Gigabyte BRIX Gaming UHD (2016)

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Findecanor

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The Gigabyte BRIX Gaming UHD mini-PC barebone is now listed on vendors' sites for preorder and there is more info.
At 2.66 litres, I think it must be the smallest machine with a discrete GPU.

Size: 110×110 base. 220 mm height. (2.66l)
CPU: i7-6700HQ 2.6 (3.5 GHz)
GPU: NVidia GeForce GTX 950 with 4GB GDDR5.
Memory: 2×SO-DIMM DDR4 slots, 2133 Mhz max
Net: Gigabit Ethernet, Intel 8260 Wifi+BT card in M.2 PCIe slot.
Storage: 2×2.5" SATA, 1×M.2 PCIe only, 1×M.2 PCIe or SATA.
1×HDMI, 3×mini-DP, 3×USB 3.0, 1×USB 3.0 Type A, 1×USB 3.0 Type C, headphone, mic,

There is a i5 model also, but it does not appear to be available everywhere (and it is less interesting ;) )

Gigabyte has a tear-down and installation tutorial

KitGuru has a review.

Airflow is vertical, from a single 80mm fan in the bottom and outlet at the top.
The motherboard is on the diagonal with CPU and heat sink on one side and with RAM and M.2 slots on the other.
The GPU appears to be in MXM format on a daughterboard with the video ports out and with tiny proprietary cables to the motherboard.
Both the CPU and GPU carry heat sinks with triangular cross-sections. M.2 drives seem to get airflow but I am afraid that 2.5" drives could get starved.

According to KitGuru's review, the 80mm fan runs fast even in idle making it heard in idle and loud under load but the thermal performance seems to be quite good both for CPU and GPU.
The GPU is unfortunately only last generation GeForce, a (relatively) slow GTX 950 but with 4GB memory.
The power is provided by a single power brick.

The nearest competitors would be ZBOX'es from Zotac, at around the same prices, but those don't seem to be as expandable and don't have GPUs in MXM format. The Zotac ZBOX Magnus EN980 is also twice as large because of its use of water-cooling. Zotac has announced models with GTX1060 and GTX1070.
According to Gigabyte reps the MXM format comes with a considerable price increase compared to cards on PCIe slots.

Anyway, I thought it would be interesting to some here where we have discussed alternative motherboard layouts for SFF PCs. I was interested in maybe buying one myself but I would like the GPU to be the latest generation and the machine to be more quiet -- and I would not mind it being a little larger in size.
 
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What an interesting little computer! I didn't see anything about upgrade-ability of the CPU or GPU. I was very surprised that there were so many places for storage. When I saw it, I thought it probably only used m.2 drives, but it can take 2 x 2.5 inch SATA drives in addition to the 2 M.2 PCIe drives! I wonder why they seemed to be focusing on the M.2 SATA drives in the video and in the review? In the video, the guy seemed excited that you could RAID the M.2 drive with your 2.5 inch SATA drives, and just glossed over the fact that you can use PCIe drives! I think that Gigabyte has made a pretty amazing little machine, but it is sad that so much power had to be sacrificed. It really does seem to be more like a laptop than a desktop, but it just doesn't come with a monitor, keyboard, and track pad built in.
 
broddy said:
At least it doesnt look too horrible like apple trash can.
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I loved that when it came out. It was so compact that I almost got my first MAC but then I saw the MSRP and walked away.

This one looks loads nicer. I'd love to see it with a gtx 1060.
 
I want to know if the gpu can be overclocked. I'd slap some of the grey noctua 80mms in there and OC away.
 
Shame they opted to launch this with the GTX 950 which is an end of life GPU. The 1050ti is right around the corner, runs on the same 75W TDP and sits about midway between a 960 and 970.
 
I would much rather get an i5 model with a GTX 1070/1080 instead.

I would sell my whole system and my Dan A4 SFX to buy that Brix.
 
Ca11idus said:
I would much rather get an i5 model with a GTX 1070/1080 instead.

I would sell my whole system and my Dan A4 SFX to buy that Brix.
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There is the Zotac EN1070 if you want an i5 with a GTX 1070. It's clocked at 2.2 - 2.8 GHz only though. I feel like if Zotac wanted to, they could probably put in an i7-6700TE and try undervolting them.
 
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Gasp! If that system can hold such power why not the UHD? Zotac, I believe in you.
 
