Build Your Own Mini-Computer

Bored in Chattanooga writes: "Tom's is running an article reviewing a Shuttle mini-computer. Seems to have everything the average computer user would need, minus a nice 3D graphics card. Perhaps the standard large ATX-size computer cases will cease to exist and be replaced by these "mini-computers." I find these gems cuter than any iMac I've ever seen!"

Comments

better mini computer

[MathJMendl]

I'd rather have one of these...then again, it might be kind of hard to upgrade.

Re:better mini computer

[stefanlasiewski]

That think is about the size of the 'dot' in 'slashdotted'.

Re:better mini computer

[SecretAsianMan]

Yeah, well I'd rather have one of these, which is what I think of when I hear "minicomputer". Nyah!

Re:better mini computer

[searleb]

Last week people were complaining about slashdot killing the lisa web server. This time the direct link to the microchip server wasn't even posted and the "machine" is already down. In fact, it's probably on fire right now.

Re:better mini computer

[seanadams.com]

The Ipic is almost certainly a hoax. This guy should *not* be taken seriously until he either:

- Posts some technical details as to how he managed to pull it off.
- Publishes his source
- Sells a product based on this
- Sets up a convincing demo

Having spent the better part of a year writing a TCP/IP stack for the PIC, I can tell you with certainly that the features and RFC compliance he claims are simply impossible to fit into the 12XXXX parts. The ROM space certainly isn't there, even if everything is tightly hand-coded in assembler. the more obvious limitation however, is RAM. He claims to be running full TCP on a part that doesn't even have the space to hold a minimum-size packet in RAM for checksumming. I could get into a zillion other impossibilities of this project, but it's easier to just show you this page, a commercial PIC TCP/IP stack), which shows exactly how much RAM/ROM it takes to fit a tight TCP/IP implementation into the PIC. There's just no way you could fit this much into the 12-bit PICs.

Re:better mini computer

[Stone Rhino]

Not just on fire, but probably exploding too!

Re:better mini computer

[Xofer D]

No kidding - I read "minicomputer" and thought "Shuttle makes THOSE?" Imagine my surprise when I saw something that would easily fit onto my desk, without cleaning! Well, without cleaning *much*...

Re:better mini computer

[LS]

You're not a very good hoax sniffer, are you? This is real. Do a little more research before crying wolf.

Re:better mini computer

[Olinator]

Blockquoth the poster:

The Ipic is almost certainly a hoax. This guy should *not* be taken seriously until he either:

The iPIC was not a hoax. I work for the CS dept. in question; we helped him set up the mirror because the /. effect was hosing the gadget. (Hey, you want a homebrew fingernail-sized webserver, you don't get a lot of room for scaling up the load.)

hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers?

[red_crayon]

Why would I want to bulid a minicomputer?

PCs blow away VAXes. A modern PC has way more computing power than a VAX 11/780.

Move along, people, there's nothing here unless you're still using your VIC-20.

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[wfmcwalter]

The /. headline is (as usual) crap.

It's not a minicomputer (VAX, AS/400 etc.), it's a "mini-pc" - a PC in a small box.

yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[nomadic]

Why on earth would a supposedly tech-savvy site misuse a term like that? I seriously thought they were referring to wardrobe-sized computers...

Re:yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[easter1916]

It's because they're idiots, you see.

Re:yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[innocent_white_lamb]

So did I. Hmm... I guess we're both dating ourselves here.

Sigh...

Re:yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[Shanep]

Yeah, I thought this was going to be an article about making a cluster of 386's or something, since a cluster of pentiums apparently constitutes a super-computer.

Anyway, nothing sucks like a Vax...

Re:yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[atam]

Why on earth would a supposedly tech-savvy site misuse a term like that? I seriously thought they were referring to wardrobe-sized computers.

It is called Jargon-Overloading(TM,patent-pending), a concept borrowed from the industrial-accepted Object-Oriented concept of Method-Overloading.

Re:yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[Anonymous Coward]

MiniPC would have been a much better choice for a name.

Re:yes, unfortunate misuse of terminology

[Eccles]

I guess we're both dating ourselves here.

Hey, it's not like anyone else would date you.

(You put a straight line like that up and you expect me to resist?)

That case and motherboard...

[AnimeFreak]

...make a great addon to a home entertainment system. Pop a 80 GB hard disk in it and you can view movies, listen to MP3s, or browse the web.

All you need to add is a wireless keyboard and mouse and you're set.

Re:That case and motherboard...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, it may make the perfect media box. I'm still very wary of a few issues, however.

The article mentions that the specs for the temperature on this machine should not exceed 50C. I agree completely (much hotter and the sucker's gonna' melt straght to the core of the earth), but how freakin loud are the fans?

I might put a system like this by my stereo, or by my home theater system, but if it's crankin out much more than 32db, no way. Maybe my ears are especially sensitive (32 db is supposed to be silent to an 'average' person, but even that is bothersome to me.)

And as they say, an average Joe, is not prepared to munge one of these together. I really wish more reviews would post some sound specs in addition to the norm. Ack! I digress.

iWhack

[athagon]

Personally, I prefer the iMac. Not only is its design somewhat useful (use it like a lamp? door stop? modern art?), but the case is gorgeous in comparison. It would almost make one wonder if the Cube (which was discontinued by Apple some time ago) was a beta, if you will, for the current iMac. Just look at the shapes. A square (okay, rectangle), to a half-sphere..I must admit, though, that the iMac's new screen is awesome in comparison to the now-ancient-history-to-Apple CRT that was advertised for use with the Cube.

Re:iWhack

[Zer0Her0]

Actually i do believe the 22" flat screen was advertised to be used with the cube it even has the ADC connector on it

Re:iWhack

[athagon]

Well, that's both true and false. In some of Apple's print ads, it was shown with the [outrageously overpriced] 22" flatscreen LCD. However, on the web (and in other print ads), it was shown with the CRT. I distinctly remember the catchphrase on their site: "The Apple PowerMacintosh G4 Cube looks great with our award-winning Apple CRT Display". Or something to that effect.

Re:iWhack

[doggo]

The Briq is cool too. 'Course it only runs Linux, but it's a G4!

Re:iWhack

[Anonymous Coward]

Almost every ad I saw had the cube and the little 15" LCD display. The PowerMac towers usually had the CRT with them.

Re:iWhack

[ericdano]

I prefer my G4 cube. It's practically silent. You can, if you really listen, hear the hard drive. No fans, nothing.

I like the idea of this little box computer. It would be great for me, a musician, to have to run virtual instruments on, like Gigastudio or something. But, if the fans are LOUD, then, that kills that idea.

Now, a bevie of G4 cubes running stuff......hmmm....

Re:iWhack

[Zer0Her0]

that was prob towards the end of the cubes life since the 15" wasn't out for a good 5-6 months after the cube was originally announced

I've already built my own mini computer

[boboliak]

And I was lead to it by a previous article here

PS: Anyone else out there with an SV/FV24 setup having what appears to be a heat issue with the hard drive controller?

Re:I've already built my own mini computer

[Anonymous Coward]

I have one. And have had it running for approximately 3 months non-stop. And no heat issues here. 40GB drive, 700 Celeron, 256MB ram, and no problems. I really like the little thing.

I have one of these

[anguish feast]

I picked one of these up last November. I put in a 1GHz PIII, 1GB Ram (when it cost about 1/3 of what it does now), and 100GB HD. It runs great so far. The on board video card could be better, but I'm using it as a little server at home. I'm pretty surprised that the little thing isn't running hot after 3 months of running dnetc non stop.

what about cooling?

[Milliken]

won't the decreased size of the case cause severe cooling problems for an 1100mhz+ computer?

Re:what about cooling?

[2nd Post!]

I dunno, I'm just barely finishing up my system, I'm hoping it's not a problem.

I have a 22W rated 800MHz Celeron in there.

The newer Tualatin Celerons are on a 0.13 process with copper interconnect technology and may actually use less power than my Celeron.

I have a Alpha pal153U, a 10mm heatsink with a 15mm fan and a copper heat spreader. I have all this stuffed into an old Mac LCII case, approx 43mm x 32cm by 45cm or so.

Re:what about cooling?

[Nurgster]

I've got one of these boxes with a VIA C3 733 in it, and it runs at 39 degree celsius. (after being on for a pretty much all day running RTCW)

What about heat?

[evilviper]

Of course a major problem with mini-computers is that there's just nowhere for the heat to go. Aluminum cases may help a small bit, but certainly not enough to accomidate an Athlon, Fast hard drive, etc. The air-circulation methods we've been using for so long just breakdown.

If small PCs are to catch on, manufacturers are either going to need to make low-heat devices their bread and butter, or case manufacturers are going to need to realize that they can just add a little extra metal and actually CONDUCT the heat out through the case, instead of the much less effecient (although for some reason exclusively used) convection method.

Re:What about heat?

[msaavedra]

Interesting idea, to have the metal in the case designed to conduct away heat from the CPU, hard drive, etc.

Another solution is to avoid athlons for these systems. As much as I like athlons, they are just running too hot these days. I recently built a micro-atx system (slightly bigger than the one in this article) with a Via C3 chip. This is an x86 compatible socket-370 CPU that uses only about 7 watts. The whole system uses about 40 watts on average, and runs only a litle bit hotter than the ambient air temperature.

True, its not blazingly fast (I think the C3 tops out at around 800 MHz and floating point sucks), but for a non-gaming desktop system or a small server, this setup is energy efficient, cool and quiet. It even seems to be quite stable, which was my biggest worry. No lockups or even any strange behavior after about month of uptime.

Re:What about heat?

[isaac_akira]

...nowhere for the heat to go

Umm... out of the case? Using fans? Like with any other pc? Being smaller might even make it *easier* to cool, as you can channel the airflow accross the components without it swirling around inside the case too much. The air going across the CPU is then always cool exterier air and not luke warm semi-recirculated air.

Just make sure the ribbon cables inside aren't blocking the airflow (or use those more expensive cables where the strands of ribbon are just bundled up instead of one solid strip).

Re:What about heat?

[batboy78]

Well being as small as it is, you could always put it in your refrigerator, right next to the mayo and pickle relish!

Re:What about heat?

[evilviper]

Interesting idea, to have the metal in the case designed to conduct away heat from the CPU, hard drive, etc.

I'm glad you are impressed, but it's not exactly hard to think of, especially for the engineers that are getting paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Yet somehow it never gets designed into modern PCs that are now made to operate in Artic-like temperatures. Now that I'm done ranting...

I think the C3 tops out at around 800 MHz and floating point sucks

I've used Cyrix processors before. One of which was a 300MHz CPU that every different CPU test clocked at 212MHz. I overclocked it to 233 (woo-hoo) but any more than that and it would become REALLY unstable. I'd say from my experience that everything about them sucks.

I leared long ago that paying a little bit more for quality components results in far better quality, stability, and longevity. If you want low heat processors, use a mobile AMD, but that still doesn't make a huge difference, and there's still the problem of heat from the power supply hard drive, videocard, etc.

Re:What about heat?

[evilviper]

I thought about that, but it's just not the case (no pun intended). Any system builds up hot air just because theres a limit to convection. Normal fans just can't push that much air through a few little holes, and this case reduces the already limited ventilation a large case would have.

Re:What about heat?

[msaavedra]

The C3 is not really a Cyrix chip, although I too have had the misfortune using a few of those hot and unstable CPU's you mentioned. The C3, though, is based on the Centaur core designed by engineers at IDT (Via bought their CPU division around the time they bought Cyrix).

As for stability, I've experienced no problems with this chip, nor have I heard of any from others. And the price isn't really any different from an Intel chip of the same speed. You're comments about "quality components" remind me of a guy I saw the computer fair in LA a few years ago. He was looking for a CPU and I recommended an athlon, and he whined "But it's not Intel! What about the risk?"

Sure, Via/Cyrix/IDT haven't always made great components, but AMD has made some really crappy hardware too, and I don't hold it against them. And don't even get me started about Intel the last few years.

Also, the mobile AMD chips are only low-heat in comparison to the desktop AMDs. You're likely to burn yourself if you actually set your laptop on your lap ;-)

Personally, I'd prefer a StrongARM, but I occasionally need to use Windows, and last I heard, nothing from MS but WinCE (or whatever they call it now) will run on it. I'll be stuck on x86 for a while longer, unfortunately.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

Using fans? Like with any other pc?

Fans make noise.

Noise's not good.

Too bad the computer designers do not tend to pay any attention to optimizing natural convection and conduction and try getting rid of the damned fans that way.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

optimizing natural convection

I've been thinking about the same thing.

I mean if there's knowledge and technology for cooling nuclear reactors in modern US submarines by natural convection alone, how hard can it be to cool a CPU the same way?

Re:What about heat?

[isaac_akira]

Convection cooling works, for consumer-level computers even. That's how the iMac (well, the OLD iMac) gets by without a fan: it actually uses the *heat* of the monitor to *cool* the cpu and hard drive by sucking cool air up the bottom of the case while hot air rises out the top (vents are only on the top and bottom -- not sides). Brilliant. This only works for a relatively cool CPU (G3's don't get very hot) and with a monitor in the case. The new LCD iMacs did away with the hot monitor, and so now have a (very quiet) fan.

Re:What about heat?

[Shanep]

Of course a major problem with mini-computers is that there's just nowhere for the heat to go.

As far as my thinking goes, the smaller the case, the better, provided that there is a strong enough air flow. Reason being, that with a small enclosure, there is less air to displace. A fan that can extract at 10 cubic feet per minute is going to fully displace the air in a 10 cubic feet case once per minute, yet this same fan will displace the air in a 1 cubic feet case 10 times per minute, giving better cooling. The air flow around components tends to be faster, but this depends on the physical layout just as much as a larger computer.

The problem with small cases are the small fans, not the small cases. Small fans don't tend to scale down well. I like to put a large fan into a small case, at an angle, with the output side ported out of the case unrestricted, with the efficiency of the fan lost at the sucking side, inside the case. This might be inefficient compared with the abilities of the fan, but tends to be much better than a small fan working at it's best.

Re:What about heat?

[Shanep]

I'm glad you are impressed, but it's not exactly hard to think of

This is not a new idea. Z shaped copper has been used for years between IC's and metal cases, to draw heat from the IC into the much larger cases or common heatsinks.

I actually have an old Apple Powerbook 100 opened in front of me, which has a C shaped copper heat transfer strip which bridges heat from two FET's into the aluminium base of the keyboard.

The cute little 1cm x 1cm 16MHz 68000 needs no heatsink though. : )

Re:What about heat?

[benh57]

They have realized this. The Apple iMac and the Cube both use convection cooling.
PC makers aren't as creative.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

ever touch the heatsink on one of those? the processors run HOT.

Re:What about heat?

[yumyum]

This only works for a relatively cool CPU (G3's don't get very hot) and with a monitor in the case

I guess that's why Apple's Cube failed: it had a G4 and no monitor to cool it...

Re:What about heat?

[TheMeld]

The problem with your argument about cubic feet and flow rate is in the basics of fluid flows. Given a presure on a fluid in a duct/pipe/whatever, the flow rate goes up with the fourth power of the diameter! This is why, as you correctly pointed out, fans don't scale down well, and thus a bigger fan is much better.

However, when you get small cases, you get small spaces for air to move through, and thus reduced flowrates regardless of fan size. The CFM rating on a fan assumes no significant load on the fan. The types of fans used in pc cooling cannot handle large resistance to flow; their cfm will drop like a rock.

Blowers (the things with a rotating circular mouse cage thing) do a lot better, but are noisier and don't move air nearly as fast in the first place.

Re:What about heat?

