@lioncat55 - I hear you man I'm in the same quest check out this review of Q2900-ITX @techspot http://www.techspot.com/review/882-intel-pentium-j... @LoneWolf - still not enough for on-the-fly-transcoding for Plex server
Give it time. These chips aren't even in the same league as the Core 2 processors from 6-7 years ago in terms of performance-per-clock, but they do use a tiny fraction of the energy.
They're certainly a big step up from the old Atoms.
Might start getting competitive with Nahelem class chips in the next 3-4 years, which is when things would start to get interesting.
You can get an AMD FX-6300 for $89, and throw it on a cheap motherboard. It works great for Plex; the 6 integer cores are surprisingly good at transcoding. I'm doing 1080p full Bluray transcoded to 20 Mbps for playback across powerline ethernet.
It does use way more electricity than one of these though.
Another decent Plex server is the NVidia Jetson board. There's an accelerated Plex build for it. It's almost $200, but includes the CPU, RAM, and 16 GB of storage, so it's basically turnkey. The power usage on that is about 7 watts typical and 15 watts peak, not counting the hard drive the movies are on. (This option does require some Linux knowledge. You need to update Linux for Tegra and set up Plex server as chroot.)
@lioncat55 - I have a FreeNAS box with Plex Server running inside a jail on an Asrock Q1900-ITX, basically the quad core version of this, but with lower per-core frequency. There are other versions available also including one with DC-in. The above model also has 4 SATA ports (vital for me with a 4 drive ZFS setup). I boot from a Sandisk Cruzer Fit USB drive with no issues.
I have one large, slow fan blowing over the drives in the entire case and never have any heat issues. Very, very happy with it... and now considering building another for a family member.
Great review, I like the comparison with HP's Stream. To push it further I would say in this particular case it's obvious one should pick up the OEM made, but what about if someone wants a quad BT? Then for 20$ more someone can get twice the performance for 5% in system cost. It's endless reasoning, but I just wanted to point out this bit
Agreed. I have the ASRock Q1900M (quad-core, full size DIMMs, a few more x1 slots and a full x16 (x1 wired) slot) and that allows for quite a bit more flexibility. It's still a very small board - same depth as ITX, just a little more width. The extra x1 slots could allow for some extra sata connectivity, the x16 could allow for a more powerful gpu (the intel solution onboard is marginal at best - only 4EU's).
Overall though, armed with a SSD (Samsung 830) it's more than adequate for HTPC duty.
I guess gaming benches were a logical component of the review for this product, seeing how it is definitely intended for such tasks. /sarcasm
To hell with stuff like media playback or a file server, workloads such a product is actually suited for. Who cares how this product works for stuff it is actually usable for.
With 6 and 8 TB drives available, I'd say it would be ample for many users. It will still do more good than it would ever do as a gaming box.
Plus there is a PCI-E slot, not useful for a GPU, especially with such a weak integrated CPU, but you can plug in a HDD controller card, there are PCI-E x1 controllers with 2, 4 and even 6 SATA ports.
The audience of this article is likely going to be able to relate most with gaming benchmarks. Also, have you no curiosity in how hardware like this is able to run modern games?
I bet everyone is wondering how good the product is at a task it is not intended for and will never be used at. That's like reviewing clothing based on the way it tastes.
BTW I don't think it is very smart of you to call "smart and on the point" "rude and shortsighted" ;) If anything, it makes you rude and shortsighted, and also a hypocrite for calling others what you are...
What a product was intended for is one thing. Total/overall performance is another. If you're not interested in certain benchmarks that's your business.
Normally i would avoid cursing but after numerous attempts to provide feedback on stopping these retarded Load Delta Charts I have just lost it.
ian - seriously - grow a f**king blub in the brain and realize that the Load Delta Chart is absolutely f**king stupid - especially when you are reviewing a product where Idle numbers matter the most. Just go back to separate Idle and Load charts. Why is it just so f**king hard for you to realize that?!
I usually don't make comments, but lately it seems like this should be mentioned as much as possible. AT articles unceasingly flog OEMs for junk TN panels and the use of mechanical storage in an apparent attempt to change the direction of the industry. I think it's the responsibility of the readers to therefore repeatedly point out that delta charts for power consumption are not what we want.
