The ASUS ExpertCenter PN54-S1 is a mainstream mini PC offering that occupies a really small footprint and is targeted at the SMB and home productivity crowd. With the variant that's powered by the Ryzen 7 260 processor, it does pack some graphics processing power for light 1080p gaming thanks to its Radeon 780M iGPU.

First announced in October 2025, the ASUS ExpertCenter PN54-S1 follows on the heels of the vanilla PN54 that I had the opportunity to review just a few weeks back, where this time round, we've got pared-down specs when compared to the OG PN54 - we're talking about processors from AMD's "Hawk Point" Ryzen 200 series line-up and *gasp* the lack of a Copilot button on the front of the PC.

All levity aside, the PN54-S1 is a budget-friendlier mainstream mini PC offering that occupies a really small footprint and is targeted at the small-medium business (SMB) and home office productivity crowd. For this review, we'll be taking a look at the highest-end PN54-S1 offering that's powered by the Ryzen 7 260 eight-core processor - this processor comes with a Radeon 780M integrated GPU that surprisingly, can somewhat game at 1080p on low-to-medium graphics settings. Read on to see if this mini PC is any good!

Summary of Specifications: ASUS ExpertCenter PN54-S1 (90MS0391-S00081)

• Processor: AMD Ryzen 7 260 (8x Zen 4 cores, 5.1GHz max boost clock)
• Memory: 32GB (32GBx1) Samsung DDR5 5600 SODIMM
• Storage: 512GB WD SN5000S NVMe SSD
• GPU: Integrated AMD Radeon 780M Graphics
• Audio: Realtek ALC3251
• Ethernet: Dual Realtek RTL8125BG 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet
• Wireless: MediaTek MT7295B22M WIFI 7 with Bluetooth 5.4
• Power Supply: Delta ADP-120VH D 120W power adapter
• OS: Microsoft Windows 11 Pro
• Official ASUS product page: https://www.asus.com/displays-desktops/mini-pcs/pn-series/asus-expertcenter-pn54-s1/

Note, the 90MS0391-S00081 variant featured in this review appears to be a review sample, going from the lack of information on this particular part number on the web.

Packaging & Accessories

Given that this is a product targeted primarily at business and commercial applications, the PN54-S1 comes with a run-of-the-mill appearance for the packaging that’s very similar to the packaging of the vanilla PN54, where it features a black and grey colourway

The following accessories come included with the ExpertCenter PN54-S1:

• Delta ADP-120VH D 120W AC adapter with power cord
• VESA mounting kit (VESA monitor backplate with corresponding screws)
• User manual
• Warranty card

Aesthetics & Physical Features

The ExpertCenter PN54-S1 has a pretty compact footprint, where it measures in at just 130mm x 130mm x 34mm. As far as I can tell, it uses the same chassis as the PN54 that I reviewed a couple of weeks back.

The mini PC has an exterior chassis that’s constructed entirely of plastic, with a matte finish for the top and bottom. As can be seen, we get a fingerprint sensor on the top panel, and over on the bottom panel, we get no shortage of little square ventilation openings and four round rubber feet. Also visible are the two screw holes that are to be used for VESA mounting purposes, and a latch and lock mechanism that are used for service access purposes.

For added visual interest, we get vertical stripes in a glossy finish that wrap around the short edge of the mini PC. All in all, the PN54-S1 has an uncontroversial aesthetic that would make it right at home in an office environment.

On the left side of the mini PC, we get ventilation openings, and the same goes for the right side, where we get a Kensington lock slot in the bottom right hand corner.

In terms of front I/O, we get a power button, a 3.5mm audio combo jack, two USB 10Gbps Type-A ports as well as a USB 10Gbps Type-C port.

Over on the rear, we get a USB4 Type-C port that supports DisplayPort video output and Power Delivery, two DisplayPort 1.4 ports, dual 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet ports, a USB 2.0 Type-A port, a USB 10Gbps Type-A port, a HDMI 2.1 port as well as a port for the mini PC’s power adapter. In case you’re wondering, the PN54-S1 supports up to four simultaneous 4K displays.

Service Access

For service access, the PN54-S1 features a chassis with a tool-less design, where gaining access to the motherboard involves undoing a lock on the bottom cover and thereafter, sliding the spring-loaded release button to the left to unlatch the said bottom cover, where you can then lift it away from the chassis.

