Zotac Mini PC MAGHD-ND01-U and Enermax Aurora Wireless Keyboard Mini review

[lsv]

Alright so... I've never done a review but I think a real life experience mini-review would do some good for Anandtech forums members looking at this Zotac MAG.

Zotac Mini PC MAGHD-ND01-U

Specs -Atom 330, 2gigs DDR2 800mhz, 160gig HD, Nvidia Ion

Purpose - Purely a light browsing and HD movie playing device.
Price - 299.99 from CanadaComputers.com purchased in Toronto

Review -

I purchased the Zotac MAG for my mother as a birthday present. She, like myself, is a music producer. Her music is a bit different than mine though. She has a very old Pentium 3 that's just fast enough for her to compose scores and submit them to her work. So her internet use is dismal at best and computer skills almost non-existent.

Upon unboxing I noticed just how small the device is. It's tiny!

I plugged in the power cord, which was strange. It's a 2 prong power connector with a ground cable lead which I had to fit underneath/around the ground of another device. In this case the HDTV. It has not caused any issues and grounds just as any other device would except it's easy for Zotac to include a normal 3 prong grounded cable. Not a big deal, but definitely cheap and easy to fix on the manufacturing side.

Once it was all plugged in with HDMI going to the TV and a usb key loaded with an imaged bootable clone of my Windows 7 install I had to go into BIOS and change the USB device to 'Hard Drive' since it was not instantly detected as an HD. Not a big deal as the USB key emulates a CD drive. *(Can't remember what brand)

Installing Windows 7 went without a hitch, all drivers (except Nvidia Ion) were detected upon boot and proceeded to connect to my wifi and begin updating/downloading free software.

Here's where I have a huge problem;

The wireless is SLOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

The Zotac is 2 rooms away and get an average of 100k/sec. Seriously Zotac?

It's a total joke.

The wireless *is* stable though. No drop outs, easily connects to my SMC Modem/Router combo from my cable internet provider, it's just brutally slow.

BRUTALLY SLOW.

Windows shows 3/5 to 4/5 bars except the speeds never go above 100k/sec down or up. It's atrocious, I will be looking to purchase either a Ethernet over power setup or a solid USB wifi key. I'm not sure which but continuing to use the current built in Wifi is a total joke.

General performance -

It's good. You have to understand this PC is only for browsing and HD movie viewing. That said, it's fantastic.

Opening Chrome and navigating to Youtube or Gmail is fairly quick. Seconds at most.

HD movies are also great, even with 2gigs of system memory I can have a 1080p movie playing and browse Anandtech. It's not super fast so I do recommend one use at a time but in all reality as an HTPC it's near perfect for the price.

Heat -

The box does get a little hot, other reviews showed the insides and it has a tiny little fan for the north bridge and CPU.

I never noticed the fan even when surfing without any audio/video playing nor when playing 1080p video. It's quiet to me and that's what counts.

I don't believe this will be an issue in the future as I simply set the machine to go to sleep after 30 minutes of inactivity.

Closing thoughts -

I believe for current use (playing Ion accelerated video and surfing the web) this little box is exactly what my mom needs. She can access her e-mail, surf the net as she pleases and access an External Hard Drive I've loaded with a bunch of DVDs and a couple of Blue-Rays I've backed up so she doesn't have to get up (she's getting old ).

Performance was solid, though I do think 4gigs of ram would make the machine run much better it's nothing terrible. I was surprised how well Windows 7 ran with these specs; I wouldn't worry about upgrading the RAM for some time.

Wireless is the real issue here. Zotac uses a terrible wifi card and if there was one thing I'd change it would be that. Instantly.

Other then the wifi issue I give the Zotac MAG a 4/5 rating. It does everything I want it to do for a cheap price. Had I known these issues I would have easily paid $400 for the same box with 4gigs of RAM and a better Wifi card... or just a better wifi card

-

Enermax Aurora Wireless Keyboard


Purpose - A simple, out of the box no drivers required wifi keyboard.
Price - Purchased for $74.99 from CanadaComputers.com in Toronto

Review -

This is short and sweet; The keyboard is working just fine. It comes with some AA batteries and a little USB dongle working at 2.4ghz. The keyboard works right away and in BIOS without issue. Windows sees it as a generic 82 key keyboard (upon installing, it may see the real device now) and it's been just fine. The trackball gets dirty quickly so I do recommend cleaning your hands lightly of grease before using it.

One side note - The keyboard goes into sleep within 15 or so seconds. The trackball will stop working until you press any key on the device. There is an on/off and connect button on the bottom as well.

This keyboard is the perfect HTPC keyboard.


Dual Conclusion

For anyone looking at an HTPC and a wireless keyboard/trackball combo that can get a wired connection to it (heh) this is perfect. It's cheap, $400~ for both and I was up and running within 1.5~ hours.

For anyone with bad wifi in their house/apartment I highly recommend a USB wifi device/ethernet over power or simple Cat5e to the device.

I never went over 50% CPU use playing 720p video and about 65% playing 1080p. There were no hiccups, the device is working just fine.

I hope anyone looking at this cheap HTPC solution makes good use of this review, especially if you're looking at the Zotac

Zotac Mag - 4/5 LSVs

Enermax Aurora - 5/5 LSVs

I'll try to answer whatever questions anyone has.

 

[EarthwormJim]

I have a zotac itx motherboard and the built in wireless works fine. Are you sure it's not just a bad driver?

Have you tried a generic driver from the manufacturer of the card, and not from zotac?

You could also replace the card with another mini pci-e card. They go for less than $10 on ebay often.

That's neat that it can play 1080p with no issue. Are you able to apply some post-processing or shader effects too?

 

[lsv]

I have a zotac itx motherboard and the built in wireless works fine. Are you sure it's not just a bad driver?

Have you tried a generic driver from the manufacturer of the card, and not from zotac?

You could also replace the card with another mini pci-e card. They go for less than $10 on ebay often.

That's neat that it can play 1080p with no issue. Are you able to apply some post-processing or shader effects too?

The Wifi issue has been cataloged on the Zotac forums as a legitimate issue;

http://www.zotacusa.com/forum/topic/2713-wifi-problem-zotac-mag-hd-nd01/
http://www.zotacusa.com/forum/topic/2246-zotac-mag-hd-nd01-wireless-issues/

However, I will in the future try out different drivers and see if it makes a difference. I'm not going to replace the PCI-E card until I buy some more RAM for it as the box is difficult to open.


I haven't tried any post processing for video but it was just fine playing 1080p x264 with the K-Lite codec pack + MPC + Ion drivers from Nvidia's site.