I think the Zotac PI320 is a much better value. It's $50 cheaper, has 2 more cores and comes with an OS. The only real advantage I see in this is more RAM.
I'd like to see VGA ports die already, but I understand they may have customers looking for that. I'd rather see the HDMI and a DP port for the video out.
At first I had the same reaction as you, then I remembered that a lot of digital signage (a target market for these devices) still uses VGA. Hell, I still have a 15" VGA only LCD around here somewhere, and I would be able to slap this on the back and make a great "kitchen PC" for when I'm cooking and need to research ingredients or methods.
But yes, a DisplayPort or mini DisplayPort connector would make more sense, given how cheap DP to VGA adapters are.
Do you cook? You need something that you don't have to hold in your hand. We have a small mini-pc with a LCD in our kitchen and the reason we got it was because my wife was sick and tired of viewing recipes on her iPhone (and even the 6 wasn't cutting it).
I'm using an original LIVA as an excellent DVR/TV tuner using a USB DVB-T tuner (I'm in the UK).
A USB3.0 hard disk provides storage for recorded TV, along side the growing mkv collection as I work my way through my DVD and BluRay collection. The windows media centre is probably the best Freeview TV interface I've ever used, unfortunately it requires 8.1pro plus another $10 or something for the media centre, but on the LivaX you can run Windows7 on an ssd, which comes with media centre, or just use Kodi. The advantage of using Windows 8.1 is that the "Modern" UI works fairly well on a TV, but unfortunately doesn't interact well with the media centre remote, so a keyboard/touchpad or accelerometer-wand hybrid is recommended for controlling it.
look at that power consumption. they should have maintained that usb power source since most displays have USB already. I imagine putting this on top of a ceiling mounted projector.
the only value would be its VGA interface. can't wait for Intel's Compute Stick.
The problem is that the power consumption starts ramping up when one adds a mSATA disk and adds power-hungry peripherals on the three USB ports. Given those capabilities, it is impossible for ECS to get by with a micro-USB power connector. There are no commercial 'wall-warts' with a micro-USB power connector that can deliver upwards of 30 W.
They run the CPU at 2.25 GHz (max. turbo speed) throughout the time the CPU is loaded. At this point of time, CPUs with such clocks are more than enough for thin-clients and basic browsing / word-processing [ well, that is what the market reception to the original ECS LIVA signified to ECS :) ]
In the end, it is all a matter of 'horses for courses' - what fits the requirements of one person might be an overkill for someone else (isn't that why tablet PC sales have caused a decline in shipment of low-end notebooks / PCs?)
I see, I missed that about it running at its max turbo since it isn't limited thermally.
I guess I just have trouble picturing the target market being anyone who actually knows what they are getting vs. what they need. Most of the places that I've seen thin clients used could easily just use a small ITX-sized desktop PC that is significantly faster, and (as is the case with this LIVA X) you generally pay a price premium for a thin client sized system. When you factor in the OS price, it seems unlikely that cost has anything to do with the purchase of a system like this, so that leaves size as the only real reason to get one.
My workplace replaced several Core 2 based itx-sized HP desktops a few years ago with these awful little WYSE thin clients. Everything takes longer, runs slower and now there is a tiny bit more desktop space for people to clutter paperwork that shoudn't be left out in the first place. I'm sure there will be some power savings, but it can't be much in relation to the cost of installing a bunch of new equipment, and they are already at their limit as far as capabilities. I give it another year before we have some new application that is too much for them to handle.
Obviously this LIVA system is faster, but it just doesn't seem like that many places are so constrained for space that PCs of this size are actually necessary, and for those that are, there are cheaper and faster alternatives, even at this price point (mostly due to the OS not being included).
The Zotac C-series with the Core i5-Y CPUs had chassis temperatures of the order of 75C. This is definitely much better.
