Zotac ZBOX MAGNUS EN970 Review - A Gaming mini-PC Done Right
by Ganesh T S on September 28, 2015 8:00 AM ESTPower Consumption and Thermal Performance
The power consumption at the wall was measured with a 1080p display being driven through the HDMI port. In the graphs below, we compare the idle and load power of the Zotac ZBOX MAGNUS EN970 with other low power PCs evaluated before. For load power consumption, we ran Furmark 1.12.0 and Prime95 v27.9 together. Despite consuming close to 19W at idle, the ZBOX MAGNUS EN970 actually happens to be the PC with the lowest idle power amongst all the discrete GPU-equipped machines that we have evaluated so far.
The load power is also amongst the highest in the set of numbers that we have seen till now. However, the big separation between the idle and load powers indicate that the sytem can operate efficiently over a wide range of loading conditions.
Our thermal stress routine starts with the system at idle, followed by 30 minutes of pure CPU loading. This is followed by another 30 minutes of both CPU and GPU being loaded simultaneously. After this, the CPU load gets removed, allowing the GPU to be loaded alone for another 30 minutes. The various clocks in the system as well as the temperatures within the unit are presented below.
According to Intel's official specifications, the junction temperature of the Core i5-5200U is 105C. We find that pure CPU loading keeps the clock frequency half-way between the base frequency (2.2 GHz) and the maximum burst frequency (2.7 GHz). However, the temperature remains well below the junction temperature (around 82C). Getting the GPU into the equation ramps up the motherboard temperature as well as that of the GPU and GPU. However, the CPU remains below the junction temperature despite going up to as high as 102C. The GPU stabilizes around 81C.
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SpartyOn - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
Apparently you either don't know what I'm talking about or have never used Steam In-Home Streaming. I'm not saying don't have a PC in the living room - in fact, I'm saying just the opposite - but make it an inexpensive media streaming box rather than a full-blown gaming system.I have two SFF media PC's, one in my living room and one in my basement, so I understand the need that these boxes fill. All I'm saying is that with Steam In-Home Streaming, that HTPC doesn't need to be a full-fledged gaming machine and your money can be better appropriated elsewhere.
donthatethesun - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
I think this is more for people that don't necessarily want to have a desktop or multiple systems. It can function as their go to in the living room and for when they travel.lmcd - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
Can't bring the desktop on a plane easily. There's your niche.tarak73 - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link
I am waiting for the same solution with DDR4 setup...rtho782 - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link
The 970m is a GM204 (desktop 970/980) with 1280 shaders instead of 1024 in the desktop 960 (gm206), 48 rops instead of 32, and, crucially, a 192bit memory bus instead of 128bit, so it should be a nice chunk faster than the desktop 960. The review seems to indicate that it being a 970m is a negative?KateH - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link
Yeah I was confused by that too. The only advantage I can see of the 960 vs 970m is that GM206 supports hardware decoding of some additional codecs that GM204 doesn't.rhx123 - Monday, September 28, 2015 - link
The lack of DisplayPort is a deal breaker. Very silly omission, with 4 HDMI Ports, it's not like space was at a premium.lmcd - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
I likewise found this very disappointing. Particularly when none seem to be HDMI 2.0 (or am I wrong?).KateH - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
All GM20x GPUs support HDMI 2.0 AFAIK, so I presume they are.meacupla - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
Lack of DP is disappointing, but why is it a deal breaker?Did you want to use this with a G-sync monitor?