Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by MikeC » Tue Feb 15, 2011 9:40 am

CA_Steve wrote:Thanks for the review, Lawrence!

Is it time to start looking for/using a lower power PSU for these low power systems...or one with higher efficiency at the low end? Or, perhaps characterizing the current SS-400ET at lower than 20W DC? I think idle power measurements are getting overwhelmed by the PSU...and the slope of the PSU efficiency curve is very steep in this range.

It seems like we're stuck at a plateau for idle power on these lower end systems. Part of it is the setup and part of it is the feature-rich mobo's. It'd be nice to understand the power cost of the components beyond the CPU/GPU/HDD/RAM.

For good or bad, I use the Mac Mini as the gold standard for idling at 8W AC...ok, it's laptop guts in a small form factor - but, so is the Zotac SU+ION.

Anyway, it'd be nice to see if there is a way to get to lower idle power without resorting to oddball PSU solutions, etc.
In a nutshell, no, not with any of the ATX or SFX PSUs I have tested. One of the most efficient ATX PSUs is the Seasonic X400. Compare that to the SS-400ET:

SS-400ET: 32W AC = 21.2W DC ; 58W = 41.6W
X400: 31W AC = 21.6W DC ; 53W = 42.6W

At 21-22W output, the difference in AC in is almost too small to be significant. At 41~43W, yeah, there is a couple watts difference (about 4W), but that isn't the power level you think is significant (and neither do I).

So how could we get say under 30W AC power draw at 20W? Anything more than ~28W would probably not be worth the pain of the change, as a lot of the low power boards would have to be retested for future comparisons to have much relevance. And that ain't no easy task, as lots of them have been moved on, no longer in our hands.

The only PSU that has ever drawn lower than 32W AC input for 21-22W DC out is the picoPSU (with a high enough efficiency 80W brick): http://www.silentpcreview.com/article601-page3.html Which is "an oddball PSU solution". We could use it... but I would need to identify/shortlist/test some high quality AC/DC bricks with enough power capacity and good voltage regulation so it would not taint the max power readings on higher power boards/CPUs/systems.

(OK, there is a 120mm-fan-modded Dell RM112 235W 80+ Gold PSU that BillyBuerger kindly sent to me a long time ago -- which I admittedly never wrote about :oops: but did test quickly. It had ~30.5W input for the same 21.6W output -- ie it was less efficient than we all hoped.)

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by HFat » Tue Feb 15, 2011 9:58 am

I seem to recall you had an Proliant Microserver Mike. Its PSU is rated at 200W. HP must have aimed at low power consumption. I don't have a reliable meter but for what that's worth my UPS reads significantly less power consumption than something which you measured at 18W idle. I doubt power consumption is really that low but it would be interesting if you could measure it.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by MikeC » Tue Feb 15, 2011 10:13 am

HFat wrote:I seem to recall you had an Proliant Microserver Mike. Its PSU is rated at 200W. HP must have aimed at low power consumption. I don't have a reliable meter but for what that's worth my UPS reads significantly less power consumption than something which you measured at 18W idle. I doubt power consumption is really that low but it would be interesting if you could measure it.
Worth a try, I guess. I will pull the PSU out and see what it does. more later.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by BillyBuerger » Tue Feb 15, 2011 11:56 am

MikeC wrote:(OK, there is a 120mm-fan-modded Dell RM112 235W 80+ Gold PSU that BillyBuerger kindly sent to me a long time ago -- which I admittedly never wrote about :oops: but did test quickly. It had ~30.5W input for the same 21.6W output -- ie it was less efficient than we all hoped.)
I'm glad to hear it wasn't completely forgotten. Although I question the 80plus gold part. I might have to find that label and see if it really says that. As the ones available on eBay look to have the 80plus silver label and not gold. And the Dell H255E I have (labeled silver but bronze according to 80plus) beat it by a very small margin. At least I can take that 70.8% efficient at 21W you found and extrapolate that to the other PSUs I've tested at similar levels.

