As the saying goes, great things come in small packages, and boy did Dell deliver on that adage!

Our friends at Dell sent over their new Inspiron Zino HD PC and I must say that this little Inspiron really inspired me.  This box has the potential to be a great solution as a small form factor (SFF) HTPC as well as a very capable desktop computer for those that have limited work spaces. I would like to apologize in advance for the length of this particular blog post, but I wanted to make sure I provided an accurate write up.

Per my usual comments, this is not intended to be an official review of the device, but more of an overview of the platform and features offered, mixed with a little user feedback.  Let me dive into some of the specifications first and then share a little on my experience with this computer.

Size
The first thing I noticed when I pulled the Inspiron Zino HD out of the box was small size.  Measuring  a mere 7  3/4 inches on each side and only 3 1/2 inches tall (approximately), this is a really small PC.  I snapped a couple of pictures to give you some references for comparison (see below).  After removing the protective packaging, it was very pleasing to the eye.  The overall shape, fit and finish are beautiful –not something I often say about a PC.  The unit has a mirror black piano finish.

As you can see, it is similar in size to a baseball cap–now that is pretty small.  I also snapped a picture of it sitting next to the Lian Li C39 chassis (a low profile HTPC chassis).

Specs
Dell is offering the Inspiron Zino HD PC with multiple configurable options so customers have the ability to personalize the platform to a specific need or budget.  The particular unit sent to me was configured with the following specifications:

OS: Windows® 7 Home Premium	CPU: AMD Athlon™ X2 3250e processor	Chipset: AMD RS780G
LAN: On board Gb Ethernet	Wireless: Integrated Wireless N	Memory: 2GB DDR2 800
Optical Drive: 8x DVD ROM	HDD: 250GB	USB wired mouse
Volume: 3.5L	LxWxH: 197.6mm x 197.6mm x 89mm	USB wired keyboard

Performance
At the heart of this little beast is the AMD RS780G chipset and the AMD Athlon™ X2 3250e processor.  Combined, these two pieces of technology deliver a very compelling experience in both processing and graphics power.  Capable of handling excellent HD playback (when combined with an HD monitor), online streamed content and more, this unit delivers a great entertainment experience.  While I did not run any benchmark utilities, I was impressed by the variety of applications and content the platform supported.

Do note though, none of my testing was done under rigorous lab conditions with repeated and averaged test results nor am I showing pretty graphs and charts.  My testing was strictly limited to putting it in a real world environment and observing the results.  See the User Experience section below for more details.  I would also like to point out that this unit is not intended to be a high performance gaming system but neither is it an entry level nettop type platform.  This is a solid performing, mainstream PC that offers a full PC experience for a variety of uses.

Optional Configurations
As mentioned above, this unit is configurable with many upgrade options.  For example, you want a larger HDD? You can get up to a 1TB HDD installed.  Higher end graphics? Yep, order an ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 4330 GPU and you have one powerful little work horse.  Here is a list of upgrade options:

CPU: Up to an AMD Athlon™ Neo X2 6850e processor
Graphics: Optional ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 4330 GPU
Memory: Up to 8GB of DDR2 800
HDD: Up to 1TB
ODD: DVD or Blu-ray drive option available
Wireless: Optional 802.11 b, g, or n
Colors: 9 color lid options to choose from (see below)
OS Options:
Windows® Vista Home Basic 32bit
Windows® 7 Home Premium 64Bit
Windows® 7 Professional 64Bit
Windows® 7 Ultimate 64Bit

Pricing and Availability
According to my friends at Dell, the Inspiron Zino HD will start at $249 for the base configuration (AMD Athlon™ 2650e processor, 2GB RAM, 250GB HDD, 8X DVD drive, Windows Vista Basic). Yes, you read that correctly, $249! This is an incredible starting price point for such a capable system in such a small form factor. Dell also told me that the unit will be available both online and through retail outlets.  Units are available online today from Dell but expect a month or two (typical retail stocking times) before systems will be available on store shelves.  Prices are in USD, see your local Dell.com site for regional pricing.

User Experience
My initial goal was to test this as a great, small form factor HTPC.  As such, I spent a good deal of time testing the box in a home theater environment. And it did most things very well.

From the moment I opened up the packaging, and powered it up, the process was smooth and user friendly.  The device immediately went through the set up process without any hiccups.  I was able to easily set up the user accounts and Media Center.  Once everything was completed, I decided to install additional software to open up the experience a little, like Hulu’s Desktop application and Arcsoft’s Total Media Theater.

I wanted to test Blu-ray playback but since my unit did not have a Blu-ray player installed, I was unable to test that functionality.

Playing Content
Once all that was done, the fun really began. I first played a couple of different DVDs to evaluate playback quality.  I was not disappointed.  With a handful of DVDs, some more intensive than others, the system played them all back smoothly without dropping frames thanks in part to AMD’s UVD hardware acceleration technology.

