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Graphics Performance in Mini HTPCs
Most of the Mini HTPCs use a specialised low power graphics chip, embedded into the wider chipset. So the ION chipset uses a version of the Geforce 9400 and the Dell Zino uses the AMD 780G chipset with an embedded version of the ATI Radeon 3200 or ATI Radeon 4330. Both of these graphics chips are specifically optimised for HD video.
Measuring graphics performance is notoriously difficult to do. Each chip will have it's strengths and weaknesses and these will be amplified by differing drivers across different operating systems. We provide a wealth of links at the bottom of this page so that you can get the best overview.
In general, all Mini HTPCs on our site are capable of decoding the vast majority of HD (up to 1080p) content you will come across. There are exceptional bits of video, encoded in a non-optimal way, that you may have problems with, but every HTPC here will cope with 99% of real world files.
If you want to do more with your HTPC (such a gaming) then we do not recommend any of these machines. There are many people out there playing games happily on ION powered PCs but it is a less than optimal experience and provides nothing in the way of future proofing. For gaming, you should go for the fastest CPU and graphics card you can afford.
Please note that whilst many of these chips are optimised for HD video, they are often not optimised for things like Hulu, BBC iPlayer, Flash. etc. Optimisation for these services is usually software dependent, so you are relying on Macromedia releasing an optimised version of Flash for Linux, or Hulu implementing support for your chipset. If you want to do more than simply play video files then it is sensible to investigate the capabilities of the machine you are looking at more closely, and might possibly be worth looking at a more powerful PC altogether.
The stats below are gathered from various sources and only serve to show that performance varies according to application but the NVIDIA ION, AMD 780G (Radeon 3200), and Intel GMA4500 are of roughly equivalent HD video playback performance.
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GeForce 9300/9400 NVIDIA ION Core Clock: 450Mhz MPEG2 1080p* 19.9 (lower is better) AVC 1080p* 25.1 (lower is better) VC-1 1080p* 48.2 (lower is better) |
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ATI Radeon 3200 (AMD 780G) Core Clock: 500Mhz MPEG2 1080p* 29.0 (lower is better) AVC 1080p* 23.4 (lower is better) VC-1 1080p* 32.3 (lower is better) |
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ATI Radeon 4330 (AMD 780G) Core Clock: ??Mhz MPEG2 1080p* ?? (lower is better) AVC 1080p* ?? (lower is better) VC-1 1080p* ?? (lower is better) |
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Intel GMA4500 (Intel G45) Core Clock: ??Mhz MPEG2 1080p* 34.4 (lower is better) AVC 1080p* 26.6 (lower is better) VC-1 1080p* 32.7 (lower is better) |
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External Links
• * GeForce 9300 (ION) vs. Radeon 3200 (780G / Zino) vs. Intel G45 benchmarks
• NVDIA ION vs. ATI Radeon HD 3200 (Dell Zino) Forum Thread
• AVForum Zino HD vs. ASRock ION 330HT-BD Graphics Chipset Performance discussion.
• NVDIA ION vs. ION LE Comparison
• 780G Radeon 3200HD Gaming Benchmarks
• AMD's 780G Page
Page last updated: 14-Dec-09
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