[smagoun]

either that, or it was too expensive for what it was. The cube cools itself quite well, as a matter of fact. Many people have popped out the existing CPU module and replaced it with dual G4/500s. Even with twice as many CPUs in the same small space and no fan, the machine doesn't come close to overheating.

Re:What about heat?

[smagoun]

ever touch a P3, P4, or Athlon? I didn't think so. You can't even find the CPU itself because it's buried under 10lbs of heat sink. The PowerPC line has always been a line of embedded processors. Power dissipation in an embedded CPU is a much bigger issue than in a desktop CPU, which is why G3's and G4's usually don't dissipate more than a few watts (up to 10 in some cases). In comparison, some Alphas dissipate >70 watts.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't that the point? Hot sink = cool processor?

Re:What about heat?

[karlm]

... or case manufacturers are going to need to realize that they can just add a little extra metal and actually CONDUCT the heat out through the case,...
Yet another instance of Apple being ahead of its time. The fanless G4 cubes had the CPU in contact with the side of the case and a little thermal paste. See the slashdot article about converting the cubes to run dual G4s; they had to add some metal to the case to get both CPUs in contact with the case.

Now... if only I could find G4 CPUs and G4 mobos on pricewatch... :-)

Re:What about heat?

[Teferi]

Every article I've seen on upgrading a Cube to dual G4s recommends installing a fan in the mount that's already there for one.

Re:What about heat?

[Stone Rhino]

what about crusoes? "slashdot requires you to wait 20 seconds between hitting 'reply' and submitting a comment. It's been 18 seconds since you hit 'reply'!" Can't you just forgive me the 2 seconds?

Re:What about heat?

[Furry Ice]

I'm certainly no expert in fluid dynamics, but I find it hard to believe that the results for fluids also apply to gases.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

You certainly are not. Fluids include liquids and gases. Why did you bother posting and taking up space? People are so f-in stupid.

Re:What about heat?

[gid]

I own an SV24, bought it about 2 months back. Heat isn't an issue, I put a dvd drive in it, a tv tuner card, 1ghz celery, and 40 gig wd hd (all running Debian linux of course :) Heat isn't an issue even with dnetc running full blast. With all the racket the thing causes, you wouldn't think it would be an issue. A quieter rear and cpu fan would be easy mods, but the loudest fan is probably the small psu fan, which is not going to be easy to replace.

Re:What about heat?

[Graff]

Totally right, but to clarify what I think your point is, the problem is no in the case but in the internals.

In order to make a mini-pc they need to cram a lot of components into a small space. They do this by layering the components, thus creating a lot of narrow spaces through which air can flow. These narrow spaces offer a lot more resistance to flow than the wide-open spaces in a normal-size case. It also makes for very long and tortured air flow paths which constrict the flow.

The Macintosh Cube combats this by careful design of the space to maximize flow. All of the boards are aligned vertically so that the natural convection of the heated air adds to the flow. They also use components that naturally generate less heat, such as the PowerPC G4 processor.

Re:What about heat?

[ideut]

Gases and liquids are both fluids.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

Signum Data claims to have designed a PC that conducts heat through cooling fins on the oustide of the case. Water cooling is involved, but it uses no fans. So it would seem to be 100% silent.
http://www.signumdata.de/english/futureclient.ht m

Re:What about heat?

[evilviper]

The point is that convection cooling, active (fan), or passive (no fan) is the most ineffecient method of cooling possible.

With metal cases, CONDUCTION cooling would be easy to impliment, require a tiny fraction of the space convection takes up, and cool systems FAR better.

Apple's designs are much better than PCs. I agree. The problem is that conduction could make any system several orders of magnitude more effecient.

Re:What about heat?

[Shanep]

The CFM rating on a fan assumes no significant load on the fan.

What you're saying is very interesting, I am far from a fluid dynamics expert, so I'm interested to know...

In a one fan solution, is it better to have the fan sucking air into a case or sucking air out?

I was thinking that if air is being sucked out, then the presure inside the case is being slightly reduced and thus less air is moving across parts, causing less effective heat dispersal, whereas a fan sucking air into a case would be causing slightly increased pressure inside the case and thus more air moving across parts, giving better cooling?

Is one better than the other or is there nothing in it?

PS, are these fans bad with high loads because they use brushless engines, giving poor torque?

Re:What about heat?

[TheMeld]

In a one fan solution, is it better to have the fan sucking air into a case or sucking air out?

Hmm ... I'm not entirely sure, but I think that it's close to a toss up. However, if I was going to pick one or the other, I'd have to go with the one pushing air in. That gives you 2 slight advantages.

One, it means that there is a high velocity cool air stream blowing over something (though not necessarily what you'd want it to). Two, it means that the pressure inside the case will be slightly higher than the outside pressure, which will make most of the small holes expell air instead of sucking it in (as they would if the 1 fan blew air outwards). If you put an air filter on the fan blowing air inwards, then the upshot will be that not much dust ends up inside your case.

Another thing to consider when placing fans in a not-so-small case is convection. Hot air rises. So put intake fans near the bottom of the case and exhaust fans near the top. That way convection currents will aid them, not fight them.

PS, are these fans bad with high loads because they use brushless engines, giving poor torque?

Actually, I think it has more to do with the blade design. DC motors give highest torque when in a stall condition, brushless are no exception to this (incidentally, this is part of why deisel locomotives actually use the engines to run generators which then drive electric motors on each wheel). The motor will not likely reach stall, however.

Try cupping your hand on each side of one of these fans so that no air can flow. The motor is slowed a good bit, but the blades still spin just fine. The blade design is optimized for moving the most air possible, not for overcoming friction. Blowers are designed to make a high velocity stream that can overcome more friction than fans.

Re:What about heat?

[Anonymous Coward]

That would explain the wet feeling when you fart.

Notebook?

[dadragon]

I wonder if they will start making standard notebook parts, so us do-it-yourselfers can build one ourselves. We could stop feeding Compaq, Dell, Apple, and IBM money and just get the parts, a case and a screen and throw it together.

Re:Notebook?

[2nd Post!]

Feeding? You make it sound as if the manufacturers are parasites.

DIY cannot make an iMac or a Cube. DIY cannot make PowerBooks or iBooks.

Rather, you can take the point of view the DIY *do* make these machines, but they happen to work at Apple.

Also, I dunno if you own a Mac or not, Macs are more than just the hardware. There's the OS and the addon software that makes it far from standard. We (me) feed Apple in order for Apple to continue producing the iPods, the iMovies and iTunes, the FCP, and the OS X for us.

Re:Notebook?

[Maul]

I doubt we'll see standard "notebook" components,
unfortunately. This seems to be where the big
computer manufacturing companies really like to
leech consumers.

I'd personally like to see this, but I don't think it will happen.

Re:Notebook?

[dadragon]

Feeding was just a word I chose.

I do own an Apple. It's a late 2001 iBook, Combo drive, my first Mac. It's great, and for this kind of hardware/software combo I don't mind paying Apple. PCs are different though. I'm used to going to Techtronics (A very good computer wholesaler in Saskatoon) and buying the parts I need to build a PC.

I like knowing EXACTLY what's inside my computer when I buy it, it's difficult to determine this with notebooks. The sales guy will always say:

It's got:
Celeron 900
30GB Hard Drive
32mb graphics card
256mb RAMPCI Sound card
10/100 Ethernet
What IDE controller is on the MB?

But what brand of HD? What brand of graphics card? What kind of ram? Does the graphics/sound work with Linux or BSD? When I build it myself I know all this, not so with most notebooks.

The iBook is different, though. I know what's in it:

A motorola G3 600
Toshiba CDRW/DVD combo
IBM TravelStar 30GN 20GB HD
ATI Rage Mobility 8mb graphics

Not that I'd care, it runs MacOS X, that's what I care about. It's a great operating system, probably the best that Apple's produced.

Re:Notebook?

[Anonymous Coward]

You have seen the 'Linux on a laptop' website, I hope?

They have a good list of most laptops in existence today, together with their linux compatibility.

A little reality check...

[toupsie]

Seems to have everything the average computer user would need, minus a nice 3D graphics card.Perhaps the standard large ATX-size computer cases will cease to exist and be replaced by these "mini-computers." I find these gems cuter than any iMac I've ever seen!"

The "SpaceWalker" is no way as cute as the Apple iMac. Plus the iMac comes with a NVidia GeForce 2 MX 3D card and 15" LCD monitor. The iMac has DVD-R/CD-R burning compared to the CD-RW of the SpaceWalker. Also, the iMac only has a 10.6" foot print. From what I understand, that is smaller than the FlexATX board.

The SpaceWalker is more a diamond in the ruff compared to the polished Apple iMac.

Re:A little reality check...

[2nd Post!]

You have to remember that Bored in Chattanooga wants less functionality, pay less for a machine, keep his hands warm, and keep his books from falling over.

He really does want the firewire, USB, tv out, compact size, built in audio, built in networking, everything the iMac offers, and the iMac does, as you mention, come with a GeForce2 and LCD screen. Except he doesn't want to pay for it and he tacitly acknowledges that look matters. Isn't that ironic? Saying that he values cute PCs, the iMac isn't cute enough?

Re:A little reality check...

[A]

The Spacewalker itself doesn't come with a cpu, ram or any drives. They sell it as a bare-bones system. (read as no CD-RW)

You could put in a "super drive" and hook up an lcd, and come close to the same _basic_ functionality. But if you are willing to pay for it, apple's design and size are second to none. Personaly, I don't think it is worth it.

Re:A little reality check...

[Anonymous Coward]

Alas, I've come to enjoy such luxories as an "eject button" on the CD-ROM and something called a "right mouse button", although control-clicking is pretty cool too. It takes too hands and thus burns twice the calories.

Oh wait, I also enjoy using the keyboard for nearly everything. I guess the iMac won't work for me.

Re:A little reality check...

[2nd Post!]

Which is exactly why you are welcome to make your own machine :)

I haven't noticed the loss of an eject button, given that I have an eject key on the keyboard, nor the right mouse button, since just extending the length of a single click also acts as a right click. That's how I've adapted.

I do wish the Mac were *more* keyboardable. Tabbing among the dialog hotspots, for example, would be nice. Being able to pull the menu down without mousing would be nice, too. Those are enhancement requests, and hopefully Apple will see fit to make their OS even better :)

Re:A little reality check...

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you tried OS X 10.1.2? Keyboard navigation is built-in, including menus (you have to enable it in the control panels). Steve Jobs hyped it up briefly at the recent Macworld Expo.

Re:A little reality check...

[2nd Post!]

OMG! Thanks man!

I didn't know this was in OS X! Cool :)
I can now access the menus, the Dock, the toolbars, and a 'utility palette', whatever that is, from the keyboard. Thank you!

Re:A little reality check...

[Howie]

The spacewalker barebones (Case+Mobo) is about $250 (£170 is the price I knew). Add a duron, 20Gb drive and 256Mb RAM, and it's about $500.

The iMac spec you describe is shipping from the Apple store for $1900.

So, with $1400 to spend, we can add a Pioneer A03 DVD-R ($500), a 15" LCD ($300?) and a PCI GF2MX (should be $100 or less if you can find one).

I think I still saved $500, and I have a computer that will fit on a shelf, and run the latest games reasonably. I guess the final decision (whether you'll pay about $500 premium for the 'sexy' Apple case) is one of taste.

Re:A little reality check...

[angelo]

Apple's design, size and OS integration with the hardware are what you are really paying for. And an athlon 800 is nowhere near a G4 800 in terms of processor bandwidth (think altivec)

Re:A little reality check...

[skullY]

I think I still saved $500, and I have a computer that will fit on a shelf, and run the latest games reasonably. I guess the final decision (whether you'll pay about $500 premium for the 'sexy' Apple case) is one of taste.

Ah, but you also get an 800mhz PPC chip, which is roughly equivilent to a 1.4-1.6ghz x86 chip. And you can run OSX on it, which is a dream to run and happily beats the pants off anything you can run on intel. Finally, I can buy the new imac for $1800, plus shipping. You have to buy your barebones system for $250+shipping, from somewhere else buy the chip, drive and ram, for another $250+shipping. Next you find the DVD-R from the one place that has it at the cheap price, but makes up for it by having all the rest of their stuff be really expensive. Same deal with the video card and LCD. Or you can bite the bullet and buy it all at the same place, and do some research to figure out where you can get the best average price.
At the end of the day, I spent 15 minutes deciding whether or not to buy a new imac, and you spent all day finding the best prices for your stuff so you could save $400. In 3 weeks when we each finally have our machines (The imac's aren't shipping for another couple weeks) I'll have mine setup and playing UT in 15 minutes. You'll have to first assemble yours, so maybe an hour later (If you're good with hardware) you have a working machine.

I dunno, to me, the $400 is worth the reduced agrivation, work, and the benefits.

Re:A little reality check...

[fwr]

To most people on /. the "aggrivation [and] work" are worth $400 in and of itself. Most people LIKE spending time putting their systems together. Most people would prefer getting their systems in parts and being forced to put it all together. The only time that's a liability is if it doesn't work when you are done, and most people on /. have enough experience to accomplish this without making any novice mistakes.

Of course I speak of a /. from quite a while ago. I have no idea of the demographics of /.'s current userbase.

Re:A little reality check...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget the software that comes with the iMac. Although it's free as in beer, much of it is truly top notch. iMovie is a prime example of this. iTunes, while just an MP3 player, is really well designed and does what it was designed to do very efficiently, even though it's not groudbreaking. iPhoto is a little rough around the edges yet, but it'll get there.

The extra cash for a Mac really does pay off if you are interested in multimedia stuff.

Plus you can easily use an iPod with it!

--wb

Re:A little reality check...

[Graff]

The "SpaceWalker" [tomshardware.com] is no way as cute as the Apple iMac

I totally have to agree. As inexpensive as the SpaceWalker might be, it is just a small, rectangular, grey box as opposed to a large, rectangular, grey box. There may be some people who might like that but even they have to admit that the iMac in all its incarnations has much more style than a simple grey or beige box.

I won't even begin to argue value or which one is better, that is up to each person to decide.

Re:A little reality check...

[RestiffBard]

I don't think the argument that buying an imac means you're paying for less frustration really works. Mainly, anyone thats going to build one of these things has more fun building it than using it. Tracking down the best price is fun for some of us. Thinking up the best config is fun for some of us. Putting it together is fun for a great many of us.

Re:A little reality check...

[Howie]

Most people LIKE spending time putting their systems together.

Indeed, I like the idea of being able to pick and choose components for my system. For me, I would pick mainly on noise - cooling noise (fanless VGA, quiet-bearings on CPU fan), hard drive noise (fluid bearings, insulation, lower speed), CDROM noise (TrueX drive) - and secondly on absolute performance. I would also have an LCD screen (assuming I wanted one) of my choice, not attached to the system - that's a benefit in my eyes. Horses for courses.

[anyone know of a UK source for TrueX drives? especially if there is a DVDROM using this technology...]

Re:A little reality check...

[multiOSfreak]

What line of work are you in? I'd like to know so I can switch careers. Anyone who can easily dismiss $400 over a few hours work must make lots of bank.

You could buy a lot of add-on hardware with $400. To me, hand picking all the parts is half the fun of getting a new machine.

Hey, I respect brand loyalty and banner waving. But let's be real: $400 is enough to make anyone think twice.

The title of the article is wrong

[Order]

The actual arcicle, on tomshardware, is called "build your own Mini-PC", and obviously refers to a computer smaller than a PC. The /. article, however, is called "build your own Mini-Computer", and obviously refers to building a computer larger than a PC.

Bleh.

