Zotac ZBOX Nano AD10 Plus U Mini SFF PC Review

Name: Zotac ZBOX Nano AD10 Plus
Brand: Zotac

by Marco Chiappetta — Friday, October 28, 2011, 10:00 AM EDT

Throughout all of our benchmarking and testing, we monitored how much power our test systems consumed using a power meter. Our goal was to give you all an idea as to how much power the base platform configuration used while idling and while under a heavy workload. Please keep in mind that we were testing total system power consumption at the outlet here, not just the power being drawn by the processors alone.

Total System Power Consumption

Tested at the Outlet

The Zbox Nano AD10 Plus is very power friendly, although it did consume a few more watts under load than did the HD-AD03. This was somewhat surprising since the Nano lacks the Blu-Ray drive, but the addition of Bluetooth along with slight differences in voltage can easily account for the 3w difference. Either way, power should not be an issue for anyone.

And with such low power consumption, noise is not an issue either. There is a single fan in the Zbox Nano that is audible under load, but it is very quiet regardless and the fan doesn't produce an annoying high-pitched whine like some others. We'd have no problem with this device in a quiet living room--it's almost silent.

Tags: SFF, Zotac, Nano, PC, HTPC, Mini, Fusion, ZBox

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com