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KitGuru isn't a Fusion Platform virgin, we know the baseline to expect from our previous reviews. The Asus E35M1-I Deluxe takes this baseline and kicks it into touch. From the moment we opened the box we knew we had something very special in our hands.
The Asus E35M1-I Deluxe has the best bios of any of these boards, offering not only mouse support and dedicated fan controls, but an advanced section with a plethora of overclocking options to ensure you get the most from the capable Zacate E350. We even scaled DDR3 memory to 1600mhz, well above AMD's official platform specifications.
We managed to achieve a 20% overclock with AMD's low power workhorse and this translated into real world, noticeable gains in all our testing when compared against the reference speeds. Video encoding times were reduced by 6 minutes and even Cinema4D received a little performance related kick in the pants.
The Atom D525 doesn't even come close to the Zacate E350 with a 200mhz clock advantage, and when clocks are equal the differences are even more apparent. Simply put, the AMD E350 Fusion system outperforms Atom by up to 20% – despite the fact that it's clocked 200MHz slower.
The Asus custom cooling solution is absolutely brilliant, using such a large heatsink means that the little cooling fan can be removed for a completely silent media experience. Even when overclocked the Asus E35M1-I ran cooler than the reference AMD board at default speeds.
Lets not forget the Armor A30 chassis. It made a perfect partner for the Asus E35 M1-I motherboard, helping to ensure that the heatsink received a fair amount of airflow. The case generates very little noise and has a fantastic cooling methodology. A single 90mm fan pulls in cool air from the front, over the hard drives, and is forced out the back, with ambient, rising heat being sucked out of the top of the chassis. It is a classic cooling methodology that has been proven to work over the years and with Thermaltake's excellent choice of quality fans, it can easily run 24/7 with only a whisper.
If you are in the market for a low cost high definition media centre, then this Asus and Thermaltake partnership would be our first choice. In the follow up to this article we are going to see if this system is capable of being used as a secondary gaming build, hooked up to a big television. Even though our previous reviews of Fusion technology have used lesser power supplies, our choice of 550W PSU means we can easily slot in a performance graphics card. Is it worth spending extra on a discrete graphics card? If so, which one?
KitGuru says: You do pay a premium for this Asus E35M1-I Deluxe motherboard, but in our opinion it is worth every penny. The Thermaltake Armor A30 is very well put together and offers great cooling proficiency while generating very little noise. Both products earn our highest award.
Cost of Asus/Thermaltake Media system:
- Asus E35M1-I Deluxe motherboard = £140
- Thermaltake Armor A30 case = £77 (Yoyotech)
- Corsair Dominator memory = £70 (Yoyotech)
- Samsung 2TB Hard Drive = £70 (Yoyotech)
- Thermaltake 550w = £50 (Yoyotech)
Total: £407 inc vat.
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Asus E35M1-I Deluxe Fusion Mainboard
AMD ‘Zacate' Fusion APU with Integrated Radeon HD6310 graphics
What a great looking case. much better than the element Q. looks like a robotic monster from the future with all the armor panels. awesome.
Asus, well not much to say about them, always brilliant. great review thanks for the fusion stuff.
christ, please stop reviewing this fusion kit, I just got married and can’t play with toys anymore 🙁 Unless i give the CC a bashing…. 🙂
Gotta hand it to asus, they never release anything in a half assed manner, no wonder they generate billions each year.
That thermaltake case doesnt appeal to me on a looks basis, but its a nice design inside.
Frigin awesome boards, the pricing of this one is much higher than the others, but it looks to be worth it. thankfully they didnt use laptop memoery slots. that was dumb.
I wouldnt mind one of these to have in my bedroom for streaming to the TV. would like a remote for it though. like a gyro unit. I hate those windows media remotes, useless.
I think these products arent gettign enough coverage, AMDs fusion will be brilliant in a laptop.
I am looking forward to the quad core products in a few months.
The power consumption tempts me, I know my media center must be sucking at least twice that at idle, probably three times. Might pick one up next month, whenever I can find the bits to buy!
low power is the future. the cost of living now is rising all the time. less = more.
I am ordering one of these when its available.
Its well worth 140 quid, compared to the others at 100.
Zardon , all these fusion reviews are friggin pointless man, you can’t buy fusion products anywhere.
AMD release this in January and over a month later still no products in European retail? They are beyond useless.
Not a single fusion board for sale in the UK, waste of everyones time
So I price up a system and realise this motherboard actually isn’t for sale anywhere.
So I look for other fusion boards, and nadda. What’s up with AMD stock?
Thanks for the review. Nice background to the graphs.
Not one to be found in the USA either. Someone on Ebay has them for $263 USD shipped from Hong Kong. It takes weeks to get here and what a rip off. Come Asus get those motherboards shipped. They have MSI and Gigabyte here but they aren’t as good as the Asus model and require fans.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131698&cm_re=zacate-_-13-131-698-_-Product 😀 In stock!
Hi, Great review! I have a question regarding the used Corsair Dominator DDR3 memory. I was searching for it and found modules with different specs. Can you specify the partnumber or details? Another question is, because the Fusion is single channel, is it the ok to place one memory module? Thanks in advance!
Hello, thanks for the comments. I unfortunately can’t check the partnumber right now, as this system is with a colleague in another part of the world. I will try and find out, but any Corsair DDR3 Dominator will work fine with this board. It will just ‘downclock’. Obviously you don’t need to use this particular memory, as every DDR3 stick we have tried has worked fine in Fusion boards.
Single channel, and one memory module is perfectly fine yes, works great.
Hi Zardon, thanks for you quick reply. I really would appreciate it if you can sort out the partnumber or details. Once I’ve got really messed up with incompatible memory and I want it to do now the right way (incl. memory that can take the heat from overclocking;-)