I am glad there was at least a more reasonable PSU used in this review. 500 watts is a lot closer to what might be considered appropriate for low-consumption equipment than 1200, but the delta chart isn't just annoying, it's uninformative and utterly stupid. If you're going to be bothered with measuring idle and load wattage, why not just post the bloody numbers? I'm sure we, the readers, can handle a little bit of subtraction on our own if we want delta values. So yes, like in other recent articles, I completely support the posting of actual wattage values and +1 the carpet bombing of profanity in the post above as, at this point, earned and deserved.
If all you need is a basic laptop for e-mail, web surf, light office docs (MS Office is actually too much program for this setup and I find myself using Kingsoft Office at home (even on my high powered machines) because it does all I need and is very lightweight. This would work very well on a Stream 11, 13, or 14 to do light office work - word processing, spreadsheet, or presentation. It saves in XML form - docx, xlxs, and pptx. The 11 especially is lightweight less than 3 lbs and adding a 64 or 128 USB stick or SD card would give plenty of extra storage over the 32 GB eMMC. You need to appreciate these products for what they are - Chromebook Competition. I think they will work quite well for younger kids or for a light laptop for around the house or even a work laptop (if work doesn't buy one for you) for short trips. I'm sure it would do fine on the movie front with Netflix or a nice 1 TB external drive with a movie and music collection.
Did you guys test the NIC at all? I bought this mobo when it came out and from the beginning had a problem moving files over my network. It would fall flat on it ass and crash when trying to stream a Blu-ray rip or move a large file over my network. I was running Win 8.1 and tried everything. I ended up buying a Asrock Q1900 itx using the same RAM and OS the problem was gone.
" I thought it best to polish of the data and see if it still relevant alongside the $200 offerings and worth the potential extra cost for a full build to fill out a motherboard in exchange for the potential extra functionality (2T2R WiFi rather than 1T1R, SATA drives rather than eMMC)."
I don't know what to do with this. Before, I built two desktops based on first and 2nd Gen Atoms as cheapest new desktop systems. For home use and applications, buying a cheap laptop would be better for many scenarios.
As a firewall/router maybe with a separate purchase of a NIC but then you could buy a powerful home WiFi router and install DD-WRT.
As advertisement display maybe but I would prefer implementing wireless HDMI adapters since this mini-itx would require routing of lan and power cables.
PS/2 keyboard & mouse sockets? Are these still needed? Do people still use them? I'd rather have some more USB. Don't know if the chipset supports any more, but if not then they could always include an onboard hub from one of the existing USB2 to provide two or three more USB2 for low-bandwidth things like... a keyboard, a mouse, a printer, the lead to charge your phone and transfer data, all of which could co-exist in the available bandwidth from a single USB2 connection, so the others are free for more demanding stuff.
Good article, but I really would have appreciated if you could compare this CPU to a Celeron 1037u. I have a feeling that with its Ivy Bridge architecture though, that it would probably wipe the floor with this new CPU.
You'd be right on the dual core version. Compared against the little quad core version, the quad does significantly better. I have to say that I wouldn't consider the dual core for any purchase, but I do have the quad in my htpc. The quad has slower single thread performance, but the total score (geekbench) using all cores matches the 1037u.
Interesting. Thanks for sharing your experiences. I have to wonder though, when I see a 1037u + motherboard system for sale for like $4 extra dollars, what's Intel's point in releasing this? I suppose eventually when the supply for the 1037u dries up, all we'll have are these Atoms. Hurray - we're paying more for less. :)
Well, I do agree on some puzzlement as to what purpose the J1800 serves. The J1800 is a 10w part, the J1900 is a 10w part. Geekbench on the J1800 is about 1000 on the single core (matching the J1900) but only 1600 on the multicore score. That is pretty useless and would be somewhat painful to use in real life.
And - considering that the J1900 scores much higher on the multi-core loads while operating in the same thermal envelope, they can't even say that it's really and issue of power usage in a mobile situation. So, I can see why they would release the J1900 quad, it turns in similar performance metrics as the 1037u while using half the power which is a worthwhile cause.
The J1800 seems to be a 'broken quad core' part that they're releasing to keep yields high as they sell them to suckers who don't realize how slow they are.
