Asus has released a new Pundit P2-AE2 barebone for s754 with an external brick PSU and a price around $180. Considering ordering a brick psu and DC-DC convertor alone costs over $80, this seems like relatively good value. This slim barebone (only a little more than 2" high) also includes a slim DVD drive.

From Newegg photos seems this system only has two fans and some sort of heatpiped? CPU/VGA? heatsink. The specs also claim Q-FAN and 25.5db idle / 29.3 db in operation. Paired with a cool Sempron processor, this sounds like a potential very quiet out-of-the-box system at a moderately low price. Of course with such a small case, expansion is limited and granted the VIA onboard VGA won't handle heavy graphics.

Anyone have any hands on experience with how quiet this system is?

Looks awesome. I wonder if they will sell them in the UK. Given that it accepts a Sempron 3000+, which has C'nQ, you could probably run it sub-25W pretty much all the time. Onboard sound, graphics, LAN; only downside seems to be that it only takes slimline optical drives, which are more expensive than standard ones. You could have an amazing (silent!) media PC pretty much straight out of the box.

It has space for a slim DVD drive, I don't think it includes one

With the fans getting fresh air from the top vents, and low-power VIA and Sempron chips, this could be quiet indeed. I'd be all over this for my Socket 754 upgrade if not for the lack of a AGP slot... but I suppose that's a different size scale we're talking about.

If only the case was a bit better-looking... We'll see if this thing comes down in price and if so, how much.

I must admit I'm not so attracted to these hush-style slim SFFs since I got my laptop. It does the job of being small, and I think I'd rather take the benefits of full-size for the desktop.

Goal! It is available in the UK:

Techstore

It's listed as socket 775 but that's clearly a typo. Considering that it comes with no CPU, HDD, or CD drive, you will probably have to add £200+ to that for the finished build.

Well from NewEgg it does seem to be included. You can see it in the product photos and user reviews. Considering that costs around $50 makes it even better value. Not sure though if this is included from all vendors.

Must... constrain... upgrade... in the fall... Not spend money...

(On a related note, a review advising Samsung 2.5" drives said the fans are quiet. This is looking better and better, I must admit.)

From the few places it is available in the UK, it does come with a slimline CDRW/DVD drive included.

Dang. The few places I checked quick in Canada (TD, Anitec, NCIX, CC) don't have this. Instead, they have a bigger sibling: AE-3, actively cooled PSU et al

I wish Newegg would get on their skates with newegg.ca.

The local ASUS dealer just started selling this and I couldn't resist bringing one home. It came with a slim DVD/RW drive for around $220. It's a relatively quiet machine out-of-the-box, but not to SPCR standards. The most annoying noise is the whine/click of the CPU fan, but will try to see what can be done. I have blogged up some photos and comments. Sorry got a little carried away typing and don't know how to link to specific sections, just skip down to FOR THE SILENT PC ENTHUSIAST, A LOOK AT IT'S COOLING, and SPECIAL BIOS OPTIONS sections. Very interesting that the BIOS has an option to set the HDD acoustic management level!

Spent some more time with the Pundit and found out I made some wrong assumptions. The mb does happily work with Speedfan and actually has a plethora of PWM options. The whole system draws an amazingly low 60W AC with everything running (Prime, HDD, and DVD) and undervolted this drops down to 52W. The two case fans are setup for intake and not exhaust. There certainly seems to be some good silencing potential for this barebone. I will tinker with it when I have more time.

I also reorganized the Blog and added more details, hopefully it's also easier to read.
Overall silencing comments
Nifty BIOS features
shots of the heatsink/fans

I'm not impressed... at all.

11.2x11.4 isnt all that small. you can get a very smilar mini-itx sized case that allows up to 2 expansion slots for the same footprint, and you can get mini-itx mobo's that support cpu's ranging from integrated via chips all the way up to P4's.

the only thing it really has going for it is the price. so i guess if you just wanna surf the net and check email and dont have a very large budget it would work for you.

12.7" x 10" x 2.7" mini-itx enclosure with supplied 120w psu.
Casetronic/Travla C137 also comes in black

Mini-ITX motherboards

The problem with Mini-ITX is: no A64 or Sempron availlable.

