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"There have been similar designs in the past, but nothing with this kind of power."

Sorry, but smaller, equally powerful machines have been quite available for a while now. Notable examples include the SaintSong Latte P4 (specs here) and the Jadetec Micropc4 just to name Pentium4-capable solutions. In cases where a slower CPU will do, even smaller options are available, such as the SaintSong Cappuccino or Espresso systems (specs here and here).

The main unifying factor of all these systems is that all claim to be the world's smallest. Currently, the title of "World's Smallest Desktop Pentium4" claimed in the article title actually belongs to the Latte (above), which has a volume of about 1951 cm^3 (although the Micropc4 comes close at 1976 cm^3). The iWill ZPC in the article is comparatively huge, at over 2613 cm^3, although Shuttle's XPC systems are over 11000 cm^3, so the iWill is certainly a small system. However, while the iWill looks to have other interesting innovations as far as minimizing temperature and noise, it fails to beat the competition in both size and performance.

There is no sig.

I've got a Solarism LM1530, it's a pretty nice 15" LCD monitor and has a fast response LCD (16 ms instead of a more typical 30 ms) for under $300. You can get a 17" version as well, for under $400. It works well with my Shuttle SN41G2. I have the black Shuttle case, and it looks great with the black Solarism monitor.

The reason I mention it to you is that I read some article where someone was speculating about how it might be good for LAN parties, since the monitor stand basically folds up and you can carry it flat. I can't say I've brought my monitor to a LAN party, but it is quite easy to carry around when folded flat.

Check out the review on GamePC for more info. I haven't seen any others yet, since this monitor is fairly new (on the market about a month, I think...). Anyway, I thought it was a great deal, since it runs about $150 less than the Hitachi CML174, and about $250 less than the Planar PX171M, which are also 16 ms response time LCD monitors. The only down side for me is that the Solarism doesn't have DVI, but the picture is still awesome for analog.

You know, you could probably fit a whole Beowulf cluster of these inside my now-seemingly-cavernous Shuttle SN41G2 XPC case!

While these small computers are desirable due to their size, their price is more than I want to spend. On a good day, I can pickup a desktop for less or even a Shuttle XPC system. My Linux router may be 3x as large, but I got it free because a friend was upgrading. I'd like to have one of these just like I would to have a new G5, but I just don't have the money.

I did forget sound. Add in a SoundBlaster Live for $25. Firewire isn't much concern to me since I don't have anything that uses it; same with optical audio. The next board up from that Tyan has GigE (as well as dual 10/100 NICs). Again, I don't have any fibre (most home users don't) so that didn't seem important. That next board up also has onboard 160MB/sec SCSI. Would most home users of my hypothetical system which had that capability find any more use out of super fast SCSI than gigbit ethernet? Would they consider the Apple's "lack" of dual 10/100 NICs a deal breaker? I doubt it. Most people only need one NIC, Apple or PC.

You can't copmpare Apples to PCs straight across. If you need GigE, then that's what makes the decision for you: buy the Apple. Or get a GigE PCI card for a PC and call it even (just make sure that your PC has a 66MHz PCI slot).

Perhaps more importantly, that system would be about half the speed of the mac to which you're comparing it.

I'd say that "speed" depends greatly on what you are doing with the computer. The Apple vs. PC benchmark debate isn't one easily settled, and seems strongly weighted towards the application being benchmarked. The "Macs are twice as fast as x86 per clock" isn't all that true, from what I've read. That's getting *seriously* close to religious war territory, but at half the price, even if it was 1/4 slower it's a good deal. For me. If not for you, then add another $250 (or therabouts) and you get basically two 3GHz AMD CPUs, thereby wiping out any "megahertz myth" arguments.

Don't need GigE, optical audio, and all that speed? Then you should be comparing to an imac, which is still cheaper than what you've listed.

Not quite. You wouldn't need the expandability of "a lot" of PCI/AGP slots, much less dual CPUs. That first system is a desktop system, and fairly formidable one at that. I'd love to have one. It's got plenty of speed. I'd certainly rather have it than the high-end iMac. A dual-proc 2.4GHz against a single 1GHz PowerPC? That's not a fair comparison (and not only because the PC is cheaper). And although you do get a monitor with the iMac, I don't think it's a better deal.

