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Hardware

Shuttle SS50 Mini-system 186

Posted by michael from the is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox dept.
Jared writes: "Small Form Factor is taking off, Viahardware wrote a review on the new Shuttle SS PC. In a case about the size of a shoebox, you get Pentium 4 support, DDR memory, firewire, tv out etc. Great box for all kinds of uses like a media box for the living room, file server, gateway, LAN box. Slashdot posted about the SV24 last fall, and this is the follow up product. Very cool." We've looked at some other Shuttle systems before.
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Shuttle SS50 Mini-system More

Shuttle SS50 Mini-system

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  • Another cube (Score:2, Interesting)

    by kaimiike1970 ( 444130 )
    But actually I like the way it looks. It would have been nice if it included USB 2.0 instead tho...

  • Finally.. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Str8Dog ( 240982 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @04:37PM (#3196044) Homepage Journal
    a case for my DirecTV Emulator that doesn't look like I raided radioshack! Sweet does it come in black.

  • Okay . . . (Score:4, Funny)

    by cjpez ( 148000 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @04:37PM (#3196049) Homepage Journal
    . . . that's pretty cool, but still, give me a huge freaking tower any day. I don't mind carting aroud a behemoth of a case so long as I've got enough room to live in there if need be. :)
    • I use Mandrake 8.1 with Ximian Gnome 1.4 (1 Gig proc., 512 RAM) on my Spacewalker that I built a couple of months ago... that and a nice (and cheap) Samsung LCD display, and I've got a small, fast, reliable and easy-to-use little station for email, web surfing, etc... (not to mention small home server) in the living room that takes up very little space. Given the price of equipment and the GPL software, its a very cheap and fast PC that fits perfectly in an entertainment room.
    • I don't have a tower - and it saves an awful lot of space. My Packard Bell sits in a cuboid shape case under the monitor. Not only does this serve to higher the monitor to a comfortable viewing height (I'm 6'5'' BTW) it also leaves deskspace to put things - phone, modem, headphones, disk labels etc that a huge tower wouldn't. I've seen some of these 1/2 towers before - personally I'm surprised no other computer has the "box" in a more logical use of wasted space - beneath the monitor.

      • I suppose I'm probably just spoiled by having a lot of space; snagged an unbelievable apartment a few years ago that continues to be one of the major factors keeping me from moving out of the area. Having a tower really isn't a space problem, especially when I like keeping computers out of the main living areas (otherwise I've found I spend WAY too much time poking around on the computer when I should really be acknowledging the existance of my girlfriend. :P ).
      • My Packard Bell sits in a cuboid shape case under the monitor.

        Did you just admit to owning a Packard Bell? Please.... say it ain't so!!!
        • Yes I did - and as far as reliability goes they keep on going and going and going. As to other features about Packard Bells - they don't feature as highly as the one mentioned above. What have you got against them anyway? I'll point out at this point I own an Amiga 1200 as well - but at this point you're probably ROFL too much to reply.

          • Re:Okay . . . (Score:2, Funny)

            by 56ker ( 566853 )
            And before anyone asks - no I don't work for them.
            • Well in response to :
              Under the agreement, starting Jan. 1, 1997, the Sacramento-based company will place a prominent notice on the cartons of all computers and monitors it sells as new, but which may contain components from previously sold computers.
              My computer doesn't fall under that category. As to the "offense" comment - yes your computer probably is better than mine but no I don't want to be reminded of that fact.
          • What have you got against them anyway?

            Nothing much aside from some of their history [state.oh.us] - it was just a joke and no offense was intended.
      • "... serve to higher the monitor to a comfortable viewing height (I'm 6'5'' BTW) ..."

        wouldnt getting a shorter chair be easier than standing up to use your PC? ;)
        • I already have a shorter chair. I used to have one of the swivelly adjustable typists chairs - but now I use an armchair instead which is lower (and more comfortable).

