The rather artsy, spherical OI520 Zotac PC that was announced last week made for an interesting object, but didn't really have anything to get gamers interested. Equipped solely with an i5-4200U 1.6GHz / 2.6GHz TB CPU and an HD4400 IGP, the little orb isn't meant for much beyond generic HTPC and movie/stream viewing tasks. Zotac has addressed this with their beefed-up version, the EN760, announced earlier today.
Zotac's EN760 & EN760 Plus "mini gaming PCs" propel the ZBOX family forward with integrated GTX 860M Maxwell GPUs in a small form factor box. Before getting deeper into this, the specs:
Zotac ZBOX EN760 / PLUS Specs
| Spec | ZOTAC EN760 | ZOTAC EN760 Plus |
| SKU | ZBOX-EN760 | ZBOX-EN760-P |
| Memory Compatibility | 2x204-pin DDR3L SO-DIMM Up to 16GB DDR3-1600MHz | 2x204-pin DDR3L SO-DIMM Up to 16GB DDR3-1600MHz |
| RAM | None. | 1x8GB DDR3-1600. |
| Storage | None. Supports 1x2.5", 1xmSATA | 1x1TB 5400RPM HDD Supports 1xmSATA |
| CPU | Intel i5-4200U 1.6GHz / 2.6GHz TB 3MB L2 Cache | Intel i5-4200U 1.6GHz / 2.6GHz TB 3MB L2 Cache |
| GPU | GTX 860M 2GB GDDR5 / 128-bit bus 1020MHz BCLK / 1097MHz Boost CLK | GTX 860M 2GB GDDR5 / 128-bit bus 1020MHz BCLK / 1097MHz Boost CLK |
| I/O | - HDMI - DVI-I - SD / SDHC / MMC / SDXC Card Reader. - 2xEthernet - 802.11ac - Bluetooth 4.0 - 4xUSB3.0 - 1xHDMI Audio - 1x3.5mm Audio | - HDMI - DVI-I - SD / SDHC / MMC / SDXC Card Reader. - 2xEthernet - 802.11ac - Bluetooth 4.0 - 4xUSB3.0 - 1xHDMI Audio - 1x3.5mm Audio |
| MSRP | $550 | $700 |
| Release Date | June, 2014 | June, 2014 |
The pre-built systems follow the same model as the OI520 & OI520-Plus units: The "Plus" model ships with 1x8GB DDR3-1600 memory and 1x1TB 5400RPM HDD, whereas the not-so-Plus ZBOX requires user installation of memory and storage. The system will be primarily relying on the discrete GTX 860M Maxwell GPU. The 860M hosts 2GB GDDR5 memory locally and won't need to tap into system RAM, as the IGP would, and so memory speeds aren't quite as relevant as with an IGP as the primary GPU. Zotac is using the stock 860M chip with a 1020MHz BCLK and 1097MHz boost clock. The memory bus is 128-bits wide.
Two SKUs of nVidia's GTX 860M exist: One uses the larger GK104 Kepler chip, the other hosts a proper GM107 Maxwell GPU; both are 28nm fab process. The 860M in Zotac's EN760 is compatible with nVidia's GameStream software (although Steam may eclipse that) and ShadowPlay, the retroactive recording suite.
Everything else is fairly standard. The 860M has graphics power that is somewhere around where an R7 260X / GTX 750 Ti would be in the desktop world.
MSRP is $550 for the ZBOX EN760 and $700 for the EN760-Plus. I'd just get the cheaper one and buy some RAM and a hard drive, if I were you.
- Steve "Lelldorianx" Burke.