With the bottom lid removed, we catch a glimpse of the PN54-S1's motherboard, where the mini PC's SODIMM slots and M.2 slots are all within easy reach.

First up, we’ve got the two DDR5 SODIMM slots that the mini PC comes with right here, where one of them is pre-populated with a Samsung 32GB DDR5 5600 SODIMM module - I do wish that the PC had come shipped with dual 16GB sticks of RAM instead for a dual-channel configuration, as running the PC in single-channel mode does leave performance on the table, which in my opinion, is a cardinal sin in PC building.

That said, the memory slots have a rectangular shroud of some sort, I can’t quite tell what material it’s made of, but I’m guessing it’s used probably as a heatsink of sorts. As of the time of publishing this review, the ExpertCenter PN54-S1 supports a maximum of 64GBs of RAM, that is, two 32GB sticks of RAM.

Next to the RAM slots, we can see the two PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slots that the mini PC comes with, of which one of the slots is populated by a preinstalled WD SN5000S 512GB NVMe SSD. According to WD’s specs sheet, the 512GB variant of the SN5000S has sequential read speeds of up to 6000MB/s, sequential write speeds of up to 4200MB/s, and utilises QLC NAND flash. The other M.2 slot, which is a PCIe 4.0 x4 slot, is empty and available for you to install a second drive where needed.

Installing and removing M.2 drives from the motherboard is a breeze, seeing as both slots utilise tool-less retention tab mechanisms.

It’s great to see that we do get two thermal pads for the M.2 slots on the lid of the PN54-S1, which should go a long way in keeping temperatures at bay.

While we’re still on the topic of M.2 slots, the MediaTek MT7925B22M WIFI 7 module can be found right next to the RAM slots, where it utilises the M.2 Key E form factor. This means in future, you can swap out the module for something newer, say a WIFI 8 module when they’re released.

CPU-Z Screenshots

GPU-Z Screenshot

Benchmarks & Test Setup

The above's a recap on the specs of the ExpertCenter PN54-S1, where it’s ready to go out-of-the-box with Windows 11 Pro pre-installed.

In terms of power profiles, over in the BIOS, we can see that the PN54 comes with a default “Balanced Enabled” power mode that can’t be changed, and for fan control modes, we’ve got three to choose from: Whisper, Standard and Performance. For the purposes of testing the PN54-S1, I’ll be using the stock Standard fan control mode.

To put the mini PC through its paces, the following benchmarks were run:

Synthetic Benchmarks

• 7-Zip Compression & Decompression
• Cinebench 2024
• Cinebench R23
• Geekbench 6.5.0
• Geekbench AI 1.5.0
• CrystalDiskMark 9.0.1

Gaming Benchmarks (1080p)

• Cyberpunk 2077 v2.31 In-game Benchmark
• F1 23 In-Game Benchmark

The PC was tested on the 0015 BIOS release, with no tweaks made to the stock BIOS settings. All the latest Windows updates were installed at the point of testing, and benchmark runs were conducted in a non-airconditioned room with an ambient temperature of around 29.6°C.

7-Zip Compression & Decompression

First up in the benchmarks section is 7-Zip's Compression & Decompression test, where the Ryzen 7 260 processor achieves a compression score of 68.092 GIPS and a decompression score of 110.515 GIPS.

Cinebench 2024

With CInebench 2024, the PN54-S1 achieves a multi core score of 846 and a single core score of 105.

Cinebench R23

Next up is Cinebench R23, where the mini PC achieves a multi core score of 15681 and a single core score of 1770.

Geekbench 6.5.0

Moving on to Geekbench 6.5.0, the PN54-S1 achieves a multi-core score of 10301 and a single core score of 2520.

Geekbench AI 1.5.0

With the Geekbench AI benchmark, the Ryzen 7 260 processor achieves a single precision score of 3825, a half precision score of 1792 and a quantised score of 7570 when tested with the ONNX model.

When benchmarked on the Radeon 780M GPU instead with the same ONNX model, the PN54-S1 achieves a single precision score of 4972, a half precision score of 8871 and a quantised score of 3648 when tested with the ONNX model.