    • Re:Okay . . . (Score:4, Funny)

      by foobar104 ( 206452 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @05:13PM (#3196276) Journal
      give me a huge freaking tower any day

      It's not really a huge freaking tower unless it's at least six feet tall. My all-time favorite workstation is the SGI Onyx 2 rack [sgi.com]*. Six feet tall, bright purple, noisy as can be. The Onyx 3000 systems are okay, but there's just something inherently cool about the Onyx 2. It's what the French call, "I don't know what."

      And the shipping crate is big enough for two people to stand up in. Well, for me anyway. I'm about 5'6".

      * Scroll down a bit to find Onyx 2 pics. I didn't think anybody would appreciate it if I linked directly to an 11 MB TIFF.
      • And all this time I've been happy and content with my l0s3r case that probably doesn't even make the three-foot mark. Oh, shame on me. :P
      • The Onyx 2 does rock - I think it's the little color LCD monitor to track the load of all of the processors in the rack.

        The later ones, with the B/W LCD readout just aren't as cool...
  • that you can't yet buy the mobo separately (at least last time I looked at Shuttle's website.)

    This would be the ideal mobo for doing some sweet mods.
    *LAUGH* I want to build my next PC in a shoebox.
  • I've waited for SFF boxes for a long time. Perfect for small desktops (PC X stations :) on the kitchen, living room, bedroom etc...

    What's putting me off is that motherboards and cabinets have been non-standard and hard to upgrade. If we can have a new truly small form factor just as standardized as ATX (right, standard non-standard you might say, but still...) it will be a big step ahead for me.

    //TheToon
    • The shuttle cases use flex-atx motherboards and mounts, it is a standard just not one that is widely used by other companies. I searched around and found about 3-4 flex-atx form factor mobos, most of which have less functionality than the shuttle boards.
  • One thing to make sure you don't forget about is the height/length restrictions some of these small systems have for PCI cards. For many people it may not matter since much hardware is already built into the board, but I have seen people be burned when there old Voodoo 3/PCI couldn't fit into the system! Just FYI. Fly
    • Buy a real computer. Pay a lot of money for it. Get a warranty/service contract (they're often free for a certain level of support). Bad RAM? Send it back. Bad mainboard? Send it back. Bad anything for the first three years? You guessed it...send it back. Get the replacement by next-day air. Free.
  • Smaller desktops are long overdue. It's kind of ironic that my old 386 had a 17" tower with a lot of uneeded, empty space inside the box. Now my Athlon 1.2 GHz has a tower of the same size, but it now needs the space to cool it off. I think it's better cooling technology that is driving this change to smaller desktops now. But why hasn't this happened earlier? (Laptops have been around forever, and since I have yet to open one up, it's a mystery to me how they keep them so cool!) Anyways, a box like this and a flatscreen will definitely give me some more desk space than I have now. I hope this push towards smaller desktop boxes continues, so we can have something that is closer to "laptop-sized" for a decent price.

    • Re:Long overdue (Score:5, Funny)

      by Chundra ( 189402 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @04:51PM (#3196146)
      Laptops have been around forever, and since I have yet to open one up, it's a mystery to me how they keep them so cool!

      Well, the general consensus is that if you use shiny or transluscent materials, and maybe slap an "i" or "e" on the front of the product's name it becomes cool.

      Now you know.
    • Yeah, but a lot of laptops are built with insufficient cooling, so they will overheat if they are kept on for too long.
  • That we make a nice case/computer for those family members that dont overclock of constantly upgrade :) I have a feeling if I put my rig in there id be able to cook a couple of eggs on the surface. Hmm I suppose I could throw about 4 fans on each side.. hmm...

  • nice form factor (Score:2, Informative)

    by frankmu ( 68782 )
    i bought the sv24 recently as a computer for my sons room. it's a nice size, and has all the connections one needs. i had a spare cpu, memory, monitor, etc, so the cost was very minimal. as noted in previous slashdot articles, it is a noisy machine,but not as noisy as my valinux 1U server. i have to run win98 because of his software (reader rabbit, etc). my only problem with the computer is that the 1394 does not work with the web cam. it may be windows, the via pl133 chip set, or the camera.
    mostly a good computer. this new one should just as good.

