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World's Smallest Desktop Pentium4?
Valour writes "The Jem Report has just published an in-depth review and installation guide for the new Iwill ZPC, a cool little Pentium4 ultra small formfactor PC. There have been similar designs in the past, but nothing with this kind of power."
If you look carefully, you'll note that they use inches and millimeters that are specifically optimized for the Iwill, thus making it appear smaller and lighter than it really is. When will the manufacturers learn that this kind of "cheating" in mass and volume benchmarks isn't really fooling anyone.
The nice thing about a computer this size is that you can just place it in a small refrigator... and then overclock the heck of it.
Plus, you have a nice place to keep your sodas/beer chilled as well.
"Honey, can you take out those leftovers? They are making my computer smell like an italian restaurant!"
Davak
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Manufacturer Iwill USA
Model ZPC
Chipset Intel 845GV
Formfactor Mini ITX/proprietary
Market Portable workstation/fashionable desktop. This machine is primarily marketed to system integrators who will use it to create systems for targeted niche markets like those mentioned above.
CPU support 400mhz and 533mhz FSB Pentium4 processors up to 2.53ghz.
RAM PC2700 is recommended, but PC2100 and PC1600 will also work. ECC memory is not supported. Maximum RAM capacity is 512MB using one 512MB module.
Iwill ZPC
Graphics capabilities Onboard Intel Extreme Graphics
IDE ATA100 (through a conversion daughter board) supports one notebook 2.5" hard drive and one slimline notebook optical drive
Firewire Yes (2) (VIA chipset)
USB Hi-speed USB 2.0 (4)
LAN Realtek 8100B 10/100
Sound ALC650 stereo
Power External 90W DC19V power supply
Dimensions Height: 54mm (2.13 inches)
Width: 184mm (7.24 inches)
Depth: 263mm (10.35 inches)
Weight 1.95kg (4.3 pounds) net weight
3.75kg (8.27 pounds) with hard drive, RAM, CPU, optical drive and power supply
9-pin serial One
Available colors Silver (aluminum) and black
Warranty One year through Iwill
The Iwill ZPC is the world's smallest Pentium4 desktop computer supporting the 533FSB. The initial material that Iwill sent me months ago made it look really cool -- there were a variety of different colors and the design was quite attractive. Unfortunately Iwill scrapped all of the colors except black and silver, and those two represent two different models of the ZPC. The black model is designed for slot-loading optical drives and the silver model supports tray-loading optical drives, but other than that they are identical as far as technical specifications are concerned. For my testing I was given one of the silver models. Here's what the front looks like when fully assembled, and here is the rear of the unit.
The ZPC can be purchased with or without the CDRW/DVD combo drive but considering the fact that you can't buy a comparable optical drive for the difference in price, I would suggest getting the full package including the combo drive unless you're running totally from the network or otherwise have no need for a CD drive. The only extra software that it comes with is Nero Express (version 5.5.10.13)
Assembly was surprisingly easy -- almost too easy, and in fact I suspected it was a trap. I was expecting something at least as complex and delicate as a notebook computer but it was actually more like a mini-PC. I have compiled a complete installation guide (including photos!) which can be found here.
The ZPC is rather expensive; unless you're buying in quantity or directly from the manufacturer you won't find one of these under $450 (no hard drive, CPU, or RAM included) but considering what you're getting, that's not all that bad. As far as price for performance is concerned there are a few things to consider. First of all the ZPC is not versatile; it can never be a good gaming machine and since there is no TV-out or DVI connector you're limited to a VGA display, so there's no video editing possibilities. That means that the ZPC is not a replacement (or even competition) for a mini-PC like the Iwill XP4-G or for VIA's ultra-cheap and somewhat expandable Epia C3 integrated CPU solutions. If you're looking for a portable gaming machine, a low-cost, low-performance low-profile desktop system or a TiVo device, the ZPC cannot meet your needs.
So what is the ZPC good for? A lot of things: as an Internet device or appliance, as a stackable node for a cluster, as a small formfactor workstation for cramped or limited spaces (dorm rooms, RVs, yachts, or even cars and airplanes). Being as it does not have a screen with it, the ZPC is not exactly a laptop replacement although it is smaller, lighter, and more durable. If you need a portable machine to take on special jobs (engineers and technicians often need good
I own a Shuttle. It is more expensive than the cheapest desktops and less portable than a notebook, but it has real desktop performance in a reasonably portable form factor. That makes sense to me.
The A64 is going to kick everyone's buttocks, because much like there is no spoon, there is no FSB on the A64.
AMD really didnt think that through. Intel tried a server chip about 5 years ago with an integrated memory controller, and they finally ditched it. Why? Because the upgrade path for memory technologies changed too damn much.
So AMD is going to release the A64 with integrated DDR333 (maybe DDR400). So next year when we are looking at DDR533, etc, what are they going to do? Imagine the confusion after a few new A64 updates- there will be 3 or 4 different versions of each chip, and each one will support different memory. Thats going to be a marketing nightmare for them. And for what? Multi-processor systems still need to maintain cache coherency, so any performance gained by each chip having its own memory controller are pretty much wiped out while you are waiting for the chips to sync up.
No thanks- I'll stick with a northbridge. Move to a high speed packetized serial FSB with QoS and a PCIExpress backbone. Thats the future. Lower pin count, lower power usage, higher performance.
AMD is just repeating the mistakes that others made years ago, but they are too dumb to see it.
The reason they carry it on is that people want it and need it. Serial is hardly useless, it is needed for older (but not that old) devices like Palms and HP Calculators. Also, the best modems generally are external that use serial ports.
Older printers (and some new ones) still use parallel ports.
PS/2 is hardly dead either. PS/2 keyboards just work. They have ironed out most of the bugs with USB keyboards, but you still have minor issues with Linux, old dos stuff, etc. Besides, all the good keyboards are either PS/2 or even the old AT style plug. USB keyboards are crap. Bottom line is, I better be able to hook up my Model M's to any computer I buy.
Ok for the past 10 years, things have been getting smaller and smaller.
I've lost my cell phone, my PDA, my laptop, and god knows what else.
Now I have to worry about losing my desktop???
Why worry? Each of us is wearing an unlicensed "nucular" accelerator on his back.
Sig changed for readability by G.W.
It seems like the Pentium M, even on a laptop motherboard, would be the ideal way to make an extremely small, fanless (at least for the 7W version of the chip) pc.
Has anyone seen something like this? Would it be difficult to make one?
And, you don't need that many versions of the same chip since memory _technologies_ don't change that often (EDO, sdram, rdram, ddr and ddr2 cover about 10 years). So one chip for DDR200-DDR400, one for DDRII. Though if higher speed memory of the same type is introduced, the chip might need revalidation and a new stepping might be needed - but new steppings are done anyway (the P4 Northwood already has 3 steppings). And guess what? DDRII533 won't magically work on your existing P4 board either. And how much people upgrade the board so they can use the fastest ram but don't upgrade the cpu?
You could call AMD's I/O links (hypertransport) exactly that, except that they are not used for ram access.