There would have been a huge market for these if they had the intuition to slot in a couple of extra SATA ports. It would have made for a super cheap 4 bay NAS with extremely low power consumption. Would have easily been the next gen successor to the 1037u for the DIY NAS builders.
In its current state, it might only appeal to the HTPC builders if it can do transconding on the fly. For those of us who don't need transcoding on the fly, the Raspberry Pi is the perfect solution.
A secondary market could be those looking for a PC just to surf the net and do light office work but with a score of 1000, even those tasks could be a handful for the J1800. I have a 7 year old Core2Duo laptop with 1083 score and it feels too sluggish for daily use even with an SSD.
Okay, so are you using UEFI in Windows 7? This obviously affects POST time. Also Windows 8 POST times with UEFI would be the best case scenario in testing. If I care about POST times, I will be running Windows 8.
I remember that there have been benches done with Anandtech on Windows 8. Why not across the board?
We’ve updated our terms. By continuing to use the site and/or by logging into your account, you agree to the Site’s updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
38 Comments
Back to Article
lioncat55 - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
When ever I see a system like this I want to build a Plex server. But it never seems like the CPU is enough.LoneWolf15 - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
@lioncat55 - Asrock makes the Q2900-ITX , a J2900 Bay Trail quad core. You'll probably find it a little more suitable.I went Core i3-3225 at the time I built my HTPC due to the HD4000 graphics. Still working well running XBMC Gotham.
xbenny - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
@lioncat55 - I hear you man I'm in the same quest check out this review of Q2900-ITX @techspot http://www.techspot.com/review/882-intel-pentium-j... @LoneWolf - still not enough for on-the-fly-transcoding for Plex serverStevoLincolnite - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
Give it time.These chips aren't even in the same league as the Core 2 processors from 6-7 years ago in terms of performance-per-clock, but they do use a tiny fraction of the energy.
They're certainly a big step up from the old Atoms.
Might start getting competitive with Nahelem class chips in the next 3-4 years, which is when things would start to get interesting.
barleyguy - Monday, December 29, 2014 - link
You can get an AMD FX-6300 for $89, and throw it on a cheap motherboard. It works great for Plex; the 6 integer cores are surprisingly good at transcoding. I'm doing 1080p full Bluray transcoded to 20 Mbps for playback across powerline ethernet.It does use way more electricity than one of these though.
Another decent Plex server is the NVidia Jetson board. There's an accelerated Plex build for it. It's almost $200, but includes the CPU, RAM, and 16 GB of storage, so it's basically turnkey. The power usage on that is about 7 watts typical and 15 watts peak, not counting the hard drive the movies are on. (This option does require some Linux knowledge. You need to update Linux for Tegra and set up Plex server as chroot.)
$.02
KWIE - Wednesday, January 7, 2015 - link
@lioncat55 - I have a FreeNAS box with Plex Server running inside a jail on an Asrock Q1900-ITX, basically the quad core version of this, but with lower per-core frequency. There are other versions available also including one with DC-in. The above model also has 4 SATA ports (vital for me with a 4 drive ZFS setup). I boot from a Sandisk Cruzer Fit USB drive with no issues.I have one large, slow fan blowing over the drives in the entire case and never have any heat issues. Very, very happy with it... and now considering building another for a family member.
dragosmp - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
Great review, I like the comparison with HP's Stream. To push it further I would say in this particular case it's obvious one should pick up the OEM made, but what about if someone wants a quad BT? Then for 20$ more someone can get twice the performance for 5% in system cost. It's endless reasoning, but I just wanted to point out this bitbill.rookard - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
Agreed. I have the ASRock Q1900M (quad-core, full size DIMMs, a few more x1 slots and a full x16 (x1 wired) slot) and that allows for quite a bit more flexibility. It's still a very small board - same depth as ITX, just a little more width. The extra x1 slots could allow for some extra sata connectivity, the x16 could allow for a more powerful gpu (the intel solution onboard is marginal at best - only 4EU's).Overall though, armed with a SSD (Samsung 830) it's more than adequate for HTPC duty.
ddriver - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
The lack of performance is otherworldly.I guess gaming benches were a logical component of the review for this product, seeing how it is definitely intended for such tasks. /sarcasm
To hell with stuff like media playback or a file server, workloads such a product is actually suited for. Who cares how this product works for stuff it is actually usable for.