A better comparison to the iMac would be a Shuttle SN41G2. Which I actually own, and recently built. It has an AMD "Barton" 2800+ CPU, 768 MB PC2700 DDR RAM, an 80GB/8MB disk, an nVidia GeForce4 Ti 4200, and a Pioneer 2x DVD-RW. The case/mainboard has FireWire, SPDIF, Dolby 5.1 sound, and an onboard nVidia GeForce4 MX (I added a Ti 4200 however; I had it "laying around"). It cost $650 to build. It's basically a tiny desktop PC for games, media, etc. You could compare it to those Alienware Navigator media center PCs that were out a while back. They were based on the Shuttle XPC case and came with Windows XP Media Edition (or whatever). Alienware had one roughly matching my specs which retailed for $1999 (I couldn't find a link but if you have the April 2003 issue of MaximumPC, check the ad on the back page).

The Navigator had a remote and some other goodies, but certainly not $1400 worth. A choice between that Navigator thing and an iMac means an iMac. A choice between building a customized version of (essentially) that Navigator system and buying an iMac means I build my own PC.

Certainly more importantly, you haven't accounted for your time spent selecting, purchasing, and assembling the parts. What's your consulting rate? Several hours work at a few hundred an hour dwarfs the cost of the hardware entirely.

I see your point, but I disagree. For some reason I get nearly e

Here we use a P120 laptop w/OpenBSD as a wireless router. Used to serve files and mysql webs off it but got slow, so moved serving to a "mini" system.

Don't use the MSI NetPC MS-6215T system as a server. The power supply is only 90 watts. I ran it 24/7 for a year, the next time I powered it down, it wouldn't power back up. Was running a P3 Tualatin (low power) 1.13ghz, Geforce PCI card, Wifi, and 60gb hard drive. Now I power the system with a standard sized ATX power supply sitting outside the case. Works but is UGLY.

But do use the Shuttle SS51g. It has a small but full power 200w power supply. Been running the hell out of this thing with 60+80gb hard drives, Geforce AGP, and Wifi. Not a single problem. Also the cooling solution in these things is very very nice.

First off where are you going and what are you doing? For reference I go to Kettering University and I'm an Electrical Engineer.

Most schools have pretty good computer labs (including Unix ones). Unless you want to do your work in your room, you can rely on the schools pcs for getting school work done.

There really are only 2 things having your own computer is good for:

1. You can take it to class and use it there for doing circuits, solving diff eqs, notes, etc.

2. You can use it for entertainment (movies, games, music, p2p). If you are into this, go on and get a computer that can do what you want, and learn to excercise a little self control. Plus not having to go to the lab to do VHDL stuff is nice. I've known guys who couldn't get their act together and played games and failed out; but these guys would have failed out even without the games, they wern't serious or interested and would have found another way to not do work. Don't let the parrent convince you games are bad, not being able to manage your time that you should watch out for.

Laptop vs. Desktop: Laptops cost a lot more and don't have the power. I looked into it and decided to spend my money on a desktop instead. I spent a lot of cash and went from having a 400Mhz PII to having dual Xeons. Making CS levels and doing 3d modeling (my hobbies) was a lot easier. Now that I'm in higher engineering courses, not having to go to school (I live off campus) to do work is nice, and I wouldn't have much use for a laptop in class. I'd still go with the desktop (actually I'd get a shuttle system since they are small).

• Other things to bring/think about:
• Calculator: I recomend the HP-49. Make sure you get one that has graphing, matrix manipulation, imaginary numbers, easy vector handling (all function and conversion), and understands differential equations. If you must get a TI, go with the 89 but you'll probably be happier with an HP-49.
• Pack light, don't bring stuff you won't use: i.e. get a tv-in card for your pc instead of bringing a tv.
• Get out and do other things, college is a great time for learning who you are and trying new things. Go to different meetings of clubs and see if what they do interests you. Meet people, and make friends; don't confine yourself to a small group. Go out for greek rush even if you have no desire to join! It's free food and events. You'll have a good time. Look around campus and find a fraternity that seems to mesh with you (there'll be a few), grab some friends and show up for one of their events. Not all greek letter orgs are about drinking and partying (for example the Kettering Chapter of Delta Chi has a dry house, and a bunch of members into gaming (we still maintain the highest grades on campus and have more members in clubs, and government then anyone else).

