Zotac Magnus One brings huge power in little mini PC at CES 2021

By Brian Westover
published

Pure gaming power in a compact design

Zotac Magnus One
(Image credit: Zotac)

Want a tiny desktop PC that packs enough power for gaming, graphics work or anything else you want to throw at it? The Zotac Magnus One (ECM73070C) mini-PC was just announced at CES 2021, and it looks like it can do all that and more.

Zotac has been in the mini-PC business for years, but it's never put this kind of power into something so small before. With an 8.3-liter case that's significantly smaller than most small-form-factor cases, the Magnus One measures just 10.45 x 9.8 x 4.96 inches.

Zotac Magnus One

(Image credit: Zotac)

Zotac will be selling the tiny case on its own or with the power supply already installed, But if you want to buy a ready-made system, Zotac has crammed some enormous power into this little case.

Specs included with the Zotac announcement show a version of the Magnus One outfitted with a 10th-generation Intel Core i7-10700 processor, 16 GB of DDR4 memory, a compact Zotac Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 graphics card and a 1.5 terabyte combination of hard drive and solid-state storage.

Zotac Magnus One

(Image credit: Zotac)

Port selection is surprisingly generous, with one HDMI 1.4 port, one HDMI 2.1 port and up to three DisplayPort 1.4a outputs. USB ports are available in spades, with four USB 3.1 Gen 2 connections, three USB 3.0 Type-A ports and a single USB 3.0 Type-C. 

A 3-in-1 card reader handles SD, SDHC or SDXC microSD cards while an audio jack is there for headsets and speakers. And if you want to keep your tiny desktop machine uncluttered from extra cables, it's also equipped for Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.

Zotac Magnus One

(Image credit: Zotac)

Configuration options let you ramp up the internal memory to 64GB of RAM and storage is surprisingly flexible, with slots for Intel Optane memory, an m.2 SSD or a 2.5-inch HDD or SSD. 

Frankly, that's a lot more room to grow than I thought this tiny case would allow. It means that even if you buy a pre-built configuration, there's still an opportunity to upgrade it in the future.

Zotac has not announced pricing for the Magnus One or when it will be available.

Brian Westover
Brian Westover

Brian Westover is currently Lead Analyst, PCs and Hardware at PCMag. Until recently, however, he was Senior Editor at Tom's Guide, where he led the site's TV coverage for several years, reviewing scores of sets and writing about everything from 8K to HDR to HDMI 2.1. He also put his computing knowledge to good use by reviewing many PCs and Mac devices, and also led our router and home networking coverage. Prior to joining Tom's Guide, he wrote for TopTenReviews and PCMag.