As for the 96 C core temp prior to throttling, there was a thermal pad placement issue in the media review samples. Seeing how this is similar to LIVA in terms of CPU performance and the fact that the material used for thermal protection is far superior, I have no doubt the units reaching the end user will have much lower core temperatures under *power virus* loads.
The temp is running furmark and Prime95 at the same time, which is a way higher load than normal. I've had computers that would crash while running that test, but were otherwise rock stable no matter what else I did.
I think the point of including an unrealistic scenario like furmark + prime95 is to stress the system in a way that induces a worst possible case situation. While most end users won't ever have that sort of thermal load on their hardware, doing this kind of testing in a review exposes potential flaws that wouldn't otherwise be discovered. I'd much rather someone does that kinda thing for me and uncovers a problem than having to figure it out for myself after I've made a purchase and have put it to use.
I'm not saying the test isn't interesting, but it's not particularly practical in this case. The only thing it does is let people know that if they want to run Furmark and Prime together they need to introduce some active cooling or a low ambient temperature. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with knowing that. However, it's not very high on the list of practical information.
"...(UCFF) have emerged as one of the bright spots in the troubled PC market."
Someone needs to do a study on the sales volumes seen in the PC component industry. There are a lot of people building these days rather than buying pre-made units from manufacturers like Cyberpower, Dell and others.
Thanks for posting idle and load power consumption numbers and addressing some reader concerns about the usefulness (or lack thereof) of delta charts where wattage is concerned.
I like these tiny PC's. I was interested in the first Liva but it's shortcomings I knew would be addressed if I waited.
As for case use -
Small HTPC. I have a Llano HTPC currently with a great ANTEC case with six drive slots not to mention the I can put two SSD's in it's 2.5 slot (no floppy) and replace the 5.25 slots with hot swap cages.
In other words it would make a very nice, fairly low draw server that can easily trans-code, among other things.
There was a time when I thought I would use the HTPC for more PC games, which is why I got the Llano but as time goes on, I use it more for console emulation when I do play games and I have PS2 and PS3.
Plus I can mount something like this on the back of a LCD and run everything else off a power USB 3.0 hub.
That said my Cable CARD tuner has to be hard reset every so often because it drops both tuners, I guess I could go with a network tuner but then I would need another cable run to where the router is.
Anyway, beyond that downgrading my HTPC seems to make sense to me. My original target was the Gigabyte Brix but only two AMD sku's are offered and the least expensive model might be discontinued and is hard to find.
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zepi - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
HEVC / H.265 decoding capabilities would also be of interest for all HTPC tests.Otherwise these are solid articles about htpc's.
YoloPascual - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
Well, this might be the best looking NUC out there.yannigr2 - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
Could you please try to do a review for this one?http://linuxgizmos.com/tiny-fanless-mini-pc-runs-l...
It looks much more interesting than the LIVA.
kaidenshi - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
Ooo, the multi-LAN version of that would work great as a custom router/firewall!speculatrix - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
Phoronix.com looked at the fitlettakeshi7 - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
I think the Zotac PI320 is a much better value. It's $50 cheaper, has 2 more cores and comes with an OS. The only real advantage I see in this is more RAM.Oxford Guy - Monday, January 19, 2015 - link
What does anyone need those extra cores for?eanazag - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
I'd like to see VGA ports die already, but I understand they may have customers looking for that. I'd rather see the HDMI and a DP port for the video out.kaidenshi - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
At first I had the same reaction as you, then I remembered that a lot of digital signage (a target market for these devices) still uses VGA. Hell, I still have a 15" VGA only LCD around here somewhere, and I would be able to slap this on the back and make a great "kitchen PC" for when I'm cooking and need to research ingredients or methods.But yes, a DisplayPort or mini DisplayPort connector would make more sense, given how cheap DP to VGA adapters are.
