A Closer Look - Inside

Simply unscrew the four little feet and pull the underside off to gain access to its interior. This will reveal the SSD and the memory inside the system.


In our review sample, Zotac used Samsung memory with 2GB capacity and 1333 MHz CL9 setting. The mSATA SSD is supplied by Kingston and offers 255MB/s read and 170MB/s write speeds. The IOPS on the drive ranges from 11.000 to 30.000. This makes the drive faster than any normal hard drive on the market, which is something one should clearly notice while using the ZBOX nano.


The tiny PCB is covered by a fairly large cooling-assembly made of a notebook-style cooler and a full copper-block. The underside of the PCB does not hold a lot of surprises once the memory and the SSD are removed.


You may detach the cooler by simply removing the screws holding it in place. A secondary PCB, enabling the front I/O functionality, connects to the large PCB via a proprietary connector.

Major ICs

The heart of the ZBOX nano is an AMD E-450 dual-core CPU running at 1.65 GHz. The AMD M1 chipset enables all additional functionality and holds the embedded Radeon HD 6320 GPU.


A Winbond chip holds the BIOS for the ZBOX nano, while an ITE IT8772E chip is utilized for sensory control. The BIOS is, unfortunately, not of the UEFI kind.


ZOTAC is using the NEC D720202 chip to offer USB 3.0 functionality - something you will see on the majority of boards requiring an external IC for the new interface standard. The Realtek ALC892 delivers the 8-channel audio Zotac advertises with the nano.


A Richtek RT8206B is used to supply ample power to the two yellow USB plugs, which allows you to properly charge devices like tablets. The Realtek RTL8111E delivers gigabit Ethernet connectivity.


Last but not least, there is an OZ8380LN chip. I, to be honest, have no idea what this one is for.