What’s this? An eMachines nettop with a bargain-basement price tag, a mobile AMD processor, and Nvidia integrated graphics? As unlikely as that combination might sound, it now exists. Say hello to the Mini-e ER1402:
This is hardly the first AMD-based nettop around, mind you, but it might be the first nettop to include the Athlon II Neo K125, a 1.7GHz single-core processor based on 45-nm process technology. (AMD released that CPU as part of its Nile mobile platform less than two months ago.) The K125 should be at least a little bit quicker than an Atom, and with a 12W power envelope, it should still play nicely with the ER1402’s 7.1" x 1.2" x 7.1" enclosure.
On the graphics front, eMachines says the ER1402 has GeForce 9200 integrated graphics—a product we couldn’t find anywhere on Nvidia’s website. The latest AMD-compatible chipset Nvidia lists is the GeForce 8300. Frankly, I can’t fathom why eMachines would choose an obscure Nvidia chipset instead of AMD’s perfectly good RS880, which has DirectX 10.1 graphics and comes as part of the Nile platform to begin with. There can’t be much of a performance difference between the two.
eMachines also outfits the ER1402 with two gigs of RAM, a 160GB mobile hard drive, Wi-Fi, and Windows 7 Home Premium x64. The complete package will set you back $299.99—definitely not bad for a non-Atom-based nettop with competent graphics and HDMI output.