    • Re:nice form factor (Score:2, Informative)

      by DBman ( 467320 )
      Linux+SV24=Headaches

      If you think you're gonna run Linux on one of these Shuttle mini systems, and you're not interested in having an unsupported doorstop, check around to see if anybody else is successfully sunning linux or *bsd and X and net and usb and ieee1394 and whatever else you might want to run.

      I've had nothing but problems with my SV, and while it's fun trying things out to make it work, i really needed a new workstation, not a new project, and had I done more research prior to buying, I probably would have picked up something else.

      They are schweet little systems though ;-)

      -doug
  • Why they won't include an AGP slot? I can't get back on the site to verify the specs. but the perfect (to me) config would be to put the NIC, firewire and sound on the MOBO, and have one AGP slot and one PCI slot.

    • Re:I don't understand (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I'm right there with you. Even some of the corporate small form factor machines (vectra/deskpro) lack a real AGP slot. In my mind, this is a tragedy, as I'll never be able to build what I've been wanting to build for a long time now.....mounting suspense...."THE ULTIMATE GAME CONSOLE"
  • Don't see anything about Macrovision on the TV out.. did I miss that ?
  • I have some pictures of this system on my website from CeBIT 2002.

    http://kruczkowski.mine.nu/cebit_2002.shtml [kruczkowski.mine.nu]
  • For hooking up to your local broadband, an old PCI Pentium system from the thrift store for $20 works great. Why fork out the money for this box, when you can get a cheap old box and throw Linux on it?

  • Take one of these impressive little boards and couple it with a Nvida nForce chipset? I would pounce on one of these small systems in a heartbeat if the graphics didn't suck ass so bad. I had one about a year ago and just ended up totally disgusted with overall video performance.

    I know a lot of people will use them in the living room/small home server. But I would love to be able to get ride of my huge tower sittign next to my desk if I had a good alternative. support for a DVI port would make the deal even better. You have this nice small system.... who wants to use a bulky CRT with something so sleek? To me, using analog LCD panels just isn't a real option either.

    Anyhow... jsut my thoughts.
    • Take one of these impressive little boards and couple it with a Nvida nForce chipset? I would pounce on one of these small systems in a heartbeat if the graphics didn't suck ass so bad. I had one about a year ago and just ended up totally disgusted with overall video performance.

      Sticking an AGP slot in would be a big improvement. If you could stick an All-In-Wonder Radeon (or one of the newer models with the remote control), a big-ass hard drive, and a combo CD-RW/DVD-ROM drive (or a DVD±RW drive) inside one of these, you'd have a schweet entertainment computer.

      • somethign like that would be a great idea. While taking up a bit more space it would give people who no only want a small system footprint, but also want some power behind it.

        I know a lot of people want these style systems for the lowend market... and that is fine. But I'm sure there are plenty of power users out there that would love to shrink the footprint of their computers.
    • Take one of these impressive little boards and couple it with a Nvida nForce chipset? I would pounce on one of these...

      The nForce chipset really only has GF2MX graphics though-not exactly a powerhouse. I'd rather have an AGP slot so I can put a real performer in there. Then it's a hell of a LAN party box. Give me 1AGP/1PCI over 2PCI anyday!

      Having said that, though... I've got a SV24 and I'm loving the heck out of it. It's a lot of fun and a great conversation piece too. In fact it's even a great LAN party box without a spiffy vid card... just as a server, not necessarily the box you'd game on.

      One more note- the videoout on the SV24 is much sharper than the TV-out on the several nVidia cards I've tried.

  • Useful areas (Score:5, Interesting)

    by halftrack ( 454203 ) <jonkje@gEEEmail.com minus threevowels> on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @04:57PM (#3196179) Homepage
    Other useful areas are:
    * Hack it to become a car media player with full featured video and dvd player.
    - Why: it would fit easily in a car. Fun. Games possible.
    - How: embedd small LCD's into the back of the seats.

