Small Form Factor Comparison Matrix

Giggles Of Doom writes "With small form factor PCs, such as the Shuttle XPC line, becoming all the rage these days for office and gamer use, it can be a daunting task to find the model that is right for you. With more and more manufacturers getting on the SFF bandwagon, the selection is growing rapidly. How do you compare each one? You could spend hours combing manufacturer sites and reviews, or you could be thankful that someone has done all the work for you already! The Small Form Factor Comparison Matrix is just that, a chart listing over 30 of the most popular SFF boxes, their features, and price. Sort by any field, and limit your search to things like "Pentium 4 Only" or "Under $200 Only." If you're looking into getting a SFF box, this is the place to start." (Sudhian Media and mini-itx.com are also good sources for information on small PCs.)

Comments

Good chart...

[Fnkmaster]

I'll throw in a good word for the Biostar IDEQ 200N. I purchased one of them recently - my desktop has gone from a mess of wires with a big annoying tower underneath to a sleek, modern looking area with plenty of leg room, much less noise and less clutter. I realized that you can be a power user and you don't necessarily need 10 PCI slots and 5 5.25" drives. One DVD/CD-R/RW drive does the trick nicely.

The IDEQ has nicely situation USB ports (2 in the front, and 2 or more in the rear - I don't even remember, more than I need). SP/DIF optical audio out, firewire out, again ports in front and rear. Everything you need is integrated, ethernet, pretty decent audio, even dual head-capable GeForce 4MX (I have an AGP GeForce4 Ti4200 card in here myself, since I do some real 3D work, and some gaming).

It's worth giving a thought to. Will you really miss all that other stuff? If you live in a city apartment where your floor space costs hundreds of dollars a square foot like I do, and your desk size is limited by your small apartment, going SFF is definitely worth consideration. If you have a big house, lotsa room, or need to swap in and out hard drives and are the kinda person who leaves your case open for easy access, then it's probably the wrong move, since it's quite crowded in a little SFF case.

Other sites with SFF lists

[armando_wall]

Here are other sites offering Small Form Factor listings:

SSF at HardwareCentral.

Shuttle PCs at PCs For Everyone.

And just in case you don't know, here this guy explains what a Small Form Factor PC is.

Re:Multi-CPU SFF?

[xlyz]

you mat want to check future c3 development from Via

here is a picture of a nice mini-itx dual motherboard: http://common.ziffdavisinternet.com/util_get_image /4/0,3363,sz=1&i=43115,00.jpg

What about openbrick?

[/.Rooster]

Seems someone has not been doing their homework properly. Can't be an accurate matrix with products missing :( For those who are curious curious. OpenBrick Website

Re:non x86 small format machines.

[jrexilius]

try yellow dog briqs.. PPC boxes size of a CD-ROM drive..

http://www.yellowdoglinux.com/products/

Re:non x86 small format machines.

[questamor]

One I forgot to mention too:

http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/briQ/

The Terrasoft Solutions BriQ. a G3 or G4 in a box that fits in a 5.25" drive bay

Shuttle - silent XPC

[bani]

http://us.shuttle.com/specs2.asp?pro_id=264

i have one.

The hard drive (Maxtor 4G160J8) is louder than the PC. And you can barely hear the hard drive.

The heatpipe, massive heatsink, and temperature controlled fan help a lot.

It WHOOOOOSHes for about 3 seconds when you power it on, as the hardware is initialized. Then it goes totally and completely silent as linux boots, and stays silent during heavy use.

Shrug.

Quiet versus silent

[Adam J. Richter]

It WHOOOOOSHes for about 3 seconds when you power it on, as the hardware is initialized. Then it goes totally and completely silent as linux boots, and stays silent during heavy use.

"Silent" would mean no noise. A PC can be silent when the hard disk is spun down and all of its fans are stopped and nothing else in it is making any noise. You probably just meant "quiet."

I remember being in a terminal room at usenix many years ago which was full of Network Computing Devices X terminals, which were silent (diskless, fanless, no other parts moving or otherwise making sound). It was like being in a library. By far, the loudest remaining sound was the keystrokes from everyone typing.

I like silent (as opposed to quiet), PC's, although I've only used them in practice as thin clients.

When I see a vendor using the term "silent" to refer to a PC that is merely quiet, I consider that vendor to be a liar, and I generally can't trust them enough to be willing to do buy from them.

I also buy a lot of quiet hardware, like big slow fans, aluminum cases so I can disconnect more fans and so on, but I try never to buy from vendors that call these things "silent."

Google Cache

[theperplepigg]

/.ed. Google Cache here.