Intel's dual-core Atom 330 reviewed in desktop guise

Intel's Atom processor and the netbook are the silicon equivalent of Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson; they're inseparable. Naturally we can't wait for the dual-core Atom 330 to cozy up to the next generation of economical portables, but have to wait a bit as it's being soldered exclusively into tiny desktops at the moment, like the one tech site The Guru of 3D just ran through a series of benchmarks. The posted results could have been interesting had they compared its performance to the single-core Atom 230 rather than AMD's (relatively) heavy-hitting Athlon 4850 X2 and Phenom 9850 -- not exactly apples to apples. We'll just have to assume it's roughly twice as fast on the right apps, all that for only twice the power consumption. That's still only a measly 8-watts!

[Via The Inquirer]

[Jash Sayani @ Sep 19th 2008 9:54AM]

Thats powerful !

[d00b @ Sep 19th 2008 11:59AM]

People keep asking for HDMI and all sorts of nifty features for the Atom. Stop dreaming. The Atom is a low-cost platform, and Intel is not going to let it cannibalize the higher-end platforms by putting in more features. The Atom will only be improved incrementally. This will only change if the Atom has competition. For this generation, VIA & AMD are not in play, so let's hope for next year.

Meanwhile, if you want a low-powered SFF HTPC, the current route is the Intel G45 mini-ITX board, paired with an E5200 or 7200. Yes, you will pay more.

[hazard @ Sep 20th 2008 6:12AM]

.. powerfully desireable

[anebg @ Sep 19th 2008 9:56AM]

Who's Samantha Ronson?

[Phoenix @ Sep 19th 2008 10:19AM]

Lindsay Lohan's lesbian lover

[Knives_Out @ Sep 19th 2008 10:35AM]

I hope they make a video ...

[Nick J @ Sep 19th 2008 12:14PM]

So, are they saying the new Atom chip is a lesbian? I am shocked and outraged, and will start a flame!!!

/sarcasm

[tom @ Sep 19th 2008 3:52PM]

Since when did microchips have a sexuality preference???

[Evan @ Sep 19th 2008 10:01AM]

Dear Tim,

You must be new here.

For future reference, please don't compare chipsets to celebrities. Just don't.



ever.

[strider_mt2k @ Sep 19th 2008 10:23AM]

Yeah, soon enough we'll run out of references and have to fall back on stuff like, "Gabbey Hayes Good!"

[CosterMonger @ Sep 19th 2008 10:07AM]

http://www.guru3d.com/article/ecs-atom-330-dual-core-p945gc-review/7
"The light bulb in my toilet uses even more power." LOL

[Jason @ Sep 19th 2008 10:58AM]

You do realize that the lightbulb in your bathroom is probably a 60W bulb.. which means it uses more power then most motherboards....

[Jason Litka @ Sep 19th 2008 10:14AM]

So if the review didn't make a reasonable comparison why bother posting the story?

[Derek @ Sep 19th 2008 10:26AM]

So if you have nothing beneficial to add to the topic, why bother commenting?

[Jason Litka @ Sep 19th 2008 10:40AM]

I responded earlier but the site seems to have eaten it...

Anyway, I commented because I think it's ridiculous to post a link to a review, even indirect, that is basically worthless. All they're doing is driving visitors to other sites that don't deserve it. An influx of traffic (and ad revenue) will only cause them to post more reviews that don't make sense. In fact, I think I'm going to go compare my new Inspiron 910 to a Tomato and write up a story. If Engadget is willing to post something like this they'll surely carry my story since it deals with a new piece of hardware.

Derek, as to your comment, how much value did it provide? Yeah, that's what I thought.

[pete @ Sep 19th 2008 10:17AM]

Probably only putting them in desktops because of the heat issues.
All current Atom-based netbooks suffer from "hot keyboard" syndrome, so I can only imagine if the dual-core Atoms are using more power they throw off more heat.
But hey winter is coming, they could make great hand-warmers I guess...

