[BlueMak]

After more than a month of intense searching comparing and waiting for my money to arrive, my new laptop, a 10" clone of a Medion Akoya Mini, which has MSI "signatures" all over it, is here.
I will try to write a small review in the next day or two.

Some specs for now, 10" monitor, ~1Kg in weight, white colour, wifi, bluetooth, 160GB WD HDD, 1GB DDR2 RAM, 1.6 Atom CPU, 945GSE chipset, 3 USB, 1 VGA, 1 modem and 1 network connections, windows XP home.

Feels quite fast for what it is, tried a couple of games, from STEAM: Audiosurf (runs good in a small window), Pirates (excellent). Civilization 3 complete (great but need to scroll the map a bit, thankfuly it is a non issue for this game).

Gets a bit just a bit warm in the area between the touchpad and the bottom row of the keyboard, nothing much. The rest is quite cool. The HDD is the loudest part of it...so it is pretty quiet. Speakers suck.

First impressions rating, 5/5.
More during the weekend.

[Partizan]

What is the battery time? I really liked the speakers description

[Customgamer1]

Yeah need some pics!

Hope you like it

[Zardon]

how do you find the atom processor for performance ?

[BlueMak]

I will post the full thing on Sunday evening or something, but to answer your questions,
battery time without changing anything manualy and just unplugging it and continue whatever I was doing before is, estimated, about short of 2 hours. I have since disabled wifi and bluetooth and changed a few things. I will test it on Sunday by letting it play some video files or something. My GUESS is that it will reach about 2.2-2.5 hours at best.

I will post some pics tomorrow. It doesn't look very cool, even my mother looked at it and said it looked like a toy, but it is very well built, very solid and looks like it is covered with chrome or something, not possible to leave fingerprints on this baby.

In crude terms, the atom cpu feels like 1/4 at best the performer of the E6600.
The atom processor is not the fastest kid in the block...I will have to try it a bit more with some games that I used to run on my old laptop (with a p4m 1.7Ghz), but so far it feels like they are about the same speed, which is not that good since this one has twice the memory and a slightly better graphics card (according to notebookcheck anyway...) and it is 6 years newer model. Of course I bought that notebook on day of release for (today's money) close to 3000 euros while I bought this one for 399.

I am not surprised about the good or bad things about its performance , but I am worried about the temperatures it is reaching. Under heavy load it has reached 91C. (Atom cpu)

[kris23]

now...... when do atom based handhelds come out?

[BlueMak]

Originally Posted by kris23

now...... when do atom based handhelds come out?

Unless Intel does something about the temps, never.

[BlueMak]

Here is my review.

What is in the box?

The name of the netbook is Multirama-HT XPRESS BOOK, sold by the greek company Multirama as a "mini-notebook". It is more or less a clone of the MSI Wind. With an Atom Silverthorne CPU Z530 at 1.6Ghz, a Intel 945GSE chipset, 1GB Ram (with an empty sodimm slot for one more GB ram). 1 WD 160GB HDD good speed and low noise. Sound solution by Realtek, ALC 888. Touchpad by Synaptics. It has 1 10/100 network connection, 1 WiFi module, 1 Bluetooth module, 3 USB 2.0, 1 power in, 1 VGA OUT, 1 microphone/line in and 1 headphones in. A 3 in 1 card reader is located on the right side of the notebook (SD/MMC/MS). There is a 1.3MPixels web cam on the top of the monitor and a build in microphone on the top right of the monitor. It was about 1.1Kg with the battery which is a 3 Cells (Li-On). It comes with Windows XP Home 32bit (greek). There is a Recovery DVD with it plus a couple of useless "manuals". One is about emissions, one is an obvious localy printed/photocopied instruction booklet (A4 size too) which has all the FN+Key combinations...wrong. There is also a large poster! that shows a different notebook, I think it is a Zepto model...