    * Controll device for robots.
    - Why: robots are cool. Easy to program. Cheap CPU-power.
    - How: simple relay control using the FireWire, USB or serial interfaces.

    * Use it for anything you'd like:
    - Why: it's a regular computer. Computers aren't tools. Tools are built for a purpose and purpose means you're locked at a target. Hammers are used to hammer nails, kettles; to cook potatos in, computers; to do anything.
    • computers; to do anything.

      Could I cook potatos in my computer?
      • !OFFTOPIC WARNING! (this is a reply)

        YES, just figure out how to transport the heat energy from your CPU - some sort of heat pump - to an installation allowing water to boil. You should not underestimate the energy the CPU emits.

        Imagination is all there takes.
      • Could I cook potatos in my computer?

        Someone figured out how to fry an egg [theregister.co.uk] with his computer, so I don't see why not...

    • Re:Useful areas (Score:1, Flamebait)

      by HamNRye ( 20218 )
      Stealing DirecTV?? I had considered an SV24 for my DirecTV emulation, but it didn't have 2 serial ports.... until now. But with no Paralell prots, how am I going to write my GBA flash?? HoHum...

      The biggest problem with using these as a DVR is that many (most) TV cards still have problems with non-intel chipsets.

      The lord Taketh, and the lord ummm... ummm...
      ~Hammy
      • The biggest problem with using these as a DVR is that many (most) TV cards still have problems with non-intel chipsets.

        That's news to my AIW Radeon, which has been running for a few months through an AMD 761. (I wish the FUD would stop...you'd think the people here would know better.)

      • I agree with the ther poster. That's crap. I have a Via Chipset and I am running a Pinnacle TV card and it works great! I also got it for 30 bucks! :)
      • I've got an old Avermedia TV98 (BT848) and Geforce 3 V3800 deluxe (philips chipset) in my dual-athlon system, and there's no incompatibility.
  • Man I need some coffee or something. I read that and thought "whoa, when the hell did the Space Shuttle get an Intel processor, let alone a Pentium 4??" =)

    Aw well, /me just being silly.
  • The SS40 is great looking but still lacks some important features (DVI, AGP slot).

    The FIC Samba SFF P4 kit includes DVI support, an AGP slot, 2 PCMCIA slots and SPDIF audio out.

    Have a look.

    http://www.fica.com/products/systems/Databook/Samb a/Samba.stm [fica.com]

  • viahardware's server (Score:4, Interesting)

    by asv108 ( 141455 ) <asv@nOspam.ivoss.com> on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @05:11PM (#3196265) Homepage Journal
    Anyone else impressed with how well this site is taking on the traffic of slashdot? Usually niche sites like viahardware go down in an instant or slow down to a crawl especially when the review is so graphics intensive. My congrats go out to Viahardware.com's sysadmin, we have have been defeated.

  • Socket 370 (Score:2, Interesting)

    by DragonWyatt ( 62035 )
    Am I the only one who would rather have a socket 370 version? Or even better, socket A?

    I'm not sure about the p4 stuff just yet. (Guess I'll have to stick with the SV24?) And while I'm wishing, how about dual NICs? And a $9.95 price tag? And a...
  • Now just throw it in a lunch-box style case with an integrated LCD (doesn't have to be great quality, I always have the TV out) and a hide-away keyboard and pointing device of some kind and I'm sold.

    Smaller system units are great, but if you're gonna go that route you may as well make it a true portable.
    • How about one of the soldam pandora+ cases [soldam.com]and mount a LCD on a swivle bar ala the new imacs. Then you could say "Oh yeah well look at this sweet beauty" to a mac fanatic.
    • Now just throw it in a lunch-box style case with an integrated LCD (doesn't have to be great quality, I always have the TV out) and a hide-away keyboard and pointing device of some kind and I'm sold.

      Smaller system units are great, but if you're gonna go that route you may as well make it a true portable.

