ASRock Core 100HT Nettop Review

Core 100HT Nettop Overview
The Core 100HT is extremely small.  It is very surprising that they can fit everything in such a small package.  It is definitely smaller than any HTPC case I’ve seen whether it be ATX or mATX.  The actual dimensions of the Core 100HT are 195mm(W) x 70mm(H) x 186mm(L) which makes it the exact same size at the ION 330HT we previously reviewed.  To give you an idea here is a picture of the ION 300HT beside an Xbox 360 Elite system.

ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop

Looking at the front of the Core 100HT you have your optical drive, which is a SuperMulti drive.  ASRock does offer a version of this nettop with a Blu-ray drive.  This is the Core 100HT-BD.  Along the bottom you have 2 USB 3.0 connections, audio connections and a power button.  USB 3.0 is something new ASRock has added to these new Core series nettops.

ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop

Moving around back is where you have the rest of the connections and there sure are a lot!  Starting left to right you have AC power, S/PDIF, 5 audio jacks, Gigabit Ethernet, 6 USB 2.0 ports, eSATA port, HDMI out, VGA out.  Also on the back is a small fan that will keep the system cool.

ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop

Getting into the system is pretty easy; just remove 2 screws and the top of the Core 100HT slides off.  Once inside you can see that everything is pretty cramped inside.  You can actually remove the cage that holds the hard drive and optical drive.  To do that you just remove 2 more screws and slide it out.  Once it is out we can take a look at the hard drive.  ASRock uses a 2.5-inch 500GB Seagate drive.

ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop

Looking at the rest of the system you can see there is a cooling system on our Core i3-330M processor.  It is a small fan / heatsink.  It really is not loud at all, but will keep your processor cool.  The 4GB of DDR3 memory is supplied by ASint, which by the name we assume is owned by ASRock.

ASRock Core 100HT Nettop ASRock Core 100HT Nettop

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