Zotac ZBOX CI320 nano Review: A Fanless Bay Trail-M mini-PC
by Ganesh T S on January 6, 2015 10:00 AM ESTFinal Words
The Zotac ZBOX CI320 nano provided us with an opportunity to evaluate one of the more configurable, but passively cooled Bay Trail UCFF PCs in the market. Passively cooled systems are either very costly (particularly if they integrate powerful CPUs) or downright abysmal in performance (when they integrate the low-end / low-power CPUs such as the older Atoms). Zotac's offering with the ZBOX CI320 nano aims to strike a balance. $140 for a barebones configuration is quite good in this market segment. A fully loaded PLUS model, along with a pre-installed licensed version of Windows 8.1 is lesser than $260. It is frankly quite difficult to build such a compact and passively cooled system for that price on one's own.
One of the aspects we were worried about was thermal throttling, but the ZBOX CI320 nano surpassed our expectations. The chassis never got extremely hot (reaching only around 68 C, even after extended thermal stress with a couple of power viruses).
Pretty much the only downside of the unit is the relatively bad performance of Bay Trail when compared to Haswell. However, we shouldn't be really complaining for the price since the system seems to operate quite nicely for day-to-day use. The BIOS does need some work - particularly to ensure that cores are not in the max performance mode always in the default configuration. The SSD supplied with the PLUS model could be a bit better, but that is not an issue if the end-user buys a barebones configuration.
All in all, Zotac manages to deliver a very price-effective passive mini-PC in the ZBOX CI320 nano. Along with the ECS LIVA and the Zotac ZBOX CA320 nano in the market, the days of users having to spend an arm and leg for passively cooled systems with decent performance are history.
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Pissedoffyouth - Tuesday, January 6, 2015 - link
I built me a mini itx the size of a bible recently, with a 65w AMD APU (A10-7800). With the L9a cooler unless under a heavy gaming load its inaudible. I recommend if your looking for a tiny PC for office work but also gaming go down that route as the performance is much better than these bay trail NUC's and similar cost.BackInAction - Tuesday, January 6, 2015 - link
What case/MB did you use?Pissedoffyouth - Wednesday, January 7, 2015 - link
Minibox m350 - the smallest case you can get. Motherboard was Asrock A88 itx - has msata which was a plus as I had no space for SSDThe_Assimilator - Tuesday, January 6, 2015 - link
Maybe the performance is much better *because it consumes 8 times more power*. And there is no way that you're not experiencing throttling, if indeed you have been foolish enough to cram an AMD APU into a bible-sized enclosure.Samus - Tuesday, January 6, 2015 - link
BRIX and NUC are still amazing. We're talking 4"x4" and power on-par with a mainstream desktop, here.That being said, ITX is the largest format I consider anymore. My Xeon E3-1231 workstation has an Asus H87 ITX board, 16GB RAM, 480GB SSD, 6TB HDD, 2TB 2.5" HDD, NVidia GTX970, 450-watt PSU and liquid cooling built in the Silverstone FT03-mini. Although it's aluminum it weighs quite a bit just because it's literally packed...not enough room inside to fit a balled-up fist.
But it's ultra-fast, 24/7 reliable and the size of a loaf of bread.
NUC/BRIX is mainstream fast, 24/7 reliable and the size of a sandwich.
Antronman - Saturday, January 10, 2015 - link
"Workstation build""H87"
"GTX970"
Just because you use a computer for work does not make it a workstation.
ITX isn't something everybody is interested in, because either they don't care about how much space their computer takes up or they need expansion room. Really, small form-factor PCs are a small niche. Otherwise you'd see a much larger variety in ITX boards, and a drive to make components much, much smaller.
As for the GTX 970, unless it has the MSI ITX variant, the card itself is the size of a sandwich.
StevoLincolnite - Monday, January 12, 2015 - link
Move over to Socket 2011, 64Gb+ Ram then you have a workstation.I laugh at your quad-core xeon and only 16Gb of Ram.
However, you can't get that much performance in ITX.
Pissedoffyouth - Wednesday, January 7, 2015 - link
It is throttling, but only under heavy gaming and I only game at 1280x1024 so it still works great. Day to day tasks never get the temps high at alljohnny_boy - Tuesday, January 6, 2015 - link
That must be an enormous bible you have in mind. Even at 45W, there is no way god damned hell you're getting an A8/10 series APU into a bible-sized enclosure.Samus - Tuesday, January 6, 2015 - link
He must be talking about those bibles that sit on a pedestal that weigh 30 lbs :)