What does it look like?
The netbook is white colour, very nice finish, impossible to leave viewable fingerprints just by handling it. The monitor is a 10.2" matte screen. Very good monitor for its size. In the last 2 days I haven't noticed anything bad about it, apart of course from the limited size.
Colours are vibrant but still feel natural, no ghosting, no tearing and no glare problems when turned on. The viewing angles are excellent, although I have my doubts you will want to look at it from a wide angle due to the small size of it.
It has a single extra/specialized button, the power button, on the top right side of the keyboard. Silver/grey in colour with a small light blue led light. It is out of the way and not problematic at all. Someone people might have a problem with it though because it is very close to the keyboard and the Del and Insert keys. In two days I never had an issue with it, for example pressing it instead of a key.
The touchpad is of the same white colour as the rest of the notebook and has a single touchpad button that depending on where you pressure it acts like a left or right mouse button. If you tab on the right side near the top and bottom of the touchpad then it will work as a page down/up key. Very useful in scrolling web pages etc. The touchpad is perhaps the first time that it is so well designed in terms of how it looks and feels in all the notebooks that I have used and even looked at. It is a Synaptics model and very smooth to the touch almost exactly like the rest of the notebook. An excellent touchpad.
I do have problems with touchpads though, I find myself always touching it when typing or just moving my hands so I am forced to disable it. If you have no such issue with touchpads, I believe it will leave you satisfied.


What does it sound like?

First of all noise from the machine. It's at a minimum. If there is any other sound source in the room or nearby, it will completely cover any sound coming from the netbook. In a very quiet enviroment, you will probably hear the HDD working more than anything else from it.
The keyboard is also very quiet. Less noise from typing on it than say from nmy Microsoft 500 keyboard. It is not without any sound, but you will probably not wake up anyone in the same room while typing. The same can't be said about the touchpad's left "button". I would say it is about 3 times as loud as any key on the keyboard. The right "button" of it is as silent as the keyboard though, so if you need to be quiet, you could just tap on the touchpad instead of clicking on the left "button" of it.
There is no noise coming from the monitor when you change its angle, including opening or closing it.
Apart from an old pocket PC I used to own, this is by far the less noisy computer I have ever owned, apart from my Atari STfm which had no fan. Though the keyboard of the Atari were much more noisy than this netbook.


Yes, but what does it sound like?

Sound, it provides good enough support for a good pair of headphones (I use AKG K271Studio), both in quality and power, I think it even sounds better than the onboard solution in my desktop PC with the Realteck 885. Playing music, watching movies, playing games, the sound quality is excellent.
I can't say the same about the built in speakers. They lack in power and quality. My Sony Ericsson K800i has more powerfull and better quality speaker than this notebook. Which is even more sad when you consider that not only the K800i is a mobile phone, but that a previous and less expensive mode (W810i) has far better speaker than it. In other words, speakers of this netbook=fail but if you use headphones=pwn.


Benchmarks? I don't need no stinking benchmarks!

I decided to not use any benchmarks apart from testing the hard drive. The basic reason for not using benchmarks is I don't trust them in real terms and I tested several games to get some real hands on experience on the speed of this machine.
For the HDD I used HD Tach and HD Tune.

I first tried HD Tach and I got some weird results. I would get spikes towards the bottom of the performance axis. This after a defrag. It would seem like every 10 percent of the test, the performance would drop for a second or two. Unfortunately I don't have the screenshot any more.
I used HD Tune to see if I get similar results.








AHA! The pattern is here too. The first test with everything on. ^^





The second with disabled onboard wireless and bluetooth. ^^


Continued...

[BlueMak]

The third with also disabled anti virus resident shield. ^^





The fourth with completely shut down firewall and anti virus. I think we are getting somewhere. ^^




The fifth is the same as the fourth only with the screen capture program on... ^^




The sixth is with the same as the fifth, but with re initialised firewall program. I think we found the culprit! ^^





The seventh is with the HD Tach with once again with the firewall shut down. It is settled.
ZA causes the "problems" with the hdd benchmarks. I would love to test it with 2GB of RAM just to make sure, but I don't have the RAM so for I will have to just accept the results as they are. If I manage to buy extra ram I will test it again, but don't count on it for a while.