I'll be getting the gigabyte fusion board on Thursday. I'll test it with my best PSUs and report how it measures up to the ASUS. And of course see how good or bad that little fan is.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by porkchop » Tue Feb 15, 2011 2:41 pm

some comments at the tech report e350n-usb3 preview from another owner put the power consumption at 17w idle and 28w load with a 75w brick, pretty much the same as the asus, i wouldn't put my hopes up :(

i'm surprised there was no undervolting in the review, there might not be much of a difference but the option is there...

i linked this in another thread but here it is again, http://forums.overclockers.com.au/showt ... p?t=936800, e350 overclocked to [email protected].

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by ces » Tue Feb 15, 2011 3:20 pm

BillyBuerger wrote:I'm not seeing what you see. If we look at Clarkdale (since SB currently isn't available), the lowest priced dual-core + mITX motherboard (since most of the Zacate's will be ITX), you're looking at a little over $100 each for the CPU and MB. Currently on Newegg, GIGABYTE GA-H55N-USB3 = $105 + Intel Core i3-550 = $130 --> $235. I don't really see the dual core SB being any cheaper than the dual core Clarkdale. And Intel isn't known for dropping prices of their old CPUs. (See the C2D 8400. Same price it was 2 years ago still) So I don't expect that SB will ever be only $30 more than Zacate. Only way you'd get that is with a lower-end MB. But currently Zacate is only available from ASUS and Gigabyte which are not budget boards themselves. So I wouldn't be surprised to some of these budget boards around $120 or less maybe.
I think I agree with all or more of what you say. The price differential between an AMD Fusion cpu/board combo and an Intel 2400 CPU/board combo is about $100.

This pricing list is dated back to December 2010 but has proven to be accurate.
http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/11/26/ ... g-appears/

You can usually get these wholesale prices from Microcenter.com in the US. They would indicate a price of $64 for what is likely to be the most popular 2 core Sandy Bridge. That brings the price differential down to about $30.

I though that the electrical usage of the Sandy Bridge would be equal to or less than the Fusion. I was in error, there is about a 6 to 12 watt difference in system electrical consumption working out to about $0.50 to $1.00 per month of increased electrical cost in most of the US and EU. That difference is isn't from the Intel CPU itself (which burns about 4 watts on idle). It comes from the H67 chipset. So going to a 2 core chip is unlikely to decrease energy usage much. I haven't done the research by Intel has another chipset for "business" that might make the total energy usage the same.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by BillyBuerger » Tue Feb 15, 2011 3:38 pm

porkchop wrote:some comments at the tech report e350n-usb3 preview from another owner put the power consumption at 17w idle and 28w load with a 75w brick, pretty much the same as the asus, i wouldn't put my hopes up :(
I don't expect it will be much different from the ASUS. Just saying that I'd post my results.
ces wrote:I think I agree with all or more of what you say. The price differential between an AMD Fusion cpu/board combo and an Intel 2400 CPU/board combo is about $100.

This pricing list is dated back to December 2010 but has proven to be accurate.
http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/11/26/ ... g-appears/

You can usually get these wholesale prices from Microcenter.com in the US. They would indicate a price of $64 for what is likely to be the most popular 2 core Sandy Bridge. That brings the price differential down to about $30.

I though that the electrical usage of the Sandy Bridge would be equal to or less than the Fusion. I was in error, there is about a 6 to 12 watt difference in system electrical consumption working out to about $0.50 to $1.00 per month of increased electrical cost in most of the US and EU. That difference is isn't from the Intel CPU itself (which burns about 4 watts on idle). It comes from the H67 chipset. So going to a 2 core chip is unlikely to decrease energy usage much. I haven't done the research by Intel has another chipset for "business" that might make the total energy usage the same.
Ah, I haven't seen the whole list of SB CPUs and the fact that they will be having some low-end ones as well. That will definitely decrease the price difference.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by CA_Steve » Tue Feb 15, 2011 3:45 pm

Mike - thanks for rooting around and looking for alternatives :D

I'm guessing, unless an OEM like Apple pounds on the PSU design/mfgr, we'll see ~5W AC of near-zero-load power draw.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by DaRuSsIaMaN » Tue Feb 15, 2011 4:19 pm

This is so stupid ... while we're talking about this, other people are more interested in something like:

Three 1000 W 80 Plus gold-certified power supplies tested

*sigh... seriously, how many people still need 1000W PSUs?? What does it take to actually saturate that? 3x SLI?

