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Sapphire EDGE HD3 Mini PC Review

CyberLink MediaEspresso 6 is the successor to CyberLink MediaShow Espresso 5.5. With its further optimized CPU/GPU-acceleration, MediaEspresso is an even faster way to convert not only your video but also your music and image files between a wide range of popular formats.

Now you can easily playback and display your favourite movies, songs and photos not just on your mobile phone, iPad, PSP, Xbox, or Youtube and Facebook channels but also on the newly launched iPhone 4. Compile, convert and enjoy images and songs on any of your computing devices and enhance your videos with CyberLink’s built-in TrueTheater Technology.

New and Improved Features

  • Ultra Fast Media Conversion – With support from the Intel Core i-Series processor family, ATI Stream & NVIDIA CUDA, MediaEspresso’s Batch-Conversion function enables multiple files to be transcoded simultaneously.
  • Smart Detect Technology – MediaEspresso 6 automatically detects the type of portable device connected to the PC and selects the best multimedia profile to begin the conversion without the need for user’s intervention.
  • Direct Sync to Portable Devices – Video, audio and image files can be transferred in a few easy steps to mobile phones including those from Acer, BlackBerry, HTC, Samsung, LG, Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, and Palm, as well as Sony Walkman and PSP devices.
  • Enhanced Video Quality – CyberLink TrueTheater Denoise and Lighting enables the enhancement of video quality through optical noise filters and automatic brightness adjustment.
  • Video, Music and Image File Conversion – Convert not only videos to popular formats such as AVI, MPEG, MKV, H.264/AVC, and FLV at the click of a button, but also images such as JPEG and PNG and music files like WMA, MP3 and M4A.
  • Online Sharing – Conversion to video formats used by popular social networking websites and a direct upload feature means posting videos to Facebook and YouTube has never been easier.

For our testing today we are converting a 3.3GB 720p MKV file (2h:12mins) to Apple Mp4 format for playback on a portable device. This is a common procedure for many people and will give a good indication of system power. We are using the newest version which has been optimised for Sandybridge processors.

Hardware acceleration is disabled.

The Sapphire EDGE HD3 takes an hour to complete the encoding task, or around double real time. The E350 system takes around 6 minutes longer, followed by the D525 system at 1 hour and 11 minutes. The AMD A8-3870K at reference clock speeds by comparison only takes 18 minutes to complete the same task. The ultra high end Core i7 3960K takes around 8 minutes for the same task.

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9 comments

  1. Its a lovely looking little computer, the price is competitive, but I dont think id be happy with a 5,400 rpm 2.5 inch drive, they are painful. my Lenovo laptop had one and I had to replace it as it was slowing everything down.

  2. I dont think the hard drive is that important, but I suppose it would depend on what you are using it for. I still have the first edge and I use it in a bedroom hooked into a television. with a remote controller. It has been flawless now for a long time. I might get this as an upgrade. I do think they should sell one with a 128GB SSD at extra cost, a lot of people would jump on it.

  3. when is this released, cant find it anywhere.

  4. wow this is some piece of kit. two USB 3 ports as well, very nice.

    the power drain alone is really worth it. I bought a power meter recently to measure my systems and my media pc takes around 200 watts !

  5. Shame they dont bundle one with an OS preinstalled, for a little extra. A lot of people aren’t comfortable with setting up a system and t hen the drivers etc.

  6. Ideal for a living room. my wife doesnt like a huge pc in the corner. and i have to deal with whinging regularly from her. I could hide this behind the tv.

    Only problem is, if she saw the credit card bill she would bitch too, so I cant win either way.

  7. It’s worth mentioning that free software exists out there to run this device as a dedicated HD media centre PC that avoids having to purchase a copy of windows. The free software “XMBC” can be easily installed from a USB drive and has a great interface for browsing and playing your media. It’s compatible with the Media Player remote controls out there and there are also apps to remote control it via your tablet PC.