I also used one cpu benchmark program, I was bored and just for the fun of it because i already had the program on a usb stick. ^^

Continued...

[BlueMak]

Now for some screenshots from CPU and GPU Z




You are sooo HOT!

Temperatures for the cpu reach mid to high 70s C after the 4M super pi test. They drop to mid to high 60s after one min of almost idle conditions. Ten min idle and the temps go to 63-64C. The ACPI temps reached a max of 61C and after 10 min idle 45C. The HDD as long as it is not used it remains steady at 40C while during HDD benchmarks it reached 46C. I am satisfied with these temps. (read further down, more info on temp under really heavy load...)


Joystick!
In other words, games! None of which playable with a joystick, hey it's my review!

Pirates!: using FRAPs and playing the steam version of Pirates! Max supported resolution
800x600. Full details on, advanced lighting off, shadows off, trilinear filtering ON.
During main map frame rate from low 10s to low 20s. During naval battle from low 10s to low 20s. During swordfighting from low 20s to low 30s. If you lower resolution and/or lower details you should get some boost in frame rate, but for me those numbers were good enough to play without feeling i was missing anything. The bigger boost was by disabling shadows and leaving advanced lighting to OFF.

Splinter Cell: Settings don't seem to affect much the fps in this game, which means either
that the cpu is what is stopping the game to reacher higher fps, or perhaps the game doesn't run that fast anyway. This is the third second time I install the game to any PC, the first was a 2002 notebook with the 7500m and P4m 1.7Ghz, that from what I remember the game was either not running at all or running very slowly. The other time was on a desktop system but I don't remember much about it. On this netbook the performance is good for this game.
The frame rate is between mid 10s to low 20s, at resolution 800x600 and 640x480, all details at max apart from shadow detail that only allowed the setting up to medium. The game looks good and plays good. Not sure how it would be if it was a fast paced game, but for what it is, you hardly notice any slowdown apart from watching the fraps number in the corner...

Locomotion: Game running at the monitor's native 1024x600 resolution. It runs without any slowdown at least for the first half an hour into the game, if things get very busy later on on a large map, there might be a problem, but since the minimum requirements are so low, I doubt it will be a problem.

Doom 3: I tried the game from 320x200 to 800x600 with all settings to minimum. I even
tried a "special" cfg file for the game, but the game is unplayable. It loads fine but
whenever there are certain types of light, for example as soon as you have control of your
character in the game, the landing pod that leaves Mars, or when you go inside the chamber for decondamination when you look towards the light coming from the fans on the ceiling, etc, the game drops from the otherwise 20-40! frame rate to low single digits. Considering how much lighting is used in this game I suspect that most of it will be like this, thus impossible to play the game and enjoy it. I am sure if I REALLY wanted to I could try to play with these ups and downs, but unless someone pays me to do so, I am not going to try.
I use the lated Intel driver for the graphics card. I am sorry to say but Doom 3 is not
going to be played on this notebook.

Oblivion: Does run without the use of oldblivion. Even then the game runs too slow to be
any fun. While the minimum frame rate is higher than Doom 3, it is constant and just
unplayable unless you manage to not do any fighting.

Command and Conquer Renegade: The game plays fine in single player, but online where things get more busy it struggles. I had to lower most of the details to minimum and resolution to 640x480 to get an acceptable frame rate when lots of troops appear/fighting. Even then it would drop to high 10s, that for a competitive FPs game (from 2002...) just plain sucks. I was getting better framerates in this game with my 7500 mobility. I can still play the game, but it is demoralizing if you think about it.

O-R-B- Off-World Resource Base: At 800x600 the frame rate remains in the 20s and 30s with all details on. It feels good to see a space based RTS game play on this computer. The game is a few years old, but it looks great on this small screen and it is a good game.

Space Rangers 2: Another space based game that runs fine. Unfortunately I didn't have the time to try the land battles yet (they have seperate graphic options), but I haven't seen
anything to make me believe the game will have a problem. The space based part is very
smooth with all details on.

