ZOTAC Goes For Iris Pro in Their New ZBOX E-Series Gaming Mini-PCs
by Ian Cutress on March 10, 2014 1:33 PM EST
So far there have been only a few ways to get hold of an Iris Pro 5200 enabled machine. The first CPUs with these processors were in laptops, until Apple put some in the 21.5” iMacs and GIGABYTE pushed for its BRIX Pro that achieved Steam Box status. Fast forward a few months from those announcements and now ZOTAC is getting in the mix by releasing a pair of ZBOX E-Series mini-PCs.
The two models will be the EI750 and EI730, differentiated by their processor. The EI750 comes with the i7-4770R, the top performing Iris Pro HD 5200 CPU, whereas the EI730 is with the i5-4570R, with lower clock speeds, no hyperthreading and a smaller L3 cache.
The ZBOX E-Series are essentially in direct competition with the BRIX Pro in this market, and ZOTAC's aim is to win on z-height. These machines in the images look longer in the x/y dimensions but shorter in the z-dimension, while still retaining VESA 75/100 mounting. Official dimensions put the system at 188x188x51 mm, which seems very small for a 65W CPU.
Both models come with two DDR3L SO-DIMM slots for up to 16GB of DDR3-1600 (1600 supported, ZOTAC have told me the latest BIOS enables up to DDR3-2133), space for a 2.5” SSD, dual DisplayPort and a DVI port, dual gigabit Ethernet ports, onboard Intel 7260 2T2R 802.11ac WiFi and four USB 3.0 ports. ZOTAC will also sell Plus models with 8 GB DDR3-1600 CAS 11 and a 1TB 5400 HDD included.
ZOTAC is aiming for a March launch, with the EI750 base model retailing at £520, or £650 for the Plus edition. The EI730 base has an MSRP of £430, and the Plus edition will be £560. US pricing should be coming to me soon.
| ZOTAC ZBOX E-Series | ||
| EI750 | EI730 | |
| CPU | Intel Core i7-4770R | Intel Core i5-4570R |
| Cores | 4C / 8T | 4C / 4T |
| Base Frequency | 3200 | 2700 |
| Turbo Frequency | 3900 | 3200 |
| L3 Cache | 6MB | 4MB |
| IGP | Iris Pro 5200 | Iris Pro 5200 |
| DRAM | 2 x SO-DIMM | 2 x SO-DIMM |
| Display Outputs |
2 x DP 1 x DVI-D |
2 x DP 1 x DVI-D |
| SATA |
1 x SATA 6 Gbps 1 x mSATA 6 Gbps |
1 x SATA 6 Gbps 1 x mSATA 6 Gbps |
| Ethernet | 2 x GbE | 2 x GbE |
| WiFi | Intel 7260 802.11ac 2T2R | Intel 7260 802.11ac 2T2R |
| USB | 4 x USB 3.0 | 4 x USB 3.0 |
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jrs77 - Tuesday, March 11, 2014 - link
I'm waiting for a small box of 5x5x5" with a 4770R, a slot for a 2.5" and space for a somewhat decent and silent cooler. And bring the price down to under €500.fteoath64 - Wednesday, March 12, 2014 - link
If Zotac could just make the side cover (one with yellow circle) about 8mm thicker with hexagonal grill and a 120mm slim mounted fan, then it will solve the heat issue. This fan will push air over 80% the surface of the board beneath ejecting hot air off the side vents. This means the huge slim finned heatsink with heatpipes will cool the CPU better without the noise factor. That slight thickness do not affect Vesa mounting but does a whole lot for thermals and noise.headloser - Sunday, March 16, 2014 - link
The only way i buying this if it is equipped with a AMD R7 250 card or nvidia version of it. Plus it must have the able to be equipped with a SSD drive.If not, not going to be bother.melk - Sunday, March 16, 2014 - link
No HDMI? Why dual Ethernet ports?