To assess the performance of the ZOTAC Zbox, we pitted it against a number of various netbook systems based on Intel Atom processor designs, including the first generation of NVIDIA's Ion platform, as well as standard Atom solutions. The performance numbers we've provided along with the Zbox are presented for a frame of reference more than anything else, since it was nearly impossible to provide identically configured test systems. As such these test metrics should not be considered "apples to apples" comparisons, but rather a general correlation of how the next-gen Ion-based Zbox will perform versus similar, low power platforms in its peer group.
|
HotHardware's Test Systems |
Performance
Comparisons |
|
Zotac ZBox HD-ID11
Intel Atom D510 (Dual Core)
(1.66GHz)
2GB DDR2-800
NVIDIA Next Gen Ion GPU
(GeForce GT218 Ion)
On-Board Ethernet
On-Board Audio
1x500GB 2.5" Hard
Drive
5400 RPM SATA
Windows 7 Home
Premium SP1
(32-bit)
|
Lenovo
ThinkPad X100e
AMD Athlon Neo (MV-40)
(1.66GHz)
2GB
DDR2-800
Radeon HD 3200 IGP
On-Board Ethernet
On-Board
Audio
1x250GB 2.5" Hard Drive
5400 RPM SATA
Windows
7
Professional (32-bit)
|
HP Mini
311
Intel Atom N270
(1.6GHz)
2GB
DDR2-800
NVIDIA Ion GPU
(Based on
9400M)
On-Board Ethernet
On-Board
Audio
1x250GB 2.5" Hard Drive
5400 RPM
SATA
Windows 7 Home
Premium (32-bit)
|
Asus Eee PC
1201N
Intel Atom
330 (Dual Core)
(1.6GHz)
2GB DDR2-800
NVIDIA Ion GPU
(Based on
9400M)
On-Board Ethernet
On-Board Audio
1x250GB 2.5" Hard Drive
5400 RPM SATA
Windows 7 Home
Premium SP1
(32-bit)
|
* Thanks to our friends at
Kingston Technology for supplying the DDR2 SODIMM memory we used for testing in this article.
Zotac ZBox Windows 7 Experience Index
We began our benchmark testing with SiSoftware's SANDRA, the System ANalyzer, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant. We ran three of the built-in subsystem tests that partially comprise the SANDRA test suite with the Ion-based ZOTAC Zbox (CPU Arithmetic, CPU Multimedia, and Memory Bandwidth). All of the scores reported below were taken with the Zobox's Atom processor running at its default clock speed of 1.66GHz, with 2GB of DDR2-800 system memory and HyperThreading enabled.
Left to right: SANDRA CPU, Multimedia and Memory Bandwidth Tests
Interestingly, the Zbox's Atom D510 Pineview core processor offered significantly better performance in the Processor Arithmetic test, versus the Atom D510 and D410 reference scores in SANDRA's reference database. We're not sure if this is an erroneous listing for the SANDRA suite but the scores here for the Zbox are robust, regardless. In the Multimedia test, we see the Zbox's D510 dual-core Atom line up just ahead of the previous gen Atom 330 dual core, partly due to its faster front side bus speed (667MHz versus 533MHz for the Atom 330). The Atom D510 also offered a bit more memory bandwidth versus the 330 as well, as you can see in the graph on the far right.