Alpha Prime, with a lot of tweaking at the lowest settings available, the game plays ok, but
during firefights the frame rate from 30s-40s goes down to 10s, that is with a couple of
enemy on sight...In terms of performance, it can be played, but it won't be pretty,
performance or looks wise. There is a graphical glitch and some interactive panels and a
small rectangle in your HUD appear in white bright light, almost like the texture can't be
loaded. I might be able to fix it, but the performance is too low to want to invest any
time in the game, so I won't even try.

Command and Conquer (The First Decade). As expected, no problems with it. I haven't tried the other old RTs games of the series, but I expect they will run just as well.

Over the next days I will try more games and I will post the results here.


You can't touch this!

Multitasking with HD video...
While playing a SD music video (external drive A), had anti virus and firewall online, Opera
browser open with a couple of tabs and uncompressing a 8.5 GB rar file on external drive B, the CPU utilization reaches an average of 39% with variations to the low 30% and low 50s. 43 processes in total in the background with another 498MBs available memory. Not bad. Trying to play a Hd video file, while continuing with the previous processes, apart from the music video. CPU reaches 97% top, average 91%, very chippy visuals, good audio. All the above using mplayer classic with latest klite codecs. Using VLC doesn't help at all, perhaps even worse. With WMP11 it actualy resembles a movie although the sound is even worse. Turning off Opera it is still choppy with visuals playing at lower speed than audio.
It doesn't look like a codec issue with the player but simply performance issue.
Tried the same file after copying it on the desktop and not running much else, no worthwhile changes.
Tried a different, much smaller HD file, but at higher resolution (1080p instead of almost
720), same results only slightly worse. Unless I have problems with both codecs, it doesn't seem likely that this netbook can play HD files without issues. Perhaps with the right codec it might, but I have nothing else to try. I might try to change the encoding if
possible and try again. I do wonder though, if I could connect it to a monitor that could
display HD content (I don't have a VGA cable), would that take some load off the netbook or are the resources used for scaling the video negligible? I suspect if I could somehow gain another 20% performance it should be able to handle 720p video.

There is one beacon of hope. Currently installing a game through stardock central, while using Opera with 3 tabs and playing with MPC a 120MB file (external USB HDD). The file has the following specs
Video: DivX 5 1200x544 25.00fps 5083Kbps [Main 0]
Audio: Dolby AC3 48000Hz stereo 448Kbps [Audio 1]
If you want to consider this HD video, then be happy because it plays without a single problem. It looks great, it sounds great and CPU utilization while doing all the above and playing the file never reaches over 81%.
I will try to find/encode some other HD files and post my results.


Major issues
I don't consider lack of performance to be a major issue since this netbook is not supposed to be a desktop replacement. Bad performance with games was expected and HD video is perhaps not a lost cause yet. The is one major issue for me. The temperature of the CPU increases alot when under heavy load, for example gaming or multitasking. High 80s C with the top so far 91C while "playing" Doom 3. If both the system and the CPU can handle it, then it isn't a problem, but it does make me feel uneasy about it.

Give me some Juice!
Battery life with the 3 cell battery is less than stellar, but not very bad. Downloading/installing games over stardock central, playing (loop) a video file of SD and having Opera on for 20 min (during which time the CPU utlization reached 97%...I suspect an issue with Opera and this installation), the total battery life time was one hour and 40 min. Screen brightness at the automatic reduced level, CPU running downclocked at 1.3 Ghz. Firewall and antivirus running in the background.
For simple text editing or similar tasks, it could reach 2.5 hours. If you need more, you will need to get a 6 cell battery when they are out.

Conclusion
If you are looking for a second or third pc/laptop or a back up system just in case, this notebook is superb. Small, light and all things considered, good performer. At 399 euros it is not the cheapest out there, but for the specs it is good enough. If you paid 70-80 euros more you could get a 15.4" Intel Core Duo notebook with a X3100 and similar RAM and HDD. At nearly 2.5 times the weight and twice the size. If size doesn't matter to you, then to buy one such netbook is a waste of money. If you need a as small as possible laptop and don't plan on using it as your main/only PC, then this is a great purchase.