It's in the car

[Sauron23]

Bought one. Works great for browsing, running Morpheus. Didn't read Tom's article. Did he mention you can have 3 ATA100 devices? Use the floppy slot for another disk. Yes you can use standard cables, yes the power supply has enough watts to do this. Sound is good for MP3 quality, graphics suck, go buy a PCI card and use that one slot, such as a 64 meg MX400 which does the trick for me as it has the TV out. Don't ask it to copy 10 gigs while your watching a DVD and you'll do fine. Add a 300 watt inverter, wireless keyboard, touch pad and small lcd and throw the whole thing in the car. Add GPS, cell phone to match your needs. Now go buy one. I want more cases like this. The cappacino PC almost made my list but lacks that important ingredient, versitility, which this has.

Re:It's in the car

[ttys00]

Thanks for pointing that out, I was about to ask why they would bother with two IDE channels when they can only fit one hard disk in it.

Re:It's in the car

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for pointing that out, I was about to ask why they would bother with two IDE channels when they can only fit one hard disk in it.

One hard disk plus one CD or DVD-ROM drive. That's TWO DEVICES. And if you know anything at all about IDE, you know that the optimal configuration is one device per channel, so having two channels is a must for performance, especially when you're already taking enough of a performance it by using (ugh) integrated graphics...

---

I'm not a real anonymous coward, I just play one on TV.

Re:It's in the car

[Stone Rhino]

what do you think the pci slot is for? BINGO- Graphics card

video

[Suppafly]

The only real problem I can see with these is the video.. its really subpar for a modern computer.. You can use totally uptodate everything else but they expect you to settle for mediocre graphics..

I know several people I'd recommend these to if they had decent onboard video or if they had a good way to update the video.

Really these would be great if you could throw a really good soundcard and a really good video card in them.. It would be like a do it yourself game cube.. Image being able to lug something that small to a lan party instead of a huge tower.

My house isn't shrinking?

[scott1853]

So why should my PC? I have 9' ceilings. Saving 10" on the vertical height of my computer is not a problem.

Besides, where will you put the flourescent light and glass window?

Uh oh, conflicting geek factors... smaller vs. pointlessly cool... arghh.... losing... precious... karma...

Re:My house isn't shrinking?

[smagoun]

Big house or not, there are still people (me) who appreciate a smaller PC. The smaller it is, the better the chance it will fit someplace a normal PC won't, like in your car, in a cabinet in your entertainment center, etc. I'm using a small PC (ok, it's a Mac IIci) as a router/server; nothing else will fit into the space I have.

I own an FV24!

[2nd Post!]

It's running W2k right now.

I stuffed it inside an old, old, $10 Mac LCII case. Yeah, you know, those 1.4", smaller than 1U case. I haven't finished it, yet, as I have to hack at the case for the power supply to fit; the power supply is like 50mm and the free space inside is only 43mm. I have to carve up some plastic.

I'm seriously considering stuffing an old iMac mobo into one of those as my next project, and then pop in a fast 800MHz G4...

Re:I own an FV24!

[WasterDave]

One upped, a mate of mine did it with a Mac classic and a 9 inch monitor.

http://www.cooljazzmotherfucker.com/PCMods/

We played rocket arena off it (serving) for several hours the other day. It rocks.

Dave

Re:I own an FV24!

[2nd Post!]

Well, yeah, I saw that. Sorta inspired me.

Except that a Mac Classic has more volume than a Mac II LC (compare 13.2"x9.7"x11.2" vs 2.9"x12.2"x15.3"

Re:I own an FV24!

[Yakman]

I increated the CPU power in my Mac Classic:

http://www.zipworld.com.au/~marcins/fish.html

Re:I own an FV24!

[Hercynium]

*bragging mode on*

Think that's cool? I stuffed a complete Pentium MMX-based PC into an Apple ][e and even adapted the integrated keyboard to work! The only thing I couldn't figure out was how to get the composite greenscale monitor to work with the PC's VGA-out. God, I wish took pictures of that system!

Re:I own an FV24!

[ameoba]

Didn't the composite monitor use an RCA plug? I would assume you could use a video card with a RCA tv-out, and you'd be fine. Of course, I don't know how long ago this was, but the cards are really common these days.

Re:I own an FV24!

[Hercynium]

Yeah, but i think I did this about five or six years ago (I was still living with the 'rents then.) I'll just have to go to the local parts store and try it out on the Apple ][c I still have kicking around. :^)

Small iMac Footprint

[fuchikoma]

As far as anyone can tell so far (apple has JUST begun shipping their new beauties), the new iMac has the same botherboard as the Powerbook G4, with some added extras (daughtercard for GeForce2, etc). It actually uses SO-DIMMS.

I'm suprised no PC manufacurer has followed suit. Laptop mobo's are tiny AND heat-efficent, two specific features that are needed for Mini-PC's.

Re:Small iMac Footprint

[AnimeFreak]

Preformance, basically.

A PIII 1000 on a laptop differs from a PIII 1000 on a PC. You get more bang out of a normal PC motherboard than the one used in laptops.

Re:Small iMac Footprint

[Risc]

PC manufactures has already done that. The now discontinued Equium 2000 from toshiba was built with notebook technology. The motherboard, harddisk and cd is built into the stand of the display. It even used the same select bay system as toshibas real notebook Tecra 8000. It was no blockbuster so I guess we windows and Linux users rather buy a cheap square big box than a smaller, designed but expensive computer.

Re:Small iMac Footprint

[Anonymous Coward]

The IBM NetVista X is pretty much the PC version of the new iMac, Been on sale for more than a year.

I like the large cases...

[cuyler]

I have a full tower sized system since its easier to upgrade. The system I use now was oringinally a P150 w/16mb of ED0 ram and a 2.1gb hard disk. Slowly over time I've upgraded the parts, one by one. The first thing I got rid of was the mini-tower case that the computer came with. It was such a PITA to work with a mini-tower computer case.

I also find most Compaq and HP computer cases to be incredibly annoying to work in.

I can understand the merits of the mini-computer for individuals (like my sister) who want their computers to look cute, never being upgrading and having only three large buttons on the desktop - email, msn, and ebay.

Re:I like the large cases...

[Anonymous Coward]

when you have 15 full size towers in your apt, these mini-cases start to look appealing....

Idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Well seeing as everyone is complaining about the Savage video chipset, I think the next step would be for someone to make an nForce based board in this form factor.

I know that Fry's sells miniature computers with an 815 chipset and firewire. But they use laptop style floppy and cd. But on the other hand, they have a PCMCIA slot in them. Still kinda neat.

Damn...

[AbbeyHoffman]

But... I have 3 CD drives...

Only one PCI slot??

[juju2112]

This is kinda cool I guess, but c'mon... only 1 pci slot? What if I want to add a radio or tv card, or more usb ports, or a scsi card? Or whatever? Seems like you're sacrificing expandability just so it can look good. If you want to do that, why not just buy an iMac? Or even better, find yourself one of those Mac cubes.

Re:Only one PCI slot??

[HalfFlat]

The reasons one might want to go this route rather than an iMac include

• Price - for the small footprint, it's very inexpensive
• x86 architecture
• customizable to a greater degree

It's not perfect for every application, but it does suit some. I know I would have preferred 2 PCI slots, but there is a space restriction after all. Certainly with so much included with the motherboard, there is less need for PCI cards than usual: firewire can fulfill many of the SCSI applications; there is onboard networking; and there is onboard sound and video too, even if it's not great for gaming. For small server applications you could pop in that SCSI card; for a portable gaming box, you could find a decent PCI video card.

Re:Only one PCI slot??

[atam]

A radio or TV card?

You can plug in a radio or TV adaptor to the USB ports.

More USB ports?

That is what a 4-port USB hub is for.

SCSCI card?

Well, you can use it on the only 1 PCI slot. Besides, it has Firewire ports so you could possibly plug in external Firewire harddisk, tape drive, etc instead of using equivalent SCSI devices. OK, I concede that this Mini-PC is not as expandable as regular PC, but the expandability is not as bad as you think.

Re:Only one PCI slot??

[Anonymous Coward]

are the signals present on the board for adding another PCI slot?
Arent most of the signals shared?

Then something like this could be hacked:
http://www.barada.ca/BPCIRU2-2000.htm

Re:better mini computer...if you like downtime

[coltrane]

Read http://www-ccs.cs.umass.edu/~shri/iPic-demo.html

It's been down for over two years...I'll pass.

"Note: 1 Sep 1999: The iPic web-server is currently off-line, it will be back shortly. Meantime, please visit the mirror site below."

Mirror site of what's on the iPic FWIW.

Wrong Concept !

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm....what do we have here ? A (flex)ATX board in a tiny (but conventional) case. Nothing special if you ask me.

Myself I am in search of a small but tiny solution, a computer that acts as 24/7 server for network, printing, files, backup and multi-media and looks very well in my home.

Well...I did not find anything that comes close to my needs.Either I find myself limited to one external drive bay or I can't fit in the PCI card I'd like or both.

The current concepts are wrong for such tasks. ATX boards require ATX PSU and ATX cases. Period. I think we need to wait for some more modularity in the hardware world, some new inventions otherwise: ATX case.

If you want a tiny but powerfull machine than you need to go offroads. Meaning no ATX. On the other hand: Offroads you will only find toys or industrial stuff that was made with a completely different market in sight

I for myself want to have this:

• DVD (1x bay)
• CDRW (1x bay)
• at least 2 HDD (2 HDD bays/holders)
• Backup Solution, pref. Tape (1x bay)
• Firewire (onboard or PCI)
• SCSI (onboard or PCI)
• Matrox gfx (AGP)
• high-end soundcard (1xPCI)
• TV-Card (1x PCI)
• NIC (onboard or PCI ?)

Makes for at least three PCI, one AGP and three external drive bays. With todays tech, that is

So it seems to me I have to wait. There are hundreds of semi-solutions for me but they are all limited and hardly expandable. So no soultion for me.

Why not just buy an XBOX?

[Nathdot]

The hardware is sold as a loss-leader, and it'd have 3D abilities missing from the "mini"

Just a thought.

Re:Why not just buy an XBOX?

[MisterBlister]

Maybe because all you can do with an XBOX is play games?

Someday some hacker might figure out how to run Linux or even Win2K/WinXP on the XBOX, but even if it does happen, its a long time off..

Don't hold your breath!

New meaning....

[ImaLamer]

to linux box.

Perfect for someone who wants to build a file server, or a firewall. You know, ideal if you want it sitting on top of your existing PC.

I say stack'em up and imagine a you know what.

Re:New meaning....

[Anonymous Coward]

BEOWOLF CLUSTER !!!!!!!!!!! W0000000T. hehe.

- Sorry, couldn't resist.

Re:New meaning....

[GigsVT]

Actually, I did consider these in building a new cluster. Bottom line is that for $250 you can get a motherbord, weak PS and case, or for $100 you can get a normal cheap micro-ATX motherboard (with more slots if you ever want to use them) and cheap 300 watt micro-ATX case and PS. It's no contest. $150 more per computer with less upgradability (not that it matters much for a cluster) just to look cooler? I'd rather spend that on RAM for the nodes.

Re:New meaning....

[ImaLamer]

Your right, I'd be nowhere without two cd-roms in each computer and maybe a few hard drives.

This would be nice if you're loaded and don't mind buying a bunch of computers. Other than that, they should come pre-built.

I'd rather have two nicely equiped towers than four small computers. But I'm a home user. Give me 2.2 Ghz [if it wasn't a PIV] - a CDRW, DVD, good graphics card and a few 100GB drives. I'm happy. The ability to add things on is essential.

But if I was to build a cluster - it would be with this box. Could be good if you've got cash to spend and provide a TV interface. Hook it into your broadband and your home stereo. Instant everything.

But theres a PCI slot...

[xfs]

The article mentions (and shows) that there is an available PCI slot. Why not upgrade the video using that?

Here is a PCI TNT2 for $39 on mwave:

http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/doc/A13650.html

Mayhaps the card is too big for the box? It sure sounds a lot better then using that onboard video/shared memory...

Doesn't look like you'll have to worry about having to use that slot for anything else major... The board already has sound, network, firewire (yay), and usb... This would be a nice addition to your entertainment center in the living room given wireless keyboard/mouse + big TV :)

Build your own minicomputer?

[geojaz]

Isn't that so like... 1983?

Re:Build your own minicomputer?

[haggar]

Flamebait? For Heaven's sake, when am I going to metamoderate these jackasses? Everytime I decide to "metamoderate today", I see mostly sane moderations...

Slow graphics?

[c.r.o.c.o]

This question begs to be asked. Why isn't any company creating something like this but instead of the very, very slow S3 chips, use an Nvidia Nforce?

The Nforce is fast enough graphics-wise, as far as I'm concerned. I mean, I'm playing RTCW on a dual Celeron 466 w/ TNT2 32Mb... Yeah, I can't have all the special effects, and it only runs at 640x480, BUT IT WORKS! I've spent far too many hours playing it at this cappy resolution and I loved it. Granted, and Athlon XP2000+ w/ GeForce3 would blow my computer away, but it is also a few thousands more expensive. So on an Nforce, coupled with a newer CPU would be significantly faster.

Not to mention the fact that the Nforce has good sound capabilities too. And it supports the Athlon, which is also faster than the P3.

Honestly, I'm just waiting for the day when they're going to come out with this very same computer, but with an Athlon w/ the Nforce inside, and I'm buying it. I hope SpaceWalker is listening to me...

Re:Slow graphics?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're not gonna put an Athlon in there, it runs too hot.

Re:Slow graphics?

[cuyler]

NVidia has the GeForce2Go which would seem like the most likely candidate for the suggestion you put forth. Course the GeForce2Go is usually found in laptops but it has great performance.

I complain about my laptop getting 50fps in Quake 3, can't imagine what it's be like with shared video...

Re:Slow graphics?

[rhekman]

Thus spake c.r.o.c.o.:
Not to mention the fact that the Nforce has good sound capabilities too. And it supports the Athlon, which is also faster than the P3.

After a couple pages of this article, that's exactly what I was shouting! It's not just the sound either, NForce supports faster CPU's, has a better memory subsystem, has superior built-in graphics, has the absolute best chipset included sound available, and comes with half the ethernet chipset all ready to go. The thing that really struck me was THG putting a SB Live in -- with decent onboard sound (aha! NForce) that slot would be available for something else like a video editing board or extra NIC. Also, why not mention a DVD+CDRW for the 5 1/2" drive option?

A couple of other things I'd do in addition if I were updating this thing: First put a larger quality copper heatsink in there, as big as will fit all the way up to the HD. Only then cut a notch in the fins to allow a PCI card. With the bigger heatsink, put the fan for it on the side of the unit with intake holes in the case. I'd replace the single rear fan with two quieter ones and add tons of rubber washers and shrouds were appropriate.

Those mods should allow a decent speed Duron while cutting down on the noise without an increase in heat build up. I'd buy and recommend something like that. Shuttle, Asus, MSI, are you listening?

Regards,
Reid

Re:Slow graphics?

[ameoba]

Well, perhaps it has something to do with Nforce boards being ridiculously expensive, or forcing you to use an ultra-hot AMD chip in a tiny case with poor cooling?

The mobo was designed and released before the case was, the case was just a proof-of-concept thing that took off. Face it, uATX boards aren't marketed at performance freaks, they're marketed at OEMs who are building small, cheap systems for office drones. (Come on, look at the chipset they're using. It's a budget-system chipset)

No marketing department in their right mind would build a machine with all those integrated components for a performance-oriented market. Top of the line products change too often. Doesn't nvidia release a new product every 9mo? You can't stick that many things on a board and make obsessive hardware freaks happy with all of them.

Blah give me my fullsized tower

[Kasmiur]

One night when hauling it to a lan party dang thing fell off a truck. Twisted the case some and made me lost a nic card I forgot to screw in. But otherwise dang thing is still cookin. Drop one of the minni ones and poof probably ruin whole box.

