Up against similar competition
| Comparison systems | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Laptop/PC | Sapphire EDGE-HD3 mini PC | Sapphire EDGE-HD mini PC | ASUS Eee PC 1215N | Acer Aspire One D260 | Lenovo ThinkPad Edge 11 | |
| Processor | AMD E-450 (1.65GHz, dual-core) | Intel Atom D510 (1.66GHz, dual-core) | Intel Atom D525 (1.8GHz, dual-core) | Intel Atom N450 (1.66GHz, 512KB L2 cache, single-core) | AMD Athlon II Neo K325 (1.30GHz, dual-core) | |
| Memory | 4GB DDR3 | 2GB DDR3 | 2GB DDR3 | 1GB DDR2 | 4GB DDR3 | |
| Graphics | Radeon HD 6320 | NVIDIA ION 2 | Intel GMA 3150 + NVIDIA ION 2 | Intel GMA 3150 | AMD Mobility Radeon HD 4225 | |
| Graphics driver | Catalyst 11.11 | NVIDIA Verde 266.89 | Intel 8.14.10.2117 + NVIDIA Verde 260.89 | Intel 8.14.10.2117 | AMD Catalyst 10.11 | |
| Display | None | None | 12.1in - 1,366x768 | 10.1in - 1,024x600 | 11.6in - 1,366x768 | |
| Battery | None | None | 6 cell, 56Whr | 6 cell, 49Whr | 6 cell, 57Whr | |
| Weight | 577g, excluding charger | 577g (excluding charger) | 1,523g (including battery) | 1,202g (including battery) | 1,513g (including battery) | |
| Wireless | Realtek 8191SU WiFi (802.11n) | AzureWave (802.11bgn) | Broadcom WiFi (802.11bgn) and Bluetooth | Atheros AR5B95 WiFi (802.11bgn) | ThinkPad 1x1 WLAN Half-Mini Card (802.11bgn) and Bluetooth | |
| Disk drive | Samsung 320GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | 250GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | Seagate Momentus 250GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | Western Digital Scorpio Blue 160GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | Hitachi Travelstar 320GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | |
| Optical drive | None | None | None | None | None | |
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate, 64-bit (SP1) | Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate, 64-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium, 32-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Starter, 32-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium, 64-bit | |
| Approx. price when reviewed | £290 (ex. Windows) | £265 (ex. Windows) | £430 | £250 | £480 | |
| Benchmarks | ||||||
| Geekbench 2.1.6 | A cross-platform benchmark used to measure memory and processor performance. Run using high-performance mode. | |||||
| Cinebench 11.5 | Using Cinebench's multi-CPU render, this cross-platform benchmark stresses as many cores as possible. Run using high-performance mode. | |||||
| 3DMark06 | A PC benchmark used to test the DirectX 9 performance of a system's graphics card. Run using high-performance mode. | |||||
| Power consumption | Using balanced power settings, we record mains power draw whilst playing back a 720p movie trailer. | |||||
Notes
We need to go back a little ways to compare the Fusion-powered mini PC against equivalent competition. The first-generation EDGE-HD was put through its paces back 12 months' ago, and it makes for an obvious candidate for comparison purposes. We've also included a faster Atom-powered netbook in the form of an ASUS Eee PC 1215N, while, adding some more spice from AMD's side, a Lenovo notebook with an Athlon II Neo chip and HD 4225 graphics makes up the quartet.
As it's difficult to compare across machines with the supplied FreeDOS operating system, we loaded Windows 7 Ultimate on to the EDGE-HD3. Do bear in mind that these aren't powerful machines, clearly, so don't expect superlative performance.
