[ronbaby]

Price just dropped on these @ Newegg. Now just $99.99 & free shipping. I just wanted to share this info with my friends in the Kodi community.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...-_-Product

Fanless!

The downside of these boxes, according to reports, is that they run hot... like maybe real hot. Thus, it probably would not be good to drop a rotating media drive into one to these. But SSD would most likely be OK. (I myself don't have any drive in my own HTPC... just a bootable USB stick with OpenELEC on it.)


P.S. If you just want to run OpenELEC, 2GB is probably more than enough main memory. I looked around the other day for (officially) compatible 2GB memory sticks and found that you can get Micron MT8KTF25664HZ-1G6M1 (which is 2GB) on eBay for less than fifteen bucks.

P.S. At this price this box is distinctly cheaper than the current recommendation (in the thread "Pick the Right Kodi Box" in this forum) for a good cheap x86 machine, i.e. the ASUS Chromebox. And you wouldn't have to jailbreak this one to use it, e.g. for OpenELEC.

[Matt Devo]

meh, BayTrail + single channel memory = not in the same class as a ChromeBox (or other Haswell-based systems). The MSI Broadwell 3205U box for $106, now that was a hot deal.

[ronbaby]

Of course, you could definitely build and/or buy a faster system, but for those more interested in saving a few bucks, rather than reading great system specs....

Rumor has it that this Gigabyte box plays 1080p vids no problem, so, ya know, if it does all it needs to do, and if it is currently the cheapest x86 solution that does, then who cares about the rest?

I mean it isn't as if people... in particular, people here... are going to buy any of these kinds of boxes just so that they can run benchmarks on them 24/7.

The question is: What's the cheapest x86 box that will provide a plesant experience with Kodi+Confluence at this moment.

P.S. I tried Kodi+Confluence (OpenELEC) on an Raspberry Pi 2 recently, and in a couple of situations it just was too sluggish for my tastes. The Celeron N2807 in this Gigabyte box is slower than the Celeron 3205U in the MSI box you mentioned, but either one still beats the snot out of an RPi2.

P.P.S. My own current HTPC (running OpenELEC) contains an AMD E-450 and it is never in the least bit sluggish at all as far as I can see. And the E-450 has an even slightly lower Passmark score than the N2807. In short, as a strictly HTPC machine, I'm sure than anything with an N2807 will do just fine for most folks.

P.P.P.S. One other small but potentially important detail... The Gigabyte box is fanless... the MSI box... ain't.

[DocG]

P.P.P.S. One other small but potentially important detail... The Gigabyte box is fanless... the MSI box... ain't.

Good point, and as you've said yourself:

The downside of these boxes, according to reports, is that they run hot... like maybe real hot.

So the MSI box would definitely be the better box then you're saying?

[Matt Devo]

Of course, you could definitely build and/or buy a faster system, but for those more interested in saving a few bucks, rather than reading great system specs....

this has nothing to do with specs, and everything to do with real world performance

Rumor has it that this Gigabyte box plays 1080p vids no problem, so, ya know, if it does all it needs to do, and if it is currently the cheapest x86 solution that does, then who cares about the rest?

because it doesn't support MADI/MCDI deinterlacing, or handle Hi10P as well, or handle HEVC as well...

I mean it isn't as if people... in particular, people here... are going to buy any of these kinds of boxes just so that they can run benchmarks on them 24/7.

The question is: What's the cheapest x86 box that will provide a plesant experience with Kodi+Confluence at this moment.

it depends on your needs. If all your need is 720p/1080p h.264, and you don't care about how hot the box gets, then I suppose it's fine.

P.S. I tried Kodi+Confluence (OpenELEC) on an Raspberry Pi 2 recently, and in a couple of situations it just was too sluggish for my tastes. The Celeron N2807 in this Gigabyte box is slower than the Celeron 3205U in the MSI box you mentioned, but either one still beats the snot out of an RPi2.

P.P.S. My own current HTPC (running OpenELEC) contains an AMD E-450 and it is never in the least bit sluggish at all as far as I can see. And the E-450 has an even slightly lower Passmark score than the N2807. In short, as a strictly HTPC machine, I'm sure than anything with an N2807 will do just fine for most folks.

CPU speed isn't the issue, it's GPU capability.

P.P.P.S. One other small but potentially important detail... The Gigabyte box is fanless... the MSI box... ain't.

if one cannot hear a fan, does it exist?

[smitopher]

P.P.P.S. One other small but potentially important detail... The Gigabyte box is fanless... the MSI box... ain't.

if one cannot hear a fan, does it exist?

Unfortunately... yes it does.

EVERY bitty box with a bitty fan that I have direct experience with was very quiet in the beginning, but eventually... the buzzing starts

I can no longer leave my Ivy Bridge i5 Foxconn nano on 24/7. It buzzes and gets VERY hot.
All it runs is OpenElec with my media on my server.

So now I'm torn between http://liliputing.com/2015/05/asrock-bee...ype-c.html or waiting for a Skylake NUC board and a fanless case

[Matt Devo]

EVERY bitty box with a bitty fan that I have direct experience with was very quiet in the beginning, but eventually... the buzzing starts

I can no longer leave my Ivy Bridge i5 Foxconn nano on 24/7. It buzzes and gets VERY hot.
All it runs is OpenElec with my media on my server.

so why not replace the fan then? My ChromeBoxes have been running 24/7 for the better part of a year, still silent. A replacement fan would run me $10 on ebay should I need it

[smitopher]

My desire to "Fix" computers usually stops at adding more ram and/or bigger/more disk drives

A new fan so I can wait for Skylake is appealing... I don't think the Foxconn Nano units fan are intended to be user replaceable. I guess that google is in my future

[ronbaby]

So the MSI box would definitely be the better box then you're saying?