It is not a gaming laptop, you can play older 3D games on it, but don't expect much out of it. Not graphical demanding turn based strategy games and wargames are no problem with it. As are old RTS games. It is fine for emulating 80s systems too if that is your thing.

For office related tasks it is a good buy. If you plan on buying this for a teenager that likes computer games, don't, unless he/she already has a gaming console and wants to play some light old games on the PC among doing other things like, homework.

Final Grade: 4/5

Photos to follow.

[kris23]

those temps are scary..... so theyre actually safe?

[BlueMak]

More to follow in a couple of min.

[BlueMak]

The TV is a 32" LCD TV. The white box next to it is a Wii. The DVD movie case is slightly thinner than a normal DVD movie case.

[BlueMak]

Kris, I don't know, I hope so...The temperature of the netbook from the outside remains cool to slightly warm near the spacebar, but nothing bad. The bottom side of the netbook is even cooler by a few degrees. I hope that either the readings are wrong or that the hardware inside can handle it. I read somewhere from someone who read somewhere...that the Atom can handle up to 125C...take that as you wish.

BTW, the photos were taken with my mobile phone so, I know they are not the best quality ever, but I did my best with the equipment I have.

[kris23]

what if you stuck an SSD in there?

[BlueMak]

Originally Posted by kris23

what if you stuck an SSD in there?

I guess you are thinking of the temperatures? If yes, then I don't see how that will change much if at all the CPU temps. I believe the HDD is not that close to the CPU. Perhaps the northbridge is closer to the CPU, but I don't know for sure. This is my personal system and I can't afford to open it just for curiosity.

If not, then I don't see why you couldn't stick an SSD in it, though I don't know why you would want to. The consumption is about the same IIRC, the writing speed is much slower, there is a limit to how many times you can write on it, it has smaller capacity and higher cost.

[kris23]

but the read speeds and latencies are what make an SSD worth it! and most people dont multiitask on a system like that.....

anyways.... thats a nice system but what will you use it for?

[BlueMak]

Originally Posted by kris23

but the read speeds and latencies are what make an SSD worth it! and most people dont multiitask on a system like that.....

anyways.... thats a nice system but what will you use it for?

Crysis, what else?

I will use it as my main PC and back up PC, also university PC and travel wherever needed for work PC.
If I manage to get a desktop PC soon then it won't be used as a main PC, but still for all the rest.

I plan on the next 2-3 days to test about 50 games on it and see how it goes as gaming system.

[kris23]

something that size can almost fit in a pocket.......

gaming on a system like that would probably be done with stuff like Metal SLug on an emulator or something.... just sounds right

[BlueMak]

Yeah, the size is both a blessing and a curse. I finaly have very good eyesight for the first time in my life and it still hard to get used to the size. How I will manage to go from my 24" to this 10.2 will be something interesting. Videos are fine on this size, I am sure the very nice monitor in question is part of this, but doing other things like playing 3D games...ouch. Time will tell.

I don't regret buying this system, but don't even think that it can be your only PC if you use a computer for more than an hour each day. It can't.

[kris23]

does it got a VGA out?

[BlueMak]

Originally Posted by kris23

does it got a VGA out?

Yes, one. Right side, 3/4 of the way towards the far side.

[kris23]

that things pretty full featured for its size... but i see no disk drive..... though that wouldve been impossible....

[BlueMak]

There is no room for any FDD or optical drive. I bought an external LG slim USB powered DVDRW drive, black and white colour about 380gr in weight. Together with usb sticks, they are enough for me. I don't think I have needed to use a floppy drive in several years.

[BlueMak]

A small update.
I forgot to mention something about the keyboard. The letters, the numbers and the ; ' [ - = keys are full size. Everything else, is not. The arrow keys are much slimmer than normal ones and you could have a problem if you have large (ish) fingers.

I tried a couple more games.

