ASRock Core 100HT-BD : Bringing HTPCs to the Mainstream Market [UPDATED : Noise Issue]
by Ganesh T S on July 19, 2010 9:34 PM EST- Posted in
- Home Theater
- Arrandale
- ASRock
- Media Streamer
- Core i3
- HTPC
It should come as no surprise that the iGPU in the Arrandales is not great for gaming purposes. It comes close to, but doesn't surpass, the Ion in gaming performance. However, some HTPC enthusiasts do want to play the occassional game, and the Arrandale in the Core 100 HT-BD obliges. The actual performance in various games at various settings has already been covered in numerous other reviews, so we will not go into those details here. To sweeten the deal for these gamers, ASRock has a pretty nifty feature called as the AiWi enabled on the unit.
This feature enables the usage of the iPhone or iPod (any model with an accelerometer) as a motion controller. The implementation of this feature is quite interesting. The player starts out by creating an ad-hoc wireless network on the Core 100 system. The iPhone or the iPod is then made to connect to this network. It is also required that the AIWI Lite app be installed from the Apple App Store. This app can be started after connecting to the ad-hoc network. After connection, the iPhone or iPad can be used as a keyboard or mouse, but the more interesting aspect is the usage of the accelerometer (G-Sensor) for gaming purposes.
We tested out this feature with SEGA's Virtua Tennis 2009. It turned out to be a pleasant surprise when we discovered how responsive the whole system was. A downside is that there aren't many games which are enabled for this interaction methodology. For those non-gaming enthusiasts enamoured by the motion controller trend that Nintendo started, this is a nice system to check out instead of going in for a dedicated gaming console.
A concern we raised with ASRock was the fact that the AiWi system was available only for Apple's platforms. With the rising popularity of Android devices with similar hardware capabilities, they have told us that the AiWi app would soon be ported to Android within the next few months. Customers who don't prefer Apple products will hopefully be able to enjoy this feature soon.
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ganeshts - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
Decaff,I will do more research on how to perfect the picture quality testing metrics.
For your second point, we do have a HTPC software article coming up (end of August) :)
Third, we just posted a review of the WDTV Live. Reviews of other boxes are coming up :)
BSalita - Saturday, July 31, 2010 - link
I congratulate Anandtech for holding out a comprehensive HTPC suite to quantify the performance of new gear. The industry has been lax in creating a consensus of how to properly test HTPC gear. I hope other review sites will likewise use this kind of test suite. Let the media server wanabees know what their systems must do to find a minimal level of acceptability. Only by holding out such a thorough test will we finally have the means for raising out of the quagmire of incomplete codecs, firmware and lightweight product comparisons.Hrel - Sunday, August 15, 2010 - link
1. No tv tuner2. No gaming
3. 700+ dollars?!
I agree with everyone else. I really see no appeal in this system. Something without a tv tuner and that doesn't function as a gaming system will never be worth more than 200, maybe 300 if the features were really nice.
I don't understand why people can't just use their laptops/desktops? I use my desktop on a 37" HDTV. Gaming, video encoding, internet browsing, torrenting, youtube, hulu, DVR, 2TB of storage internally in RAID!!!! Seriously, it's baffling why anyone would accept less when you simply don't have to.
vanderwijk - Monday, August 23, 2010 - link
I was very surprised to read that because HDMI port on the unit is 1.3a the maximum resolution is only 1920 x 1080. This would mean that my Dell 2408 would not be supported because its resolution is 1920 x 1200 :(A quick check on WikiPedia shows that HDMI 1.3a is capable of at least 1920 x 1200, so what's the deal here? Is this an error in the review or is it really not possible to display more than 1080 vertical pixels?
blacksun1234 - Wednesday, August 25, 2010 - link
Yes, it can support 1920x1200.blacksun1234 - Friday, September 3, 2010 - link
Dear Ganesh,Can it support BD 3D playback with Samsung 3D LED TV?
mega999 - Sunday, January 16, 2011 - link
Can it support BD 3D playback with Samsung 3D LED TV? -or do I need the new asrock visiond 3d one for that because of it's hdmi 1.4?Regards,
mega