Obtaining a low power-consumption system

[stringZ]

Dear Community!

I've been struggling to find a solution for building a low-energy consumption system for my work. Now I have a Pentium 4, 2.4 GHz, 1G RAM configuration that consumes around 160 Watts (measured by a Voltcraft power-consumption meter). I think there are many configurations that with same features that consume around 30W like Asrock ION 330HT-BD that has Intel Atom 300 (1.6GHz, Dual Core) and consumes 23 Watts according to a TechSpot review. A pre-built nettop with multimedia features (like the one above) is satisfactory, but not the only option. I would put my new PC together from different parts if necessary, the only thing I don't know, where to start and what kinds of parts are in the market I should take into consideration.

My needs are the following

■Drivers for Windows XP (32-bit)
■CPU: Intel Atom (Dual Core or any other CPU that consumes 2-8 Watts and has >=2GHz clock allover, like Z550)
■Memory at least 1024MB
■Passive cooling or very low noise if possible

■DVD burner (no problem if supports blu-ray as well)
■USB port, at least 4
■ESata, at least 2 (or 1 if 2nd SATA HDD can be mounted inside)
■FireWire (IEEE 1394)
■LAN supporting at least 100Mbit/s speed (full duplex)
■VGA connector (D-sub 15)
■IR-port (infrared)
■Parallel port (not so important if I can replace it with an USB->Parport converter)
■Serial port (RS232)

If not pre-built

■ At least one PCI slot (PCI 2.0 backward compatible - no timing problems at older devices)

I would like to use this configuration for the same purposes I use mine now: high-quality music authoring and recording, video editing and compositing (with hardware acceleration), web surfing, programming (developing applications), writing articles in office apps, watching movies, listening to music.

Thanks for your help
stringZ

 

[masterasia]

If you can find one that can do all that, then let me know cuz I want one too.

 

[p55ibexpeak]

You're looking at mini itx, am I right? The Atom dual-core is ok for general use, but it'll suck at audio/video editing & composting. And maybe 1080p video playback with the occasional out-of-sync audio. Ion would be a better IGP, but still.

I built a low-power headless matx home server a while back for $200 excluding storage. It can do what you want. It's been 5 months and still kicking. Running Ubuntu server, Samba, media streaming, etc. The dual-core 45w cpu is discontinued. I upgraded the ram to 4 gigs. It's flying when copying files from server to Vista. Over 100Mbp/s max.

 

[stringZ]

Thank you for your answer, p55ibexpeak! I don't really understand why it will suck. The only Intel Atom that has Dual Core is Intel Atom 330 (IA330) and that is 1.6GHz (3.2GHz really, because of the two cores if we suppose a multi-threading application). My current CPU is a Pentium 4 2.00GHz. I can edit videos smoothly and compositing works well using hardware acceleration of my NVidia Geforce 7300 GT. Why would IA330 suck more than my current CPU if it has higher overall speed? I have the same question for Z550 that is single-core 2.00GHz and has almost the same parameters (except power-consumption), the same amount of L2 cache my current CPU has (IA330 has 1MB).

 

[p55ibexpeak]

Sorry I compared Atom to my Athon X2. You're right about that, but 1.6Ghz x2 doesn't equal 3.2Ghz. Not technically. You can benchmark a 1.6Ghz 1 core 1 thread vs 3.2Ghz. The 3.2Ghz will be much faster. Hence, x2 != double Ghz. 3.2Ghz will be utilized by everything, but not dual cores. Many games & apps use single core.

 

[stringZ]

Yes, I know that they're not equal, that's why I mentioned Z550 that is 2.00GHz like my Intel Pentium 4. According to overclocking reports it can be pulled up to 2.4GHz.