      There are devices like that on the market... They're called lap something. Lap-computers? Lap-processors? Whatever. Anyway, they're all the rage. I'm sure you could find one just about anywhere.

  • I'll express my excitement in haiku form... (Score:4, Funny)

    by MonkeyBot ( 545313 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @05:14PM (#3196278)
    Small box under desk, Promiscuous mode net card, Silently watch boss.
  • Does anyone know where one can purchase these, specifically the SS40. I've been intel free for over 2 years now and I see no sense in stopping now.
  • I recently noticed that Epox is shipping their 8KHM microatx k5266a based mobo. Average price is 80$ with sound onboard. A little more if you want the crummy onboard video.

    Get this board, a midrange athlon xp (newest ones may not be supported yet), ddr ram, and twink out the system the way you like it.

    With the ati all in wonder 8500 out this makes an awesome tv box, nice an compact, without being very expensive. Think I paid about 800$ for the whole system including monitor + shipping + tax.
  • by losing the floppy disk bay. Who uses floppy disks anymore anyway?

    Replace that with a 2x20 LCD screen, though, and maybe you could keep it. (Although Matrix Orbital and Crystal Fontz don't seem to make LCDs for the floppy bay .. dunnno why not)
    • That's not a floppy disk bay, that's a 3.5" device bay.

      You can put a tape drive there, a Zip drive, and Orb drive... many possibilities.

      Even a floppy comes in handy sometimes, too!

      But I think I would like one of these better if they made it with two 5.25" device bays, one of which came with a bracket for 3.5" devices. Then you would have even more options, and the case need not be much larger.

      steveha

  • Bewoulf ? (Score:3, Funny)

    by ajaygautam ( 554694 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @05:26PM (#3196359) Homepage
    Perfect size for a Bewoulf component :)
  • uhh... Why 'd you wanna use a PIV as a gateway? Aren't gateways the reason why god made the PI?

  • Check out the even smaller mini-ITX platform (Score:3, Informative)

    by swordboy ( 472941 ) on Wednesday March 20, 2002 @05:31PM (#3196386) Journal
    Check out the new mini-ITX platform [viatech.com] that VIA has put together. Supposed to be fanless and under $100 with processor. If someone doesn't sit down and develop a Linux based set of appliance firmware, then Microsoft will fill yet another market. 3D will be damn cheap soon enough and will become part of these products.
    • Speaking of fans, can some hardware person explain to me why circuit boards aren't always mounted vertically? Wouldn't it be better for airlow? The way systems are put together now, either the mother board is horizontal or the slots are horizontal. Why?


      Admittedly, the way expansion boards are made today, it would mean that connectors would go on the top or botttom of a system instead of the side (back), but would that be so bad? Also, I don't see why you couldn't put external connectors for an expansion board opposite the edge connector, so it would end up on the side of the system.


      Is there a good reason or is this just one of those historical mistakes?

    • Re: mini-ITX platform - Looks neat, but the main reason I bought my last low-profile system was for use as a video player. Not sure the VIA C3 chip is suited for that. I tend to prefer Intel CPUs all around as I have experienced better stability, and stability is #1. I would gladly take a speed decrease (as long as I can still play intense media) over a system that crashes often. That is what I like about the SS50. Too bad it uses the SiS chipset :(

      Give me Intel or give me death (Blue screen of death, to be exact).
  • So will the TV out in work in Linux? Or if I throw my GeForce 2 MX in there will that overide the onboard video, and then tv out will work under Linux?

  • Does anybody know if there is a driver for the onboard network device on this board? (It's the Realtek 8100). I know that there is a driver in the 2.4. series for a realtek RTL8139. Is this the driver to use on this board???

    • the 8100 is basically the same as the 8139, its simply a motherboard version of the 8139. So i think you can just use the 8139 driver in linux.

