730 6197, 6177, 16420 | 4503, 1978, 8823 7301, 11678, 5499 6394, 6329, 17840 |
| Cinebench 2024: Single Multicore | 87 631 | 120 1,146 | 107 938 |
| 7-Zip | 89,999 | 123,551 | 102,259 |
Geekbench AI scores are in the following order (left to right): Single Precision, Half Precision, Quantized.
As was to be expected, the Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U falls below both the Ryzen AI 9 HX370 and Ryzen 9 8945HS in all tests, no surprises here.
Gaming
The M7 Ultra has a pretty weak 680M that does not come close to any dedicated GPU, so it goes without saying that expectations should be checked in this department. However it falls just below the pretty old GTX 1050 (nine years old now) dedicated GPU in terms of performance (this is also something GMKTec highlights on the product page).
Final Fantasy XV
To gauge the capability of the 12CU Radeon 680M integrated graphics processor (iGPU), I ran the standalone Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition Benchmark on different resolutions at the Standard Quality preset to see what kind of gaming performance one can expect from the onboard GPU.
The full scores are below, and are based on the settings detected for the game, which recommended 1080p at Standard quality.
For comparison, an MSI A15 Thin laptop was used that packs a Ryzen 7 7735HS APU with a 12CU Radeon 680M iGP, which is the same iGP as the one we have on the M7 Ultra, but as you will see, performance can vary greatly depending on form factor. We also have the 16CU 890M of the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and 12CU 780M on the Ryzen 7 8745HS on our other mini PC devices.
We start off at 720p, where every iGP was able to deliver a playable performance, ie, >30 FPS. Quite surprisingly, the 680M on the M7 Ultra was able to outperform the 780M on the AX8 Max, and compared to the same iGP inside the MSI A15 Thin laptop, we see a 17% gain. This was mostly down to clock speeds, as the 680M inside the M7 Ultra mini PC was able to hold higher clocks much more easily.
The 780M, though, continues to maintain its lead over the 680M, indicating the VRAM bandwidth in its case is plentiful. Memory bandwidth plays a big part in the case of the M7 Ultra too as the 4800 MT/s memory runs out of steam gradually as we raise the resolution, you can see it falling behind slowly. While the laptop"s iGP seems certainly quite capable, the TWSC RAM may not be as good as the Samsung module we have in the MSI A15 Thin notebook.
Browser Performance (result is best to worst)
| Browser | Low | High |
|---|---|---|
| Edge | 27.5 | 27.7 |
| Chrome | 25.8 | 26.3 |
| Firefox | 20.2 | 20.7 |
Next up, I tested browsing performance using Speedometer 3.1. Speedometer provides a value and also a range showing the lowest and highest scores after three runs, as indicated in the chart above by the two scores for each browser. Edge is the clear winner here, with Chrome coming out in second. Firefox was left in the dust coming in 7 points below Edge on the high, and 7.3 points behind on the low score recorded on each browser after three runs.
Disk performance
I also tested the SSD"s capability using AS SSD and CrystalDiskMark.
| AS SSD | CrystalDiskMark |
|---|---|
The TWSC 1TB SSD is rated for 3500/3100 MB/s read/write, and you can see that it"s pretty mediocre with writes, not coming close to its own rating; however read speeds are better matching or exceeding the claimed rating in our tests. It"s unclear why GMKTec decided to go with such an SSD when the world has mostly moved onto PCIe 4x4 drives, most likely a cost cutting exercise!
3DMark Storage Benchmark
Next, I ran the Storage Benchmark, which is a component test that measures the performance of the TWSC SSD, particularly for gaming, using real-world gaming-related activities like loading games and recording gameplay. As you can see, this SSD falls well below the average of all those tested.
Heat
Despite running all of the above benchmark tests, the M7 Ultra did get a bit warm on the top, but no annoying noises were coming from the single fan that cools the unit. The Highest CPU temperature recorded was during the Fire Strike test, where the CPU Core reached 86.5 °C.