[telepheedian @ Sep 19th 2008 10:35AM]

I haven't gotten that at all with my Eee 1000h, although other parts of the laptop can get rather warm if its in Super mode.

[WilfordBrimley @ Sep 19th 2008 11:28AM]

"Hot keyboard" happens because the heatsink is a sheet of metal under the keyboard and there is no fan. Since the Atom processor is using only 8 watts, it is not the major cause of the heat, it's the chipset and in some cases a discrete graphics chip. Look at the photo. The fan you see is on the 945GC northbridge & integrated graphics chip in the middle, not the Atom chip. The Atom is at the bottom with the black heatsink. The mismatched pairing of the Atom with the 945GC is horrendous and it shows where cost took precedence over energy efficiency, but the result is a desktop motherboard/CPU combo that sells for less than $80.

[flx @ Sep 20th 2008 3:49AM]

hi there,
when will the atom single/dual core cpu be available in stores? and corresponding board?
anybody?

thanks,
flx

[CosterMonger @ Sep 19th 2008 10:24AM]

http://www.guru3d.com/article/ecs-atom-330-dual-core-p945gc-review/5
"Enermax Galaxy 1000 Watt (DXX PCIe 2.0 model)" - isn't that a little overkill for the test, at the such low levels of power consumption for the atom 330 computer system the PSU is going to only be pushing 60% efficiency: is that going to give accurate results?
http://i20.tinypic.com/29marrl.jpg

[fmg00 @ Sep 19th 2008 10:33AM]

WTF, TMZ??

[Evan @ Sep 19th 2008 10:38AM]

The processor is fine, the bad choice of ports is what will really limit this board's potential!

- Lose the legacy PS/2 keyboard and mouse ports and the printer port.
- Add an HDMI port and we could have a neat little HTPC.
- Upgrade the network to gigabit and we'd have a nice little home server.

[Josh @ Sep 19th 2008 10:52AM]

agreed, i'm looking for more usb and hdmi - can you even get ps/2 peripherals anymore?

[Phil Perman @ Sep 19th 2008 11:29AM]

When Intel finally get round to designing a new chipset for the Atom rather than using one that is well over a year and a half old and designed for a different purpose, you just might get that.

Its a pretty strange state of affairs when the chipset needs a fan but the CPU doesn't

[d00b @ Sep 19th 2008 11:39AM]

You can't have HDMI because the ancient Intel chipset doesn't support it. If you want digital out, get the Intel G45 mini-ITX board. That said, the Intel board for the dual-core Atom does have a S-video port.

[bethel03 @ Sep 19th 2008 1:07PM]

Well I see two SATA ports, which is a GREAT thing! Hope they are RAIDable... Perfect for a home server configuration. But it still looks to be PCI...where's the PCI-E?

[Joe H @ Sep 19th 2008 10:52AM]

I'd personally have liked to see how this performs using the CPU for decoding HD video. Can it decode 720p/1080p h.264 on the CPU using something like CoreAVC? If it could do that, and had HDMI as mentioned above, it'd definitely make a good HTPC.

[limaxray @ Sep 19th 2008 12:36PM]

I highly, highly doubt it. It takes a surprisingly large amount of processing power to decode h.264 at those resolutions and frame rates - processing power the Atom simply doesn't have and native functionality the chipset lacks. The Atom just isn't designed to be an HTPC; it's meant to be portable and energy efficient. If you want something that is designed to run cool yet handle such media, you should look at one of Via's offerings.

[Fanfoot @ Sep 19th 2008 1:14PM]

jkkmobile has a video up of his Eee PC 901 (1.6GHz single core Atom) playing 1080p WMV (i.e. VC-1, which is almost the same as h.264, so YMMV a little) video just fine:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVf3PtNF-j0

[Joe H @ Sep 19th 2008 3:26PM]

I agree that 1080p is almost definitely not going to happen, and 720p is unlikely, but it'd have been nice for someone to at least test it.