So if you want to build a system with relative low power requirements you are either stuck with low computing power (VIA C3) or high price (Pentium M). On top of that this barebone is relative widely availlable for the average consumer and not only for the PC enthousiasts. (See your own problems getting your brick PSU working.)

Point taken, there are a lot of nice, small, quiet, and stylish Mini-ITX options if price is not a concern, but IMO these are targeted at the enthusiast market. The Pundit on the other hand is a relatively mainstream barebone with wide availability and priced pretty close to your normal noisy and bulky entry level PC. Maybe think of it more as a low-noise, low cost SFF barebone, with limited expandability.

The Casetronic case with PSU you mention is already $156, plus another $230 or so for the P4 ITX board and a slim DVDRW you are talking double the Pundit's price. The Pundit's lack of even one PCI slot however is a big minus.

Also in terms of price-performance-cool running, (in that order) possibly AMD chips have an upper hand? I really haven't seen much comparisons with the VIA chips though.

Err, and how much do those mini-itx mobo's cost that accept P4's Aris? A bucketload more than the Asus Pundit, that's for sure. And availability (in the UK) is poor to non-existent. As much as you try and push mini-itx solutions, they are slow, expensive, barely upgradeable and require specialised (read more expensive) RAM, optical drives, hard drives, etc. Sure, you can use them with normal-sized peripherals, but then what's the point of going mini-ITX?

Simply using CrystalCPUID to undervolt and Speedfan for controlling the fans, allows this system to be very quiet with reasonable temps. At two feet, the fans are inaudible over the idle noise of the Samsung single-platter notebook HDD (tested by SPCR at 17dba from 1m). This maybe the quietest out-of-the-box SFF?
Also the CPU fan is easily replaced with a 80x15 Zalman fan that runs much smoother, is equally as quiet, and cools better. Pics and temp details posted here.

Thanks to alleycat's idea of a home brew coolpack HDD enclosure, in combination with stealthing the Pundit behind a LCD monitor (a la iMac)

I am very pleased that the Pundit has found it's place on my desk and is completely inaudible with my head within two feet, in a very quiet room. I cannot perceive any difference in noise by turning off the Pundit, no matter how hard I try to listen for it! Temps and details here.

Great job with your Pundit, Hifriday - the blog is especially helpful for anyone considering this system for silence.

If this barebones had been available a year and half ago when I built my Small & Flexible: Back-of-LCD variable power consumption box, it's quite possible I would have used it. My system is pretty similar - not quite as small, but it's got a similar cooling arrangement and is mounted vertically on the back of my LCD.

I am getting mine today!

Linus, excellent work on your Back-of-LCD PC. How did you manage to get your LaScala case to be held up by the LCD? I see a photo of a mount, but it seems quite recessed and a little low on the screen to be the only point of support? BTW what is the size of your LCD?

QuietOC, do let us know how you like your new Pundit!

Just built it this evening. Very easy and fast build.

What's the deal with the feet--they're huge? It would make sense if there were any vents down there, but there aren't. Why make a slim case and then needlessly add so much width/height to it? I also discovered that it just won't work horizontally under my SAMSUNG 997MB. The cpu intake vents would be mostly blocked. Oh well, it is very quiet sitting on edge on the carpet. I think the fan on top idea wasn't the best. I am thinking blowers and blowing the air directly out rather than let it disperse inside the case.

I can't figure out how to get the memory to run at PC3200. Seems the motherboard refuses to set it to the right ratio. Stuck at PC2700 which is a shame since its 2-3-2 PC3200. This is the biggest sign of crap motherboard to me--any board that looks like it is letting you set something that it just won't do. Would have ordered some cheaper memory if I had known.

I am using an old 40GB 3.5" Seagate U6 ATA for the drive--literally covered in rubber--quieter than a lot of 2.5" drives, unfortunately, slower than a lot of 2.5" drives. Interesting that the Pundit came with a little rubber isolation gasket for the hard drive, but then also has places to screw the drive directly to metal. I didn't do that. It seems like it should stay in place just fine.

Funny that it has the VIA southbridge with SATA RAID and only one SATA port and, one IDE connector. Two IDE connectors definitely would be nice. Some people might be interested in some 2.5" SATA RAID in this case. Also the left off IDE channel shows up in windows???