Also the smaller case is a good idea but where would I set my soda then?

Re:Blah give me my fullsized tower

[Anonymous Coward]

One night when hauling it to a lan party dang thing fell off a truck.

Ya should have tied it up in the back, alonside yer pitbull.

... dang thing is still cookin. Drop one of the minni ones and poof probably ruin whole box.

You're one of those guys who drives a 1-ton pickup because those little imports can't be any good, right?

Also the smaller case is a good idea but where would I set my soda then?

On your little sister's flat, inbred, cro-magnon head.

Re:Blah give me my fullsized tower

[EvanTaylor]

feeding a troll but... smaller would actually be better, first of all it wouldnt drop, second of all if it did it would be stronger.

Stupid

[seanadams.com]

I'm just amazed by the number of posts along the lines of:

* What, only one PCI slot? Stingy bastards.
* No on-board 3D video, wtf?
* All the peripherals are integrated - what if I want a 3com NIC instead of Realtek?
* How am I supposed to fit my three CDROM drives into this?

Guys - this is EXACTLY THE FRIGGIN POINT. Believe it or not, there are other people in the world besides you, and many of us have been waiting for exactly this kind of integration in commodity PCs for quite some time. Not everybody wants to spend weeks building the Ultimate Gaming Machine - some of us have real work to do and we just want a reasonably fast machine without all the hassle. Small is great when you need several machines in a rack, or you want to stash the machine neatly behind your monitor. This machine is perfect for me - I have several Linux and Windows workstations, plus a couple of FreeBSD servers, all with empty slots and drive bays, so this would be a much better replacement for all those bullky mid-towers.

If you want five PCI slots, a $400 video card, surround sound, 1TB of hard disk space, etc, then this product is not for you. It's not designed for you, it's not being marketed to you, so why are you complaining that it doesn't fit the bill?

I'm surprised it's taken this long. Large cases date back to the days when you'd need a separate card for your serial/parallel, IDE, VGA, etc, and a bunch of drive bays for a pair of 5.25" drives, a newfangled 3.5" drive, and so on. There are still plenty of uses for that space, sure, but not so much in "mainstream" PCs any more.

Re:Stupid

[doorbot.com]

It's not designed for you, it's not being marketed to you, so why are you complaining that it doesn't fit the bill?

Stupid is right. But that's the same kind of mentality those paranoid dillusional types have when they think that the NSA is spying on them. In actuality, they're the most boring people alive and don't do anything even remotely illegal, but somehow they think that they're so important, and so special, that they're being watched at all times.

Re:Stupid

[Glorat]

I think you've got half the point here. There is definitely a market for small machines but there is a conflict of interests here. You say you have several Linux and Windows workstations, plus a couple of FreeBSD servers and that there are other people in the world besides you (i.e geek type), and many of us have been waiting for exactly this kind of integration in commodity PCs for quite some time

Yes, so as a result, I reckon these things could sell very well at the low end market. All my uncles and aunts don't care about games. Heck, they still hear of things thing called Word Processor to write their articles and maybe possibly want to learn email. A low end compact device like this would be great for them

But the article says build your own machine. Now no newbie would go building their own machine let alone one like this and if you have several workstations to build yourself then probably no. You will get your Dell or whoever to mass build them for you and quality assurance since that is what you want as a business

And what about the geeks? Well frankly, we do want all the 3D graphics and super dooper CPU's. And myself, I built myself a cheapo machine for $500 or so but the thing I am most happy about is its upgradeability. Rather than having to upgrade the entire machine (which you would have to do with the integrated boards) I can upgrade component by component which is just that much harder to do with compact machines

Re:Stupid

[NeuroManson]

In the Mini PC business, note that most of the systems are geared towards the Japanese market... Where a studio apartment on average is smaller than some folks' bedrooms, an ultra compact PC is ideal...

Re:Stupid

[Barrow_Boy]

3 cd-rom drives? doh! stick a scsi card in that pci slot and you can have a ton of cd-drives. a scsi card would really make this a cool server box. i am gonna get a few and stack them high.

i saw one of these babys at the local lug the other day and it was running linux great, and looking good!

Re:Stupid

[tempmpi]

The article is by tomshardware, sure it says build your own machine, because most if not all of the readers of tomshardware build their own machines. But I also the that these case has really chance to enter the "aunt, uncles and newbie" market. Barebones are really great for small computer stores. Just add a CPU, some ram and a harddisk and you can sell a complete computer. Sure that wouldn't be as successfull as selling it at fry's, but it would be a start and I think the sv24 is already clear success for shuttle.
Also you ask if geeks would buy that barebone. You said they wouldn't buy it because it is too slow and not upgradeable. I think you forgot something here, sure geeks wouldn't buy it as their main working machine but it is a really good case for every geek that wants to build a small pc for a special purpose like a small fileserver or a mp3 player, or just a pc to surf the web in the living room.
I think this is a great computer for both the newbie and the geek.

Re:Stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm...where'd that come from?

Working for the NSA perhaps?
...Or just watching too much propaga^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hteevee?

Re:Stupid

[spudnic]

I got one of these to use as a portable storage box. I prefer this to a laptop because I can use standard components in it (100Gig HD, Plextor CD-RW, PIII-1000, 512M RAM). I use it mainly when I'm doing consulting onsite, most of the time headless just as a personal file server of sorts. I always have all of my files with me and don't have to worry about filling up a (comparatively) small laptop hard drive. I've also used it when having to do presentations and product demos. Thanks to vmware, I have just about any operating system I need on here.

I bought a Fender OEM handle like they use on their amps and screwed it into the top. It works great! I get to a site, plug in power and network, turn it on and go. Not to mention the comments I get about it. Even though it kind of looks like a frankenstein box, it has its own charm in person.

For the right application, this is a great little box. It's not meant to be everything to everybody. If it's not what you're looking for, go get something else. But don't put it down because you're trying to make it into something it was never intended to be. Admit to yourself that you could imagine a situation where a system like this could be usefull and move on.

Re:Stupid

[tumbaumba]

But that's the same kind of mentality those paranoid dillusional types have when they think that the NSA is spying on them.

Well, well.
I have quad Athlon XP with Nvida in it, and I know NSA is after me.

Re:Stupid

[jually]

Building your own machine doesn't necessarily mean you want to build HAL, and it definitely does not exclude newbies from building what they need. Face it, you do not consider what other people do with their time and effort to be on par with your endeavors, and that makes your perspective myopic (well, that's nicer than saying you're wrong, right?)

If you *really* wanted a sooper dooper CPU, you'd be after a Digital 21164...y'know, what they build Cray's out of?

From my own experience, upgrading a PC is often more expensive than buying a new one, and you don't get the satisfaction you'd derive from, say, rebuilding a '65 GTO. More like rebuilding a Playdoh jackhammer...

Subpar Video?

[x136]

Well, if you don't like the video, make use of the PCI slot. Ditch the sound card. ATI just announced a PCI Radeon 7000 for the Mac, so I would imagine it's either already out or coming soon for the PC. Sure it's PCI, but it'll still spank a Savage4. Plus, the Radeon 7000 has a DVI port, so you could hook up a nice LCD display.

Having said that, I'd love to see one of these slightly taller, with either 2 PCI slots, or a PCI and an AGP slot. Then there wouldn't be much to complain about! (Actually, I wonder if there would be room for another card with the floppy gone? I mean, who needs a floppy anyway?)

As others have pointed out, it isn't nearly as attractive as the new iMac, I wouldn't mind having it on my desk next to one. :)

Re:Subpar Video?

[Calle Ballz]

If I had mod points you'd be getting one. I was going to say the same thing...

Right now in one of my boxes I have a voodoo3 3000 PCI video card which has played q2, q3a and cs just perfectly... and those are the only video games I play. Next paychecks one of these badboys is mine.

Now if there was only a way to make my 19" trinitron monitor about 60 lbs less than it is now...

Re:Subpar Video?

[Leto-II]

Actually, I wouldn't bet on the PCI Radeon having DVI output. I bought another mini computer (much better looking than the shuttle box, I think -- an MSI 6215) and am using a PCI Radeon AIW. They dumbed it down a bit from the AGP version. For one it's just got SDR ram instead of DDR. And they also took out the DVI.

Re:Subpar Video?

[Howie]

Having said that, I'd love to see one of these slightly taller

Try the ASUS Terminator then. 2 PCI slots, 2 3.5" bays, 2 5.25" bays. A bit more plasticky too though.

Re:Subpar Video?

[The Fred]

Ok, the case takes a flex-atx motherboard. The motherboard which TH looked at is not the only one available in the world. I know for a fact that ASUS makes at least one Flex-ATX board. Look around, maybe you can find one with an AGP slot or multiple pci slots, and generally better hardware.

Hack that box, that's what we're here for anyways.

Re:Subpar Video?

[man_ls]

I used floppies to boot into Win2K install. Apparently, burned discs aren't bootable, even from ISO images...wait, I didn't say that.

Anyways, I still use floppies...not often though, but in VERY necessary situations.

mini-computer?

[Anonymous Coward]

When I read the story, I thought they were going to teach me how to build a REAL mini computer. not some stupid x86 box. When did mini computer stop meaning mini computer (as opposed to a mainframe) and start meaning a small x86 box?

Re:mini-computer?

[Cid Highwind]

When did mini computer stop meaning mini computer (as opposed to a mainframe) and start meaning a small x86 box?

When the last real minicomputer was replaced with an x86 box of 1/100th the size and twice the computing power, or sometime around 1988.
Sheesh, yet another grumpy oldtimer :-)

Re:mini-computer?

[Anonymous Coward]

or sometime around 1988.

Except for the several billion dollars of AS/400 gear that IBM still ships every year.

Re:mini-computer?

[Anonymous Coward]

>When did mini computer stop meaning mini computer...

Since Microsoft brainwashed them with windblows 3.0

Mini-Case

[Anonymous Coward]

I really liked this idea, I would put one together myself but I really have no use for a highly portable fast computer with a peice of crap S3 video card. I purchased a Coolermaster ATC-200 for its lightweight frame, so it was easier to transport to lan events, but I'd REALLY love to have a computer the size of a toaster, because, well I'd stick it in my toastmaster toaster case and stick some orange neons in!

2002 iMac has 1 DIMM, 1 SO-DIMM

[extra88]

The pre-installed RAM comes in a standard, 168pint DIMM slot which apparently is a bitch to get at. The "user-upgradable" slot is an SO-DIMM accessed by unscrewing the bottom plate. I haven't read how you're supposed to tilt it to avoid damage to the LCD while installing the RAM or AirPort card.

I think the original iMacs used SO-DIMMs, until they came out with the Indigo, which had 168pin DIMMs.

Re:2002 iMac has 1 DIMM, 1 SO-DIMM

[daniel_isaacs]

The pre-installed RAM comes in a standard, 168pint DIMM slot which apparently is a bitch to get at.

But enough about my PowerMac 8500... :)

Re:2002 iMac has 1 DIMM, 1 SO-DIMM

[extra88]

Dammit, you just made me have a nasty flashback. I'm gonna go spend a few hours in my special place.

BTW, that's a 168pin slot. A 168 pint slot would be pretty damn big ;)

Another similar, but better looking case

[Nerant]

Soldam also has something similar. Pandora

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, those Pandora rock :-) The only gripe I have is that now I'm looking somewhere to know how much EUR is 38,800 yens :-)

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[arjennienhuis]

330, but they only ship in the USA

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[gizmo_mathboy]

From reading the specs it looks to be the exact same system (Shuttle SV24 is the mobo and the case interior looks to be the same).The only thing changed is the exterior. Admittedly, the Pandora looks nicer to me than the SpaceWalker in my opinion.

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[Anonymous Coward]

Yahoo has a currency calculator. Also, they only ship to the USA and that costs another ~15,000 yen (I asked).

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[gid]

Different power supply, different arrangement of the HDD, rear fan is in a different place, and it sports the word "quiet" on it, which is always welcome. Also the pci slot is straight up, no angle adapter is needed. I kinda like the looks of the front of this one better.

I own a shuttle SV24, nice little box, but it's quite noisy. A better/quieter rear fan is going to be my first mod to it.

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.xe.com/ucc/ says it's 330 EUR or 300 US$.

Re:Another similar, but better looking case

[Greedo]

One advantage to the Pandora case that immediately comes to mind: two 5.25" bays at the front means one for a DVD/CD-ROM, and the other for an LCD insert from Matrix Orbital or Crystal Fontz (although, I doubt they make cool translucent inserts ... time to get a Dremel!).

Why they don't make an LCD insert for a 3.5" drive bay is beyond me ...

Mini-Computer ?

[Anonymous Coward]

If Digital made PDP-8's like this, perhaps they wouldn't of been bought out.

hmmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a hard core Mac fan, and even i like this small PC. It had the one things new Mac's don't, audio ports. Built in firewire is great (IEEE1394 for you PC nuts), thank god it isn;t USB 2.0. Gigabit ethernet would be nice, but we are comparing it to an iMac afterall, so that evens out. I think the design has a ways to go still, but it's a good start towards small PC's that inclide most everything you need. I feel the addition of the NForce chipset, ad someone mentioned earlier would be perfect.

Place for those nForce things

[Isldeur]

You know, this could be the perfect place for those embedded NVidia nForce chipsets. That way you could have reasonable 3D as well.

Re:Place for those nForce things

[Anonymous Coward]

What's with the 3d thing?

Does it make your xterm or emacs run any faster?

I just bought my first 3d card (GeForce2 MX) because the shop was out of the Matrox cards I usually buy. It took me a while to realise that in order to get 3d working under Linux I had to download proprietary driver software. No go. I hope someone points NVidia's wrong licensing out to RMS.

not good for a/v component

[tap]

I've got one of these at work to make an X-terminal out of. It comes with three fans, a 60x10mm fan on the short heatsink that sounds like a jet engine, a rather noisy 60x25mm fan as the case exhaust, and a tiny 25mm fan in the power supply. Even without a hard drive, it's a very noisy machine.

In order to quiet it down, I got a low power VIA C6 CPU for it, the 800Mhz samuel2 1.6V model. I couldn't find the C3 ezra 1.3V cpu for sale anywhere at the time. The small heatsink wasn't enough to cool the chip without the fan. I've ordered the Alpha PAL6035 heatsink to see if that will cool the C3 ok without a fan. There isn't much space in the case to put a large heatsink in. The intel OEM PIII heatsink is too wide, so is the Alpha PAL8045 and Thermalright SK6. The Swiftech MCX370 should fit, and I think the Zalman heatsinks can fit if you cut and bend some of the fins and don't have a harddrive.

Re:not good for a/v component

[aD docwolf]

If you still need to use the fan, the low-profile Golden Orb does work with this box.

The noise that this box generates is pretty heinous. And unfortunately, the loudest fan is in the power supply. Unless you wish to void the warranty, there isn't much you can do yet, b/c no aftermarket powersupply fits in this case.

Re:not good for a/v component

[cinnerz]

I've had good luck with the Alpha U60-V25C cooling off the chip w/o a fan. It's a pretty small heatsink, but it seemed to do the job.

Re:not good for a/v component

[dashuhn]

I'm using exactly this system as an a/v component, but in order to silence it, I had to go to some lengths:

• I completely removed the power supply fan. To do si, I
  • Removed the cover of the power-supply
  • Attached 486 heatsinks to the two puny heatsinks in the power supply
  • Turned the power supply around 180 so that the new heatsinks are fully exposed to the air that comes in through the vent holes in the front.
• Removed the fan in the back
• Removed the CPU fan
• Now here's the hard part: I added a carefully cut-out piece of sheet aluminum horizontally into the chassis, so that the whole chassis is divided into an upper part (housing the two drive bays) and a lower part (hosing power supply and board).
• In order to achieve a defined air-flow, I then added a thermo-controlled 80mm fan (Papst) to the piece of sheet aluminum right above the CPU heatsink.
• The two chassis halves are now sealed. Therefore I had to cut small openings into the piece of sheet aluminum to allow the cabling to pass. In order to keem them small, I used rounded cables for IDE etc. and wrapped the power cabling with special cable wrapping tube.

