Lenovo ThinkCentre M90q Gen 5 2025, Core i7-14700, 32GB, 1TB SSD, Black

The ThinkCentre M90q Gen 5 is a tiny office powerhouse with a 20-core i7 and 32GB of RAM, scoring 90.3 for compactness. It's fantastic for productivity but the integrated graphics are weak, with a gaming score of just 14/100. Worth it if you need vPro and a tiny footprint, skip it if you want to game or save money.

The i7-14700 is the star here. With 20 cores and a 2.1GHz base clock, it chews through productivity workloads without breaking a sweat. Our database puts the CPU at the 82nd percentile, which means it's well above average for this category. The 32GB of DDR5-5200 RAM also lands at the 80th percentile, so you can run a pile of apps side by side and still have headroom. Storage is solid too, a 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD at the 74th percentile, fast enough that boot times and file transfers feel snappy. The weak link is the integrated Intel UHD 770 graphics. It sits at the 36th percentile, which is mediocre, and the gaming score of 14 out of 100 confirms this is not a machine for play. Ports are decent at the 74th percentile, with HDMI 2.1a, two DisplayPorts, six USB-A ports, one USB-C, and Ethernet. You can run a multi-monitor office setup without dongles.

Stacked against the competition, the M90q Gen 5 occupies a weird middle ground. The Apple Mac Studio M4 Max absolutely destroys it in graphics and raw compute, but costs way more and runs macOS. The HP OMEN B91WHAA#ABA is a gaming desktop with a real GPU, so it wins on gaming but loses on size and power efficiency. The Dell Tower ECT1250 is a traditional tower, cheaper per core but takes up ten times the desk space. The MSI MEG Vision X AI is a different beast entirely, aimed at AI workloads with a massive price tag. For pure office productivity in a tiny package, the M90q holds its own. For anything involving a GPU, every competitor here beats it.

Pricing is all over the map depending on where you shop. In the US you'll see it listed between $2,597 and $3,190, a spread of nearly $600 across just two listings. That's a lot of money for a machine with integrated graphics, even one with a 20-core CPU. The vPro support and Opal-encrypted SSD add real enterprise value, but home users are paying a premium for features they may never touch. If you need this exact form factor with this much CPU power, it's defensible. If you just want a fast office PC, you can get 90% of the performance for a lot less money in a slightly bigger box.

The Lenovo ThinkCentre M90q Gen 5 is a tiny desktop that packs a serious punch for office work. You get a 14th gen Core i7-14700 with 20 cores, 32GB of DDR5, and a 1TB NVMe SSD in a box that weighs about as much as a hardcover book. It's built for spreadsheets, browser tab hoarding, and multitasking, not for gaming or rendering.

Lenovo clearly aimed this at businesses and home offices that want vPro management and a clean desk. The compact score in our database is a 90.3 out of 100, which tells you it nails the small form factor brief. Just don't expect the integrated Intel UHD 770 graphics to do anything beyond driving monitors and light media work.

Skip this if you need any kind of real graphics performance. The integrated UHD 770 is fine for Excel and YouTube, but it's a dead end for gaming, video editing, or 3D work. Also skip it if you're on a budget, because you're paying a hefty premium for the tiny size and vPro features. A mid-tower with a dedicated GPU will cost less and run circles around this thing in anything graphically demanding.

Buy this if you need a vPro-manageable, ultra-compact desktop for serious office multitasking and you have the budget. It's a great fit for IT departments deploying fleets of tiny machines, or for a home office where desk space is at a premium and you live in spreadsheets and browser tabs. The 20-core i7 and 32GB of RAM will keep this thing relevant for years of productivity work. Just know you're paying a premium for the size and the enterprise features, not for graphics or gaming.