Sound Tests - Subjective Listening
The 8-channel Realtek ALC880 CODEC is on
par with our previous experiences with the same chip. While it
will pale in comparison to the high end Audigy cards, we found
the CODEC acceptable for DVD and gameplay. Compared to non-HD
enabled Realtek chips, we did find the overall sound quality a
bit stronger.
Sound Tests - Performance in Gaming
We fired up UT2003 and ran through the Inferno demo and collected
numbers at 640x480 (Min detail) and 1280x1024 (Max detail).
At the lowest resolution, we see the CPU take the
hardest hit, losing over 23 frames per second with the onboard
sound enabled. A loss of just over 1 frame occurs at 1280x1024,
which isn't too bad at all and in line with our experiences with
the Realtek CODEC.
Overclocking, Noise and Heat
Like we covered in the BIOS section of the review,
you won't find any results here.
The mPC 945 is surprisingly quiet considering the
closed quarters and 3.6GHz CPU. When the fan spins up, it does
get loud, but compared to the Soltek QBic, it's much quieter since
it does not have the side fan as the QBic. The temperatures are
also lower than the QBic, which at times cracked 70°C. the
mPC 945 kept under 60°C most of the time, and the only time
it hit 62°C was when it maintained 100% CPU usage for more
than 3 minutes sustained.
Final Words
The MSI mPC 915 was a solid SFF and a nice return
into the market by MSI. The mPC 945 doesn't change the formula
too much, but you do get a more modern chipset and some nice features
that really are required by the majority of enthusiasts, though
at the same time, there are a few items missing.
First the good. The mPC 945 adds support for 8xx
series of Intel Dual Core CPUs. Newer chips are on the market
now of course, but if you were an early adopter and want to hold
on to these CPUs, the mPC 945 would make a nice home and will
not be out of place either on your desk, between your TV and XBOX
360 or even as a LAN gaming PC.
HD Audio, and Gigabit LAN are welcome additions
and "modernizes" the mPC family. The WiFi connection
is an option and was offered as such with their previous mPC,
but needless to say, this does give the user more options about
the PC's placement should there be no hard wired Ethernet connection
near by. The mPC 945 is not terribly noisy and much quieter than
the majority of full desktop PCs. Temperatures are kept in check,
and most of the time, stays under 60°C. Stability was never
in question, and performance was quite good at stock speed, slightly
faster than MSI's previous mPC 915. It still has to do a bit of
catch up to the Soltek, but we'll get into that shortly.
The main gripe some people will have with the mPC
is the fact that there are no overclocking options. Naturally,
for performance enthusiasts, this will be a show stopper, but
on the plus side, this keeps the system stable. Still, even with
the newer chipset, in most cases, the mPC 945 still lagged behind
the QBic by a small margin. We don't think this difference is
enough to really make an impact on real-world performance in non-benchmarking
scenarios, but it does take some of the fun out of tweaking a
computer. Another obvious downside that affects all SFFs is the
upgrade options will be slightly limited. We could not get a 7950GX2
to work, likely because of the 260W PSU. Intel's latest C2D chips
are also out of the question.
That said, we do think that anyone looking for a
classy computer that doesn't eat up a lot of desk space will be
very happy with the MSI mPC 945. Despite the lack of enthusiast
performance options, the box is still very fast, and looks pretty
sharp as well. For LAN gamers, it's easy to carry and armed with
Gigabit networking, lag should not be an issue with it. There
are some obvious limitations in the upgrade path, but the mPC
945 is modern enough to handle most mainstream needs.
If
you have any comments, be sure to hit us up in our forums.
HOME