The effect of the whole operation is a well-defined air-flow inside the chassis. The horizontal fan doubles as a CPU fan (at least good enough to keep a Celeron 900 at And last but not least my Linux experiences:

• Sound AC97 works
• Networking works
• APM works
• Video (S3 Savave) works, but the Savage driver has some problems with Xv, therefore video has to be played back in the slower XShm mode.
• USB works
• Hardware sensors work
• Firewire yet untested.

Re:not good for a/v component

[dashuhn]

Oh, yeah. BTW: the described procedure WILL void your warranty :-)

PCI GeForce?

[Viceice]

THere is a limited quantity of GeForce2 MX with a PCI interface in the market. Anyone ever thought of getting taht? even if it's to hard to find I'm sure any OEM will make at least a TNT2 for PCI if they were to include it in the box or sold as as option

Re:PCI GeForce?

[inkypi]

I have one of these boxes with an ASUS GeForce 2 MX400 PCI in the expansion slot. It took some work to get it to fit in the case around all of the cables, but it's in there and it works fine. I left the machine on for 36 hours straight and there were no problems. By the way, I use this as my lan gaming machine, and it works perfectly. Of course, I've had to tone down the graphic detail on Ghost Recon, but it is eminently playable. For non 3D or semi 3D games like D2 and Starcraft, this machine is awesome for convenience. I have mine set up with a P3-1G, 512M PC133CL2 SDRAM, and a WD 1000BB-SE hard drive. It's simply awesome.

Although I love it, there's always some downside: it is VERY loud. My "real" gaming machine is housed in a Lian-Li PC68 case (4 fans), runs Cheetah XL15 and Cheetah 73.4M 10k drives and it's running dual P3 1G, and the little Spacewalker is much louder than the big one! Also, the AC97 sound seems to click and pop in a couple of games - something to do with the interrupts, I hear (?). Putting it together is a bit of an adventure too. On the other hand, put the Lian Li next to the Spacewalker and it looks like a family reunion.

Badly drawn wendigo

[Graymalkin]

I saw one of these at Fry's a couple weeks ago and thought it looked pretty cool. For the complaining Frank does about the video chip it is a pretty keen little box and may very well be the start of a trend if it becomes popular. Consumer systems didn't always used to be two and a half foot metal and plastic monstrocities. I really like the look of the old SparcStations or the Quadra 610 and at times even the LCII/III. Why do PCs have to be so damn big and bulky. It wouldn't kill anybody to have a full fledged PC the size of a Playstation. I would have gotten a much smaller case for my PCs had they been available. I want something I can easily tuck under my desk, next to my monitor, or under my router.

Not cute....

[tbien]

Sorry, but that thing look like a shrunk PC and thats definitely not cute.

Re:Not cute....

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yes it is.

Computers are just like operating systems.

The less you have to pay attention to them the better they are.

I don't understand.

[Anonymous Coward]

What does "friggin" mean? Did you mean "fucking" instead?

Re:I don't understand.

[Anonymous Coward]

What does "friggin" mean? Did you mean "fucking" instead?

frig (vulg.) v.i. and v.t. to masturbate : loosely, to have sexual intercourse with: (often with about) to potter about : (with off) to go away

frigging : masturbation : pottering about.

So "frigging" (or friggin') is not identical in meaning to "fucking" but you did get the general idea right, yes.

Hopefully this has helped to expand your vocabulary.

Re:I don't understand.

[Anonymous Coward]

I like Linux. Linux is the best. I think that everyone should have Linux on his computer.

Learn about Linux at Red Hat.

Mini-computers from the retail world

[innit]

I picked up a splendid little PC just before Christmas. It was second hand, and not particularly well specced, but it's absolutely perfect for playing MP3s and DivX movies.

It's a Celeron 400, with 64Mb RAM, 4.3gb disk, 52x CD ROM, onboard VGA (including composite and s-video TV-out), USB, Sound, 100-baseT network; and I picked it up for £89 GBP ($129) second hand. It doesn't have any expansion slots though, so if you're not happy with any of the onboard peripherals you're a bit stuffed.

It's not quite as small as the ones in this article, but it's definately cute, and goes well with all my AV equipment. I'm currently looking for a wireless keyboard and mouse for it.

Pictures here: front , rear

They don't make this particular model any more of course with that spec, but I do believe they sell a "modern day" equivalent, for about 700 quid, with a TFT screen and a 1Ghz processor or something, I didn't pay much attention to the new one.

Cute :-)

Stuii!

Re:Mini-computers from the retail world

[really?]

Akihabara if full of those small "pizza box" type barebones.

As for this "minicomputer" ... OLD news, and I believe it's been on Slashdot before ....

Re:Mini-computers from the retail world

[spudnic]

That's a Book PC. You can still find them at several places on the 'net. They really are good little boxes.

Ok, someone went and changed the definition...

[Sycraft-fu]

...of mini computer. Last time I checked the computers we normally used were "micro" computers. Minis are the thigns that are bigger than that, but not big enough to be a mainfram yet. A good example would be the Sun 10000 we have at work. It's huge 8 processor server with a ton of disks, in a rather large box. Too big to be in teh same category as the desktops, but not as big as the supercomputer up stairs (a mainframe). So it's a mini.

Re:Ok, someone went and changed the definition...

[Anonymous Coward]

the e10k is a 64 processor platform. your configuration is rather cheap, only two populated system boards.

Re:Ok, someone went and changed the definition...

[LatJoor]

That's why the *article* never says "minicomputer", it says "mini-PC". It's just Slashdot that said "minicomputer". Really, guys, you're supposed to be geeks and should know better.

Re:Ok, someone went and changed the definition...

[Anonymous Coward]

amazing, you could even figure out how to use quotes around the word "mini-computer", why couldnt the editors? why they don't make a serious effort to improve the site is beyond me. they've become complacent and lazy. we are clearly demanding a better quality when 1/3rd of the articles in a day have some absolutely obvious misinformation to any REAL geek. an xbox emulator? even *I* knew it was an impossible product before i read a single comment. you want to know how? I learned all about the differences between an xbox and a pc by READING SLASHDOT. do the editors READ SLASHDOT or just use usto demand money from the corporate masters?

Re:Ok, someone went and changed the definition...

[haggar]

I, too, was amazed at the stupidity of calling this a mini.

I really don't know who is running Slashdot, geeks or a bunch of PHBs.

A sad reality

[Anonymous Coward]

At first i did not see anything special about this case of this article - small form factor PC's have been a reality in the corporate world for years (Compaq Deskpro EN, Dell GX150) etc and as such hold no surprising news for most of us - i mean come on this is simply a small case PC basically. It has lousy graphics but as its aimed at the SOHO and consumer market thats not a major issue.

So whats the story here ?

Then i thought about it and had a look at the number of slashdot posters with academic and university/college email addresses and thats when i remembered something i had forgotten. Most of the posters on here have no grasp on the real world - their idea of a PC is a 1.4gig Athlon monster with 200gb of HDD and 5 GB RAM running an esoteric linux build which requires all new software to be compiled using a backwards Sanskrit compilier piping output to a braille terminal (sort of like trying to get Div-x to work simply under any linux build really)

That would explain why this is news to them, and why the only stories that generate posts are Pro Linux and or Anti MS (most of the best get half the posts of the others)

Grow up people! The PC is a consumer level device now at sub $1000 prices, thats why the average home user buys Packard Bell or HP or Dell or Compaq pre-loaded with Windows and Office - they dont care about overclocking, heat transferrance, efficiency of named constructs or what color socks Richard Stallman is wearing (my bets on grey to match his personality, or maybe red to match his politics)

This is a waste of time story.

Re:Can you post a pic?

[2nd Post!]

Um, sure, I guess :)

From the outside it's just... a Mac LC II.

So far the power supply is still a tad to big... I'll put up some pics on my Mac homepage tomorrow or something.

Re:changed the definition...minicomputer/midrange

[Anonymous Coward]

Like my AS/400, picked up second-hand - rather than letting it be scrapped, I grabbed it. AS/400 is the same level as the VAX. and several other machines of that era - not big enough to be mainframes, not small enough to be microcomputers/personal computers. Come to think of it, I got offered a PDP 11/45 once, but didn't have the room for a five foot high box in my flat. Pity - I think it got scrapped.

Relax

[r1_unknown]

It is amazing the amount of flaming responses an article gets here on /. One would think that this article poses some sort of threat. So the article was entitled 'Mini PC', rather than 'Miniature PC' (although, mini is usually equivalent to miniature), which apparently confused a bunch of people into thinking it was about building a minicomputer. Then you have all the grousing and carping about its limitations (subpar video, lack of expansion options, etc)... Some of these guys are so upset their typing/spelling abilities just came apart. Relax, guys, its just an article that was posted for your edification and enjoyment - BTW, it is pretty cool (the mini PC),but not for me.

Re:Relax

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, Mini PC is not at all confusing. Mini-computer, the term used by the post's author seems to indicate the (now considered) giant computers of old. The computers we use now are microcomputers.

not as sexy but...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.itox.com/pages/products/cases/cobra/bCo braSpec.cfm

(for some reason the link above comes out separated. fix where obvious)

and

http://www.itox.com/pages/pdf/BabyCobra.pdf

No heat problems, and much smaller.
I have one of these, the only downfall is that it does not have a CD-ROM, I use a DVD share off of another machine in combination with VNC to do everything I need to. Two nics, a hard disk, and PIII 1Ghz and it does everything I need my server to do.

Imagine...

[willum448]

A beowulf cluster of these!

Re:Imagine...

[lposeidon]

they need to make one that can handle alpha chips. now that would be a beowulf cluster ;)

What about this one from Gateway?

[DudemanX]

I think this is a slicker way to do the tiny-PC than anything Apple or Shuttle are doing. Laptops have been around for a while now. It's odd that no one thought to just stand one up and flip the screen over to turn into into a very low profile desktop PC untill recently. Or do they have laptops that can dock like that these days?

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe you should read the mod before commenting. He obviously was trying to be funny. It was a poor attempt but obvious not in seriousness.

in wood

[Anonymous Coward]

maybe OT but look at http://home.c2i.net/fisherking

power and heat problems

[tempmpi]

An nForce in this case would be very nice, but I think that it wouldn't be easy to solve the heat and power problems of this combination.
Now the case contains a 145 w power supply, when you want to add a athlon and nforce you would need at least 250 W.
Also needed is a special cooler, because there isn't enough space in the case to mount a standard athlon cooler. I think that these problems aren't easy to solve. I think they could maybe solve these problems if they find a good way to use the case as a heatsink.

Re:power and heat problems

[Howie]

Actually, one of the few recent mobo reviews I've seen without a fan on the northbridge (only a heatsink) was for an nForce board: the MSI K7N420 Pro.

Re:power and heat problems

[tempmpi]

I don't think that the heat of the nForce is the problem, the athlon is the real heat problemmaker here. If a northbridge has a fan or not is more a marketing trick than anything else, almost no northbridge really needs one. Hardcore gamers wouldn't buy a nForce anyway, so you don't need a fan to sell your board to that market.

Re:power and heat problems

[rhekman]

tempmpi said:
Now the case contains a 145 w power supply, when you want to add a athlon and nforce you would need at least 250 W.

Actually the wattage of the PSU isn't the problem, it's the current output. P4 systems get their amps from the PSU's 12V line while K7's get current from the 3.3 and 5V lines. A well chosen power supply and your problem is solved. I find it interesting that the planned update to the Shuttle unit is stated to be a P4, given its thirst for juice.

Heat dissipation would be less of a problem if a Duron is used -- which still beats the pants of the Celeron (or C3). I still think this thing needs a big side-blower copper heatsink with shroud though.

Regards,
Reid

drivers license and car vs. SpaceWalker

[Dr. JackAzone]

I just can't decide, I have the money for a drivers license and a cheap car(approx. 4000 in US$) but this litle thingie looks so cute, I meen all I have to do would be to put in a nice geforce2 MX400 and one of my spare blocks of 512MB ram, buy my a hub and somekind of a switch for keyboard, mouse, monitor and speakers preferably in one switchbox. I could just take the bus for the rest of my life right? who needs a car? on the other hand I could just get the car and the gadget here
who needs a drivers license?
and maybe even a new flatscreen to go in the car

AMD model, an alternative, and experiences...

[Anonymous Coward]

There was a Shuttle mini-site that showed an upcoming AMD based SV24-alike --- I think the SV31? 35? Hopefully it'll be out soon. I couldn't find *any* information *anywhere* about a release date at the time (mid-December).

Also, there are alternatives. FIC have a similarly endowed model, the Sabre 1815.

The FIC has a thinner footprint when sitting upright. Form factor is the differentiator, imho, when choosing between these, because they are both rock-solid in terms of construction. The Shuttle *is* much cuter, tho. (The FIC came with two little cradle-feet to serve as a base, as well as a really slim but great cpu fan.) Read the review, of course, for the goods on the Shuttle.

For the record, both models run and install Mandrake 8.1 and RedHat7.2 just dandy. As well as Win2k Server, although for Win2k I had to install the drivers that came along with these fine foxen' boxen on CDROM. What?! Linux install was easier? Someone is doing something right. Good going you hax0rzz.

The FIC/RedHat combo did get a little fussy during install due to something weird with the screen bring at 60Hz, but that went away when I changed modes after login. Could have been the monitor, but I have a feeling it may have been the 815 chip. No biggie tho.

These things got snatched up like candy during the Christmas rush.

Happy minicomputing. Hah.

Re:AMD model, an alternative, and experiences...

[augustz]

I'd like to see an nforce based integrated system that scaled better in this form factor (ie AMD 1.2Ghz). Then you'd have 5.1 sound and decent graphics (or add a high end graphics card) and could pretty much have a state of the art machine in a nice tiny formfactor, perfect for the college student going to school and back.

Hopefully they wouldn't forget DVI out for those with LCD panels.

Wow!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's... an ugly version of the Mac cube.

DIY lacks aesthetic apeal

[doggo]

DIY is okay I guess if aesthetics are not an issue. But I gotta say, I haven't seen a decent looking case yet that's not part of a manufacturer's system.

Trust me, I've looked at probably every case vendor's web site. They all look "cool" if you're a high school kid. I mean c'mon, you gotta be kidding! What do they do, have the president of the company's nephew do the industrial design?

I think I'll stick with the big manufacturers for cool small computer design.

But then again, most people here are looking for horsepower and upgradablitly, not sleek lines.

I needed a display stand...

[TicTacTux]

...so I bought this and that. Not as geeky as the shuttle thingie, not as fast as the bleeding edge, but a tad cheaper... Most important: Everything is supported under Linux, hehe.

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[rbeattie]

Yeah, this title had me confused too...

I think the Slashdot editors are too young to know that a "mini-computer" used to be the term for a computer smaller than the room sized monoliths they used to have at like IBM and a "micro-computer" is what is also called a PC.

Tom's has the right title, "build your own mini-PC".

-Russ

replace ATX???

[Cynikal]

where do i put my 4x raid array?
my 2nd nic for my home network?
my removable HD bay, cdrom and cd-rw with only one bay?
how about my firewire card?

ok yea, its cute, and its a nice idea for ppl who dont want to upgrade in the slightest, but even boards with only 2 pci slots in them dont get much market cause most ppl want to upgrade alot.

i think they have a good concept that might sell to some people, but i think its pretentious to say that it will replace ATX, the whole AT/ATX concept is built on scalability, take that waya and you have you're own use once and throw away computer.
yea, 1mhz with 1gb ram sounds decent now.. but someday it wont even be good enough to donate to a 3rd world country.