Maybe. Maybe not. I don't mind if a box runs hot as long as I'm not planning on putting any rotating media into it and as long as it doesn't burn itself up.

because it doesn't support MADI/MCDI deinterlacing, or handle Hi10P as well, or handle HEVC as well...
...
it depends on your needs. If all your need is 720p/1080p h.264, and you don't care about how hot the box gets, then I suppose it's fine.

That was pretty much the point I was making.

In my personal experience, from 10 feet away... or even 8... (and up to a 50" screen) anything beyond well produced 720p is overkill. In practice the average person will never notice the difference. So when people start to talk about 4K (or when some salesman snags me on the way through a store and wants to show me the shiny new 4K TVs) I just roll my eyes. It's just a marketing gimick to separate people from their money.

Of course, someday, in perhaps 7-10 years from now, it will all have been commoditized down to reasonable prices, will be widespread, and then it will be foolish not to buy 4k capable systems and equipment.

I'm no expert, but as far as I can make out, the same is all true also of HEVC and Hi10P. It all sounds great in theory, but in practice there's essentially zero content at this point in time and there is no compelling reason for that to change anytime soon. (And in the absence of original content already encoded in HEVC, HEVC is only useful, in theory, for saving some disk space. But I personally have PLENTY of disk space... the stuff is cheap these days... so for me that's absolutely a non-issue.)

As far as the fancier new deinterlacing possibilities... all I can say is that my old E-450 seems to be deinterlacing all my old 480p vids just splendidly, so this doesn't seem like an issue that I personally am going to be caring about anytime soon.

But again, I don't think you and I are even disagreeing. True devotees/aficionado and those who want to buy something that won't be at least partially obsolete 5 years from now will want to buy something else. But for Joe Sixpacks (like me) who are happy just to watch 1080p, 720p, and 480i rips and broadcasts, these low priced x86 boxes will be more than adequate.

Oh! And by the way, here's another one I saw today that's also pushing down close to that $100 magic number:

Zotac ZBOX-BI320-U
http://www.amazon.com/Zotac-Mini-Barebon...zotac+zbox

[Matt Devo]

Oh! And by the way, here's another one I saw today that's also pushing down close to that $100 magic number:

Zotac ZBOX-BI320-U
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00LJEFR68

that's also a great deal for $100. I just can't recommend BayTrail devices to people when Haswell devices can be had for slightly more and offer significantly more video playback capability.

[ronbaby]

that's also a great deal for $100. I just can't recommend BayTrail devices to people when Haswell devices can be had for slightly more and offer significantly more video playback capability.

I have to agree that with the Zotac, you're getting more bang for virtually the same bucks. The downside is that it has a fan, but users seems to be saying that it's pretty darn quiet.

The humorous thing is that Newegg is taking pre-orders for the Intel stick at a price point (including shipping) that is even a bit higher than either the Zotac or the Gigabyte boxes.

Given the choice, would you spend more and get a stick that has only one USB 2.0 port and a microSD slot, or a box that has three USB ports (six in the case of the Zotac) gigabit ethernet, HDMI and second display capability, full-sized SD card reader, dedicated mic & headphone ports, and, in the case of the Zbox, an S/PDIF optical out port?

This isn't a hard decision. Anybody who buys the stick must have a really small apartment. :-)

[ronbaby]

that's also a great deal for $100. I just can't recommend BayTrail devices to people when Haswell devices can be had for slightly more and offer significantly more video playback capability.

So, um, just for my edification, you're saying that even though this box:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...24G2HM7503

is quad core (rather than dual) and even though it's clocked faster (1.83GHz) than the other two boxes I've mentioned, you still wouldn't recomment it because it is Bay Trails?

[Matt Devo]

So, um, just for my edification, you're saying that even though this box:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...24G2HM7503

is quad core (rather than dual) and even though it's clocked faster (1.83GHz) than the other two boxes I've mentioned, you still wouldn't recomment it because it is Bay Trails?

yes. The BayTrail SoC is Atom-based, regardless of how Intel markets it. Core for core, the Haswell Celeron has roughly twice the horsepower compared to a BayTrail Celeron/Atom, and although the GPUs are of a similar architecture, the Haswell Celeron has 10 execution units (EUs) to the BayTrail's 4, which gives it a significant advantage in video processing. While no benchmark is perfect, Octane does a good job showing the relative performance of the two, where the Haswell Celeron scores ~13000 and the BayTrail is in the 7-8000 range.

[Robotica]

Already noticed the Asrock Beebox (Celeron N3000 Braswell with 12 EU's - 4W, usb3.0, type C, 2x hdmi, displayport)?

[ronbaby]

Already noticed the Asrock Beebox (Celeron N3000 Braswell with 12 EU's - 4W, usb3.0, type C, 2x hdmi, displayport)?

No, your mention of it if the first reference I've seen to such a box.

Gee! It appears that everybody is getting into this market now. That's great news for everybody who wants, plans, or is already using Kodi, of course.

That AsRock box definitely looks interesing, but of course, the price is critically important. And I'm not seeing anyplace online when any price info has yet been disclosed.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

I do like the look of it. It appears that Asrock had the good sense to put a USB 3.0 port on the front, and also to equip the thing with an IR receiver.

P.S. I guess this box will contain a "Braswell" processor, which I can only guess.... based on the name... will fall someplace in between Bay Trails and Haswell. This of course gives me an excuse to ask Matt Devo what he thinks of "Braswell" for a Kodi box.