On board video has occasional image tearing at the desktop in WinXP SP2 running at 1600x1200@75Hz. I tried several driver versions, but all seem to have it. VIA/S3 Unichrome Pro IGP really sucks compared to the GeForce 6100 IGP. I'll get to compare them to the SIS IGP on Monday on another build (ASUS Terminator T2-AE1). It was okay playing a DVD tonight.

Cool'n'Quiet works fine with my new/old odd Sempron 64 3100+. CrystalCPUID seems to be able to set lower multipliers and voltages just fine.

Installing the latest (beta) BIOS didn't seem to fix or change anything.

+Very quiet stock
+It does have a miniPCI slot which should be great for a wireless card.

I haven't been too impressed with ASUS. I like their form factors though...

I'm expecting ASUS to announce an AMD-based DIGIMATRIX with a 6150 motherboard anytime now.

this is a really nice barebone, especially for that price.
but like someone posted earlier, availability is still an issue here in canada.
gotta say nice review of the barebone on your blog hifriday
this would be a nice replacement for the beige tower sitting nice to the tv my mother use to watch video with

My Pundit came with the 0210 bios and seems there is no where in BIOS to set RAM speed/timings. I suspect that it reads the SPD setting directly off the memory, as that's exactly what my memory is set at per CPUZ (DDR 400 3-5-5-8 ) 1GB Corsair Value RAM. Maybe it has trouble interpreting higher spec'd RAM or the particular brand you're trying? I'll try swapping in some CL2 RAM and see.



VIA onboard graphics isn't all that great, but it seemed to handle 2D without any problems in several systems I used. Maybe the limited 64MB shared memory not quite enough to handle 1600x1200, is this with lots of windows open? I am curious how this stacks up to SIS, do let us know.



I didn't realize the P2-AE2 was so similar to the Digimatrix. Checking some old reviews show that the new Pundit seems to be simply a stripped down version of the Digimatrix turned AMD with a redesigned front panel and slightly modified back panel. The casing, feet, heatsink+fan, drive cages, power brick all look exactly the same. Now I know why the Pundit had "FM Tuner" printed on the sound card PCB when there was no such option. Seems ASUS did some intelligent parts/design recycling, probably also explains the relatively low price tag. I'm somewhat skeptical they'll come back with the Digimatrix though, seems the first one didn't fare too well.

just wondering if it is possible in swapping out the motherboard for something with a better integrated video, such as the a8n-vm csm

Doubt it, it looks pretty proprietary:

Don't think a mb swap is possible; not only would size, CPU socket location, plus back panel ports have to match, but more importantly this barebone uses an external AC/DC brick meaning the mb needs built in DC/DC converter accepting 19v (that round din plug next to the VGA is the power in).

Being able to run very quietly, and to be easily silenced, all for a modest budget is one of the advantages of this barebone, unfortunately expandability/features are not.

It is a Kingston stick. The two newer BIOS had a setting for the memory divder. When set to 2:1 DDR400 it just kept the memory at the DDR333 speed. The actual performance of the memory at DDR333 even with the low latency was abysmal according to Sandra which is normally very generous with its ratings.

1600x1200x32=7.3MB. 16MB is more than enough even to run a full back buffer. The 32MB setting is normally the best for performance for IGPs in testing that I have done.

It might be something like AGP Fast Writes not working correctly, but there is really no excuse for that with an IGP. Something just isn't right. I am going to return the whole thing.

The ASUS Terminator T2-AE1 build went well... a little longer than the Pundit build. The Zalman 7000CU fit in nicely. The best part was the previous install on this hard drive was with a SIS741GX motherboard, and it won't boot the VIA based Pundit, but it booted just fine on the T2-AE1.

It was pretty simple, really. The LCD had four VESA mounting holes on the back (check out the 5th picture on the gallery post), which I didn't need since I used the proprietary base mounts underneath (4th picture) to mount it to the cable management box. I removed the feet from the case, drilled holes in the bottom to line up with the VESA holes, and screwed in bolts to hold it on. Then installed the motherboard with cables routed underneath, added drives, etc.