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by Luke M » Tue Feb 15, 2011 4:21 pm

I'd like to see more motherboards with on-board power supplies (external DC). That would increase the value for silent PCs since you wouldn't need to add a picopsu or whatever.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by goatsandmonkeys » Tue Feb 15, 2011 4:52 pm

Luke M wrote:I'd like to see more motherboards with on-board power supplies (external DC). That would increase the value for silent PCs since you wouldn't need to add a picopsu or whatever.
But the cost would be built into the cost of the motherboard. With pico PSU you can reuse it.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by MikeC » Tue Feb 15, 2011 5:40 pm

Luke M wrote:I'd like to see more motherboards with on-board power supplies (external DC). That would increase the value for silent PCs since you wouldn't need to add a picopsu or whatever.
I think motherboard makers generally resist this, at least for mainstream products. Power circuitry is the source of a LOT of failures already, and this would increase the failure rate -- not to mention price. Intel has been talking for years about moving to a single 12VDC PSU, but I don't see this happening any time real soon either.

Now, if AMD or Intel actually made reference boards w/ good power 12VDC input power circuitry for their partners to simply copy (like they do for video cards, for example), I'm sure you'd see it a lot more.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by MikeC » Tue Feb 15, 2011 5:49 pm

DaRuSsIaMaN wrote:This is so stupid ... while we're talking about this, other people are more interested in something like:

Three 1000 W 80 Plus gold-certified power supplies tested

*sigh... seriously, how many people still need 1000W PSUs?? What does it take to actually saturate that? 3x SLI?
Remember that a 1000W rated PSU does not have to draw 1000W. So it cruises at 500W peaks, and the buyer is willing to pay for the capability for 1000W peaks. That's their business, silly as it seems.

The green PoV is that improved efficiency at higher power makes a lot more difference in energy savings than at low power.

Say you have a 90% efficient PSU that takes 50W AC to pass 45W DC. An 80% efficient PSU would give 40W DC from the same 50W AC, so just 5W saved. Go up an order of magnitude, and the same 10% difference in efficiency would mean a 50W savings at 500W AC input.

Of course, another PoV is why have a PC that sucks 500W.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by DaRuSsIaMaN » Tue Feb 15, 2011 11:01 pm

MikeC wrote:
Of course, another PoV is why have a PC that sucks 500W.
Exactly. I agree with all that you said but I just have a feeling that too many people don't actually realize, and don't bother to calculate, how little power their PCs actually use compared to how much they think it does. PC power requirement has actually been somewhat trending downward recently, yet people still seem to be getting ever beefier PSUs. From what I understand, a typical system of a few years back using 2x radeon 4870s, for instance, would use more power than an analogous more modern system using, say, 2x 6970s... even at peak load. That's taking the recent advancements in PSU efficiency advancements into account.

At least that's the impression I'm getting from following some video card reviews on Tom's. Correct me if I'm wrong?

EDIT: Ok not sure about comparing the 4870s but there's one comparison I found between 2900XT and 5870 which sort of supports my point:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/graphics-power-consumption,2708-6.html
Last edited by DaRuSsIaMaN on Tue Feb 15, 2011 11:18 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by DaRuSsIaMaN » Tue Feb 15, 2011 11:06 pm

porkchop wrote:discussed in length here viewtopic.php?f=28&t=61118&p=533579#p533579

summary:
sb numbers are estimated dc, fusion is ac.
looking at picopsu efficiency, fusion dc numbers should be about 13w idle, 23w cpu load, 30w cpu/gpu load.
Anyway, back on topic, thanks for that link to the other thread. Although I'm kind of struggling to find the patience to actually read all of that...

