GIGABYTE BRIX Pro: A First Look at the Intel i7-4770R with Iris Pro HD 5200
by Ganesh T S on January 7, 2014 8:00 PM EST
We have had a quick glance at what the Core i7-4770R is capable of in the BRIX Pro. The initial look has given us various avenues to explore in the second part of the review. After getting back from CES, our first plan is to investigate whether any real-world workloads can cause the unit to throttle. The WLAN card is also pending investigation. At first glance it appears to be a 1x1 802.11ac card from Realtek, but more tests need to be done in order to get an idea of the WLAN performance.
The unit does offer the DIY crowd a little bit of flexibility in fine-tuning the performance. With judicious choice of DRAM and SSD / HDD storage, it is possible to adapt the BRIX Pro to one's requirements. The effect of the choice of DRAM modules can't be overstated in determining the performance of the system. We plan to benchmark the unit with a couple of additional DRAM modules (varying in size and speed). The Corsair Vengeance SODIMMs capable of running at 1866 MHz and the 8 GB per stick ADATA stick capable of running at 1600 MHz are already with us. The memory slots in the BRIX Pro are tuned for DDR3L (1.35V DRAM). It will be interesting to watch what speeds can be hit with these memory modules.
Additionally, as readers requested in our NUC review, we plan to add some basic gaming benchmarks to the mix. Anand has already covered the gaming performance of the Iris Pro HD5200 in detail before, but this will give some additional context for the BRIX Pro as a gaming machine.
Gigabyte's press release for the BRIX Pro went out yesterday. The product has two SKUs, one based on the i7-4770R, and the other based on the i5-4570R. Both CPUs have 65W TDPs, and hence there should really be nothing different between the two versions other than the CPU itself. One of the interesting aspects in the press release was the reference to 64 MB of eDRAM on the Iris Pro HD 5200. Anand's testing of the i7-4950HQ estimated the amount of eDRAM to be around 128 MB as per Intel's specifications. However, Gigabyte continues to hold on to the 64 MB eDRAM number for the i7-4770R and the i5-4570R even after a request for comment was sent. This is one additional aspect that we would like to evaluate in our second part of the review.
The final aspect that we are covering today is pricing. The i7-4770R and i5-4570R cost $392 and $288 respectively (as per the ARK pages). They are only available to OEMs. The MSRP for the GB-BXi5-4570R is $529, while the GB-BXi7-4770R comes in at $649. Considering that no other vendor has brought out a i7-4770R system, Gigabyte can charge a premium and still get away with it. Given the high price demanded by Intel for the CPU alone, the end pricing of the systems don't appear outrageous.
The BRIX Pro is a very exciting system and will definitely energize the NUC / UCFF category. The only worrying point is the thermal performance. Would it have been better for the 47W TDP version (i7-4950HQ) to come in this chassis, with the 65W TDP version sacrificing some of the compactness for a better cooling system? At this point, we don't want to jump to conclusions before digging more into the throttling behaviour. Stay tuned for further coverage towards the end of this month.
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DIYEyal - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
I could use something like that for editing on the go, much smaller than any mITX system.. Much cheaper than a laptop with similar specs.. I could plug it to the hotel's TV via HDMI and get some editing done (weird configuration, I know)CharonPDX - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
Re: "One of the interesting aspects in the press release was the reference to 64 MB of eDRAM on the Iris Pro HD 5200.".Apple doesn't just "imply", they outright state it: "The 15‑inch MacBook Pro has a phenomenal display — with the graphics power to match. Its fourth-generation Intel Core i7 processor features Iris Pro Graphics with 128MB of embedded memory, which accelerates processor- and graphics-intensive tasks by acting as an ultrafast cache. "
But the Retina MacBook Pro uses the mobile chip, not the desktop chip. Maybe the desktop chip only has 64 MB?
JohnHardkiss - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
Interesting. It would be gold if these seemingly contradictory bits of information would be settled.Daedalus1 - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
I have been waiting for a NUC or similar to come out with the 5200 Iris Pro graphics for some time. At last. And then disappointment, it only supports 2 monitors not 3.Oh well maybe I just have to go the AsRock mini iTX route after all.
Daedalus
kgh00007 - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
Great, I've been waiting for you guys to get a hold if one of these, I'm looking forward to part 2!I would also like to request a 1080p gaming benchmark, at low or medium details, this thing will likely be connected to a 1080p HDTV afterall, that's what interests me the most!
And maybe a look at the preformance difference between 8GB and 16GB RAM configurations if any!
ryrynz - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
I think you could just look up any review of the difference between 8 and 16, there's not much.. which is why I haven't bothered moving to 16.DarkXale - Wednesday, January 8, 2014 - link
RAM benefits are binary.You either have too much, or too little. In the case of games its generally an easy answer; unless you're at 4GB, or rare cases 6GB, you have too much. Its still exceptionally rare for a game to be 64-bit, and they are thus incapable of addressing more than 4GB. The rest is simply up to the system & background tasks.
However, its always preferable to have too much RAM - than too little. Too much generally just means that you ended up paying a bit more - too little means extreme swapping, utterly annihilating performance.
8GB as such is the sweet spot, because its a level which is difficult to reach without the use of specific software - but cheap enough that going down to the 6GB or 4GB levels saves almost no money on a home-build setup.
lco45 - Monday, January 20, 2014 - link
Nicely put.8steve8 - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
1. gigabytes own specs list 3200x2000 @ 60 Hz the max resolution on the displayport...why, it's DP 1.2? This would exclude it for use with all the new 4k LCD's coming our soon.
2. a few gaming benchmarks would be appreciated... part of the allure of this is that it's a tiny workstation that can also kind of play games.
Samus - Tuesday, January 7, 2014 - link
Wow this little thing is amazing.