Ca11idus said:
Gasp! If that system can hold such power why not the UHD? Zotac, I believe in you.
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I am just annoyed at Zotac though as they could have easily used an i5 6500T instead which clocks at 2.5GHz and up to 3.1GHz.
 
Perfect example of a manufacturer taking the cheap way out. 6700T would have been my choice.
 
I feel that 6400T would bottleneck many games. Well, at least Zotac went back to their slim factor back from that big water cooling cube.
 
Bieberfever said:
Shame they opted to launch this with the GTX 950 which is an end of life GPU. The 1050ti is right around the corner, runs on the same 75W TDP and sits about midway between a 960 and 970.
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Yeah, I think NVidia is crazy to release the high-performance GPUs before the low-performance GPUs in the same generation. Nobody wants a slower GPU when they know that a faster model at a comparable TDP / size / price point exists.

Neither the Gigabyte BRIX UHD or Zotac Magnus 1070 is out yet, but at least the BRIX has a lower list price.
 
Bieberfever said:
Perfect example of a manufacturer taking the cheap way out. 6700T would have been my choice.
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i7 6700TE for slightly better temps. It is silly considering the fact that even the Alienware Alpha r2 sports the i7 6700T, but in Zotac's defense the Alpha only has the outdated GTX 960. To be honest, I don't know if Zotac can actually cram a mobile GTX 1070 in that 2.6L box form factor.
 
KazeoHin said:
Am I the ONLY one who is going to point out that a product called "GAMING UHD" comes equipped with a GTX 950?

Does anyone else see an issue there?
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Yeah a GTX 950 is not much of a gaming GPU in my mind. My idea of gaming may be different than others though.
 
KazeoHin said:
Am I the ONLY one who is going to point out that a product called "GAMING UHD" comes equipped with a GTX 950?

Does anyone else see an issue there?
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Agreed. I think the absolute base for something called GAMING anything should be a GTX 960. I love what they are trying to do with the form factor, but I think they sacrificed too much to make it so small. I think it looks like a great little computer that you could even squeak a little light gaming out of, but it is not a GAMING computer.

Again, I love the layout of the computer and I hope we see more like it, but with options for upgrading the components, and even centering it around a larger (more quiet) fan.
 
It's a shame when anything comes out with Maxwell hardware today (laptops included). Pascal or bust especially when you are doing a TDP-limited application. Not that I'm saying Maxwell was bad, but when you can get "full fat" Pascal in mobile form factors why the hell would you even want Maxwell anymore :)

I think the concept is cool though and being quad-core helps a lot for my patience level with these types of devices.
 
Well, the biggest thing is that the product is coming out soon. I'm sure that after the first run they will get it right and update the gpus to the Pascal variety. That should help a little with the price if the market is a little more saturated with Pascal mobile gpus.
 
Zotac EN1070 is just $1199, but does not include storage, ram, and OS. The i5-6400T makes it a tough sale for me. They dropped the ball and should have went with the i7-6700T.
 
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AnandTech has a review of a pre-equipped Gigabyte BRIX machine. It comes with a small cheap SSD, a HD and only one RAM stick.
They wrote that that the GPU is only on eight PCIe lanes, not fully 16.

The cooling design is the best that they have found among all mini-PCs that they have tested.

CknSalad said:
Zotac EN1070 is just $1199, but does not include storage, ram, and OS. The i5-6400T makes it a tough sale for me. They dropped the ball and should have went with the i7-6700T.
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For gaming, a quad-core i7 with hyperthreading does not have any significant performance gains over a quad-core i5. Gigabyte has BRIX Gaming UHD with either i7 or i5 but opted to sell only the i7 model in many markets.
 
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Findecanor said:
AnandTech has a review of a pre-equipped Gigabyte BRIX machine. It comes with a small cheap SSD, a HD and only one RAM stick.
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No surprise, there. The box uses laptop components and they're using the same techniques as laptop manufactures to reduce cost while keeping "good enough" performance. Not really befitting of a gaming device, though.

They wrote that that the GPU is only on eight PCIe lanes, not fully 16.
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Hasn't it been proven that just 4 lanes are enough for even high-end GPUs like the GTX 1080?
 
Brian_R170 said:
Hasn't it been proven that just 4 lanes are enough for even high-end GPUs like the GTX 1080?
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There have been tests comparing Thunderbolt (PCIe×4) to PCIe×16 that have shown fewer lanes to be a bottleneck in some games but carry only a small drop in frame rate in others.
 
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