jabber - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
I think what you are looking for there is a laptop.Murloc - Sunday, January 18, 2015 - link
a smartphone is good enough to read recipes, there's no extensive writing anyway.Utnnyan - Thursday, January 22, 2015 - link
Do you cook? You need something that you don't have to hold in your hand. We have a small mini-pc with a LCD in our kitchen and the reason we got it was because my wife was sick and tired of viewing recipes on her iPhone (and even the 6 wasn't cutting it).speculatrix - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
get a waterproof tablet like the Sony Z tablets and the stand with the magnetic charger. you won't kill it if you splash water on it.Wwalter ones - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
Any thoughts on using this as the receiving pc to stream steam games at 1080p?BigLan - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
Could ECS release a version of this with Windows 8/bing? It'd save users a bunch compared to having to buy a separate windows license.sonicmerlin - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
So could you connect a USB cablecard tuner and an HDD and turn this into a DVR?mm0zct - Thursday, April 23, 2015 - link
I'm using an original LIVA as an excellent DVR/TV tuner using a USB DVB-T tuner (I'm in the UK).A USB3.0 hard disk provides storage for recorded TV, along side the growing mkv collection as I work my way through my DVD and BluRay collection. The windows media centre is probably the best Freeview TV interface I've ever used, unfortunately it requires 8.1pro plus another $10 or something for the media centre, but on the LivaX you can run Windows7 on an ssd, which comes with media centre, or just use Kodi. The advantage of using Windows 8.1 is that the "Modern" UI works fairly well on a TV, but unfortunately doesn't interact well with the media centre remote, so a keyboard/touchpad or accelerometer-wand hybrid is recommended for controlling it.
flyingpants1 - Friday, January 16, 2015 - link
Mini-ITX is still better for 90% of consumer applications.zodiacfml - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
look at that power consumption. they should have maintained that usb power source since most displays have USB already. I imagine putting this on top of a ceiling mounted projector.the only value would be its VGA interface. can't wait for Intel's Compute Stick.
ganeshts - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
The problem is that the power consumption starts ramping up when one adds a mSATA disk and adds power-hungry peripherals on the three USB ports. Given those capabilities, it is impossible for ECS to get by with a micro-USB power connector. There are no commercial 'wall-warts' with a micro-USB power connector that can deliver upwards of 30 W.ozzuneoj86 - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
Seems a bit expensive for its capabilities. A 1.58Ghz Bay Trail is pretty slow for a non-mobile device.ganeshts - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
They run the CPU at 2.25 GHz (max. turbo speed) throughout the time the CPU is loaded. At this point of time, CPUs with such clocks are more than enough for thin-clients and basic browsing / word-processing [ well, that is what the market reception to the original ECS LIVA signified to ECS :) ]In the end, it is all a matter of 'horses for courses' - what fits the requirements of one person might be an overkill for someone else (isn't that why tablet PC sales have caused a decline in shipment of low-end notebooks / PCs?)
ozzuneoj86 - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
I see, I missed that about it running at its max turbo since it isn't limited thermally.I guess I just have trouble picturing the target market being anyone who actually knows what they are getting vs. what they need. Most of the places that I've seen thin clients used could easily just use a small ITX-sized desktop PC that is significantly faster, and (as is the case with this LIVA X) you generally pay a price premium for a thin client sized system. When you factor in the OS price, it seems unlikely that cost has anything to do with the purchase of a system like this, so that leaves size as the only real reason to get one.
My workplace replaced several Core 2 based itx-sized HP desktops a few years ago with these awful little WYSE thin clients. Everything takes longer, runs slower and now there is a tiny bit more desktop space for people to clutter paperwork that shoudn't be left out in the first place. I'm sure there will be some power savings, but it can't be much in relation to the cost of installing a bunch of new equipment, and they are already at their limit as far as capabilities. I give it another year before we have some new application that is too much for them to handle.
