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TEST RESULTS
The system shipped with German version of XP and a power
brick with a European power plug. We started fresh with an English version of XP and used a North
American AC power adapter.
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Test Results: mCubed HFX Micro Business S12
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Test State
|
Mean
CPU Use
|
Peak
CPU Use
|
System Power
|
|
Off
|
N/A
|
2W
|
|
Sleep/Standby
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N/A
|
3W
|
|
Idle
|
N/A
|
25W
|
|
Dark Knight
(720p H264)
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34%
|
56%
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~30W
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|
Rush Hour
(1080p H264)
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65%
|
90%
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~33W
|
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Coral Reef
(1080p VC1)
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29%
|
35%
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~31W
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Undead Battle
(720p x264)
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39%
|
50%
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~28W
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Spaceship
(1080p x264)
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47%
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67%
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~30W
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Prime95
|
100%
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33W
|
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Prime95 +
ATITool
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100%
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39W
|
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Grey boxes indicate test failure.
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The HFX Micro is a fairly low power system running at only 25W idle, 28-33W
during video playback, and 33W when the CPU is under full load. The GPU inefficiency
is evident as the power draw increased by 6W when the GPU under load
using ATITool. For such a weak IGP, it shouldn't be using more than 2-3W extra. We managed to get a bit higher power draw than the 33W maximum cited in mCubed's specs by loading the CPU and the GPU simultaneously.
Video playback was smooth except for our VC-1 Coral Reef clip. The audio clipped
throughout this clip even though CPU usage was relatively low. The problem stemmed
from the fact that only a single CPU thread was active during playback —
something that has not occured on previous tests using AMD X2 and Intel Core
platforms. We are unable to explain why this occurred.
Both 720p and 1080p x264 clips played without difficulty. Slower single core
machines are notorious for not being able to handle 1080p x264 clips, even using
CoreAVC, so we're happy to report that a dual core Atom system is sufficient
for such files.
VS OTHER ATOM SYSTEMS
Its picoPSU allowed the HFX Micro to post power consumption readings
similar to the single-core D945GCLF, as the Seasonic SS-300SFD power supply used to test the latter is slightly
less efficient. Neither system can compare to the efficiency of the Eee Box
even though it uses the same single core Atom in the D945GCLF. The difference is in the mobile chipset used in the Asus.
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Comparisons with Other Atom Systems
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Test State
|
HFX Micro
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D945GCLF +
SS-300SFD
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Asus Eee Box
|
|
Mean
CPU
|
System Power
|
Mean
CPU
|
System Power
|
Mean
CPU
|
System Power
|
|
Off
|
N/A
|
2W
|
N/A
|
1W
|
N/A
|
1W
|
|
Sleep
|
N/A
|
3W
|
N/A
|
2W
|
N/A
|
1W
|
|
Idle
|
N/A
|
25W
|
N/A
|
27W
|
N/A
|
16W
|
|
Dark Knight
(720p H264)
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34%
|
~30W
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62%
|
~31W
|
65%
|
22W
|
|
Rush Hour
(1080p H264)
|
65%
|
~33W
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97%
|
~33W
|
98%
|
22W
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Coral Reef
(1080p VC1)
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29%
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~31W
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63%
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~33W
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65%
|
22W
|
|
Prime95
|
100%
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33W
|
100%
|
31W
|
100%
|
22W
|
|
Prime95 +
ATITool
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100%
|
39W
|
100%
|
38W
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100%
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25W
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Grey boxes indicate test failure.
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The extra CPU core of the D945GCLF2 gives it an advantage in high
definition video playback. The board played both our 720p and 1080p H264 clips
perfectly (the D945GCLF/Eee Box
could only manage 720p). VC-1 playback was also a bit less problematic, though
it still failed the test.
VS DELL STUDIO HYBRID
The 545 EURO price-tag (~$706 USD at today's exchange rate) puts it in league
with the Dell Studio Hybrid
configuration we reviewed recently. In this comparison, to say the price of silence is high would be an understatement.
With only a dual core Atom processor and 1GB of RAM, the HFX Micro is
twice as slow at some tasks compared to the Dell's 2GHz+ Core 2 Duo with more
memory. AAC encoding using iTunes was dreadful, almost four times
slower than the Dell Studio Hybrid. The only area in which the HFX Micro performed
better was boot-up time, but this was most likely due to the fact it was running
XP instead of Vista with a few pre-installed applications.
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Benchmarks Comparison
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|
System
|
mCubed HFX Micro
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Dell Studio Hybrid
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|
CPU / RAM
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Atom 330 (dual core)
1.60GHz / 1GB
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Core 2 Duo T5850
2.13GHz / 3GB
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Boot-up Time
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39 sec (XP)
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59 sec (Vista)
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PCMark05
|
2024
|
4176
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3DMark05
|
256
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953
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3DMark06
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N/A (would not run)
|
444
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NOD32
|
691 sec
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~30W
|
301 sec
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~40W
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WinRAR
|
684 sec
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~30W
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274 sec
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~45W
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iTunes
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1219 sec
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~28W
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312 sec
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~43W
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TMPGEnc
|
906 sec
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~30W
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468 sec
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~52W
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*Boot-up Time - start button to when the desktop
appears
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