You killed the $96/mo VPS. The better answer is a small computer you buy once and own outright: a cheap business mini-PC with real RAM slots, running headless Linux as the cortextOS brains. The Mac stays the hands. The catch is honest: a 2026 RAM price spike makes "cheap plus 32GB" harder than it was six months ago, so the winning move is a used micro with open slots you fill over time.
$170 to $330$170 best case for a refurb Dell OptiPlex already at 32GB. About $330 the reliable everyday path: a business micro at 16GB plus one stick, or a new box that ships 32GB. One-time buy, no monthly bill, real RAM slots.
Brains you own, hands on the Mac
The box: brains
Runs the whole cortextOS daemon: agent reasoning sessions, the message bus, ChromaDB vector store, task state, crons, coordination.
Headless Linux (Ubuntu). No screen, no keyboard. Sits on a shelf, sips power, stays on 24/7.
Real RAM slots, so you add memory as the fleet grows instead of buying a whole new machine.
→
The Mac: hands
Browser automation against ChiroHD, SKED, GHL, and the other no-API surfaces that must run on a real Mac.
Local UI actions, Telegram desktop, iPhone mirroring, anything Mac-only.
Stops being both brain and hands, which is what makes it choke today.
One honest architecture note. cortextOS has no built-in multi-host mode today. So the box does not "share the load" with the Mac. It runs the entire daemon, and the Mac becomes a pure browser operator reached over a secure tunnel. That is a clean one-time migration, not a split-brain setup.
Auth rule the migration must respect. Only one machine may run the Claude agents on our account, because they share one credential and a second machine refreshing it triggers a lockout race (we hit exactly this on June 20). That rule is satisfied here: the agents move entirely to the box, and the Mac runs zero Claude agents afterward. The box becomes the auth authority. One migration detail to handle: Linux stores the credential in a file rather than the Mac keychain, so the credential-keeper we are building gets a small Linux variant.
What the brains box actually needs
Claude and Codex run their models in the cloud. The local box is not doing AI inference, it is running Node.js CLI sessions plus a vector database. That keeps the spec modest and cheap.
RAM target32 GB
Comfortable room for 8 to 10 long-running agent sessions plus ChromaDB. 16GB runs it lean; 32GB is the headroom number. Add more later via the open slot.
StorageNVMe M.2
ChromaDB does fast random reads. A 512GB or 1TB NVMe drive gives years of runway. Most of these micros ship with one and have a free slot.
CPU4 to 8 core
Any recent business chip (Intel i5/i7 8th gen and up, or Ryzen) is plenty. This is coordination work, not heavy compute.
The 2026 RAM spike, stated plainly
There is a real AI-driven memory shortage in 2026. RAM prices have jumped hard, which is why "sub-$300 with 32GB already installed" is tough right now. The lever that beats it: buy a box with DDR4 slots. DDR4 is the older, cheaper memory, and used business micros use it. You pay less per gigabyte and you add it gradually.
DDR5 32GB SODIMM kit$350 to $440
What new mini-PCs use. $14.12 per gigabyte right now. A kit briefly spiked past $800 in May 2026.
DDR4 32GB SODIMM kit$200 to $250
What used business micros use. $9.08 per gigabyte, roughly $150 to $200 cheaper than DDR5 for the same 32GB. This is the cost lever. A single 16GB stick is $85 to $120.
The picks
Best price
Dell OptiPlex 7080 Micro
The cheapest confirmed route. i5-10500T, two DDR4 SODIMM slots (max 64GB), NVMe M.2. A Micro Center refurb ships already at 32GB and 512GB.
$169.99 refurb at 32GB / 512GB (Micro Center, stock-dependent). 16GB configs $200 to $230 at Best Buy.
Safest supply
HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini
The safe sweet spot. i5-9500T or i7, two SODIMM slots (max 64GB DDR4), two NVMe M.2 slots. Huge refurb supply, well documented, tool-free to open.
$245 refurb at i5 / 16GB / 256GB. A 32GB config runs about $339.
Solid alt
Lenovo ThinkCentre M90q
Compact, two DDR4 slots, NVMe (Gen 2 has two M.2). Cleanest BIOS of the three. Buy on price, it sometimes runs higher used.
$170 to $250 refurb at i5 / 16GB / 256GB on eBay.
Best new value
WVX Ryzen 5 6600H
Ships with 32GB DDR5 in two real SODIMM slots (teardown-confirmed swappable, max 128GB), two NVMe M.2 slots, 512GB included. New, with warranty, already at 32GB.
~$330 on Amazon. Caveat: 2022-era laptop APU, plenty for headless server duty but slower than Ryzen 8000 chips.
Faster, pricier
Minisforum UM870 Slim
Ryzen 7 8745H, ships 32GB DDR5, two SODIMM slots, expandable to 96GB, two NVMe slots. More CPU than the WVX but a real price jump.
$447 to $560 new, or about $298 barebone (no RAM/SSD) on sale.
Premium
Beelink SER8
Ryzen 7 8745HS/8845HS, 32GB DDR5 in two confirmed SODIMM slots, two M.2 slots. Excellent box, but priced well above the budget target.
$499 to $600 new depending on variant and coupons.
Skip the Trigkey Key R8 for this. Its memory reads as LPDDR5, which is usually soldered, not removable SODIMM. That fails the "add RAM later" requirement, so it is off the list despite the attractive price.
Three ways to 32GB, by total cost
Bars show one-time total to reach 32GB. Lower is better. The Mac mini line is the new-Apple-hardware comparison from the earlier research, shown only to anchor how much a dedicated box saves.
Route
What you buy
RAM path
Total at 32GB
A. Refurb already at 32GB
Dell OptiPlex 7080 Micro, 32GB / 512GB
Nothing to add, ships at 32GB
~$170
B. Business micro plus one stick
HP EliteDesk 800 G5 at 16GB
Add one 16GB DDR4 stick ($85 to $120)
~$330
C. New box, done day one
WVX Ryzen 6600H, new with warranty
Ships with 32GB DDR5
~$330
D. Low-RAM micro plus full kit
8GB micro plus a 32GB DDR4 kit
Worst value, the spike taxes the kit
$350 to $425
How we actually move
The one-time migration
Install Ubuntu headless on the box, plus Docker and the 1Password CLI for secrets.
Cold-copy ChromaDB, the repo, and agent state from the Mac. The live fleet keeps running untouched during this.
Bring the daemon up on the box in shadow mode, verify it matches the Mac, then cut over in a quiet overnight window.
Keep the Mac as cold standby for a couple of days. Roll back by repointing if anything regresses.
What needs you
Buy the box (account plus payment). I cannot purchase hardware, so I hand you the exact listing to click.
That is the only gate. Everything after, Ubuntu setup, migration, tunnel, cutover, the fleet runs on a single go.
One-time spend, not recurring. No monthly VPS bill, and you own the hardware.
Sources and notes
The pick: if you can land the Micro Center refurb, the Dell OptiPlex 7080 Micro at $170 already holds 32GB and 512GB, which is the whole job for the price of a nice dinner out. If it is out of stock, buy the new WVX at $330 or the HP EliteDesk at $245 and add one $85 to $120 stick. Either way it is a one-time spend under your budget, and the slots stay open for 64GB later.
Prior research: VPS pick (killed, too expensive) and Mac mini RAM analysis in Sage's notes. The Mac mini path was ruled out because Apple memory is soldered and cannot be upgraded, which fails the "add RAM slots later" requirement.
Architecture grounding: cortextOS state is file-based and single-host; the box runs the whole daemon, confirmed against the codebase.