CrystalDiskMark 9.0.1

Rounding things off in the synthetic benchmarks section is CrystalDiskMark. Once again, do note that WD advertises the 512GB variant of the SN5000S SSD to have sequential read speeds of up to 6000MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 4200MB/s - the drive's performance is pretty much on the mark based on the results shown above.

Cyberpunk 2077 v2.31 In-game Benchmark

The PN54-S1 clearly isn't designed with gaming in mind, but I was curious how the Radeon 780M iGPU would fare, so here goes. With Cyberpunk 2077's in-game benchmark, the mini PC achieves an average FPS of 26.09, with a minimum FPS of 21.60 and a maximum FPS of 32.42 when tested at 1080p on the "Low" preset with upscaling and frame generation disabled.

With FSR enabled and set to "Auto" on the same "Low" graphics preset, Cyberpunk 2077 becomes more playable with an average FPS of 33.58, a minimum FPS of 27.56 and a maximum FPS of 41.49.

F1 23 In-game Benchmark

F1 23's a game title that doesn't go too hard on lower-spec hardware; on the "Medium" preset at 1080p, we get a respectable average FPS of 49, with a minimum FPS of 40 and a maximum FPS of 61.

Power Consumption, Thermals & Acoustics

Under Load [F1 23 In-game Benchmark, 1080p, Medium Detail Preset, TAA, FSR Off, Singapore Circuit, Five Laps (~9 minutes)]

• Avg. CPU Tctl/Tdie Temperature: 80.1°C
• Max. CPU Tctl/Tdie Temperature: 86.0°C
• Avg. CPU Package Power: 46.9W
• Max. CPU Package Power: 56.0W

Under Load [Cinebench 2024 Multi Core - 10 minute run]

• Avg. CPU Tctl/Tdie Temperature: 96.9°C
• Max. CPU Tctl/Tdie Temperature: 100.4°C
• Avg. CPU Package Power: 49.3W
• Max. CPU Package Power: 64.6W

Idle

• Avg. CPU Tctl/Tdie Temperature: 55.7°C
• Max. CPU Tctl/Tdie Temperature: 68.8°C
• Avg. CPU Package Power: 4.2W
• Max. CPU Package Power: 17.8W

The temperature and power figures above were obtained from HWiNFO64 sensor readouts in a non-airconditioned room with an ambient temperature of around 29.6°C.

A brief note on acoustics, the ExpertCenter PN54-S1 was audible under load, but not annoyingly so in my opinion – in a room with around 46.5dB of ambient noise levels, my decibel meter recorded 46.7dB of noise when the PN54-s1 was idle, and 49.2dB of noise when under a typical gaming workload. The decibel meter was placed 30cm away from the mini PC during testing.

Once again, the results above were obtained on the "Balanced Enabled" BIOS power mode, "Standard" BIOS fan control mode and "Balanced" Windows power profile.

Conclusion & Pricing

To sum up, the ASUS ExpertCenter PN54-S1 will do just fine as an office workstation, given its productivity performance and the fact that it comes with support for up to four concurrent 4K displays. You could also use it at home as say, a home theatre PC, where it'll chug along just fine. While you might get away with very light gaming at 1080p on Low to Medium settings with older game titles, don’t expect too much performance out of the integrated Radeon 780M iGPU - I have to say though that in general, the integrated graphics of today offer a significant improvement in performance over the iGPUs of yesteryear.

Thermal performance is average at best, where the Ryzen 7 260 processor didn’t break 100°C when under a gaming workload, though it did go beyond 100°C at times when running Cinebench 2024’s multi-core test, which isn’t all that surprising seeing as the multi-core test is a pretty intensive workload. The biggest bugbear that I have with the PN54-S1 is the fact that ASUS shipped the PN54-S1 with single-channel memory, instead of going with two 16GB sticks of RAM for a dual-channel configuration. This is because running memory in single-channel mode does leave performance on the table - I'd think that gaming and productivity performance would have been better had the PN54-S1 been shipped with dual-channel memory.

In terms of pricing and availability, I don’t yet have any pricing and availability information on hand as of the time of publishing this review, but hopefully the PN54-S1 should go on sale in the next couple of weeks or months (and hopefully with dual-channel DDR5 rather than single-channel DDR5).

Get this mini PC from Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Xt7SgL

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The mini PC featured in this article was a review unit provided on loan from ASUS Singapore.