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by porkchop » Wed Feb 16, 2011 3:47 am

hence the summary :)

on another note, an asrock budget board has surfaced on newegg: $110, no usb3, not all solid caps, maybe a less extensive bios. interestingly, it doesn't have a p4 power connection. asrock also have another version which has usb3 and all solid caps, hopefully it's still a good chunk cheaper than the gigabyte.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by andyb » Wed Feb 16, 2011 9:16 am

interestingly, it doesn't have a p4 power connection
WTF, most of the APU draw is through the P4 power connector, what are the implications.?

The last board that I saw that didnt have a P4 opower connector was back in the days of the athlon XP, and it was shit. By far the most unreliable motherboard I have ever had the misfortune to use was the ASUS A7N8X-X, not that this was necessarily a fault of not having the P4 power connector, I just thought I woulkd draw attention to it as an example.


Andy

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by MikeC » Wed Feb 16, 2011 10:38 am

Absence of an AUX12V connector is insignificant for such a low power board w/ fixed CPU. AUX12V is only an extra cable path to the same 12V source as the main 24-pin ATX socket.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by porkchop » Wed Feb 16, 2011 3:27 pm

http://hothardware.com/Reviews/AMD-Fusi ... ed/?page=8

power consumption page of the hothardware gigabyte e350n-usb3 and zotac e350 based zbox review. the zbox does 13w idle, 23w cpu load and 29w cpu+gpu load... makes you wonder if some new driver or bios stuff hasn't been implemented yet in retail motherboards, though i guess it's more likely that some sort of 'mobile' platform is being used.

edit:
i think the lack of the aux12v connection is great. one less cable, and i can save a few bucks buying the picopsu-80 instead of 90.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by DaRuSsIaMaN » Wed Feb 16, 2011 5:29 pm

Good link, thanks!

But dang it, I wish they had a sandy-bridge system for comparison! The mATX boards out there would be close enough of a comparison to this mini ITX.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by allwinner » Wed Feb 16, 2011 8:29 pm

Excellent review. I have been following the various previews of the bobcat variations with high hopes that they could meet my htpc and/or home server needs. The current iteration doesn't meet my htpc needs but it may serve as a worthwhile replacement for my whs. I have a few questions and comments.

(1) It's unfortunate there is no heatsink layout standard for the fusion? Examination of the Asus, MSI, and Gigabyte boards evidences that the heatsink is defined by the layout of the APU & FCH which is different for each board. Consequently, we'll be SOL when it comes to aftermarket heatsink replacements (except some of the boards could conceivably match some standard (AM2, northbridge or a southbridge layout). This is unfortunate since the low power draw begs for semi/passive cooling that could be achieved with larger after market heatsinks. We always have the option of simply hanging a larger mm fan over the heatsink & uninstalling the stock fan so that it doesn't block airflow and maintains silence.