Remember, to have fun and try new things, the most important parts of college are in the social skills and experiences you have outside of the classroom.

I've been using a Shuttle XPC System for several months now. They're the ones using heat pipes to conduct heat from the CPU to a radiator and fan mounted on the rear of the chassis. The larger fan, with speed control, is much quieter then normal CPU fans. It's quiet enough that I'm now looking at acoustic noise specs when selecting a new hard drive, something I ignored in the past. They're pretty spiffy looking boxes too, though I had to take a Sharpie to the blinding blue power LED on the front so that it wouldn't scare the neighbors.

With the pending bankruptcy, this product might have been vaporware used to stoke investor interest. But man, do I wanna buy one:

GoVideo® D2730 Networked DVD - World's First Networked DVD Player!

"The GoVideo Networked DVD Player is a high end, slim-line Progressive Scan DVD player, and is the first player of its kind to be able to stream video files through a wireless network to a consumer electronics component. The Networked DVD Player works with either a wired PCMCIA Ethernet Adapter (included) or an optional PCMCIA 802.11b Wireless Network Card. The D2730 can also stream MP3 and WMA audio files and JPEG image files, as well as MPEG1 and MPEG2 video files."

Yes, I can roll my own (even stylishly, with a Shuttle XPC. Yes, I can do so with a cool Linux distro (can't remember the couple I've examined off the top of my head - anyone? Bueller?). But I sure as hell can't do it for $250, which was the SRP for this unit.

There ya go.

Yes, mythTV is your friend. Mix one part MythTV, and one part Shuttle XPC and you have the ultimate Linux PVR.

I don't know why someone would donate mega-$$$ for this to be accomplished. Seems like an egotrip. The money could be put some truly worthy cause. I hear cancer hasn't been cured yet...

So that's what all the residue on my BookPC's motherboard was. A few of the capacitors had "swollen" tops (where the metal endcap peeked up from the plastic rim of the casing), but none that had obviously burst. Voltage from the power supply was okay (delivered 12v and 5v to the motherboard via a peripheral power connnector), but output from the motherboard was less than half what it should have been. Hopefully, the same won't happen to its replacement, otherwise my still working 10+ year old 486 will have to come out of storage...

The company where I work bought 300 microcomputers 2 year ago , now at least 10 micros per week appears with capacitors problem. Who is the reponsable for this damage, the vendor, the manufacturer, the computer integrator?
Is possible to change the capacitors?

By the way, the motherboards are Shuttle Spacewalker ME64, there is no reference about this problem manufacturers site.

The company where I work bought 300 microcomputers 2 year ago , now at least 10 micros per week appears with capacitors problem. Who is the reponsable for this damage, the vendor, the manufacturer, the computer integrator?
Is possible to change the capacitors?

By the way, the motherboards are Shuttle Spacewalker ME64, there is no reference about this problem manufacturers site.

2 slots NOT a bit deal

No, really, it is for the modern LAN gamer. Many are realising their huge ass 10 bay tower cases are a pain to haul around. So people are looking at cases like the Shuttle XPC series to cure this issue. And a GeForce FX high end card will not fit in one, due to the AGP slot being the second slot in the system.

Of course the FX dosen't really impress me all that much. Nothing solid has been released in the way of benchmarks, so I'll continue to enjoy my Radeon 9700 for now. I'll skip whatever replaces the 9700 and the FX, and upgrade with the next gen card. By then, I figure some games might need the power again to run at 1280x960 with all the settings to high.

What's the point in replacing your bulk case with equivalent? Most users don't use 6 PCI slots and 4x3.5"+4x5.25" drive bays.

When I buy a new case, I want it to be like this.

yes, this is pricey, but if your looking for a media PC, this will do the trick, and you shouldn't have trouble hooking up your ipod or any other media device to it. Alien Ware Media Center PC

That Alienware box looks suspiciously like the Shuttle barebone PCs which you can buy at newegg.com for less than $400. Do-it-yourselfers could save more than a few bucks making these into an equivalent media PC.

Hi there,

Just so you know, Apple Computers Inc has applied for a patent that covers your mouse: Unless you want to be paying Apple a fair few bucks, I suggest that you send information on your device to the Patent Examiners office for Prior Art

Apple's pending patent: DN/20020190975
I put a link to the patent here

The particular product that I would use as prior art if I were you:
http://www.dynamism.com/grast/index.shtml

Cheers!
Travis Smith

1. Build a Windows XP desktop for my father out of assorted spare parts and a Shuttle SV25. I'm getting tired of trying to figure out what is wrong with his old Win98 system, so this one is set up with Cygwin and VNC for remote administration.

