Zotac Zbox Plus ID45 Review

 

 

Cinebench

Maxxon’s Cinebench provides an insight into how well the CPUs would fare when tasked to render complex images, as well as how the GPU deals with rendering a scene using OpenGL.

 

 

Cinebench gives us our first look at what the integrated GT640 is able to do. In the CPU tests, the ID45 can do nothing to keep up with the others which is a real shame. However, on the OpenGL benchmark, the GT640 does significantly gain ground ahead over the i3 3220. Since OpenGL massively favours AMD graphics, it’s no surprise the 6800K and 5800K both pull away, but the ID45 still has done well to get that close to them.

 

POV-Ray

POV-Ray is another benchmark focused on how well the CPU deals with complex image renders.

 

 

Yet again here we see the i3 3227U trail behind. It is a shame that the ID45 isn’t equipped with a better CPU. Image and video rendering are common tasks set to HTPCs, and since this is one, it is definitely a failure from Zotac in not giving the ID45 a more advanced CPU. To add to this, it seems very odd that it’s now been 8 months since we saw the first Haswell i3s, so it’s baffling to us why the ID45 is still using the older Ivybridge models, especially when Zotac have put the more up to date Haswell processors in other Zbox systems. Hopefully we will see other iterations of the ID45 but with a slightly more powerful processor, but keeping the GT640.