Nettops don’t normally fall into the category labelled ‘portable’ but it’s thin. Thin in the sense that it is a low power-consumption device strong enough to play media and get you online.
Liliputing reports that Acer now offers a very small form-factor desktop computer with AMD insides. Interestingly enough, there aren’t many AMD based computers in this segment, as it’s heavily dominated by Intel Atom processors.
A dual-core E-450 CPU runs the whole show, clocked at 1.65 GHz. For those curious as to how on earth an Intel Atom competitor lines up in terms of benchmarks, here’s a Geekbench result page.
AMD’s 6320 takes responsibility for graphics processing. Although the chip is aimed at the netbook/nettop market, it pulls its share of the weight rather well, as can be seen in notebooktech.net’s superb benchmark database. That said, you won’t be doing much gaming on any computer equipped with an AMD 6320 or comparable, according to the site the chip runs Starcraft 2 in low at 46 frames per second.
2GB of RAM, 500GB of HDD make their appearance in the model, not too shabby for the starting price of $329.99.
Of course Revo 70 is capable of connecting to Wi-Fi networks — 802.11 b/g/n — and features an HDMI output for a good compatibility with various HDTVs and newer monitors.
So?
I personally think there should be a wider selection available. These small desktop computers meet a demand very specifically, a demand that is currently filled by value notebooks.
There are at least three people off the top of my head, who I think would make great use of such a device. They use value notebooks right now; Fujitsu-Siemens, Acer and Asus products being the most prevalent. They make very little use of the portable aspect of the computer. Might as well opt for a nettop next time they shop around, as it gets them a better hardware setup, keeps more money in their pockets and can be connected to a TV more easily than the thick-and-heavy laptops they use.
Then there’s the noise.
I don’t have my hopes high, though, I’m reasonably sure they will not look into nettops at all next time they shop. They’ll buy another Fujitsu-Siemens value notebook when the one they’re using now breaks for good.
via Liliputing
