Zotac Zbox Plus Nano XS AD11 review

The Zbox doesn’t look as if it should be upgradeable, but you can open it up and change its memory. It has one slot for DDR3 laptop RAM, currently occupied by a 2GB 1,333MHz module, and a hard disk, which is a 60GB solid-state mSATA module. This is about the same size as the memory, so if you want to upgrade you’ll have to replace it with the same kind of disk. Although it isn’t a major performance boost, the solid-state drive had a positive effect on the PC’s boot time and overall responsiveness.

The XS’s AMD E-450 processor is one of the better ultra-low-power chips around at the moment, and we got an overall score of 13 in our benchmarks. That’s enough to browse the web and watch videos, but you won’t want to do much more than that. The integrated AMD Radeon HD 6320 graphics processor supports DirectX 11, but it isn’t really up to gaming, as shown by its failure to run Dirt 3 at our standard laptop test settings. Even so, the E-450 processor’s onboard graphics should be able to cope with relatively undemanding games, such as Portal, at minimum quality. All 720p and most 1080p video files played smoothly, but the system was unable to handle our full Blu-ray rip.

At £299, the XS is typically priced for a mini PC. Its mSATA hard disk provides less storage capacity than you usually get from similar systems with a traditional hard disk, but its faster access speeds make up for this. If you really want a computer that consumes the bare minimum of space and can run most applications, this system is a perfect match. However, the Lenovo IdeaCentre Q180, which costs £50 more but comes with Windows 7 Professional, a Blu-ray drive and a 750GB hard disk, is a better buy if you want to run Windows on your mini PC.