(2) Thank you for considering the utility of the e350 for home server usage (it would be "great as a home server"). The other reviews I've read haven't really considered such use (or I simply don't recall such considerations). My current WHS consists of an AMD 780g based motherboard, a be-2350 (45w), 2gb DDR2, 1 x Seagate 1.5tb 7200rpm and 3 x 2tb Western Digital 5400rpm drives (wd20ears), a 550w Corsair PSU (received from Corsair as replacement for their 400w that refused to cold boot the system despite 2 or 3 different units tested), a 140mm fan and a 120mm fan (both operating at their lowest voltage). The AC draw is ~61w at idle according to a Kill A Watt.
(a) What type of power draw can I expect by switching to an e-350. Given the inefficient PSU and the 4 drives, I'm guessing around 30-35 idle. While this is not the primary reason I'm switching out motherboards (the board is sometimes stalling at the SATA scan which is a killer on a whs that goes into hibernate when no users are logged in & is wakened for use), it is a factor b/c if power savings will be negligible, I might as well just stick with the be-2350.
(b) Perhaps this is a bit off-topic, but would a Pico-PSU be appropriate for the server or is the start-up draw too much (given the 4 hard drives)? I've examined the pico-psu option a few times but always felt limitations and uncertainties weren't worth the hassle (eg., my htpc also idles ~61w but not when gaming b/c it has a 5750 - thus ruling out a single pico psu).
(c) Would the lesser processing power (e350 vs. 2350 (2.1ghz)) be noticed in a typical WHS environment - downloading files and serving audio/video? I wouldn't think so, but WHS has never felt "light" to me (but that may be the function of it being server software).
(d) Transcoding - You note the relatively poor encoding of the e350 ("It was also incredibly slow when encoding video"). And, although I agree that it may not be "critical for most prospective Fusion adopters," encoding is more likely to be critical for those intending to use this for a home server (which, again, you note the e350 would be great for). I'm hoping you can reconcile these potential conflicts. Many users have their home servers transcoding video in realtime in order to meet the limited number of formats supported by various media players/consoles. Is the e350 so poor in encoding that it would be insufficient for this use? If so, then the e350 may not necessarily be generally considered "great" for home server usage. Such a test may be worthwhile in future reviews. BTW, I don't have my server transcoding anything but I'm curious none the less. My ignorance of the horsepower needed for real time transcoding may be reflected in this entire paragraph. I've transcoded video (first time being on a P2, 350mhz; most recent on a Phenom II) but for storage purposes rather than real time streaming.

(3) Has anyone read any reviews that compare the e350 to the 250u (1.6ghz AMD Athlon 25w tdp) or any of the low power Athlons (160u is 1.8ghz 20w tdp)? Anand tested against a 3.1ghz Athlon II 255. While interesting, it doesn't permit for the best extrapolation. Extrapolating the numbers provided by Anand, and considering the power draw of the 250u, it would appear the e350 brings some additional speed plus features at a slightly lower power draw. 250u review here. However, after considering costs, the low power AMD chips would be a compelling alternative for those that already have an AMD board . . . if the low power chips were in supply. After all, the additional benefit of a superior APU (vs. the igp that would be used with the Athlon chips) is of little to no value to those using the board for a server or a gaming htpc (the apu is still too weak for htpc gaming resolutions thereby necessitating a discrete solution).

(4) I think it's worth noting that the chip cannot decode blu-ray 3d. This could be a deciding factor for those building an htpc. Then again, for those who do not want a discrete solution but want 3d bluray support, I believe Sandy Bridge is the only option at this time, and it's considerably more expensive.

Thanks again for the solid review. If you feel my post should be a separate topic, feel free to move.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by HFat » Thu Feb 17, 2011 12:42 am

allwinner wrote:This is unfortunate since the low power draw begs for semi/passive cooling that could be achieved with larger after market heatsinks.
You don't need huge heatsinks for passive cooling. See the D510MO for instance. It doesn't burn as much power as the E-350 of course but they're not worlds apart as long as you don't burn the GPU with 3D.
allwinner wrote:(a) What type of power draw can I expect by switching to an e-350. Given the inefficient PSU and the 4 drives, I'm guessing around 30-35 idle.
I think you're being optimistic but I haven't seen numbers for your PSU's efficiency or your drives' power consumption. I don't know about your GPU but other than that mainstream gear doesn't consume that much power at idle: the big difference with something like a Zacate is at load.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by ces » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:35 pm