Gigaplex - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
Insufficient SATA ports for this to be used as a file server.ddriver - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
With 6 and 8 TB drives available, I'd say it would be ample for many users. It will still do more good than it would ever do as a gaming box.Plus there is a PCI-E slot, not useful for a GPU, especially with such a weak integrated CPU, but you can plug in a HDD controller card, there are PCI-E x1 controllers with 2, 4 and even 6 SATA ports.
III-V - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
The audience of this article is likely going to be able to relate most with gaming benchmarks. Also, have you no curiosity in how hardware like this is able to run modern games?Pretty rude and shortsighted response.
ddriver - Sunday, December 28, 2014 - link
I bet everyone is wondering how good the product is at a task it is not intended for and will never be used at. That's like reviewing clothing based on the way it tastes.ddriver - Sunday, December 28, 2014 - link
BTW I don't think it is very smart of you to call "smart and on the point" "rude and shortsighted" ;) If anything, it makes you rude and shortsighted, and also a hypocrite for calling others what you are...Morawka - Sunday, December 28, 2014 - link
you were rude, now hush and run alongOxford Guy - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
What a product was intended for is one thing. Total/overall performance is another. If you're not interested in certain benchmarks that's your business.XZerg - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
Normally i would avoid cursing but after numerous attempts to provide feedback on stopping these retarded Load Delta Charts I have just lost it.ian - seriously - grow a f**king blub in the brain and realize that the Load Delta Chart is absolutely f**king stupid - especially when you are reviewing a product where Idle numbers matter the most. Just go back to separate Idle and Load charts. Why is it just so f**king hard for you to realize that?!
Throwaway007 - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
I signed up just to say the same thing.I bet Ian probably introduces himself on various dating sites as having a penile length delta of 2 inches.
Sounds like this man is hiding something.
BrokenCrayons - Tuesday, December 30, 2014 - link
I usually don't make comments, but lately it seems like this should be mentioned as much as possible. AT articles unceasingly flog OEMs for junk TN panels and the use of mechanical storage in an apparent attempt to change the direction of the industry. I think it's the responsibility of the readers to therefore repeatedly point out that delta charts for power consumption are not what we want.I am glad there was at least a more reasonable PSU used in this review. 500 watts is a lot closer to what might be considered appropriate for low-consumption equipment than 1200, but the delta chart isn't just annoying, it's uninformative and utterly stupid. If you're going to be bothered with measuring idle and load wattage, why not just post the bloody numbers? I'm sure we, the readers, can handle a little bit of subtraction on our own if we want delta values. So yes, like in other recent articles, I completely support the posting of actual wattage values and +1 the carpet bombing of profanity in the post above as, at this point, earned and deserved.
ant6n - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
If it had 4 SATAs it could make a good file server.trivor - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
If all you need is a basic laptop for e-mail, web surf, light office docs (MS Office is actually too much program for this setup and I find myself using Kingsoft Office at home (even on my high powered machines) because it does all I need and is very lightweight. This would work very well on a Stream 11, 13, or 14 to do light office work - word processing, spreadsheet, or presentation. It saves in XML form - docx, xlxs, and pptx. The 11 especially is lightweight less than 3 lbs and adding a 64 or 128 USB stick or SD card would give plenty of extra storage over the 32 GB eMMC. You need to appreciate these products for what they are - Chromebook Competition. I think they will work quite well for younger kids or for a light laptop for around the house or even a work laptop (if work doesn't buy one for you) for short trips. I'm sure it would do fine on the movie front with Netflix or a nice 1 TB external drive with a movie and music collection.Kneedragger - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
Did you guys test the NIC at all? I bought this mobo when it came out and from the beginning had a problem moving files over my network. It would fall flat on it ass and crash when trying to stream a Blu-ray rip or move a large file over my network. I was running Win 8.1 and tried everything. I ended up buying a Asrock Q1900 itx using the same RAM and OS the problem was gone.almostold2 - Friday, December 26, 2014 - link
" I thought it best to polish of the data and see if it still relevant alongside the $200 offerings and worth the potential extra cost for a full build to fill out a motherboard in exchange for the potential extra functionality (2T2R WiFi rather than 1T1R, SATA drives rather than eMMC)."Proofread please.