Infrared thermal imaging
| Top | Bottom |
|---|---|
Despite all this, the outer shell never exceeded 38 °C while I was pointing my FLIR ONE Gen 3 thermal camera at a hot spot on the bottom while running a 3DMark Fire Strike test. The top of the Mini PC even showed a more uniform max temp of 35°C across the whole plate, while on the bottom, it was more concentrated towards the back.
Power draw
During my testing, I also kept an eye on the power draw using a Green Blue energy meter.
| in Standby | Windows 25H2 idle |
|---|---|
As you can see above, when powered off, it draws roughly 1.6W in Standby. When turned on and idle with no apps opened and just sitting in the Windows desktop, the draw was roughly 14-16W.
| Cinebench 2024 | CrystalDiskMark (peak) | 3DMark Fire Strike |
|---|---|---|
Next, I measured the maximum power draw when running the Cinebench 2024 test, which relies mostly on CPU access. I also measured power usage during the CrystalDiskMark and saw a peak of 35.6W, and finally, a peak of 63.7W was measured when running the 3Dmark Fire Strike benchmark.
Conclusion
I"ve said it time and time again, I love these Mini PCs. They simply aren"t gaming PCs, though, so you will not be able to enjoy graphically intensive games on them. For that, you need a dGPU along the lines of the mobile Nvidia 4060, AMD 7600 (XT), or better. However, it absolutely is suited for light gaming, and perhaps more so as an office workstation. Perhaps it"s a good solution for a student with limited living space, with the ability to pack this into a backpack for a portable solution. This thing isn"t taking up much room; you can even screw it to the back of a screen if it has VESA support with the included mount plate.
In a world that is apparently too stingy for phone manufacturers to include a power lead and charger for their flagship phones, GMKTec has provided all of the cables and tools necessary to get started straight away, along with a Windows 11 Pro license and a booklet with instructions on how to access the internals.
When it comes to Mini PCs, the market is saturated with crap, so you really have to be on the lookout and study the specs properly. One trick I have seen often is Mini PCs utilizing old tech, sometimes two generations behind. This Mini PC will let you connect to four displays, whereas cheaper solutions will be limited to two screens.
The good
What I love about this is the fully functional USB4 port on the front, this means no messing about during presentations, just whack the portable/external display in the front port, need to charge your phone? That port offers up to 100W power delivery, so it will juice any modern flagship with PD 3.0 support. I also like the OCuLink option, this means you can get this relatively cheap mini PC and pair it with any dedicated GPU to beef up the performance.
The bad
While there"s not a lot to dislike about this Mini PC, I have to fault the decision to include a PCIe 3.0 SSD, I mean this decision was taken before AI companies started gobbling up storage and memory chips like there"s no tomorrow. There"s also no SD card slot, but that"s just me nitpicking now, it has everything else you could want from a mini PC, even HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort 2.0 support.
Would I recommend?
For the discounted price (of around $469.99, see below), yes, yes!
Where to buy
Assuming you"ve made it this far, our configuration at an MSRP of $649.99 is not even that expensive compared to the competition, even if we consider that GMKTec currently has it discounted by $180, bringing the price down to $469.99 on the official website.
- 32GB+1TB - GMKTec M7 Ultra official U.S. website for $469.99 (was $649.99)
- 16GB+512GB - GMKTec M7 Ultra official U.S. website for $389.99 (was $539.99)
- BAREBONE - GMKTec M7 Ultra official U.S. website for $309.99 (was $469.99)
- 16GB+1TB - GMKTec M7 Ultra on Amazon U.S. for $419.99 (25% off)
- 32GB+512GB - GMKTec M7 Ultra on Amazon U.S. for $439.99 (27% off)
- 32GB+1TGB - GMKTec M7 Ultra on Amazon U.S. for $459.99 (30% off)
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