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We found it amazing to see all three competitors doing a good job when it comes to offering low-power systems, although the approaches are fundamentally different. AMD has its efficient 780G mainstream system with integrated graphics, which we equipped with a low-power Athlon 64 2000+ model at 8 W TDP. Intel’s Atom platform is based on an ECS motherboard using the 945G chipset that isn’t really a low-power product. But the Atom 230 processor requires so little power that it still hits the same 28 W idle power level as AMD and VIA’s devices do.
VIA With Best Performance And Best Features
VIA clearly offers the best processor performance with its new Nano L2100 CPU on the EPIA-SN mini-ITX motherboards, but the processing performance comes at a price—its peak power is significantly higher than the peak powers of the AMD and Intel systems. In addition, the performance crown only applies to single-threaded applications, as Intel’s Atom 230 does amazingly well thanks to its Hyper-Threading feature and higher memory subsystem performance. This does not leave much room for AMD’s 1,000 MHz of the Athlon 64 2000+, which cannot dominate the benchmarks. Since this processor isn’t really available in retail, we cannot consider it as an option anyway.
Atom Is Ambivalent
We are not sure what to think of the Atom solution, as it offers an interesting, extremely low-power processor, which delivers at least acceptable performance. But Intel stopped somewhere on the way and decided to pair its excellent low-power processor with an average mainstream chipset, which consumes four times the power as the processor. The efforts to develop an adequate chipset were probably too large, especially since Intel wants to release an Atom successor that includes graphics and memory in 2009. Atom eventually is economical enough for Intel to afford throwing in a timeworn chipset.
Recommendation: Watch Out for Other Options
Intel’s Atom has one definite advantage over the two other solutions—the power requirement stays within very controllable boundaries, which means that the delta between idle power and peak power is very small. If you know your performance requirements then you can be sure that Atom will be the lowest power solution, although not necessarily the most efficient one when more performance is required. The VIA device benefits from its integrated random number generator and hardware encryption support, which is both favorable for networking and security appliances.
Desktop users should look at some other options on the market, namely a current Intel mainstream chipset such as G31 or G33 paired with one of the low-end Core 2 models. The M0 steppings of Intel’s mainstream processors are especially efficient, and using an efficient power supply will move such a solution rather close to the idle power we’ve seen with the three low-power machines in this roundup. Performance will benefit a lot, as you can see in our additional test results, where we compare the three platforms to a Core 2 Duo E8500.
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I'd like to see how much electricity you would save in a year by having an efficient machine for basic home use - the one you could leave on 24/7 guilt free
There are some things with this test review that pussles me. Why did you use 3,5" drives? They draw about 10 watt instead of 2 watt for 2,5" drives. Also, I think you could have used a much more energy efficent power supply. That is probably why they all had the same idle watt; the psu was the bottleneck.
I use a setup with the following:
Jetway VIA C7 1.2 GHz
picoPSU 60 watt power supply
1 GB Kingston DDR2 667 Mhz RAM
250 GB Samsung 2,5" drive
This setup only draws about 20 watt when working and even less when idle (measured with a wall socket device, so I know it's accurate and total).
http://www.mini-pc.de/catalog/il/420
http://www.mini-pc.de/catalog/il/338
/Alex
By the way, It would have been interesting also to see you review the dual core Atom.
And maybe also compared to a more modest "normal" computer instead of a gaming rig, to see how low you can get with a normal PC.
Otherwise an interesting article, as they most often are.
/Alex
My last entry for today...
http://www.mini-pc.de/catalog/il/941
(And no, I don't work for the company...)
Here is a very nice review including the dual core Atom 330. I also has many more benchmarks.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/c [...] anano.html
This review could be seen by some as using very selective benchmarks.
my underclocked ADO5400IAA5DO consumes ~5W more than athlon in ths reaview, but I have 2x1000Mhz
as a bonus I can always relax minimum power requirement and take performance route a step or two 
I sugest to try "AMD NPT Family 0Fh Desktop Processor Power and Thermal Data Sheet" document on the www.amd.com - interesting read
by the way, my geode lx800 (500MHz) board on the full load fits into 6W
It would be nice to build Core2 Duo (or even Solo) and under-clock it to similar power envelope (not very much unlike AMD system)... I wonder how It would compare with the rest of the bunch.
n/a, what power supply do you use?
The WinRAR graph is wrong, or the comment about it is wrong. There's a typo in the Winzip comment.
WinRAR: "Still, VIA’s Nano still is more powerful."
Well, it looks to me like Atom won.
Winzip: "Hence VIA’s Atom does well again."
Oops
Really stupid test setup ...
Using slowest AMD clocked 1Ghz vs 1.6Ghz Atom and 1.8Ghz via ... You should use faster x2 losing only few more watts but gaining fastest and best platform in test.
Atom is including old platform slow crap, but this "test" is obviously aimed to show that AMD is bad, buy intel. Choosing BEST cpu from intel and VIA and testing it against SLOWEST AMD ... what is the point???
This AMD 1Ghz/8W will have aprox 12W on 1.5Ghz ... and then including excellent 780G chipset will be total winner of all test including price, performance per watt etc.
Choosing BEST cpu from intel...
If Atom is the best, Intel is screwed.
Does CPU manufacturers sometimes pay reviewers for reviews? I was just wondering because I have it on other websites but fortunately not here.
Does CPU manufacturers sometimes pay reviewers for reviews? I was just wondering because I have it on other websites but fortunately not here.
Have what, Faithful?
The WinRAR graph is wrong, or the comment about it is wrong. There's a typo in the Winzip comment.WinRAR: "Still, VIA’s Nano still is more powerful."Well, it looks to me like Atom won.Winzip: "Hence VIA’s Atom does well again."Oops
Nice catch Random, fixed.
The AMD processor is clocked at 1000MHz. One ideea for the next article would be to take a real 2000+ Lima (or even an X2) and underclock it until it reaches 10-15 W (not 8). This would be a much more fair comparasion with VIA, because that particular solution needs 18W, so you could argue that the bast comparison would be a VIA at 18W and a AMD also at 18W (probably a Lima at 1600Mhz, or a X2 at 1000Mhz). Any chance at this article being done?
..because I have seen it.."
the atom processor would always win in this segment.
the price. the design and manufacturing technology for the atom will allow intel and consumers on a win-win situation. profitable for intel and low prices for consumers while offering adequate performance for net use.
i am sure the atom can still use less power.
its as if, intel drove the atom to maximum clockspeed for the given die space and architecture so that it can achieve that adequate performance.
CPU-Z memory speed for Athlon X2 is right. K8 processors have minimum divider 1/5 from clock speed, so at 1000 MHz it just cant go above 200 MHz physical clock or 400 MT/s (DDR2-400). You can check it with C&C on any Athlon - drop to 800 MHz, and the memory goes DDR2-320 (160 MHz physical). So i wonder why you use horrible 6-6-6 timings for the memory? At DDR2-400 it should have no problems with 3-3-3.
I'm glad this was mentioned!
I had problems with other reviewers that would insist on using 1000W power supplies for low power consumption hardware, the P/S efficiency is only around 50-65% on low power conversion.