Next I loaded up some Hulu content via both the Hulu website and their Desktop application.  With the latest Flash player from Adobe, the system did pretty well.  I played content from both Hulu’s website and using their Hulu DT application. Both versions played very well. In addition to the Hulu content, I tried the new Internet TV functions integrated into Media Center. After updating the flash player plug in for Media Center, again, content played back smooth and without issues.   Not wanting to limit the experience to Hulu or Media Center, I also tried content directly from ABC’s website, again smooth playback.  Lastly, I tried content from YouTube with great success as well.  Now this mix certainly does not reflect all the different websites and content that exists, but I think it does provide some idea of what you might expect.

When placing your order, it should be noted that the current version of Flash player does not take advantage of the hardware acceleration via the graphics chip. Therefore, flash playback is very CPU intensive and the more robust or faster the processor, the smoother the playback (assuming you are not limited by your internet connection).  Likewise, if a future version of Adobe’s Flash player supports hardware acceleration, playback of Flash content should be even better.

Thanks to my coworkers in Canada, I managed to get my hands on a new USB TV Tuner (based upon the ATI Theater™ HD 750 tuner) and connect it to the Zino HD.  Windows® 7 immediately recognized the tuner and installed the appropriate drivers.  After a quick set up in Media Center, I was able to watch live and DVR local broadcast content in HD (using my HD capable monitor) without any issues.  Playback of both live and recorded TV content was clear, smooth and stutter free.  Signal strength was good but of course that is highly dependent on terrain, distance from towers, etc. but needless to say, it was a pleasant experience with the ATI Theater HD 750- based TV tuner and the Zino HD combination.

Now, I did run into a stuttering issue playing back recorded TV over the wireless N network. However, I don’t believe this to be an issue with the Dell hardware because when I watch the same content live or recorded locally on the HDD it plays back just fine. Likewise, if I pause the streamed recorded TV content being played back, it will play fine for a while before it starts stuttering again.  Therefore, this would appear to be something limiting on my wireless network.  Unfortunately, I did not have enough time to debug the issue at the time of this posting.

Integrated Wireless
The integrated wireless N adapter worked exceptionally well. I had full bars and it worked even better than my USB wireless N adapter that I normally use for my bedroom HTPC. The Windows® 7 Home Group functionality makes adding systems and sharing content very easy. With a couple of quick clicks, I was able to see the media on my main HTPC without issue. Movies streamed from my main HTPC played back very well– again no dropped frames and the picture quality looked excellent. Likewise, music and pictures were also easily streamed from the main HTPC to the Inspiron Zino HD without issue.  Therefore, other than the minor issue with recorded TV content, streaming over the network was very solid and smooth.

Storing CDs to drive
I also decided to load some music content on the local drive so I popped in a couple of CDs to see how well the system was able to convert music in different formats. The results were quick and again, local and remote content played back smoothly.  Speaking of storage, the device does have 2 eSATA ports so external storage can be easily added if you run out of space on the HDD.

Power Draw
After bringing the unit back to work, I connected it up to a Kill-A-Watt meter to see how the power draw was going to be on this machine.  Now, power draw did vary as expected based upon different use cases (DVD, streaming internet content, etc.).  At idle (staring at the desktop), the system was using a mere 29W.  When I streamed content from Hulu (via Hulu DT), the system was drawing about 40W while DVD playback was about 37W.  With such low power operation, no high speed fans were necessary to keep this unit cool, bringing me to my next topic — noise levels.

Noise Level
While I did not have a noise meter handy, it is worth noting that under all these circumstances, the box remained very quiet.  Even in the quietest of rooms, the system is only barely perceptible.  In most cases, I needed to put my ear within a few inches of the PC to hear it.  I even left it on overnight in my bedroom and it was only noticeable if you were listening for it.  Dell did an excellent job of keeping this PC almost silent.

For me, this computer makes for an excellent small form factor HTPC.  However I think it would be equally at home for college students in a dorm room for example that have little desk space and need a system to function both as a PC and an entertainment device.  Likewise, this could make for a great kitchen PC, where you might want to have a PC nearby when cooking, looking up web recipes, and more.  This unit could also function as a kid’s PC where you might not need high end gaming performance but want something small and quiet.

I recently recieved  a version that has the Blu-ray drive and the ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 4330 GPU.  Read about how it performed here.

There is so much more I would have like to have covered but I think I have rambled on enough.  To our friends at Dell, I say congratulations on a job well done.  To our AMD@Home blog readers, this is quite a capable little device that was whisper quiet with low power requirements. It was able to handle just about everything I could throw at it without issue. Even at the base configuration, to have such an elegantly designed, HD capable machine available at for $249 from Dell is astounding. It would be hard to build a similar machine yourself at that price.  I think I know what is going on my Christmas list — now I just need to worry if I have been good enough this year.

Till next time, Happy Trails!

Jay Taylor is a Senior Developer Relations Engineer at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such linked sites and no endorsement is implied.