Gigabyte Launches AMD-powered Brix Gaming PC

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By Jane McEntegart
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Gigabyte drops dedicated gaming Brix right after CES.

Gigabyte today announced a brand new addition to its Brix line of compact computers; this time the company is taking aim squarely at gamers.

 

Dubbed the Gigabyte Brix Gaming, the little box is based on AMD technology and packs AMD's A8-5557M APU as well as Radeon R9 M275X discrete graphics. It supports both mSATA SSD and standard 2.5-inch SATA hard drive installation as well as Mini DisplayPort and HDMI. The Brix Gaming includes USB 3.0 x 4 (two up front and two in the back), Gigabit Ethernet, a Mini PCIe module for 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, and Bluetooth 4.0.

 

The whole thing measures 59.6 x 128 x 115.4 mm and comes with a VESA bracket for mounting the system behind your monitor or TV.

The unveiling of the Brix Gaming comes less than a month after Gigabyte introduced us to the Brix Pro with Iris Pro graphics at CES in Las Vegas. Not long after the Brix Pro's unveiling, Intel provided Valve's Steam developers with 12,000 Brix Pro units.

Now with SteamOS supporting AMD systems, this could pave the way for another variant of Steam Machine from Gigabyte.

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18 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Spelli
    An interesting concept, but inappropriate tech for gamers. This CPU will bottleneck pretty much any non-casual game (and some casual browser games).I would like to see this chassis with a 45W A8-7600 with an optional dedicated GPU, maybe up to an R7 260X if cooling allows it.The A8-7600 chugs 35W. I have no data on the R9 M275X, but it's probably in the 35W range, too. Both components together are sure to sip more wattage than an A8-7600 alone while delivering inconsistent gaming performance due to the underequipped CPU.
    Reply
  • de5_Roy
    i don't think amd has enough money to give away that many free pcs. however, i'd like gigabyte to build low power kaveri based brix gaming pcs, may be another variant with dual gfx-able discreet gpus. those will be easily cheaper than iris pro based $800-1k brix pro pcs.
    Reply
  • jerm1027
    An interesting concept, but inappropriate tech for gamers. This CPU will bottleneck pretty much any non-casual game (and some casual browser games).I would like to see this chassis with a 45W A8-7600 with an optional dedicated GPU, maybe up to an R7 260X if cooling allows it.The A8-7600 chugs 35W. I have no data on the R9 M275X, but it's probably in the 35W range, too. Both components together are sure to sip more wattage than an A8-7600 alone while delivering inconsistent gaming performance due to the underequipped CPU.
    I don't think that CPU will be much of a bottleneck considering it's a quad-core. Here is the most helpful info I could find, coming from Tech Report:
    For those not intimately familiar with AMD's mobile product family, the A8-5557M is a quad-core part with a 2.1GHz base speed, a 3.1GHz peak Turbo speed and a 35W thermal envelope, according to CPU-World. We haven't seen official specs for the Radeon R9 M275X. Considering the rest of the M2-series Radeons seem to be made up of re-badged 8000M-series offerings, however, the M275X may be no different. We're told it performs roughly on par with the desktop Radeon HD 7750, in any case.
    Given the "X" moniker, likely a re-bradge of the 8000 series (which, in turn, are re-bradged 7000 series), and rough performance expectations, I'd say that's a Chelsea XT GPU there, which is in the 7770M and has a 32W TDP.I agree that it's not really appropriate for the typical gamer, but the this is a fair bit gaming horsepower in this form factor. I think it's impressive. Would have been more so if Gigabyte waited for the mobile release of Kaveri
    Reply
  • killerclick
    Laptop internals, might as well buy a laptop with the same specs.
    Reply
  • ryanazar
    What an odd choice of hardware. Why did they not just use an a10-7850k w/ ddr2133?
    Reply
  • de5_Roy
    12545651 said:
    The A8-7600 chugs 35W. I have no data on the R9 M275X, but it's probably in the 35W range, too. Both components together are sure to sip more wattage than an A8-7600 alone while delivering inconsistent gaming performance due to the underequipped CPU.
    the 7600 has a configurable tdp of 65w and 45w. but it (i.e. equipped system) uses different amounts of power at peak and average(65w).
    http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/a10-7850k-a8-7600-kaveri,3725-15.html
    12546251 said:
    What an odd choice of hardware. Why did they not just use an a10-7850k w/ ddr2133?
    a 7850k might need a bigger case for dissipating ~100w :P
    http://www.pcper.com/news/Storage/CES-2014-Gigabyte-BRIX-MAX-Haswell-based-Android-NAS-Device
    Reply
  • falchard
    If it was a SoC, they can pair it with bad solder to make it a real brick.
    Reply
  • childofthekorn
    An interesting concept, but inappropriate tech for gamers. This CPU will bottleneck pretty much any non-casual game (and some casual browser games).I would like to see this chassis with a 45W A8-7600 with an optional dedicated GPU, maybe up to an R7 260X if cooling allows it.The A8-7600 chugs 35W. I have no data on the R9 M275X, but it's probably in the 35W range, too. Both components together are sure to sip more wattage than an A8-7600 alone while delivering inconsistent gaming performance due to the underequipped CPU.
    Short term perhaps. However, you realize that the system will be optimized to run most games in the next year or two, right?
    Reply
  • tntom
    12546229 said:
    Laptop internals, might as well buy a laptop with the same specs.

    Agreed! I am so frustrated with the pricing of these small form factors. They will probably ask $300 - $400 for this in barebones form just like the intel models of Brix. Core i5 Laptop w/ GT750 $850 compared to this.
    $850-$150=$700 No LCD
    $700-$100=$600 No RAM
    $600-$100=$500 No HDD
    $500-$100=$400 No Battery
    $400-$50=$350 No Keyboard and Mouse
    $350-$100=$250 No Win8
    $150-$100=$150 i5 to A8 downgrade
    Update: Looking at Notebookcheck.net benches, this GPU R9 M275X might place beside the Iris Pro 5200 and between GT 740M
    and the GT 750M.
    Update 2: I know a laptop is a package deal with some markup but compare the price of building a complete Mid ATX system that is larger physically, higher part count, more materials, a giant steel case, and much faster to this the size of a Roku box. It shows that the pricing is way distorted.
    Reply
  • irish_adam
    12546229 said:
    Laptop internals, might as well buy a laptop with the same specs.
    Agreed! I am so frustrated with the pricing of these small form factors. They will probably ask $300 - $400 for this in barebones form just like the intel models of Brix. Core i5 Laptop w/ GT750 $850 compared to this. $850-$150=$700 No LCD$700-$100=$600 No RAM$600-$100=$500 No HDD$500-$100=$400 No Battery$400-$50=$350 No Keyboard and Mouse$350-$100=$250 No Win8
    yes but a hardware manufacturer wont be paying $100 for the ram, HDD or probably battery. They pay wholesale prices that we could only dream of and then put their 75% mark up or w/e they add on top to make a profit. so you cant do the calculations that you've just made
    Reply