KaarlisK - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
"with the upper flipped around due to the dual channel nature of the SoC"Could Ian please elaborate on this?
Pissedoffyouth - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
OP can't inb4zodiacfml - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
I don't know what to do with this. Before, I built two desktops based on first and 2nd Gen Atoms as cheapest new desktop systems. For home use and applications, buying a cheap laptop would be better for many scenarios.As a firewall/router maybe with a separate purchase of a NIC but then you could buy a powerful home WiFi router and install DD-WRT.
As advertisement display maybe but I would prefer implementing wireless HDMI adapters since this mini-itx would require routing of lan and power cables.
yannigr2 - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
A useless product with an Intel logo on it making all the difference. Remove the Intel logo, and no one will care about it.PrinceGaz - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
PS/2 keyboard & mouse sockets? Are these still needed? Do people still use them? I'd rather have some more USB. Don't know if the chipset supports any more, but if not then they could always include an onboard hub from one of the existing USB2 to provide two or three more USB2 for low-bandwidth things like... a keyboard, a mouse, a printer, the lead to charge your phone and transfer data, all of which could co-exist in the available bandwidth from a single USB2 connection, so the others are free for more demanding stuff.PrinceGaz - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
Oh, and that Logitech MK120 you suggest requires two USB ports, one for the keyboard, one for the mouse. :pOxford Guy - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
People still use the old IBM M keyboards.jbltecnicspro - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
Good article, but I really would have appreciated if you could compare this CPU to a Celeron 1037u. I have a feeling that with its Ivy Bridge architecture though, that it would probably wipe the floor with this new CPU.bill.rookard - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
You'd be right on the dual core version. Compared against the little quad core version, the quad does significantly better. I have to say that I wouldn't consider the dual core for any purchase, but I do have the quad in my htpc. The quad has slower single thread performance, but the total score (geekbench) using all cores matches the 1037u.jbltecnicspro - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
Interesting. Thanks for sharing your experiences. I have to wonder though, when I see a 1037u + motherboard system for sale for like $4 extra dollars, what's Intel's point in releasing this? I suppose eventually when the supply for the 1037u dries up, all we'll have are these Atoms. Hurray - we're paying more for less. :)bill.rookard - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
Well, I do agree on some puzzlement as to what purpose the J1800 serves. The J1800 is a 10w part, the J1900 is a 10w part. Geekbench on the J1800 is about 1000 on the single core (matching the J1900) but only 1600 on the multicore score. That is pretty useless and would be somewhat painful to use in real life.And - considering that the J1900 scores much higher on the multi-core loads while operating in the same thermal envelope, they can't even say that it's really and issue of power usage in a mobile situation. So, I can see why they would release the J1900 quad, it turns in similar performance metrics as the 1037u while using half the power which is a worthwhile cause.
The J1800 seems to be a 'broken quad core' part that they're releasing to keep yields high as they sell them to suckers who don't realize how slow they are.
nginx - Friday, January 2, 2015 - link
There would have been a huge market for these if they had the intuition to slot in a couple of extra SATA ports. It would have made for a super cheap 4 bay NAS with extremely low power consumption. Would have easily been the next gen successor to the 1037u for the DIY NAS builders.In its current state, it might only appeal to the HTPC builders if it can do transconding on the fly. For those of us who don't need transcoding on the fly, the Raspberry Pi is the perfect solution.
A secondary market could be those looking for a PC just to surf the net and do light office work but with a score of 1000, even those tasks could be a handful for the J1800. I have a 7 year old Core2Duo laptop with 1083 score and it feels too sluggish for daily use even with an SSD.
flensr - Saturday, December 27, 2014 - link
the price link to the dell monitor goes to the amazon search for the viewsonic monitor.eanazag - Tuesday, January 13, 2015 - link
Okay, so are you using UEFI in Windows 7? This obviously affects POST time. Also Windows 8 POST times with UEFI would be the best case scenario in testing. If I care about POST times, I will be running Windows 8.I remember that there have been benches done with Anandtech on Windows 8. Why not across the board?