HFat wrote:
allwinner wrote:(a) What type of power draw can I expect by switching to an e-350. Given the inefficient PSU and the 4 drives, I'm guessing around 30-35 idle.
I think you're being optimistic but I haven't seen numbers for your PSU's efficiency or your drives' power consumption.
allwinner would you be kind enough to supply HFat the model numbers so he can crank out an answer?
HFat wrote:mainstream gear doesn't consume that much power at idle: the big difference with something like a Zacate is at load
Do you not need to factor in the amount of work done per cycle in making such a comparison? HFat can you supply some numbers on this. Zacate versus say a low power AMD chip or a CULV dual core Celeron SU2300 or even a Sandy Bridge. Here is some information that I have supplied (I can get more for you if you would like - I take great pride in corroborating what I have to say with third party references):
viewtopic.php?f=23&t=61546&p=533963#p533963
viewtopic.php?f=28&t=61485&start=30
allwinner wrote:However, after considering costs, the low power AMD chips would be a compelling alternative
SPCR wrote:"The E-350 CPU's performance was inconsistent, trailing Intel's CULV dual core Celeron SU2300 by small margins in some tests and larger margins in others. It was also incredibly slow when encoding video, even more so than Atom."
These comments are why I suggested a low power AMD chip or a CULV dual core Celeron SU2300. I suggested the Sandy Bridge because I thought it an even better alternative than these two.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by henfri » Fri Feb 18, 2011 9:30 am

Hi,

I'm still a bit disappointed by the power-consumption for the IDLE condition.
I intend to run this as a NAS, so IDLE is probably most relevant.
Do you see any further potential? Shutting down the HDD (running the System from Flash) would possibly bring the power down by 3W, but besides this??
So 15W would be the limit?

What about the little single core brother? I have not yet found any comparisons, but I suppose, you can't just subtract the TDP delta ;-)
Still, maybe another 5W are possible --> 10W?

What do you think?

I also wonder, whether for this purpose I would see any difference in the performance?

Regards,
Hendrik

P.S: Thanks for the great review!

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by Greg F. » Fri Feb 18, 2011 4:38 pm

does this board have RAID?
I don't see it, but there have times I've just missed things in reviews. I really don't use RAID anymore, but it would be nice to have it. I use The
Cloud and usb external drives for backup. Are 6gbs SATA drives worthwhile yet?

For me the most telling line in the review was that the Fusion system felt subjectively faster that Atom/Ion and SUV.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by faugusztin » Sat Feb 19, 2011 3:12 am

Greg F. wrote:does this board have RAID?
I don't see it, but there have times I've just missed things in reviews. I really don't use RAID anymore, but it would be nice to have it. I use The
Cloud and usb external drives for backup. Are 6gbs SATA drives worthwhile yet?.
No, it looks liek it doesn't (at least the only downloadable manual, in german, there is no word about it).

The only reason to use SATA/600 for now is for SSD.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by BillyBuerger » Sat Feb 19, 2011 12:52 pm

So I'm playing around with my gigabyte board which I'll post on later. But one question I had is did the ASUS clock the CPU down at idle? The gigabyte doesn't and I'm wondering if it's a GB thing or just the nature of the CPU. It drops the voltage but not the clock. Which is the important part but I might be able to undervolt more if the clock dropped too.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by porkchop » Sat Feb 19, 2011 3:22 pm

undervolt more? yippee! looking forward to the results with optimism.

perhaps the mhz readings you're getting are unreliable, a new version of cpuz just came out and it officially supports zacate/ontario. might be worth a shot.

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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by BillyBuerger » Sat Feb 19, 2011 8:04 pm

Oh yeah, the new CPU-Z is reporting it dropping down to 800MHz. That's good. Gigabytes EasyTune doesn't pick up on this. Unfortunately, it seems to jump up to full speed at times while remaining at the lower voltage. Assuming CPU-Z is reporting correctly. So that might be affecting my attempts to undervolt.

Blappo
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Re: Asus E35M1-M Pro: AMD Fusion Motherboard

Post by Blappo » Sat Feb 19, 2011 9:59 pm

The idle power consumption maybe held back by the implementation of the mobo. Extra controllers for USB3, etc would consume some power and at these levels 0.5W can add up fast. I am really curious about the $109 ASRock board for an HTPC.

@BillyBuerger - Keep us up-to-date about your experiences.

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