Nettop and Mini-ITX Buyer’s Guide
by Zach Throckmorton on April 22, 2011 2:00 PM ESTIntel Upgraded HTPC Nettop
| Intel Upgraded HTPC Nettop | ||
| Component | Product Name | Price |
| CPU + Mobo | ASRock A330ION (Atom 330 + NVIDIA ION) | $120 |
| Memory | Patriot 4GB (2x2GB) PSD34G1333K | $40 |
| Case + PSU | Antec ISK310-150 Black/Silver + 150W PSU | $80 |
| Storage | Samsung SpinPoint MP4 HM640JJ 640GB 7200RPM 16MB | $60 |
| Optical Drive | Sony Optiarc BC-5500H-01 BR-ROM/DVD-ROM | $90 |
| Operating System | Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit | $100 |
| Extra Software | CyberLink PowerDVD 11 Ultra | $100 |
| Total Price | $590 | |
For our upgraded configurations, we’re going to look into making something that’s a bit more capable as an HTPC. On the Atom side, the only way you can do that is if you get a better GPU than the 3150, and the easiest (and cheapest) way to do that is to purchase an ION motherboard. With the arrival of AMD’s Brazos, most motherboard manufacturers are shifting to that platform. It certainly doesn’t help that when Intel moved from the original Atom platform to Pine Trail, they integrated the Northbridge into the CPU package and 
essentially killed off the ION chipset, so now you’d have to get a Pine Trail board with a PCIe slot if you wanted a discrete GPU. The result of all this is that we’re sticking with the older Atom 330 + ION for our upgraded Intel configuration, which is not without drawbacks.
For this setup, we’ve selected the ASRock A330ION board, but availability and pricing can be a little sketchy on any of these older ION boards. As one of the major flaws with the Atom platform was its inability to play HD video smoothly, NVIDIA used their ION (a rebadged 9400M chipset) to address this issue. Paired with the dual-core Atom 330 CPU, this platform can play HD videos and even Blu-ray content—though not 3D Blu-ray. The ASRock board also has VGA, DVI, and HDMI ports. We first looked at the ION platform almost two years ago, and you can still get a good idea of its capabilities and limitations from our original assessment. For the memory, we’re again using desktop DIMMs, but now we’re upgrading to 4GB (2x2GB) of Patriot memory. The basic desktop DDR3 kits seem to have bottomed out at around $40 shipped without rebates. 2GB is sufficient, but the $18 extra can provide more headroom for multitasking.
The remaining components once again depend on the case selection, and we’ve selected the upgraded Antec ISK310-150 this time. We like this case a lot because it comes with a reasonably quiet 80mm fan, typical minimalist Antec aesthetics, and uses an external power adapter (which makes no noise, and is more efficient than internal power supplies—especially considering these low-powered nettops draw at most 25-30% of even a low wattage 150W PSU). It’s also available with a black bezel if you prefer that to the silver bezel. As with the ISK 100, this case uses 2.5” laptop hard drives, not 3.5” desktop hard drives. We’re only using one HDD again, but this case can fit two drives so SSD + storage drive is again an option.
For the hard drive, we’re going to offer an alternative to the 500GB Seagate that has seen so much use in laptops during the past year. Samsung recently launched their 640GB 7200RPM SpinPoint MP4 HM640JJ, at the same $60 price point as the Seagate. The higher areal density should improve sequential transfer speeds, and it will certainly be faster than the 5400RPM laptop drives. For the optical drive, you could stick with the same Samsung mentioned in the basic Intel configuration, but our upgraded nettops are going to take more of an HTPC role so we’re going the Blu-ray route. Slim BD-ROMs are difficult to find for less than $100, and in fact this is the only slim BD-ROM Newegg currently stocks. Note that it’s a DVD-ROM as well, so there are no burning capabilities to speak of—we suggest you use a different system for burning, and particularly video encoding/transcoding as such tasks can be painfully slow on Atom.
If you’re going to watch Blu-ray movies, you’ll also need appropriate software. The software included with the Sony drive is underwhelming, and CyberLink’s PowerDVD Ultra tends to work well with a variety of platforms. It also happens to cost $100, so you might want to start with the basic Blu-ray software and only upgrade if you want access to other features.