Galactic Civilization 2.
The minimum requirements to run the game is a resolution of 1024x768. The driver support this and you can use the mouse to scroll the screen up and down. By setting the in game video options to low you can play the game if you don't mind either scrolling a lot or zooming out and playing mostly with the map and use shortcuts or any combination. When you are zoomed in enough to be able to see 3D graphics of the items (ships, planets etc) then the game slows down when scrolling etc. When you scroll the screen there is some flashing near the borders of the game and some small slow down/jerkiness of movement. Again, if you zoom out enough where you don't have to scroll the map that much then you should be able to play the game without any problems. This on a small map with 5 opponents. I don't know yet about larger maps and more opponents.


Xpand Rally.
With all details to minimum, in game anisotropic filtering (I find it the best for performance) and lowest view distance (which affects more the long distace view of the scenery than the road ahead), I get min fps of 9, average of ~18 and max (for more than a split second) of 28. The low frame rates are usualy in tight corners where the max fps is in long straight lines or corners where there no much scenery near you or when mountains block the view. Basicaly where ever there is view of the horizon = low frame rate. It's playable if you are willing to accept the low frame rate. What helps is that it is a rally like game so you don't have other cars with you.

Trackmania Nations Forever.
All settings at minimum at 640x480 resolution and 2x AF. Single player only, the game is playable with frame rate from (rare) low 10s and (usual) mid to high 10s, to top of 30s. Average about 17. Playable but not sure how it will be against other oppoenents, my guess is, not good.

[Partizan]

BlueMak. Do you have any experience in disassembling notebooks?

If you have, you could try and replace the thermal grease with Arctic Silver 5 or MX-2 compound (It will probably void your warranty). I gained 8 degrees celsius

Also, you can try undervolting your CPU with Rightmark CPU clock utility (don't know if the Atom CPU is supported though). With that little program I gained another 5 degrees on my laptop.

[BlueMak]

Thank you but I will leave it as it is.

I have a question though, I checked the bios and has an option for pci latency timer which is set at 32 pci bus clocks. If i try to change it i get different options up to 248, but i have no idea what they would do or what is the best etc.

[DJ BIG T]

congrats on the laptop!!! its so little and has all those feathers i like it..

[BlueMak]

Thank you. I have tried more games and more or less the results are nothing new. What is a bit surprising is that it can run Company of Heroes (with all the patches) with an average of 10fps (min ~3 top of ~30). It still feels too slow though. I will post the results from this and other games later. Trying to find nocd patches since I don't feel like always connecting the external dvdrom drive.

[BlueMak]

Oops, sorry for the delay. I forgot it.

First of all about HD videos, since I don't have a HD optical drive I tried some downloaded 720p and 1080p videos from Microsoft's site.

1080p videos play, but at least with my players, they are unwatchable. Too much skipping and just useless.

720p videos play without a problem and look great.
Impressive that this little machine can run 720p video files without a problem.


About more games.

Star Trek Birth of the Federation: No problems, great game for this system.

Command and Conquer games pre Generals: Feel the same as on my desktop PC, no problems.
Generals and Zero Hour, very slow but still playable with 1 on 1 maps. I wouldn't try it online though.

Company of Heroes, benchmark might say otherwise, but the game is very slow to play and the scrolling of the map is painful to watch.

Fallout 2: Plays great with the 1.02e UK patch. Started a new character to play over the next weeks.

Post Mortem: Very smooth and enjoyable.

Rally Championship Xtreme: I am having some Windows problems with it, but in terms of performance, it was built for this netbook.

Shattered Union, plays fine, though I am not sure I want to play it, full of bugs.

Syberia 2, as expected plays great.

The Myster of the Mammy, same as above.

Far Cry, with lowest settings while in the first "level" inside the caves, the frame rate reaches very high numbers. As soon as you get outside though it plummets. I didn't use FRAPS, but I would say the frame rate goes between 4-20, mostly around 10. It doesn't help that the ground the sea and the sky are all the same cyan colour...
Unplayable.

POD: I am sure the game will play fine, as soon as I remember how to make it run under XP.

I am a bit busy since I am trying to get ready for my move to the UK on the 17th, but I will try a few more games till then.

So far it looks like anything pre 2002 will play from amazingly good to just ok. After 2002, it depends on the game.