Overview
Apple products using newer Apple Silicon chips are absolutely incredible. Highly efficient and powerful. So, what’s the catch? Apple charges absurd amounts of money for anything beyond the base spec.
For example, at present time the base M4 mac mini is an amazing deal at $599 for the 16gb/256gb model. But, 256gb of storage in 2025 is absolutely ridiculous.
Apple charges $200 for 512gb (really only +256gb), and $400 for 1TB (+754gb), and $800 for 2TB !!!
Third party PCIE 4.0 2TB NVME drives are as cheap as $90 for budget drives and $120-$150 for top tier drives, so Apple is charging 5-6x retail prices for these which are insane.
Additionally, the base M4 mac minis only come with a 1Gbe ethernet port, charging $100 for a 10Gbe option.
Enter, the Beelink Mate Mini:


This new Thunderbolt 5 hub is an insanely affordable hub compared to the competition for expanding storage and also adding a few ports.
It’s designed to sit above or below your Mac Mini, but also can easily be attached with a Thunderbolt 5 cable to any laptop or miniPC. For sake of this review I’ll be testing it with an M1 Macbook Pro Max, a Minix N512, and a Beelink SER8.
Opening it up involves removing the rubber adhesive pads, and then removing about 8 small screws.


The NVME port is easy to access, and a thermal pad is ready to go for you.
Specs:
Storage | A-type: 2 x NVME PCIE 4.0 x 2 ports (~3000MB/s), or B-type: 1 x NVME PCIE 4.0 x 4 ports (6228MB/s) |
Ethernet | 2.5Gbe ethernet |
Data | (2) USB 3.0, (1) Thunderbolt 5 80Gbps |
Other | (1) 3.5mm headphone, (1) USB-C PD external power option |
Beelink offers 2 versions of this, the type A that’s probably best for most has two NVME slots that run PCIE 4.0 x 2 lanes, and it’s still quite quick up to around 3000MB/s. For most home users that use this for backup that is plenty of speed and allows for up to 16GB of storage (2x8gb).
If you want raw speed, the type-B that I’m testing out here uses all 4 PCIE lanes and can reach up to 6228MB/s when using a TB5 port and a fast SSD. (note that TB4 ports as used in this test max out at 40GB/s).
While I didn’t need to use external power, Beelink indicated that for the USB-C PD spec: “It supports fast charging at 5V / 9V / 12V / 20V. Any USB-C PD charger with 15W or above should work just fine”
Speed Testing
I am looking to buy a new M5 based Mac Mini when they come out shortly, but in the meantime tested the Mate Mini across 3 devices: a 2021 16″ Macbook Pro Max (TB4), a Beelink SER8 (TB4, AMD based cpu), and a Mini N512 (TB4, intel based cpu).
I am using a 512GB KC3000 Gen 4 NVME drive which is considered a high end SSD. In previous testing within a device, this SSD reached around 7000MB/s sequential read and around 3900MB/s sequential write in crystaldiskmark. We of course don’t expect it to hit those numbers under TB4!
M1 Macbook Pro Max:

Here, the KC3000 was formatted using APFS. Blackmagic disk test had it regularly hitting around 2500MB/s write and 3000MB/sec read. Thunderbolt 5 testing from other reviewers has these numbers hitting as high as 5000-6000MB/sec.
Beelink SER8 (AMD 8845HS):

CrystalDiskMark tests slightly differently than BlackMagic, but here you can see 3900MB/s read speeds and 1920MB/s write speeds.
This test was done with NTFS formatting of the drive. ExFAT performed nearly identically.
Minix N512 (intel i5-12600H):

My Minix N512 with the intel i5-12600H chip and TB4 performed similarly. This machine may have run slightly slower due to it currently having a single DDR5 chip instead of dual ram chips.
Strengths
- Incredibly affordable for a TB5 enclosure
- Very fast performance, even with TB4
- 2.5Gbe ethernet port
- Quiet fan
Could be improved
- Removing the rubber arced feet to expose the screws is annoying, especially if you plan to open the device multiple times.
Summary
Overall, the Beelink Mate Mini is an astounding value compared to competitors that want $200-$300 for TB5 expansion hubs. I look forward to testing it with an M5 Mac Mini in the near future and in some TB5 vs TB4 options.
For those that mostly wil use these machines for additional media storage, just buy the type-A and get more expansion. If you want to do more video editing consider using the full TB5 port and getting the type-B that can hit 6000MB/s+.
The 2.5Gbe ethernet is a nice perk for those with the 1Gbe mac mini option.
This device has proven to work great across many platforms as shown here with both Mac and Windows/AMD/Intel machines.
Buy the Beelink Mate Mini on Amazon now.
I also recommend this OWC Thunderbolt 5 cable to attach to devices other than the Mac Mini.