With all of the upgrades and a copy of PowerDVD, the total system cost is nearly double that of the base Atom setup, though much of that comes from choosing to include Blu-ray support. $590 is a lot to pay for an Atom nettop, certainly, and we’ll discuss other options in our conclusion. If you want to skip out on Blu-ray playback, you can get the above system for $400. Using the same case and components, the difference in motherboard choice makes this platform $10 more than the basic AMD E-350 setup, or $37 more than the stock Atom configuration.
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ArnisR - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
Antec ISK 300(310)-150 series have internal PSU.External PSU is for earlier sibling - ISK 300-65.
uncola - Sunday, April 24, 2011 - link
this is correct, I noticed this mistake in the article too-BubbaJoe- - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
The M4A88T-I DELUXE motherboard is extremely capable.You can fit a 6-core AMD processor into it, and its currently the only AM3 ITX motherboard that has a full x16 pci-e slot. Add in eSATA, USB3, and built-in WiFi you got yourself a powerful little box.I have mine paired with a 5770, 8gb of ddr3, and a Athlon x3 445 all in a Sugo SG-05 Able to play games such as BC:2 just fine. Very awesome little computer.
shamans33 - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
Just an FYI, M4A88T-I DELUXE onboard video does not do dual display because of limitations of 880g chipset on dual digital display output..Andrew Rockefeller - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
"...check email, browse and shop on the web, occasionally remove red eyes from family photos, and type the occasional letter. From that perspective..."Were you to build a cheap PC with that critera, I'd seriously concider Linux. You can then take $100 off the total for each build which is not an insignificant percentage especially when you talk about options to save $30 here and there. As much as I love and recommend Win 7, I'd expect Linux to provide a better user experience with the limited resources of these systems (the Atom and Brazos builds in particular, the i3 build may be OK on 7).
Although my computing/software needs exceed that which I can comfortably achieve with Linux, for the average Joe It's capabilities are well in excess of what they'll ever need. Unfortunately I wouldn't expect average Joe to be in here reading this.. but people who build systems for their less tech savvy loved ones are.
Gigantopithecus - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
Hi Andrew - I couldn't agree more that a Linux variant is an excellent alternative to Windows 7 for basic computing needs, and I have built nettops with Ubuntu for friends. However, it's also been my experience that for less tech-savvy folks, Linux is simply not an option because they're not willing to learn a new OS. While you and I think the learning curve is shallow and no real obstacle, that simply is not true for many people (at least in my experience). FWIW older people who have little to no computer experience often learn it the fastest - a friend's 92 year old grandfather loves Ubuntu, possibly because he's never known anything else.That said, Windows 7, like most other OS's, isn't particularly CPU intensive; it's much more dependent upon RAM. An E-350 with 4GB of RAM or even 2GB RAM works just fine, whereas my Phenom II X4 945 with 1GB of RAM installed struggles with Windows 7 (this is not its usual configuration - obviously the Phenom II with 8GB RAM runs W7 much better than an E-350 with 2GB RAM, ha).
lowimpact - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
I got really excited when I saw this article since I've been putting together my own mini-ITX build, but am puzzled that you haven't included a gamer box (or workstation buidl) in your lineup.Here's a good start:
$120 Silverstone SG05BB w/450w psu
$100 Gigabyte GA-H67N-USB3-B3 Intel H67
$125 Intel e3-2100
$200 560 ti (5950's are too long)
$40 4GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333
$40 500GB Hard Disk
$25 DVD Burner
$100 Windows 7 x64
----------------------------
$750
Any reason you left something major like this out??
Andrew Rockefeller - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
I think the intention was to design systems to cover the needs of a typical user. The system you describe is somewhat niche. Although in your world a moderately powered gaming PC may be a high priority, it simply is not for the masses.Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate your enthusiasm for your particular design. My taste is for the highest compute power whilst remaining passively cooled (Power/efficiency). I however recognise that my ideal results in a computer more powerful/expensive than the average person needs, but less powerful than what a power-user would want and can easily achieve by sacrificing form factor... niche.
Gigantopithecus - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
Yep, the goal of this article was to cover nettop options. Jarred suggested adding a higher-end Intel mini-ITX system based on the i3-2100T CPU so we tossed that in there. I hope to have a mini-ITX gaming guide up soon as those are very popular with my younger undergraduate friends who live in dorms and small apartments.lowimpact - Saturday, April 23, 2011 - link
You also remember that intel graphics are bugged when it comes to playing back 24fps content right? What's the point of putting a blu-ray player in any of the intel builds if you can't watch movies without judder from adding a frame every 40 seconds? You wrote about this on your own site:http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the-sandy-bridg...