Acer’s Chromebox Mini CXM1 is a modest ChromeOS desktop designed to power digital signage and kiosks. For just $279.99, it provides a compact, VESA-mountable design, silent operation, Wi-Fi 6E, and support for up to three monitors. It should work fine for businesses, but mainstream shoppers may be frustrated by the limited performance shown by its aging Intel Celeron N4500 processor. For mini desktops that pack more punch for general audiences (such as for business or home productivity work), look to our Editors' Choice-award-winning Geekom A6 and Apple Mac mini. However, for small businesses in need of a low-cost and low-power computer, or an easy signage solution, the Chromebox Mini CXM1 will fit right in.

Configurations and Design: Compact and Understated

The Chromebox Mini CXM1 reviewed here features the aforementioned Celeron N4500, 8GB of LPDDR4X memory, and 64GB of eMMC storage. Acer’s CXM2, featuring updated Intel silicon and Wi-Fi 7, will soon replace the CXM1 at an unspecified price. This, in turn, could make the CXM1 even more affordable in the short term; however, the release date of the updated model has not been made public yet.

In addition to its old age, the Celeron N4500 sports just two processing cores and a 2.8GHz turbo clock, a combination that makes this one of the weakest-performing chips available in a current PC. It suffices for simple web browsing and background tasks, but not for more demanding tasks.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Competition comes from ChromeOS devices like Asus’ Chromebox 5A (starting at $329), CTL’s Chromebox CBx3 (starting at $359), and HP’s Chromebox G4 (starting at $349). Those models include a newer and modestly more powerful Celeron 7305 at a mildly higher price—a difference that can add up for bulk business buyers.

Design-wise, the CXM1’s sturdy black plastic—with minimal branding on top—gives the unit an industrial look. The system also runs silently, since the limited hardware inside doesn't produce enough heat to warrant active cooling. It became only lukewarm to the touch during our testing.

At 1.3 by 6.3 by 4.7 inches (HWD), this Chromebox is easy to mount out of sight. A bracket and Velcro strips are included, and it also supports VESA mounting. Its power adapter is external, but it too is compact and concealable. The wireless antennas for its Wi-Fi 6E radio are built into the chassis, eliminating the need for external protrusions.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The CXM1 features excellent connectivity, including an audio combo jack and three USB Type-A ports up front, along with an Ethernet jack, two HDMI outputs, a USB-C port, and two additional USB-A ports located at the rear. The USB-C port doubles as a DisplayPort output, allowing the system to support three total monitors. The HDMI ports are only version 1.4b, though, which is limited to a refresh rate of only 30Hz if powering a 4K display.

Other notables on the rear edge include the tiny barrel-style power jack and a Kensington lock slot. You'll find no features on the rest of the unit, and none of its components can be upgraded or replaced.

Performance Testing: Two Cores Are Limiting

As we haven’t tested any Chromeboxes recently, we selected several Chromebook models for benchmark comparison against the Chromebox Mini CXM1. The only one that isn’t an uprated Plus model is the CTL Chromebook PX141EXT, featuring an Intel Processor N100. The Plus models all feature more powerful hardware: the Asus Chromebook Plus CX14 leverages a Core 3 N355, the Acer Chromebook Plus Spin 514 includes an uncommon MediaTek Kompanio Ultra 910, and the HP Chromebook Plus x360 uses a Core i3-N305. 

Productivity and General Performance Tests

We challenge Chromebooks' productivity power with three overall performance benchmarks, two online and one based on Android. Basemark Web 3.0 runs in a browser tab, combining low-level JavaScript calculations with CSS and WebGL content. Principled Technologies' WebXPRT 4 uses HTML5, JavaScript, and WebAssembly workloads to simulate tasks ranging from photo enhancement and OCR scans to sales graphs and online homework. Finally, PCMark Work 3.0 for Android performs assorted productivity operations in a smartphone-style window, giving a sense of Android app performance on the device.

The Chromebox Mini performed poorly in Basemark, scoring significantly below its competition, which is, again, intended mainly for a different audience. (Well, except for the CTL laptop that also trounced it.) The Chromebox Mini fared better when it didn't rely so heavily on the CPU, as seen in PCMark (which didn’t run on all units) and WebXPRT 4, where its score still lagged about 40% behind most of the others. The Acer Chromebook, meanwhile, left the rest of them in the dust. The CXM1 will get through super-basic work tasks with ease, but little more than that, as these results show.

Component Tests

Finally, two more Android benchmarks focus on the CPU and GPU, respectively. Primate Labs' Geekbench 6 utilizes all available CPU cores and threads to simulate real-world applications, ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning. Meanwhile, GFXBench 5.1 stress-tests both low-level GPU routines, such as texturing, and high-level, game-like image rendering that exercises the GPU’s graphics and compute shaders. Geekbench delivers a numeric score, while GFXBench counts frames per second (fps).

The Chromebox Mini landed at the bottom of the charts in Geekbench 6, while the next-best machine, the CTL Chromebook, nearly tripled its score. Graphics performance isn’t a strength for the Chromebox Mini, either, where it produced roughly half the CTL’s performance and was only able to complete the Car Chase portion of GFXBench. The Chromebox Mini is capable of handling basic everyday use with a single app at a time; we wouldn't load it up with Chrome browser tabs or set it up as a daily driver for day-to-day work.