[Capissen @ Sep 19th 2008 11:02AM]

Is the fan on the northbridge in that photo, instead of the CPU? It's like Bizzaro World!!

[WilfordBrimley @ Sep 19th 2008 11:34AM]

Yes the fan is on the northbridge which burns about 30 watts IIRC. Usually a northbridge has no fan but expects to get some benefit from the airflow surrounding the nearby CPU's fan, but since the Atom has no fan, the northbridge needs its own.

[paul-engadget @ Sep 19th 2008 11:31AM]

the single core atom uses less power than the rest of the chips on the motherboard, and a dual-core chip will not quite take twice the power of a single core because of efficiencies in sharing off-chip buffering. so, performance per watt should be quite good, provided that all your software is multi-threaded or multi-processor capable.

as someone said, a gigabit nic and a DVI or HDMI port would make this thing so much more usable; a touchscreen interface and single rail power supply would make it an interesting basis for a car computer!

[Fanfoot @ Sep 19th 2008 1:17PM]

I'm not clear why everybody wants one of these in a laptop. Given the sizes of today's netbooks, if you don't want the battery to stick out, you're limited to about 4 cells. Which gets you maybe three hours of battery life. I understand the desire for more performance in a certain sense, but think that probably the single core Atom is a better choice for the moment. The most obvious thing that needs improving is the SSD performance, and you can improve that by moving the SLC. Now, if the chipset is redesigned to reduce power, then there should be some headroom for a dual core Atom.

[bot @ Sep 19th 2008 1:22PM]

I wonder how this compares to the ULV Core 2 Duo chips which use 10W. Also how the power consumption of the entire board compares to that of a board supported a ULV C2D. My old 12" laptop was getting 5-6hrs with a 1.2ghz ULV C2D on a 6 cell battery, which is what the single core Atom based netbooks are getting.

[chris fredette @ Sep 19th 2008 1:53PM]

What is going on with those damn Parallel ports! Can someone tell me something that uses this port that was made in the last 5+ years? The serial port is almost as bad. Just loose them and 2 more USB ports.
Also, these things need a big heat sink so there is no fan. And I think they should add hdmi or displayport support just to use a smaller connector.

[egotman @ Sep 22nd 2008 10:01AM]

Many of the uses that this board and chip would be used for are for embedded applications such as POS terminals, monitoring of scientific gear, remote control uses where peripherals of these non-consumer devices are usually parallel and serial port based. Sure YOU may not have seen a device with serial or parallel ports in the last five years, but there are a lot still being made out there these days in use by industry. Intel is merely being smart by making this board have the widest market appeal possible by adding low cost legacy ports.

[Rob @ Sep 19th 2008 2:18PM]

No offense but...

PS/2? IEEE-1284 Parallel? Serial ports? This is 2008, not 1993.

[Carl Watkins @ Sep 19th 2008 9:54PM]

When will they come out with the quad core atom?

[puvi @ Sep 23rd 2008 7:14AM]

soon intel will make stickers for that dont worry :))

[OB Ron @ Sep 20th 2008 6:38PM]

Doesn't anyone read Intel documentation?
http://www.intel.com/products/centrino/atom/index.htm
I don't know when these described Centrino versions of the Atom processor and its associated System Controller Hub will be commercially ready, but this document clearly states that together they will support 720p and 1080i HD formats.plus will include WiMAX support.
I think being able to use wired (HDMI) or wireless 802.11n to use an HDTV for large hi-res display and big sound is an essential long term goal of netbook design.

[Puvi @ Sep 22nd 2008 2:50AM]

hmm 8 W , even 8085 run at .2W with out any main peripherals(like memory controller north brige etc)(LOL) then you can say it is good than other ics in market :P . and i also can put huge number of adds in tv to brainwash a lay man to buy it :)).