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Exclusive Review of the Zotac ION

Roydon Cerejo, May 12, 2009 1815 hrs IST

Smallest and strongest chipset/processor combo commercially available

Expert Rating:

Easy playback of HD (1080p) content, small size, low power draw, WiFi, no power supply needed

Expensive

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EXPERT REVIEW

After being bogged down with an age-old 945 chipset the Intel Atom finally gets to stretch its legs thanks to Nvidia's latest mini-ITX platform. That's right, the ION platform has officially launched today and Zotac is the exclusive partner for bringing this product worldwide.

We first caught a glimpse of the ION when Acer launched its Revo mini PC a couple of months back. It's still not available in India but it featured a smaller version of the mini-ITX MCP7A 9400 chipset with an Atom processor. It was so tiny that it could easily fit in your palm, but was powerful enough to handle BluRay movies.

Zotac has launched the ION platform in a mini-ITX form factor for all you DIY'ers out there. Zotac will also be launching a few variants of the ION to suite each ones budget. The chipset used is MCP7A or 9400 which features an onboard GPU of the same name. The processor varies according to the model and the one we have today is the high-end one with an Intel Dual Core Atom N330 running at 1.6GHz with Multi-threading. The board supports many connectivity options which are highlighted in the schematic above. We'll check them out a little later when we inspect the design and layout of the board. Another first is the bundled 90W AC adapter meaning there's no need for a power supply.

How will the ION benefit me?

The main reason for launching the ION is to get the best of both worlds. You get the low power of the Atom coupled with the brute force of the Nvidia 9400 GPU, which makes it great for a HTPC, casual gaming PC or a media hub all bundled into a small package.

Possible Usage Areas

HTPC
Low powered download rig
Media server (stream your movies thanks to the built-in WiFi)
General purpose small form factor PC
Out of these, an HTPC or a media server makes more sense as it's designed for those segments. So without further ado, let's check out the Zotac ION platform.

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USER COMMENTS

Fantastic piece of hardware..fantastic review.. I have one question.. I basically want to build a download rig which i can also use to watch movies.. I cannot afford the one with the power adapter and the wifi can the reviewer or someone pls suggest me which cabinet and power supply should i purchase for the other models ?? i.e. the one without the inbuilt AC adapter.. Thanx

by Jay, Mumbai, on May 15, 2009 01:02 AM, Report abuse Reply

Zebronics have a couple of mini-ITX cases which you can check out. They also comes with a 400W PSU which will be enough for a HTPC.

by Roydon, Mumbai, on May 17, 2009 12:28 AM, Report abuse

Hi Roydon, Thanx i checked them out...pretty good...but a 400W PSU kills the whole idea of a low cost download rig... I already hav a C2D...want to build an ION based download rig so that i can keep it on 24*7 and save on power... What is the psu power required for this kind of machine ??

by Jay, Mumbai, on May 18, 2009 08:47 AM, Report abuse

It dosent matter what PSU you use, ultimately its how much power the components will draw. So even if you put a 700W PSU, the ION will still draw around 50W ie if you're using a laptop HDD. In that case you can even go for a lower wattage PSU but having a little more dosent hurt.

by Roydon, Mumbai, on May 21, 2009 01:56 PM, Report abuse

In what way Rs 12.500 is Expensive? I find it quite cheap but no PCI then I have think again.

by chris, mumbai, on May 14, 2009 06:59 PM, Report abuse Reply

Manufacturers find many ways to" loot" the non-techie customers and this is one of them. This board is worth 5k and they are trying to sell it for 13k. I'd rather love to buy the latest C2D processor along with a good MB for the same price. This is not Japan and the average indian who can afford a PC can certainly afford a lot of deskspace for sure. Small is certainly beatifull but definitely Non-functional as well. These products are not upto the mark when we talk about performance and one can have the latest Nvidia GPU based MB+C2D CPU+2GB RAM for 12K for a 500% jump in performance. These manufacturers are simply asking for too much of a price. 5K is justified, 6K is O.K. Anything more than that is a Nooooo, Noooooo.

by Sid, Bhubaneswar, on May 12, 2009 11:58 PM, Report abuse Reply

Agreed dude, This product is specially for those people who just want to show off about the machine but not to use. Coz the people who really want a PC for their actual use will definatlly not go with this shitt.. ;)

by Ronney, N.Delhi, on May 14, 2009 11:42 AM, Report abuse

No PCIe = fail. POV has a better board, minus WiFi but with a PCIe 16x slot.

by Angad, Los Angeles, on May 14, 2009 04:54 AM, Report abuse Reply

The Acer Reevo doesn't fit in the palm and it hardly plays Blu Ray (unless you use a bulky USB drive with an extra power cable). We'll be selling this board in a new PC (the D2) for R 28,000 including shipping to India!

by mike rosenberg, london, on May 13, 2009 11:55 PM, Report abuse Reply

good form factor, suitable for offices, performance is better than other systems with onboard graphics, seems like it cant run vista smoothly, but for xp it is a great deal, price is a major setback. hence no value for money item. but lets see when competetion arises, prices will come down to comfortable levels. but a good buy for office & home/htpc. gamers know what it lacks.

by naveenchaudhary, meerut, on May 13, 2009 12:47 PM, Report abuse Reply

If you drop of the Wifi it would be a steal if it comes around 10K. It costs about 2.5K just for the 90W DC adapter. A good quality SMPS would cost no less than 3.5K anyway. The power usage is a meagre 35W at peak load. Simply awesome. The N330 intel board with crappy graphics and higher power consumption costs around 5.5K. Add to that an SMPS or a DC Power adapter for 3K. For a 1.5K extra you are getting 5.1 analog out, Esata, HDMI, Superior Graphics that supports 1080P, quieter, cooler and power efficient PC. Try to beat that. THIS IS A STEAL, if you have the right application in mind (HPTC, Download Rig etc)

by Srikanth Koka, Hyderabad, on May 13, 2009 10:04 AM, Report abuse Reply