Re:replace ATX???

[Anonymous Coward]

>where do i put my 4x raid array?

in a raid enclosure where it belongs

>my 2nd nic for my home network?

get a router

>my removable HD bay, cdrom and cd-rw with only one bay?

why do you need a cdrom if you have a cdrw?

>how about my firewire card?

FIC sabre 1815 has 2 1394 ports onboard and similar size

>ok yea, its cute, and its a nice idea for ppl who dont want to upgrade in the slightest

i just upgraded my "mini" to an 800mhz, 60gbHD, 512MB ram, have a pci video card, pci audio card with digital i/o, and raid controller

>pretentious to say that it will replace ATX, the whole AT/ATX concept is built on scalability

ATX isnt "scalable", you just have empty slots right now. you cannot add more. THAT is not scalabilty.

>take that waya and you have you're own use once and throw away computer.

no, you find another use for it.

Re:replace ATX???

[Anonymous Coward]

> where do i put my 4x raid array?

On your LAN.

> my 2nd nic for my home network?

And how about a 3rd nic to talk to your printer. And a 4th for ICQ chatting, and a 5th for Quake games. Or wait...could the same bits go over the same wire, and be handled differently based on various packet criteria?

> my removable HD bay, cdrom and cd-rw with only one bay?

It has USB and firewire built in, so outside the box. (Yes, there are *removable* external firewire drives).

> how about my firewire card?

It's built in...if it weren't, this would be pretty fscked as far as expansion.

Re:replace ATX???

[Anonymous Coward]

thx for the flame:)

>> where do i put my 4x raid array?

>On your LAN.

i'm not a company, i'm a person w/ 2 computers.. the whole reason i would use 4x raid striping is for seed.. my lan would choke that speed.. and no way am i gonna pay for more periphials just to work with my mini comp..

> my 2nd nic for my home network?

>And how about a 3rd nic to talk to your >printer. And a 4th for ICQ chatting, and a 5th >for Quake games. Or wait...could the same bits >go over the same wire, and be handled >differently based on various packet criteria?

ok more details: 2 computers, with net sharing, cant afford a router, wont pay for a 2nd ip to my dsl..

> my removable HD bay, cdrom and cd-rw with only one bay?

>It has USB and firewire built in, so outside >the box. (Yes, there are *removable* external ?>firewire drives).

so i have to buy more stuff and hook everything up externaly? sorry, not in my budget..

>> how about my firewire card?

>It's built in...if it weren't, this would be >pretty fscked as far as expansion.

sorry, didnt notice that was in it.. but my argument remains that without a decent amount of space and expansion slots, this comp doesnt fit my needs, and i imagine the needs of many other users.

i'm not saying its useless, it would certainly work nicely as a workstation for a school or bussiness, but then again again so would an imac..

Re:replace ATX???

[90XDoubleSide]

The simple answer is that if you buy a new machine every 2-3 years you don't ever need to upgrade anything except the RAM and perhaps the HDD; this has been the philosophy behind the iMac since it's introduction. Certainly a lot of /. users will probably want the slots, but the average home user today will probably never use any of their PCI slots. The average /. user will also just upgrade their components and have everything new except the case every 2 years, but for the average user it's easier (and much cheaper if they can't do the labor themselves) to buy a new machine every 2 years, so these new compact machines definitely have a market, unfortunately this company is unlikely to reach it; it really has to be released be a company with good retail presence to reach the home market (I wonder who that will be now that both Gateway and Compaq are bleeding red ink like it's going out of style?).

The important thing about this machine (and about the iMac) is that it has FireWire built in. This is important not only because you would ordinarily be using one of your PCI slots for it, but because it will fuel all of your external expansion, such as HDDs and RAIDs, extra optical drives, etc.

Re:replace ATX???

[man_ls]

It'd still make a nice LAN box...

I agree about the upgradeability. My motherboard has 5 PCI slots and that's not enough...I've got 1 left and am trying to decide between another IDE controller or another serial controller (I have a ton of older legacy devices that connect by COM port.) Other than that, I've got *2* SCSI cards, NIC, 56k modem, sound. One of the SCSIs is ISA, but that's gonna change to an AHA-1560 soon.

Re:replace ATX???

[Anonymous Coward]

There are several routers you can get at Best Buy for around $100. I don't see how somebody with two computers and DSL service couldn't afford that.

Re:replace ATX???

[ameoba]

Solution : get a dual-channel SCSI card and some USB/RS-232 adaptors.

I have to wonder tho... WTF do you have 2 SCSI controlers AND want an extra IDE controller?

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[tedrlord]

Hey, I'm only 21 and when I saw the headline I thought they were talking about some sort of homemade PDP-11. I was pretty surprised that they'd use this term to describe a smaller microcomputer. I'm guessing it's an oversight, though, because I can't imagine anyone here not knowing what a minicomputer is.

Anandtech Review

[wpmegee]

Anandtech has had a review up since last year (December 27). They didn't exactly gush over it, calling it a good pc for average use, but they like the price, $250.

There is no integration in PCs

[Anonymous Coward]

The Intel/AMD PC end-user has had the 'freedom' to mix and match components. The trade off is that the user does not get the system integration engineering to ensure that it all works together.

An AMD XP1800+ white box for $800 (less monitor)that runs flawlessly, but is a little noisy with 3 fans, works for me. In the old days a PC could be buried in paper and still run for months. Don't try that with the new ones.

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you ever seen a VAX 11/780? A single PC cannot compare to one. Try running 80 concurrent users from your PC, each with dumb terminals hooked up. Do you think that your graphics card could handle 80 connections over an RS 232 port? Do you think that all of the users could compile a C++ program at the same time on your little PC? You can run a PC server and have people access your server through their PC's, but they are using their own resources for even simple tasks. Basically, you would need 80 computers to get the equivalent of 80 users on a VAX system. The architecture is completely different and to try and compare the computing power between a PC and a super-mini (which the VAX was) computer is ludicrous.

EZgo

[neonstz]

What about these beauties? A Celeron 733MHz or P3 1GHz with 128 or 256 MB of memory. It got VGA/S-Video/Composite out, 100Mbit ethernet, modem, serial, USB, audio in/out, mouse/keyboard (PS/2) in/out and serial and parallel, a 2,5" HDD and DVD-ROM (or CD-ROM if you want.). And the best part, the size is only 157 x 146 x 45 mm (with external power supply though).

Bah!

[Guppy06]

"from the no-not-that-kind-of-minicomputer dept."

Then who needs you, anyway? I'd rather have something to fill up my garage that I can host god-knows-what on. So who needs ya?

Two changes...

[TheSHAD0W]

Two changes to this configuration would make it perfect, IMO...

No onboard video and an AGP slot on the opposite side of the board...

And for the case, a separate power supply module.

The result would be even more compact, and the components would be even smaller. Swap the A/C power module for one supplied by 12 volts, and you've got the perfect box for your vehicle.

Re:Two changes...

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi, fucktard. Do you really think this deserved your +1 bonus? How old are you? 13? The world does not revolve around your dreams and wishes.

Scratching my head

[wazzzup]

Seems to have everything the average computer user would need

Hmmm. I thought this was the done already, and done far better. It was called the Cube from Apple. Of course, everybody complained about the inability to expand it, no PCI slots, middle-of-the-road video card, middle-of-the-road CPU due to heat concerns. But hey! If it's not Apple and I can build it, then it's just what most people need!

I find these gems cuter than any iMac I've ever seen

Puhleese. It's a beige case shrunk down. I still think it's pretty cool, but it's not even close to being in the same league as the iMac aesthetically. But then again, the iMac and this appeal to completely different demographics. There is nothing wrong with a utilitarian approach to computing, but this is the same mentality that keeps X-Windows around, chunky fonts, blocky grey widgets, and one of the reasons Linux has been held back from expanding on the desktop at a greater rate than it has.

On that note, if I were building a beige box, this is definitely the case I would use.

(lack of) processor choice

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a bad design. However, after reading the article and doing a brief search on Google, it seems the only Flex-ATX motherboards out there right now only take Pentium III and Celeron processors, although the article mentions the VIA C6 may work as well.

Anyone know of a Flex-ATX mobo that supports AMD chips (pref. socket A)?? Yes, yes, I know, possible heat problems, but the Athlon XP is just so darn cute!!

Glenn

Back in my day...

[Anonymous Coward]

mini-computer meant it filled only half the room!

Re:You fucking morong!

[Anonymous Coward]

the 'minicomputer' in not personal

Chattanooga here...

[mkelley]

I really am from Chattanooga and would rather have the iMac as opposed to that ugly generic box with no decent warrantee plan. Some people are very untrusting when looking at a generic system. People have been raised on that. Most people would get a bag of Doritos than their generic alternative. Same with computers.

Re:Chattanooga here...

[Anonymous Coward]

Some people are very untrusting when looking at a generic system. People have been raised on that. Most people would get a bag of Doritos than their generic alternative. Same with computers.

Well, that's actually the silliest thing I've ever heard. PC components are all basically built by the same manufacturers. What shop you order it from prebuilt doesn't matter much. Companies like Dell, Compaq, Gateway, etc. generally use crappier components than what you can buy by buying piecemeal and building your own system. When you build your own you're getting a quality motherboard, case, good memory (almost always with a lifetime warranty), the CPU you want, hard drive, etc. Everything is built to order perfect to your specifications. With the Dell you accept their non-standard case with their generic piece of shit motherboard and clumsy non-customizable BIOS. Compared to my AMD Athlon system I built at home with a nice Abit motherboard, the Dell workstation I use at work is a piece of crap.

Re:Chattanooga here...

[2nd Post!]

Except we're talking about Macs here, and a Mac isn't 'prebuilt' so much as custome built, when you consider the case, the OS, the mobo, the drivers, the firmware, etc.

Sure, you really can't tailor it, like you can a Dell or Compaq, and most of the components are standard, like the drives, the memory, and the CPU; you *are* paying for good quality, since the components are chosen for their ability and performance. IE, low power, low heat, ruggedness, noise, size, etc.

You make a very valid point when talking about the mainstream PCs, since they really don't add value in their products.

Still, Chattanooga has a point, it's easier to trust a Dell than it is to trust a random main street PC boutique, if you don't have the skills to build your own system.

Re:Chattanooga here...

[connorbd]

Actually, with Dell the case is standard; it's the power supply that's @!#$? proprietary...

I think the only real problem with the SV24 is that there's only one motherboard out there that will fit in it. I think it's a great design (perhaps a bit aesthetically challenged), but I'd like to see more FlexATX boards on the market before I give it any serious consideration.

Perhaps... perhaps the thing to do is to slap a mobile Athlon on a daughter card. That will help the heat dissipation problem a bit. For graphics, wait until nVidia comes out with a second-generation nForce (one that actually has decent performance and uses the GF3 core that the Xbox Northbridge uses) and go with that...

I do like the system. It's not real pretty to me, but it's elegant in its own way.

/Brian

Re:Chattanooga here...

[Anonymous Coward]

For your needs, you may be right about bitch about Dell's component quality and it's custom BIOS.

But one thing's for sure -- the Dell Workstation gear is compatible with much more stuff than your semi-in-spec VIA mystery meat. Talking high-end video and audio hardware here, none of which seems to run properly on AMD/VIA.

For what I do (I use an IBM), that's more important than a bunch of semi-documented memory timing switches that might make my box 1% faster if it doesn't crash it.

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Anonymous Coward]

Your graphics card has an RS-232 port?

queer post

[Anonymous Coward]

"I find these gems cuter than any iMac I've ever seen!"

Do you fuck your disk drives or something? fag

Give me a break, kids

[Anonymous Coward]

A MINICOMPUTER is a computer about the size of an armoire, with blinkenlights and a console. Like a VAX or an old PDP. This is an uninteresting Wintel x86 MICROCOMPUTER in a goofy shoebox case. Hooray. I thought I was going to get to homebuild a VAX.

You fools!

[Nickovsky]

Its not a computer!!! Its a Gamecube!!! A GAMECUBE I TELL YOU!!!!!

Why not just take a page from stereo components?

[AndyBarrow]

You know, this might be one of thos situations where the real answer has been staring folks in the face for years.

Got a stereo component system? Have a look at the back of your amplifier - particularly those big jobs that are designed to really put out the power. Fins, lots of them. On the high end boxes, the cooling fins sometimes go around three sides of the case. The result is that noisy fans aren't needed (who would buy a stereo component that sounded like a vacuum cleaner (or your average PC)?

I guess the difference is that the nice folks who make stereo components acknowledged a long time ago that cooling was an issue - I think PC manufacturers are still in denial that good, quiet cooling would actually sell more boxes, and keep the things from coming back for repair.

Apple made an attempt with the Cube, but look what happened to that!

Build your own minicomputer?

[Second_Derivative]

why did I think "What, are PDP's still in vogue?"..?

The best Media Machine

[Gyorg_Lavode]

I have a shuttle with a 80gig HDD, DVD drive, and DVD hardware decoder which I use as a media machine. With a soft keyboard, a wireless trackball, and enough cabling, it's VERY portable. The hard drive houses a large amount of music along with TV shows, movies, etc. I plan on getting a few other things including the new external soundcard from creative labs and a second HDD to complete my media machine. So far it has served it's purpose admirably. I've taken it to friends houses to play DVDs, parties to play music, and just as an extra box at home. I wouldn't recommend it for a primary computer. It just doesn't have the strength. But as a secondary computer and a media box, I don't think anything could beat it.

Set top box?

[newdaemon]

Here is a review from Anandtech. They did some cool things with this little box.

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1572&p=1

Switching Components

[man_ls]

I'm moderately curious. They seem to have everything decent onboard, with the exception of the video, as well as a PCI slot. For what? It's already got an NIC, sound, controllers, USB, IIRC FireWire, and such.

Maybe, instead of 1 PCI slot, give it an AGP slot?

Not *that* hard to do I'd imagine. I'd 100% definately buy one if I could put my own video card into it.

If this doesn't date the editors...

[Anonymous Coward]

I was expecting to find an article on how to build a minicomputer, you know, one of those things on wheels varying in size between a small safe and a wardrobe. Instead, I find an article on how to build a smaller-than-average microcomputer.

techies...bah!

Look at that Mini PC!

[Mupp252]

Is it just me or does the picture of the mini computer look like some SCSI DLT Tape drive that met a few too many carnies on his way to manufacturing?

Nice system

[Anonymous Coward]

Now all it needs is a 15" LCD with a swing arm.

So...

[christurkel]

You really think a metal rectangle is cuter than the iMac? Get real!

Now, as far as _building_ something like this...

[Denial of Cervix]

...where can one find things like 90deg PCI adaptors, low-profile power supplies, etc. ? I'm in the middle of trying to build myself a Linux print/music server from an old Dell 300 and an Apple IIgs case. The power supply has me stumped, unless I take apart an OEM one and split it in half.

Speaking of power supplies, is the nasty voltage all in the caps and what's a safe way to dissipate it?

DoC

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Stone Rhino]

"Build your own mini-microcomputer!"

Two Applications...

[Junta]

I would probably never use this thing as a desktop class system, just not enough expansion. This is clear to most everyone here, and the source of many complaints. But it was intnded more for stuff like a TV-PC.

I think it would be very convenient to have something that small to put in an entertainment system. In this case, the PCI card would likely be used either for a better sound solution to provide Home Theater class playback, or else some sort of Capture card to provide TiVo like functionality.

