Pros: Was in the market to replace my aging Asrock Ion 330ht. Despite playing HD cable perfectly via HDHomerun and Media Center, it was no longer able to deliver a smooth HD stream on Netflix, and A mazon and HBO Go were also jumpy. On a 720p plasma I am getting 60fps in WoW and Diablo 3 using med to high settings. The 8850m is no slouch and is comparable to a Nvidia 860m. As the title suggests, I am primarily using this beast as a cable box replacement, connecting to an HDHomeRun Prime on the network. Have yet to test the 3d capabilities due to owning an older tv, but I can attest to the fine standard Blu-ray playback. If not for the Plasma's power bill, this thing could become my primary PC. The HT version of Asrock's Vision HTPC's, as well as their Beebox line, will do many of these things as well. But you'll sacrifice in having great Blu-ray support and/or gaming capability.

Cons: Availability has been an issue with this model from day one, which wouldn't have been too bad if it wasn't the only one with a Blu-ray drive (finding a replacement on the other models seems to be a hassle due to eject button placement). I wanted to upgrade my old Ion platform last year when it came out, but kept missing the two or three times it was available here. I was lucky to find it "used" off of A mazon last month (Everything was sealed like new, I guess the first owner didn't realize they had to supply an OS). Looks like Asrock has been more interested in keeping their Beebox line in stock than their line of heavy hitting HTPC's. The only area I can think of where they cut corners on the device itself is deciding to go with 1GB of DDR5 on the 8850m as opposed to the standard 2 that everyone else seems to use. Luckily that hasn't impacted me yet, but I've yet to try anything other than WoW and Diablo 3 so far. Still wish MXM cards were easily interchangeable, but that's a complaint against the industry at large. Also, seeing as everything inside of the case is laptop guts, it would have been nice for the machine to utilize the lower powered Intel GPU for less intensive tasks (video streaming) instead of the AMD doing everything, like how most gaming laptops work. Overall just a minus 1 for the poor availability. Everything else is nitpicking.

Other Thoughts: Originally put Windows 10 along with the sideload of Media Center, but ended up installing 7 because of finicky IR controller support in Windows 8-10. Far more easy to swap in hardware upgrades than on the Ion 330ht. Upgraded ram to 16GB, swapped in a better ranged Intel wireless adapter and replaced 5400 rpm HDD with a faster HGST Travelstar. I plan to next replace the generic msata SSD with one from Samsung. I very much hope this isn't a last hurrah for the Vision X line from Asrock, who saw a 4th gen Intel refresh instead of a 5th gen update. But coupled with the market shift away from physical media and Microsoft's complete abandonment of Media Center, the future looks bleak indeed.