Biostar iDEQ 200P Athlon64 SFF System

The small form factor PC (a.k.a. mini PC) market is in full swing now with new competitors and new products entering the market all the time. One company that must have had a past vision of this current boom in the fledgling SFF market is Biostar. Even though the company has only been in the market for about a year, Biostar has established itself as a leader and innovator. Biostar currently offers six different SFF systems in its iDEQ line. These systems are barebones offerings, including a stylish case and a motherboard. However, Biostar does not stop there. One of the more innovative features of the iDEQ line is its cooling system. Also, each iDEQ features pre-routed wires and cables in an effort to provide the consumer with a quick build.

As you have probably guessed, this review will cover one of the six current iDEQ systems offered by Biostar. Two other iDEQ systems have made their way into Bjorn3D reviewers' hands, and each was highly praised and awarded with our highest honor - the Bjorn3D Golden Bear Award. Naturally, this made me excited to get my hands on one and see what all the fuss was about. However, as it turns out, I was in store for not quite the same uplifting experience as my fellow reviewers had with the iDEQ 200T and the iDEQ 200N. The iDEQ 200P is one of Biostar's newest models in the iDEQ family, and it is the one we will be taking a look at today. It features support for AMD's Athlon 64 processor by way of NVIDIA's nForce3 150 chipset on Biostar's own K8BNP motherboard.

For a complete list of specs and features, please check out Biostar's iDEQ 200P web page. I've included most of the specs and features below.

Specifications

Features:

Each system in the iDEQ line provides the following features:

• Sliding front cover allows you to cover up any floppy or optical drive that does not match the color of the case

  Push down on the tab at the top to reveal drives

• Cables and wires are neatly routed and bundled to minimize their affect on airflow

  Cables neatly tucked away

  More cables neatly tucked away

• A unique cooling system to keep the CPU and other components as cool as possible (Check it out here)
• Abundance of connectivity options (see table above for list)

  Check it out! S/PDIF input on the front panel!

  The usual rear ports

• Removable 5.25" and 3.5" drive trays

  The 3.5" cage separates with one thumbscrew

In practice, most of these features actually were beneficial to my experience with the iDEQ 200P. For instance, the nice, clean wiring and cabling job made it easy to remove the primary IDE cable. I did this because the only hard drive in the system has a SATA interface, which meant the primary IDE cable was useless to me, especially since it is routed in such a way that it cannot be attached to an optical drive. That is fine, though, since the other IDE cable is routed to serve that purpose.

Being able to remove the drive trays certainly made installation of other components, as well as the drives, easier. Unfortunately placing the drive trays back into the case and attaching them was not nearly as easy as removing them, but that is at least somewhat expected since the iDEQ's case is so small.

Package Contents:

• iDEQ 200P barebones system
  • Biostar K8NBP motherboard
  • Black iDEQ SFF case
  • Pre-routed cables for floppy and IDE devices
• Drivers/Utilities CD
• User´s Manual
• Installation Guide
• Thermal grease
• Power cord
• Serial ATA cable (with right-angle connector for drive connection to help it fit in the case)
• Serial ATA power cable (4-pin Molex-to-SATA adapter)
• Package of screws

This is what you get in the box

After removing the 200P from its box and packaging, the first thing I noticed was the very nice black, brushed aluminum finish. It's definitely a nice touch and could make this stand out (even more than it already would) at a crowded LAN party. I hope that some of the pics above show this accurately.

Hardware Installation

I learned a hard lesson in SFF system building with this system! Planning ahead is crucial before starting the installation of hardware in a small system like the 200P. Obviously, one of the more appealing features of the 200P is its small footprint; however, this can also make installing hardware in it a much more stressful experience than it is with a mid-tower or larger system. Don't get me wrong. Expecting anything else but a little more need for planning (and stress, if planning is inadequate) would be unrealistic. Basically, it comes down to a series of trade-offs. For example, with this system, installing a video card would probably be easier with the drive trays removed; however, replacing the drive trays may be more difficult because of the video card. You would have a similar story if you reversed the order. It's a conundrum! The pictures below give you an idea of what you have to work with inside the iDEQ 200P's chassis.

I think most people look at a system like the 200P and see LAN party written all over it. Of course, this leads to wondering if the upper echelon of video cards can fit into such a small case. The largest boards around seem to be based on NVIDIA's GeForceFX 5950 Ultra GPU, so installing one of them would probably present the biggest challenge among video cards. If you're wondering whether it fits, check out the list of hardware I installed in this system:

• AMD Athlon 64 3200+
• Corsair TWINX1024-3200LLPRO
• Reference GeForce FX 5950 Ultra
• Hitachi Deskstar 7K250 120GB Serial ATA 7200RPM Hard Drive w/8MB Buffer
• Pioneer DVD-ROM
• Sony floppy drive

That's right. The two-slot-hogging 5950 fit into this SFF system; however, since it uses both of the only available slots, you cannot expect to be able to put a TV tuner or some other PCI card in there if you want to stick such a large video card in it. Also, please keep in mind that it did take quite a bit of work to get the board to fit. However, fitting any full-height AGP card in there is not exactly trivial. This may well be the most time-consuming effort in the installation process!

A key element in the iDEQ cooling system is the heatsink-and-fan unit for the CPU. It directs hot air from the CPU toward the back exhaust fan. That way both fans work in tandem to move that hot air out. I had no problem with installing the CPU and the cooling unit on it. I used Artic Silver 5 instead of the thermal grease supplied by Biostar.

A decent chunk of copper...

...a small fan...

...and a not-so-clean surface

And here's a few pictures of what the system looks like with some hardware in it:

You may be thinking that the video card in the second picture is not a 5959 Ultra, and you are right. It is a 5600 Ultra! I took these pictures before trying to fit the 5950 in the case.

Software Installation

After installing all the hardware, I decided to install 32-bit Windows XP Pro (and Service Pack 1). Installing Windows on a SATA hard drive is a bit more complicated than doing so on a PATA drive. I have done this many times on other systems without a problem; however, the iDEQ 200P posed a problem I had never dealt with before (or I was just lucky those other times!). As usual, I proceeded through the Windows installation and pressed F6 to install third-party drivers (for the SATA controller). All went well, and the installation continued normally until the first reboot. It rebooted and restarted the installation from the beginning! After re-trying the installation many times and some troubleshooting in the BIOS, I figured out that in order to make the installation work, I had to enable the SATA ROM in the BIOS (under Integrated Peripherals -> Onboard Devices -> Onboard SATA ROM). After that was done, the installation proceeded without another hitch! I hope that professing my ignorance here will help someone avoid the grief that I experienced! Please keep in mind that I have performed Windows XP installations on SATA drives on at least two other occasions (one of them being a similar nForce3 system) without a single problem. Unfortunately, Biostar had no help on this issue that I could find in any user's manual or BIOS manual or anywhere on their many websites.

I think I would be remiss if I didn't mention a small gripe that I have that will plague anyone who has to clear the CMOS on this system due to setting a BIOS option incorrectly or too aggressively. The CMOS jumper is in a difficult to reach location. I was able to barely squeeze my fingers into the case just right to get to it and put it in the clear position, but I risked dropping it when I did it. I guess that would not have been too big of a deal, since a tweezers would probably allow me to pick it up. A tweezers might have made it easier to deal with the jumper from the beginning, but I was stubborn and just used my fingers. A lot of people probably would not be that lucky, and they will have to actually remove drives and/or expansion boards to get to the jumper.