Considerations:

- I lined it up so the front-now-top of the case was just below the little bumps the LCD handle rotates around.
- In theory I could have flipped the handle up so it would be functional, but it's visually distracting.
- At one point I had considered grommets to minimize vibration, but ultimately decided they were unnecessary.
- The one problem with this mounting is that I have to disassemble the PC almost completely to get at the inputs for the LCD. So I was careful to plug in cables for everything I thought I'd need before assembling everything.

The screen is a 17", widescreen-format Planar XP17WSA-01.

Thanks for the kind words!

QuietOC - sorry the Pundit didn't work out for you.

I swapped in some Crucial Ballistix RAM and my Pundit was able to automatically set the right clock and timings according to SPD (200mhz 2-3-3-8 ). It worked fine one stick in either slot, or with both sticks. I ran SiSoft's memory benchmark and came back with roughly 2800MB/s for both scores. I ran the same benchmark on several other mATX K8M800 boards (MSI, DFI) and even on a S939 6150 mb (with only one stick RAM) and scores were very close. Actually the Pundit beat the 6150 by a few insignificant points, and topped the other K8M800 boards by a few percent.
Please keep in mind that Sisoft mentions "System/Video shared memory greatly reduces performance." and "Synthetic benchmark. May not tally with 'real-life' performance."

For 2D performance, I ran Passmark 6, PCMark05, and BitBlt on these same motherboards. The Pundit scores were very similar to the mATX K8M800 brethen, again beating them by just a few percent. However it was quite a bit slower than the 6150 (which was paired with a faster CPU). I've used several K8M800 machines at work and running office apps seemed perfectly acceptable. I do wonder how it stacks up against the SiS, if you have a chance would you mind posting up some benches. The following were run at 1280x1024

A) Pundit with a Sempron3000+ and 1GB RAM vs
B) 6150 with a A643500+ and 2x512MB RAM

Passmark 6
2D = 212 vs 480
3D = 64 vs 36 (an unexpected result)

PCMark05
2D Windows = 30 vs 56
2D lines = 137 vs 423
3D+Physics = 30 vs 56

BitBlt
Blt = 883 fps vs 745 fps
ReverseBlt = 78 fps vs 458 fps (??)

It's okay. It's on its way back to Newegg now.


Sounds good. Yes, it is probably junk SPD timings in the Kingston. They probably programmed conservative SPD timings in it. The Terminator does run it at DDR400. Unfortunately, the timings are still lax, and there is no way to change it in the BIOS. Also there are settings for high memory speeds up to DDR500 in the BIOS, but setting those doesn't change the actual speed from DDR400. Grrr...

I have a 1GB PQI Turbo 2-3-2 stick I can try.


The SIS760GX has DirectX 8 pixel shaders--nifty, I didn't remember that. I was surprised to see the Nature sceen play in 3DMark 2001. So it is light years beyond the shader-less VIA Unichrome. The SIS even pretends to have hardware T&L, but 3DMark 2001 SE was slightly faster with the software T&L setting. 3DMark 2001 seems to be T&L/CPU-limited using the Sempron 64 3100+. Scores are in 1960 range. Also verified again that the 32MB setting yeilds the best performance (in 3DMark 2001 SE at least). I didn't run 3Dmark2001 SE on the Pundit.

I have still have some Desktop flickering at 1600x1200@75Hz. Not as bad as the VIA. Another plus: the 760GX will output up to 2048x1536@60Hz, while 1600x1200 was the top setting for the VIA.

I never thought of running 3DMark, IMO if you plan to do any 3D gaming even very occassional, you'd be better off getting a dedicated graphics card even a budget one. Despite so many new chipsets being brought to the market (even by the two graphics kings), none of the onboard solutions can handle modern 3D games.
For comparison purposes though, I installed 3DMark2001SE, and as you pointed out since Unichrome doesn't have pixel shader, I wasn't able to run the Nature test. However the overall score came out to 2021 for what it's worth (6150 gave a score of 4610).

A second thought on your flickering... is the whole screen flickering or is it only the refreshing of some windows that's slow? If it's the whole screen, I seem to remember having some problems before with my 1600x1200 monitor which went away when I switched to a different VGA cable. Having said that though, I found at such high resolution DVI had noticably better image quality so maybe a dedicated card is worth considering(assuming you're using a LCD).