Another application for a lot of people here would be a small router/internet server. You acheive a form factor and noise level close to the "cable/dsl router/switches", but with the flexibility of a PC class system. This might be appealing to replace my aging P-60 which is a bit too slow and high-profile.

which imacs have you seen exactly?

[surfsalot]

were they hit by cars or something? No offense, but small grey boxes dont exactly strike me as cute :)

Done 12 years ago by IBM

[Anonymous Coward]

It was called a PS/1. Just fished one out of the garbage the other day. The genius behind this design (IMHO) was that the power supply was in the monitor, which really freed up the tiny case. Lots of home computers from the 80's used external supplies (though not in the monitor).
Of course there's a lot more current required by a modern PC, but the small voltage drop across the wires can be easily compensated by remote sensing. Don't tell me it can't be done, I've specced all kinds of switchers with remote sense and independently regulated supplies.
Sure, IBM shot themselves in the foot with all the non-standard peripherals and underpowered hardware (even in 1990 a 286-12 and 2400bps modem was not SOTA by long shot).
But the basic design of the small case was done and it worked great. Easy to pull apart, and the usual IBM quality for the mechanical stuff.
I'm certainly going to take a stab at a mini-pc with my PS/1, as soon as I start my dozen other projects....

Better "mini" that is real

[_avs_007]

Check out the cappuccino pc

We have about 4 of these in our lab..

addendum

[_avs_007]

I don't have the URL of the manuafacturer off hand, but the link I provided is a little old. The ones we have, have P-III 800s, built in Ethernet,1394,USB.

Wireless and Firewire

[instinctdesign]

Perhaps what I found most interesting abot the setup mentioned was the inclusion of a firewire port. Its good to see that this is getting more and more attention from PC manufactures after Apple made it a crucial part of their desktop line. I have a firewire harddrive which is plenty fast for general use and with more and more devices coming out the limited expandability due to the size of the case could become less and less important.

However, I would be included to wait a little while if I were to invest in a system of this type. Once Bluetooth or 802.1 gets established, the issue of space could be even less of a hindrance as it won't be as important that there is that direct and internalized method of communication. That said however, I have to echo what had been said earlier, why would you bother packing in decent amounts of RAM and a fairly fast processor if you're going to be using this for word processing and the like. Not necessarily a criticism of the case per se, but something that I thought of reading THG's review.

No slots

[Animats]

Basic truth: 80% of PCs are never opened after they leave the factory. That fraction of the market doesn't need empty slots or bays.

The new Apple flat-panel iMac is a step in the right direction. It looks better in the ads than it does in person, though. All the cables have been left out of the ads.

Here's the logical next step for mainstream business PCs.

• Packaging is a small rectangular box that also acts as the base of the flat-panel monitor.
• USB, IEEE-1394, and Ethernet. No legacy I/O. No big connectors. USB and IEEE-1394 connectors are on the front, so portable stuff can be plugged in. The backside has Ethernet and AC power, and maybe audio connectors.
• No floppy. One CD/DVD read/write drive.
• No slots. No empty bays. No user-serviceable parts inside. Maybe a PCMCIA slot.
• Power supply is a high-frequency switcher embedded in a solid block with a heat sink, not a sheet metal box with a fan. Cooling will involve a few very tiny fans, rather than a big one, and airflow will be engineered based on the known heat loads of the fixed configuration.
• One big chip does all the motherboard stuff. Probably an NVidia Nforce, but there will be others. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the CPU gets absorbed into something like the NForce.

From a business perspective, the sell is low total cost of ownership. Nobody on staff ever opens these boxes; if they fail, they're replaced as a unit. No user-serviceable parts inside, 3-year warranty. That's the shape of a mature product.

Stuff close to this is already shipping, but at premium prices. Soon, this will be the mainstream low-cost PC.

Re:No slots

[Anonymous Coward]

one large fan can move much more air more quietly than several small fans.

IE: a 92mm fan will move more air with less noise than two 80mm fans at the same speed.

Shuttle Mini already reviewed.

[shlamo]

Anandtech
already reviewed this on December 27th 2001(compared to THG's Review on January 11th 2002).

"Final Thoughts
Overall, we were quite impressed with this little box. It's small, cute and well thought out. However, it lacks the expandability of a desktop, which brings up the whole "beige vs. unique" debate. So, why buy this instead of a desktop? If space, heat or looks are an issue, this is a system to consider. We wouldn't recommend this for a primary machine, nor for an average desktop (which has room to store that big, beige PC), but there are lots of other places in which it excels.

As we found out, this makes a great "living room," or "average use" PC. It also makes a great "TV PC." If the applications you use most include Office, Internet Explorer, Netscape, Winamp, ICQ, AIM, etc, you're fine. Of course, you're probably fine with just about any computer out there.

Gamers should look elsewhere. Although the Savage4 core is now quite mature, it wasn't designed to compete against top-of-the-line desktop cards. It will work fine with 2D applications and will probably make a good mobile 3D chipset, but a Doom 3 tamer it is not.

Finally, this model is limited by its support for (only) Pentium III / Celeron CPUs. Support for newer Pentium III Tualatin CPUs is crucial to upgradability and unfortunately not provided by this version of the motherboard. VIA does offer a PL133T chipset with Tualatin support but it is unclear as to if/when we can expect to see that implemented on the board. Shuttle has informed us however that they will be producing a version of the SV24 based on the Pentium 4 processor. With the 0.13-micron Northwood core producing very little heat and running at speeds greater than 2GHz, the SV24's successor might be able to offer some killer performance.

After this endeavor, we like the SV24; it doesn't rethink everything, it shrinks everything...and covers it in attractive aluminum. It doesn't replace that beige PC, it complements it. We expect that Shuttle should have no problem selling them at their list price of $250 USD. Hopefully, that will eventually lead to more interesting machines elsewhere as well. "

Re:Shuttle Mini already reviewed.

[connorbd]

It might be a good price for OEMs as well. I could see someone doing a handy business kitting out SV24s for home users, as a matter of fact; the same goes for some of FIC's small-profile systems.

I don't think these are quite what the market needs, though. The best thing would be something like the old Gateway living room PC, maybe an NLX-format case in black or grey with a front panel display and lots of blue lights. The home entertainment thingy HP is selling is close, but I'd like to have a generic system case that does the same job, fits into the same sort of situation, etc.

The Spacewalker and friends come close, but...

/Brian

What they really need for systems like this.....

[dr_db]

... Is a new video card form factor. Take a agp slot and make it into something the size of a socket 472 - make the video manufacturers fit the video into that area - say a couple small stacked boards so it's the shape of a cube - should give enough room.

Then people can have a case like this, but choose the video they want. I have had no end of grief with onboard sound/video, and wouldn't buy this system based on that reason alone. But I am sure they can do better. Apparently Creative Labs has come out with a sound card that hangs off a USB port. I visualize serial ATA moving drives out of the boxes (like macs in the 80's). Basically, the computer will be a hub with a bunch of components plugged into it, outside the case

Bad Concept, Period.

[Bowie J. Poag]

1) Who on earth is going to buy a stainless steel case, and then mount drives with BEIGE faceplates inside of it? Talk about ugly, sheesh.

2) It may take off elsewhere, but this is America. Bigger is better. Most people want a machine that kicks ass and takes names, not something that looks a blinking vaccum cleaner attachment.

3) Design thats pleasing to the eye will take off. Not this crap. I'm still waiting for a company with some balls to produce a nice black pyramid shaped case, an oversized corner slab or monolith-shaped case.. Those things would take off hardcore.

Cheers,

Re:Bad Concept, Period.

[2nd Post!]

Ah. You mean like a NeXT cube.

Or rather, the old black borg case milled out of magnesium.

how to connect this to a tv screen

[Anonymous Coward]

This would make a nice little game box if you could hook it up to a tv. Any idea what sort of adapters would be need?

Poor Savage4 support with XF86

[crush]

Aside from the fact that the Savage4 is underpowered compared to recent cards, as pointed out by many above, there is a slight problem for those that wish to run XF86 with it.

Although there is support for the chip with the new savage driver under the DRI infrastructure it is poor compared to Matrox, ATI and Nvidia support[1]. Check out the XF86 newbie and Xpert lists and you'll find plenty of moaning about this chip.

The problem is that S3 have been slow (to say the least) to release specs or their own drivers to the community.

The presence of this Savage4 chip is thus a serious deterrent to anyone that is interested in running a *BSD or GNU/Linux

1. Thanks to the XF86 developers for what they have been able to do with this chip however. Although it still only provides 2D and no OpenGL support and various versions of it need to have Option "noaccel" and Option "swcursor" activated (thus slowing it even more) it nevertheless will be acceptable for those looking for basic graphics.

Re:Poor Savage4 support with XF86

[Gyorg_Lavode]

Just a note. I have Suse 7.3 running stable on this as a triple boot with winXP and win2Kpro. I had no installation problems or runtmi problems. Installing drivers I"m using savagepro, not savage 4 drivers so I'd assume that there is some confusion as to which chip this board uses.

Re:Poor Savage4 support with XF86

[crush]

I bow to your superior knowledge and experience. I think there was confusion.....mine! Thanks for the correction.
-crush

minus a 3d card?

[p4r4d0x]

minus a 3d card? that's like...having a bed without a pillow...or Linux without vi...or a woman without breasts...

I've got one. Love it.

[Ian the Terrible]

I bought one of these from mwave several months ago. Added a 60G HD, a gig of RAM, and a Celeron 900, and was out the door for less than $600. Scavenged a CD-ROM and a second NIC, installed RH 7.2, and off I went. It makes a dandy mini-server, and I've had no heat or noise complaints.

What's a 'botherboard'? n/t

[Anonymous Coward]

:)

(what part of "no text" don't you understand?)

Alternate vendor

[RedDirt]

The case, power-supply and motherboard is also available from AMS, the company that makes the case: http://www.american-media.com/index-CF7989.html

Re:Alternate vendor

[rtrifts]

At a more expensive price than at Tiger Direct.

AMS=$279

http://www.american-media.com/amsestore/shop_cas es .html#gbox

Tiger Direct= $249

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTo ol s/search.asp?keywords=sv24

Either way - these systems are a touch expensive.

DEC Multias

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone remember the DEC Multias?

They looked smaller (and were probably quieter) than this appears to be. They looked sexier, too.

I want to replace the slot on my 166 AXP Multia with one of the ~1GHz processors with "acceptable 2D graphics" video systems, etc. But no, it's time to invent something NEW....

Funny how definitions change

[krow]

When I think of a "mini-computer" I think MicroVAX II. The class of computers that was not as large as a mainframe.
Funny how these things change.

Fanless, silent

[leandrod]

All these PCs, even if small, are still noisy... if you try to build a silent one, it is big; and the small ones need fans.

If we could buy an efficient processor that didn't generate much heat -- that would mean RISC: ARM, PowerPC, the notebook Alpha 21264 that was never built, MIPS -- and build our own silent, energy-efficient, small systems, I wouldn't have my craving for a Cube or new iMac. If it had USB 2, 1394b and SCSI 3 so much the better -- throw in a slot-loading SuperDrive to burn DVDs *and* CDs and it's a deal.

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Billly Gates]

"Try running 80 concurrent users from your PC, each with dumb terminals hooked up. Do you think that your graphics card could handle 80 connections over an RS 232 port? "

Yes I can. With a scsi hard drive and 512 megs of ram and a special card to output to terminals. Or perhaps with a high speed network connection over telnet or ssh that I could use as a terminal. Even a value $699 pc has much better i/o then a VAX. Scsi one drives from the time had a maximum throughoutput of 5 mbs and a VAX had 2 megs of ram and maybe if your lucky you had one with 4. 80/4= 50k of ram for each user assuming there is only 4 megs of ram! IF your running simple 50k programs for each user then even a 486 would probably work. Todays programs are much bigger though so it may give you a false sense of which machine is better.

By the way a 20 year old Vax can't do any graphics either. It is up to the terminals to do them. All the server does is send asci numbers over the line and the terminal interprets them and displays them. ALso I can run X with 80 clients if I have the right amount of ram and a scsi hard drive on a pc. Can a Vax do that? Can I run today's unix software reliably without running out of ram or basically at all on a VAX? Also a dual processor x86 box with enough ram should be able to do X-windows for 80 clients. Try that on a Vax. I have seen 40 internet terminals running WindowsNT and IE emulated from a dual alpha server running digital unix. I admit it was slugish but it worked. TOdays intel based servers and pc's are quite powerfull. ITs true that mini's always had much better i/o then pc's but we are talking 20 years after Vax's were state of the art. I would much rather compile my c++ programs on a modern pc or server class mini from a terminal then an old ancient VAX. THis assumes that I could still get a modern iso compatable c++ compilier that is spefically written for the VAX. Most of your observations assume that all pc's can do is run citrix winframe terminals but that is not true. With Linux you can run all the unix stuff that the old vax's running bsd unix can and perhaps some ported vms stuff as well.

So, how is...

[Simba]

... the crack on your planet?

"I find these gems cuter than any iMac I've ever seen!"

So.. a 1/4 sized boring grey intel box is in some way nicer then a full sized boring grey intel box? It's also 'cuter' then something that's faster with a moveable 15" LCD?

Somehow, I don't think the kind of CD burning you'd get by running a 1100Mhz high-voltage intel proc in something the size of a breadbox is what the average person has in mind.

Yeah, sure it's cool. If totally useless for a desktop application, which is what it's aimed at. (Show me one desktop geek who doesn't demand 64MB of video ram and two bigass monitors at a huge resolution)

As a small server, sure. It could be handy to stack a few in a corner somewhere. But why the hell bother when you can simply use a 1U rack case and get even better space utilization?

So what other uses could it possibly have? Competing in iMac country with a smaller footprint, while trading off performance and expandability? Sure. There are just two problems with that. First, if you dump a huge CRT beside it, it kind of defeats the purpose. Second, if you opt for a smaller LCD display with it, the thing ends up running you more then a top of the line iMac.

This thing is, in a word, useless. Other things do its job better. Aside from that, comparing it to an iMac is beyond stupidity. One may as well put a ford escort beside a Ferrari and proclaim it to be faster and better looking.

Re:So, how is...

[Gyorg_Lavode]

Someone already said. It doesn't make a good main box, but as a support box, a micro-server, or a media machine, not much beats it. The real advantage fo this is that it DOES allow for standard hardware. You can put standard HDD's, standard CDroms, a standard pci, standard ram, and a standard processor in it. It's a mini computer that can be customized to fit specialty needs as a secondary computer for which it fits the niche nicely.

Re:So, how is...

[Chris Johnson]

Well, those of us (like me) who find this really cute aren't really thinking in terms of cost and usefulness. I'm a mac user myself, I'm not _expecting_ this to be really competitive. I'm looking at what it is. It's a tiny, _elegant_ arrangement of generic hardware that could potentially be really cheap to buy, and will get more so in future- it's an aluminum case, not a tin can (I like that especially, it's part of the cuteness though it adds cost)- and I can't look at it without picturing it running WindowMaker or maybe even just console or some fascinating, alien hybrid. It's like there's the possibility for it to go off in totally other directions from the computers we're used to, simply because it's really a very generic device, and because it LOOKS different than most PCs do. With such a compact arrangement it blatantly suggests a different path from the usual windows huge morass of cab files and 'look how many junky game sound cards you could buy if you wanted'. It makes me think of focus, of getting rid of waste and coming up with some elegant little workspace to live in that resonates with the elegant little looks of the tiny thing. Like I've said, the first thoughts that come to my mind are- ballbearing fans and underclocking, and getting special low-noise drives for it, so it could sit on the desk and be whisper-quiet despite the lack of space for sound absorption inside it.

That's something I know about as my current desktop and work machines are already whisper-quiet- but they are PowerMacs without need for CPU fans, and they are tower or short tower cases with space inside for acoustic foam. Handled right this little machine could be as quiet and unobtrusive...