2. Build a new Gentoo Linux server to replace my aged RedHat Linux server.

3. Fix a friend's computer after it crashed in the middle of installing SP1 for WinXP. It wouldn't reboot, and Sony's lame "system recovery" disk is actually a "system initializion" disk (losing all the files). I used tomsrtbt to boot the laptop and cpio/rsh all files to Linux server mentioned above. Then, recovered the laptop with a real Windows XP CD-ROM. Didn't need the backup, after all.

4. Deliver computer (above) to my father and fix the telephone wiring in his house so that DSL works a bit better (I hope).

5. Re-cable a couple of hard drives and use the Promise Raid controller on the Asus A7V333 in my Win2K desktop.

6. Clean house, as I've been out of town for three weeks and a friend is visiting New Year's Eve.

Yes, yes, a million times yes! I recently tried to visit the website for Shuttle (the tiny-computer manufacturers). Their US division's website flat-out refused to let me enter with Mozilla, saying that they only supported IE. I launched Konqueror, changed the User-Agent string to IE, and visited the site again.

At this point, I wrote a short-but-pointed letter to their sales department stating that I'm responsible for recommending hardware purchases for a few companies, and as a Unix user I could not visit their site. Since they denied access to non-IE visitors, they clearly did not welcome sales to Unix users. Then, I gave them a list of their competitors' sites that I was able to visit, and expressed relief that some companies still wished to do business with me.

Their reply stating that the problem was permanently fixed came within 24 hours. Apparently, not everyone in their organization is as quick to dismiss potential customers as their website design department.

Now go spend your time protesting something that is really taxing, the US Government. Sheesh!

Not only have large heat pipes been around for quite some time - their application on CPUs and various other computing/chips isn't novel either. The only novelty here is the size.

http://www.coolermaster.com.hk/en/products/cooler/ hhc-001.html

http://us.shuttle.com/specs_access.asp?pro_id=150

They would be the SK41G, or SS40G.

I intend on getting an SK41G, as I need AGP for the G400MAX. DivX player without the slightest hint of an X server :) mplayer rules!

For all those people who have been waiting for an XPC with socket A *and* AGP, it seems finally Shuttle are releasing one. I noticed the SK41G seems to have been released.. See the shuttle website here and here.

For all those people who have been waiting for an XPC with socket A *and* AGP, it seems finally Shuttle are releasing one. I noticed the SK41G seems to have been released.. See the shuttle website here and here.

According to their website: "Dubbed XPC, short for 'Next Generation 'PC'"

That's the official name... :) It actually stands for eXpired Personal Computer... in other words... it's a recycled computer. ;)

According to their website: "Dubbed XPC, short for 'Next Generation 'PC'"

I liked it the first time......

when it was called the Shuttle SS51G.

Seriously, it looks like they just made a goosed-up shuttle barebones and then jacked up the price (and all their stuff is way overpriced, really).

I've seen a lot of post saying.. "big whoop my computer does this too so what!"

Well thats not the freakin' point.. My computer does a lot of this too.. but I don't want the damn thing in my living room sitting in my entertainment center.. its big its bulky and out of place right next to other nice ergonomic entertainment center pieces. This thing is SMALL and also very QUIET (liquid cooling! from what the site says.. I personally still wanna see it desected though). This thing looks like a game cube or XBOX things that are acceptably fit into an entertainment center.

Now the second point is building it yourself. I'll agree it is probably a bit cheaper but.. I personally and a friend have been looking for parts for this very type of thing. I think Shuttle makes a bar bones kit. Plus if you look on Tom's Hardware they have an article specifically for this. Now after looking at that article it seems a bit further over the general populace's heads to make something such as this... for really (after my own pricing and such) not all that much more. By building I think you could save about 200 or so dollars.. but then again its not quite warrantied is it.. and it doesn't have the liquid cooling to make it quiet does it?.. ok well thats all I have.

Did That.
Used a Shuttle SS51G with ATI 8500dv for video output to widescreen SONY using ATI HDTV component that doesn't work.
ATI's solution?
We have no solution..Tough beans.
NEVER AGAIN ATI.
Oh! but cool remote input.