Obviously this LIVA system is faster, but it just doesn't seem like that many places are so constrained for space that PCs of this size are actually necessary, and for those that are, there are cheaper and faster alternatives, even at this price point (mostly due to the OS not being included).
kgh00007 - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
They need to sell a Windows 8.1 with Bing edition of these, the windows Licence increases the cost of the device by 1.5 times!!That's the biggest barrier to these cheaper mini PC's for me and for recommending them to anyone like family members!
Teknobug - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
hmm only dual core? I've been liking those Bay Trail Z37**'s.powerarmour - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
If a 59'C case temp isn't hot to touch, you probably need to visit the doctor!, 100'C core temps are ridiculous also, terrible design.ganeshts - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
The Zotac C-series with the Core i5-Y CPUs had chassis temperatures of the order of 75C. This is definitely much better.As for the 96 C core temp prior to throttling, there was a thermal pad placement issue in the media review samples. Seeing how this is similar to LIVA in terms of CPU performance and the fact that the material used for thermal protection is far superior, I have no doubt the units reaching the end user will have much lower core temperatures under *power virus* loads.
kmmatney - Sunday, January 18, 2015 - link
The temp is running furmark and Prime95 at the same time, which is a way higher load than normal. I've had computers that would crash while running that test, but were otherwise rock stable no matter what else I did.Oxford Guy - Monday, January 19, 2015 - link
Exactly. Who is ever going to use one of these for anything like that sort of load. It's bogus.BrokenCrayons - Tuesday, January 20, 2015 - link
I think the point of including an unrealistic scenario like furmark + prime95 is to stress the system in a way that induces a worst possible case situation. While most end users won't ever have that sort of thermal load on their hardware, doing this kind of testing in a review exposes potential flaws that wouldn't otherwise be discovered. I'd much rather someone does that kinda thing for me and uncovers a problem than having to figure it out for myself after I've made a purchase and have put it to use.Oxford Guy - Wednesday, January 21, 2015 - link
I'm not saying the test isn't interesting, but it's not particularly practical in this case. The only thing it does is let people know that if they want to run Furmark and Prime together they need to introduce some active cooling or a low ambient temperature. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with knowing that. However, it's not very high on the list of practical information.Oxford Guy - Monday, January 19, 2015 - link
"32 GB is not enough once a couple of Windows updates get installed."False. I have a 32 GB model and it has around 6 or 7 GB of free space with a fully updated Windows 8.1
random2 - Tuesday, January 20, 2015 - link
"...(UCFF) have emerged as one of the bright spots in the troubled PC market."Someone needs to do a study on the sales volumes seen in the PC component industry. There are a lot of people building these days rather than buying pre-made units from manufacturers like Cyberpower, Dell and others.
BrokenCrayons - Tuesday, January 20, 2015 - link
Thanks for posting idle and load power consumption numbers and addressing some reader concerns about the usefulness (or lack thereof) of delta charts where wattage is concerned.djfourmoney - Friday, July 3, 2015 - link
I like these tiny PC's. I was interested in the first Liva but it's shortcomings I knew would be addressed if I waited.As for case use -
Small HTPC. I have a Llano HTPC currently with a great ANTEC case with six drive slots not to mention the I can put two SSD's in it's 2.5 slot (no floppy) and replace the 5.25 slots with hot swap cages.
In other words it would make a very nice, fairly low draw server that can easily trans-code, among other things.
There was a time when I thought I would use the HTPC for more PC games, which is why I got the Llano but as time goes on, I use it more for console emulation when I do play games and I have PS2 and PS3.
Plus I can mount something like this on the back of a LCD and run everything else off a power USB 3.0 hub.
That said my Cable CARD tuner has to be hard reset every so often because it drops both tuners, I guess I could go with a network tuner but then I would need another cable run to where the router is.
Anyway, beyond that downgrading my HTPC seems to make sense to me. My original target was the Gigabyte Brix but only two AMD sku's are offered and the least expensive model might be discontinued and is hard to find.
m-ITX is an option but cost is off-putting.
Just thinking out loud I suppose.