Re:So, how is...

[Simba]

A lot of things beat it, IMO.

In terms of a support box, or coffee table box, or what-have-you-not-a-main-box box, one could simply buy an iMac and have twice the machine, with a LCD monitor. iMacs (and everything else Apple makes) take standard HDD's, standard (if you want) CDroms, standard PCI cards, and standard RAM.

Anyways, sure, as a micro-server it has a bit of potential as I said. However, if space is a concern, one could just use a cheap 1U rack case and save even MORE space.

As for it being a media machine, I just don't see that. Crappy on-board video and audio doesn't really make the term "media box" leap out at me.

What I'm saying, is that all of the functions it is trying to perform can be done better with other hardware. Thusly making this thing cool, but pointless.

There are two kinds of company when it comes to hardware. The first kind innovate and design entirely new things. (See: Apple, SGI, Cray, etc).

In that light, if someone came along and cranked out a single board machine about the size of a few DVD cases which had a decently fast proc, onboard audio, room for a pair of 2.5" lappy drives, and a daughterboard for an AGP or PCI card.. THAT would be useful.

The other type replicates (see: Dell, Microsoft, any xyz intel box maker). These take existing technology and repackage it, be it in a 1/4 size case, or something that looks like one of the old Apple G3 tower cases. Their products are most always done better by existing companies.

Anyway, sure this thing is cool. But if you boil it down, it is simply a hacked up ATX board crammed into a 1/4 size ATX case.

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Wavicle]

As much as I hate to reply to an AC...

I'm kind of curious about this. What you say could likely be right (the VAX 11/780 was specifically designed to host a whole lot of dumb terminal connections), but I'm not sure that saying the PC could not do some of those things is correct

I've heard of PC's hosting a large number of concurrent NetHack players for NetHack contests. That is pretty close to dumb terminal connections (though all the terminals use a network connection instead of RS-232).

If you really wanted to connect that many dumb terminals, you could get one of the USB RS-232 port adapters. One of them can drive 8 ports.

As for compiling... well, I'm betting that running 80 simultaneous instances of gcc would cause a great deal of consternation to your PC. However, GCC is a huge compiler. I doubt its equal existed in the day for the VAX. So if you instead ran 80 instances of a tiny C compiler with cfront for C++, I think the machine could handle it. It might run slow, but you wouldn't expect a VAX running 80 simultaneous compiles to run any faster.

Nothing New

[MoneyT]

If I may, allow me to run off a list of computers for you:

Power Macintosh/Performas (education versions, all in one design)
iMac
G4 Cube

All of these computers have one thing in common, they all use the whole idead of a computer cramped into a small space, and what is one of the first complaints from the Wintel flunkies and the critics? NO EXPANDABILITY!

I thought the whole reason to buy a PC was because it was expandable, this MiniPC most certainly is not. Sure you can take things out and move things arround, but it would be like trying to service the old PowerComputing Macs, or any of the old desktop style (horizontal, for the technicaly impaired) and those were a real pain.

As far ies equipment goes, this thing is underpowered for a PC, and lacks everything that my PC using buddies criticise my mac for not having (large HD, expansion bays, a good graphics card, lots of PCI slots etc etc etc).

This is really just the PC version of an iMac, sans 15 inch LCD screen. I'm not impressed because I've seen the same concept before. On the other hand, it is nice to see someone finaly realizing that computers are getting way too big.

No overclocking with FV24

[GodWasAnAlien]

Issues that I have with my Fv24:

- Bios does not allow overclocking or underclocking. I want to underclock and run fanless.

- There is space for 2 5.25 bays, they should have put two in.

- Mine did NOT come with a CPU fan.

- The FlexATX back panel is a little non-standard, and there is no removable back panel plate. It may be hard to put another FlexATX MB in there.

It's all relative.

[Don Faulkner]

Well, there are a few nostalgic reasons for wanting to build a mini... For instance it would give me something to do with the few reels of 9-track I still have lying around.

In another sense though, this is a mini. The "original" mini's were mini's because they were smaller than the prevelant computers of the day, right? So, the little cube is smaller than our prolific PC-size. Someday we may call the fingernail computer a "mini" because it's smaller than the more common wristwatch computer. Then we'll all have some fun when someone points out that he still manages a VAX cluster.

Cute?

[Josuah]

I fail to see how this little rectangular box is cuter than an iMac the poster has seen. Apparently, said poster gets excited over tool boxes and tiny file cabinets as well.

Re:Cute?

[Chris Johnson]

Well, I am a Mac user and have seen iMacs and I agree that it's cuter than an iMac. I also want one more than I want an iMac, but only if it runs linux :) that is also presuming that I can have my Macs to get my work done. But I can just imagine doing this web browsing and continual internet-connecting over one of these teeny buggers, perhaps with a nice WindowMaker interface on it and all the parts set up to furnish macstyle cut and paste between each other.

That, or since it is plainly capable of processing and I/O sufficient for basic multitrack recording with the right PCI card (and breakout box?), how about picturing it as a teeny Audacity host box? Call it a dedicated DAW and boot it straight into the DAW software, run realtime.

It's very encouraging that these things are not only happening, but can be appealing. I think my only remaining question would be: could this bitty box be not only cute but dead silent? What if you underclock the 1ghz cpu by about 50%?

Hell Yes

[soupforare]

Mount one of these bitches on there (whee, Svideo), hack up a custom battery and you have one *hell* of a quake2 mobile rig.
(Good for trash-talking bastards:) "Man, I'm the fucking best DM'er ever! My sk1llz are t3h best, rar!"
'umm, right, so, ok. Here's my box [*grunt*] Bring it'

Screw you guys with your fancy-ass video cards, poor people *tweak* baby! I had a P200(nonMMX) with a Savage4 and I got it to play UT.
I currently run a G400(guh) and I run Counterstrike in OpenGL 800x600x32 at a consistent 70fps, it spikes to 99+

So when is the shipping company getting off it's ass to bring me mine? :D

um...

[Profe55or Booty]

Imagine a beowulf cluster of those!

-greg.

My Mini-computer

[clasher]

I'm posting this from the best computer I have right now, my home build mini-computer.

I used an Intel D810EMO mainboard. (legacy free).

In a Elan Vital MF-1

And a Maxtor 531dx hard drive.

with a USB Microsoft Natural keyboard and a USB Optical Logitech it is one nice machine. And it even looks good sitting on my desktop.

The Linux support for this hardware is excellent, also BeOS runs beautifully.

Sheesh, what's up with michael?

[Anonymous Coward]

This plus the story about the iPod crusher on the same day. [The synopsis of the crusher story is that yes, it probably could crush an iPod, but only if dropped from about four stories up.]

You'll take my full tower from me when. . . .

[Com2Kid]

Cold dead hands rip from.

MINE DAMNIT MINE!!!!

Besides, for $60 I got a full tower case with a removable Motherboard tray and a 300watt AMD approved PSU.

It works.

I can shove lots of stuff in it

AND I LIKE BIG BEIGE BOXS DAMNIT!!

It doubles as a footstool. Or a mini ladder. It can support over 200lbs on top of it. I like the free whitenoise.

Flex-ATX + IA-1 = ONE VERY KEWL hack

[rtrifts]

I remember the other snazzy mini-computer hack project we discussed here a month ago.

For those who don't remember, it is the snazzy looking but desperately underpowered IA-1

View the IA-1:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTo ol s/item-Details.asp?sku=C860-IA1

Now - question is - can you pull the guts out of the IA-1 and install the SV24 motherboard and p/s in it, get a decent hard drive in the space left (notebook or otherwise) AND manage to get that kewl monitor in the IA-1 working with the built in video card on the SV24?

Show me one of THOSE home hack projects, and my daughter will think you rule ('cause I'll build her one too).

The G4 Cube

[Tokerat]

Tried it before. No one bought it.

Might be nice for the rack, though.

Now *this* is a real ...

[Anonymous Coward]

... "micro" computer http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/briQ/ ... you've got to point out that its difficult building small (and quiet) computers based on anything Intel makes.

Computer Brick a Real Cutie...

[ablair]

Yeah, I think it's cuter than any iMac too! I think I'll pick one up in my new car and show it to my girlfriend. Finally, someone with my tastes!

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Paul Komarek]

Me, on the other hand...I was really hoping someone was selling PDP-10 kits.

-Paul Komarek

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[Anonymous Coward]

USB? Try something like a 16-port Digiboard x 6 PCI slots. You could also use dedicated terminal server hardware, like ISPs do for their modem racks.

I'm sure most 80-user VAXs weren't supporting developers - more likely data entry applications and so on. UNIX is very also very heavy on the interactive - on a mini like the AS/400 all your compiles, etc get sent as batch jobs where there's a complex policy system to ensure that you don't hog the machine. The terminal handling is a smarter too.

Dude!

[Anonymous Coward]

I have the emulator software and OS for that model of computer. My computer can not only support 80 terminal sessions, it can emulate the VAX 11/780 on all of them as well.

PC makers make crappy cooling on purpose

[yerricde]

I think PC manufacturers are still in denial that good, quiet cooling would actually sell more boxes, and keep the things from coming back for repair.

Or they just go into denial in front of their customers: "It's broke. You're going to have to buy another one (and line our pockets yet again)." Disposable hardware creates a revenue stream.

The Need for Bigger Small Standards

[andrew_mike]

While this trend is indeed fascinating, I also find it alarming. The main problem I have with it is the fact that there are no real existing standards for small computer systems. This leads, as evidenced by the laptop industry, to proprietary systems with components that are incompatible with other comparably sized systems. While people such as Compaq/HP and such would be licking their lips over this prospect, it is not a favorable setup for consumers, especially since Microsoft's new OSes force you to upgrade every 18 months or so. Even *NIX would have a problem with this; there would be so many systems (and so many individual ways of controlling said systems) that hardware driver coders would be hard-pressed to keep up.
There is also a problem with using existing standards (IDE, PCI, etc.) with small cases; namely, they were built for ATX motherboards. A check of the open case screenshots before and after the IDE cables are in place confirms this theory. Clearly, using existing standards in smaller cases is not the answer either.
What there must be, in order for small-case computers to succeed in this world, is hardware standards designed around a smaller, common size. These standards should be universal (not proprietary to any company) and utilize the latest modern technology. Without these standards, the small computer will be mired in the past.

does it run linux?

[Afrosheen]

How hard would it be to get linux up and running on this little thing? A friend of mine needs a box for a VPN connection to his network...

you have issues with rage...

[Anonymous Coward]

I forgive you. *hugs*

I liked this thing better on October 18

[Anonymous Coward]

I heard about this PC somewhere before, maybe it was SLASHDOT Wow, do people even read before submitting "news". Wait wait, have you heard of that new OS called Linux, its so 1337, i should tell slashdot about it!

Pelican PC

[plimsoll]

Ever since I heard about the firewire-equipped Shuttle FV24 motherboard I've been fiending to make a DIY pseudo-laptop to fit inside a rugged, waterproof, 10 5/8" L x 9 11/16" W x 6 7/8" D Pelican #1300 case (pic).

We're talking lunchbox form factor!

I say 'pseudo' laptop because I don't want to mess with batteries when pretty much all the places I'd care to use a laptop there are already electrical outlets nearby. Plus how cool would it be with an old vacuum cleaner's retractable powercord?

There are plenty of little optical mice and the Happy Hacker would certainly be adequate... but I kept getting hung up on what I have heard is the most expensive part of a laptop- the display.

Most of the 4"-8" discrete LCD modules I can find (such as these) only have standard "Yellow RCA" composite video-in.

Anyone know where small LCD modules with VGA connectors can be found?

Re:better mini computer...if you like downtime

[xl4bs]

It has been down AFTER it got slashdotted probably :)

Bad idea.

[edunbar93]

This has been done. PC manufacturers in days of old did their best to make desktops nice and small, because well, we used to put them *on* our desks under the monitor, instead of next to the desk on the floor. I'm sure some of us remember *why* that idea was thrown out the window - it was a royal pain in the ass to do something inside, like upgrade the harddrive or the RAM. The odd thing is that this article is aimed at exactly the sort of people who would have their hands inside the case on a regular basis. Sorry, but I don't really feel like removing *all* the hardware from the box before I can get at the RAM.

Noise?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi,

how noisy is the system? We bought a couple of similar PCs but couldn't use them on the desktop because the builtin fans were really noisy.

Re:Noise?

[anguish feast]

It's definitely more noisy than I'd prefer. I'd say it's above average for a desktop system. Noise wasn't so much a factor for me, but an ultra-quiet fan would be nice. They probably should have given it more consideration and shipped it with something better. I got a better heat sink for it a couple weeks after I built it. The one they include seems to be adequate though and haven't taken the time to swap it. If you were considering buying a better heat sink and fan for the processor, maybe you want to get a better case fan instead....

Perfect for...

[WyldOne]

A Firewall. I wish these were more prevalant 2 months ago. At that time the atx-flex spec was out but nobody had any thing for it. Worse yet nobody near me had any parts/cases etc.

A beowolf cluster system - someone had to say it :) I have been thinking of a four node beowolf for some time now and those MB look perfect for it. Eg built in NIC and video,

One thing to about it though - Why didn't they use the combined CD-RW/floppy in a 5 1/4" bay and save the floppy spot for another HD/PCI slot? Slashdot had a article on them awhile back (slimline CD-rom/RW)


Remember this article?

Another site w/ instructions

[syn3rg]

http://www.datadocktorn.nu/us_desktop1.php Godd info for HD Defrag too... (note the use of Anti-static solutions)

Re:hmm... haven't we progressed from minicomputers

[hearingaid]

I notice your usage of the 11/780. Now that's stoneage... the thing dies when it gets more than about four users. Compare a modern PC to an 88x0, and you'll get closer.

Of course, modern micros are still impressively powerful. But none of them run DCL or TPU, wah.

Currently available, pre-built "mini-pcs"

[Anonymous Coward]

I love smaller computers when you want to just set it up and leave it. If you're one to change parts all the time then these don't seem practical as larger cases are much easier to deal with.

I'd like to see more systems available that are smaller than the Dell GX150 and the like. The iMac is cool but I like the flexibility of having a large monitor. Maybe it'll be easier, but pricier, to add a larger monitor to the new iMac.

Spacewalker: I have 7 of these at work

[Sean Clifford]

In early November I bought seven of these SpaceWalker SV 24 systems from Multiwave and shelled out about $834 apiece after shipping with 512MB of RAM, huge hard disk, CD, and floppy. This included Windows 2000 Professional (we have to use it for now), about 20% of the total system price.

I didn't find them as quiet as other reviewers have - the fan noise is definitely noticeable, but not terribly loud. Like Tom's Hardware, I really wished they'd gone with a GeForce2-based integrated video card solution. You could slap in a PCI version if you want to sacrifice your single slot and disable the integrated video. DVI-out instead of VGA would have been even sweeter, so I could mate this with an LCD monitor for a sweet little LAN party box that I can carry in one load (without breaking my back). But it's hard to complain with VGA out and front-mounted USB/mike/audio. It also looks pretty cool and is surprisingly light.

I didn't have an opportunity to snag one for Linux or FreeBSD, so I don't know how well my favorite *nix distros run on them, but I can't wait to find out. I'm fully satisfied with them in our office environment - you can put a couple of them under your desk without splitting open your knee on the case. I highly recommend them.

Re:BOFH

[sparkyz]

You know man, you can really write. This is funny, articulate and interesting, regardless of it's fact/fiction status. This showed up on my Meta-Moderate page as Offtopic and I can't disagree. That means that, at -1, most folks will never read this. What a waste. You have a site with more stuff like this? I'd love to see more.