Sapphire Pure Fusion Mini E350 Review

Benchmark Results:

The E350 performed very well overall for an economy-line of boards, but Futuremark politely reminded me that it is not a performance rig, reflected in the Performance test set results. The 1.6GHz processor performed much better than other “green” chips of its speed, however.

The E350 performed very well for an integrated system, but gaming enthusiasts will want to add their own video card in order to maximize their settings.

Video Playback:

I ran several different types of video files through the Zacate, but I wasn’t able to make it stutter or slip. Whether running full screen videos from Hulu or YouTube, it performed like a champ. I ran mp4 and mkvs through both Windows Media Player 11 and Media Player Classic, and FRAPS showed a constant 60 FPS on Windows Media Player and a solid 24 on Media Player Classic. It didn’t matter if it was a 23-minute TV episode or an 8-GB BluRay rip, the video played perfectly.

However, it’s worth noting that not all was perfect on the video front. I tried to hook up the HDMI port to my Vizio VO47L, but I could not get a proper video image to display while in Windows 7. Every time it tried to output to the TV using Windows drivers, the image was corrupt (usually green over-saturated) or constantly flashed the screen as if trying to find a negotiable refresh rate. I tried every available refresh rate and resolution combination, but the best I could get was a green-tinted and vertically stretched photograph of my desktop. Twice during my adjustments, my TV actually hard-locked, forcing me to unplug it before it would respond to input again. However, the image was perfectly fine as it went through the startup screens, even the Windows loading screen – it only bombed out when it loaded the desktop drivers. I tried the included set on the CD, the built-in Windows set, as well as a generic Radeon driver set from ATI’s website.  I wasn’t able to work with Sapphire to resolve the problem, so I don’t know whether there is another driver or setting I was missing, or whether my test board had an issue. I found a few other reports on the web of HDMI issues, but nothing quite as extreme as mine. Hopefully this issue (if it isn’t a manufacturing defect) will be resolved by a driver update going forward.

Video Game Performance:

I wasn’t able to get hard-and-fast test demo benchmarks run on a wide selection of games, but with FRAPS counting frames the anecdotal spread I had access to frankly surprised me. The original Portal, while a Direct-X 9 game, trounced my older system, reminding me just how old it is. The Mini E350 slaughtered it at a steady 60FPS at the default settings, and only dropped to about 30-35 when I bumped them all to the maximum. While there was some minor clipping of the walls when I spun around as fast as I could, I think that could be fixed with some tweaking of the graphics settings.

Starcraft 2 pulled about 35 FPS at the default settings, even with medium-sized armies crowding the screen. Dropping the graphics settings to the minimum jumped the frame-rate up to over 60, while maximizing them pulled it back down to a struggling 20 or less. However, at a happy medium, it was a very enjoyable experience and I didn’t feel like I was missing much. True gaming enthusiasts will want to add their own video card, but Sapphire planned for that and provided a PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slot for just such an audience.

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