This is what came up in the browser window after a JavaScript-controlled redirect to http://www.shuttle.com/english/default_n.html:

THE SHUTTLE WEBSITE don't support Netscape browser or another browser.

Please use Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or above to view our website!

Thanks your cooperation.

I'm running Mozilla 1.0RC3 on Win2K. Damn clueless webmaster...especially since changing the URL to http://www.shuttle.com/english/default.asp takes you right to their website, and it renders almost the same as it does in IE 6. (I had to try viewing their site with Lynx to figure that out...it got stuck on the JavaScript redirect page.) If they can screw up such a simple thing as a website so badly, it raises questions about the other stuff they make.

I was giving a half-serious thought to snagging one of these boxen, if they make one with an AGP slot sometime in the future. The other specs are nearly perfect—it works with AMD processors, it includes built-in FireWire ports, it uses PCI audio instead of AC97 audio, etc. Now, I'm not so sure...maybe I'll just track down a desktop ATX case, move my current workstation hardware into it when Hammer comes out, and throw that into the A/V stack. It's not like I haven't used a beige box as a DVD/MP3 player before. (Unless someone knows of an ATX case of similar proportions and styling to home stereo equipment...something's probably out there already.)

This is what came up in the browser window after a JavaScript-controlled redirect to http://www.shuttle.com/english/default_n.html:

THE SHUTTLE WEBSITE don't support Netscape browser or another browser.

Please use Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or above to view our website!

Thanks your cooperation.

I'm running Mozilla 1.0RC3 on Win2K. Damn clueless webmaster...especially since changing the URL to http://www.shuttle.com/english/default.asp takes you right to their website, and it renders almost the same as it does in IE 6. (I had to try viewing their site with Lynx to figure that out...it got stuck on the JavaScript redirect page.) If they can screw up such a simple thing as a website so badly, it raises questions about the other stuff they make.

I was giving a half-serious thought to snagging one of these boxen, if they make one with an AGP slot sometime in the future. The other specs are nearly perfect—it works with AMD processors, it includes built-in FireWire ports, it uses PCI audio instead of AC97 audio, etc. Now, I'm not so sure...maybe I'll just track down a desktop ATX case, move my current workstation hardware into it when Hammer comes out, and throw that into the A/V stack. It's not like I haven't used a beige box as a DVD/MP3 player before. (Unless someone knows of an ATX case of similar proportions and styling to home stereo equipment...something's probably out there already.)

This is what came up in the browser window after a JavaScript-controlled redirect to http://www.shuttle.com/english/default_n.html:

THE SHUTTLE WEBSITE don't support Netscape browser or another browser.

Please use Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or above to view our website!

Thanks your cooperation.

I'm running Mozilla 1.0RC3 on Win2K. Damn clueless webmaster...especially since changing the URL to http://www.shuttle.com/english/default.asp takes you right to their website, and it renders almost the same as it does in IE 6. (I had to try viewing their site with Lynx to figure that out...it got stuck on the JavaScript redirect page.) If they can screw up such a simple thing as a website so badly, it raises questions about the other stuff they make.

I was giving a half-serious thought to snagging one of these boxen, if they make one with an AGP slot sometime in the future. The other specs are nearly perfect—it works with AMD processors, it includes built-in FireWire ports, it uses PCI audio instead of AC97 audio, etc. Now, I'm not so sure...maybe I'll just track down a desktop ATX case, move my current workstation hardware into it when Hammer comes out, and throw that into the A/V stack. It's not like I haven't used a beige box as a DVD/MP3 player before. (Unless someone knows of an ATX case of similar proportions and styling to home stereo equipment...something's probably out there already.)

THE SHUTTLE WEBSITE don't support Netscape browser or another browser.

Please use Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or above to view our website!

Thanks your cooperation.

Doesn't Shuttle build barebone-systems in mini-aluminium cases ?
If Shuttle had a website that worked without JavaScript, I'd give a better link...

Shuttle has several small form factor barebones systems that might do the trick. Put 1 small hd for the os mounted read only and then a larger hd for storage and you should have no problems. You could probably go as far as to put alot of ram in it, get one of the micro distros of linux that will run on a floppy, write a script that will create a ram drive and load the os into it on start-up, and run with that. Todd