Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
The Intel D510 Atom is slow only in comparison to more expensive recent pro-
cessors, though. To put the performance of the D510 Atom in perspective, it's
faster than high-performance processors from just a few years ago, such as the
AMD Athlon 64 4000+ and the 3.8 GHz Intel Pentium 4. Millions of people still
use systems with those older, slower processors and are perfectly content with
their performance.
Before you decide on a processor, decide just how much performance you re-
ally need. It's tempting to build a faster appliance system than you really need,
but the downsides of doing that are that your fast appliance system will be
larger, noisier, and more expensive.
For a typical appliance system, we think the best choice is an Intel Atom D510
processor on an Intel D510MO motherboard. That combination is fast enough
to handle routine tasks under Linux or Windows. The integrated Intel Graphics
Media Accelerator 3150 (GMA 3150) video is not fast enough for full-HD video
playback, but it is fast enough for SD video and has excellent display qual-
ity for typical general computing tasks. (We do wish the D510MO included a
DVI or HDMI output rather than just analog VGA, but that's acceptable for our
purposes.) The processor and video together draw a maximum of only 13W,
which means the system can use passive cooling. The motherboard meets Intel's
usual quality, compatibility, and reliability standards, which are extremely high.
And the whole shebang—motherboard with processor installed—costs well
under $100.
Other than the analog-only video port, our only criticism of the D510MO is
that it includes only two SATA connectors, which limits us to one hard drive
and one optical drive. Or so it seems at first glance. In fact, we could install
an optical drive just long enough to install the operating system and then re-
move it and substitute a second hard drive. Alternatively, we could install a
half-height PCI or PCI Express expansion card to get additional SATA ports.
The
GIGABYTE GA-D510UD
is another excellent choice. It's very similar to the
Intel D510MO, but costs $10 or so more. For that extra money, you get an add-
ed standard ATA port and two more SATA ports. GIGABYTE (along with ASUS)
makes first-rate motherboards, and we might actually have chosen this board
if it had been the same price as Intel's offering or if it had included a DVI/HDMI
video output. But in our experience it's tough to beat Intel motherboards for
quality, stability, and reliability, so we happily selected the Intel D510MO.
Of course, you may need more horsepower—CPU, video, or both—than the
D510MO provides. Here are some options:
•
If processor performance is adequate but you need better video perfor-
mance, choose an ASUS or GIGABYTE D510 Atom motherboard that uses
embedded NVIDIA 8xxx/9xxx-series or ION video. Those boards are more
expensive than the D510MO, but their embedded video is more than ade-
quate to handle full-HD video streams, such as for Blu-ray playback. Alter-
natively, look for an ASUS or GIGABYTE Atom motherboard that includes
a PCI Express x16 expansion slot and install a standalone video adapter.
Of course, that means you'll probably also need a larger case and power
supply.