      If the kernel driver doesnt work, try the driver posted below, its a direct link to realtek's linux driver

      ftp://ftp.realtek.com.tw/lancard/drivers/8139/li nu x24x-8139cp(101).zip
  • Personally, I don't mind having a tower. I like throwing in odds-and-ends in my PCI slots, so something like this would never really be my primary rig. However, for the "average" user (or even a secondary living room computer or something) this thing looks great!

    It's got everything the one could ask for, with a few more conviniences than even your average desktop. (That being readily-available mic, headphone, USB, and firewire on the front of the box. Nice stuff.) The fact that it's so tiny is also great, as it could be shown off as a table-top piece, or stowed away where nobody could see it. Pair this with a flat-panel and you've got a PC box with (almost) as much appeal as the G4 Cube. (Which, I'll admin, does look a bit cooler...but I'll take what I can get.)

    The only handicap I see is the lack of an AGP slot and, thus, very weak gfx performance. *sigh* Oh well. Can't have everything, I guess.

    -Jayde
  • they atart offering them with crappy old Geforce 2 or other video cards that actually have some capabilities instead of the crap that is always in these boxes... The cappuchino knock offs that you can buy for $350.00 and the Cappuo it's self. have the absolute crappiest video card available... It's like these manufacturers go out of their way to try and find super crappy video.

    Hell offer Geforce 2,3 or even a 4 chipset in there.. if they did I know of at least 10 people that would buy one in a few seconds for their lan-part machine. (I'm waiting for the "use a laptop" comments... Sorry no laptops exist with good video chipsets.. that rage mobility is pure crap... Worse than an EGA video card.)
  • If you want to use a parallel-port based gadget with one of these, you will either need to use one of the PCI slots to get a parallel port, or else use a 1394-to-parallel adapter. Or a USB-to-parallel adapter, if you don't mind the speed hit (USB isn't quite as fast as a parallel port running in 1284 mode).

    But all the new stuff is either USB or 1394 anyway, so I doubt that many people will care.

    P.S. It has two serial ports! Two serial ports and no parallel. I guess it was just a question of what they could fit in there...

    steveha
  • Toss the box in a closet somewhere out of the way...

    Er... spend over the odds on a flashy aluminium brushed finish sexy case and throw it in a closet? I think not... The closet if for beige PCs surely....

    moog
  • There has been a standard called PC104 in use quite a while now. They are special mobo boards with very small form factor used in industrys and in embedded devices. Usually they have everything on a single board but they can be expanded easily. They arent top_of_the_line but for things like fileservers and routers/proxys they would do just dandy. Especially considering many cisco routers still in use have 68030s in them. There are boards for faster cpus too if you would need that. Cool that someone took this concept and made it mainstream atlast.

  • SV24 a big disappointment (Score:2, Insightful)

    by dsfox ( 2694 )
    I'll think twice before checking out another shuttle mini system. The SV24 looked good on paper, but the company failed to release decent software support for the video or the audio. Sure, they had some creaky binary only drivers, but if you are trying to develop softwrae on these systems, forget it.
  • Add an AGP slot so power users can put in their own video, and this system will own MANY LAN parties. Until then, it's just a cute toy.

  • For those of you looking for a REALLY small system, check out the Nano Module [nano-system.com] from Nano Systems (a small Swedish start-up).

    It's a Pentium 266-class PC in a 5.25"-size package, containing:

    • National Geode SC2200 CPU/microcontroller (Pentium compatible)
    • Standard 168-pin 133 MHz SDRAM DIMM
    • Compact Flash (ships w/ RedHat on a 64MB card)
    • Dual 10/100 ethernet controllers
    • USB controller
    • IDE33 controller (for external disk)
    • VGA controller
    • 1 PCI slot (w/ 90 degrees angle adapter)

    It's powered by a small 12V laptop power supply. No fans. It's definitely not for the 3D game boys in the crowd, but for embedded use or a firewall/mail gateway/proxy/whatever it's close to perfect.

    It's so small you can put it in one of the 5.25" bays of your computer while developing. It even has a connector so you can power it from the PC power supply.

    I bought one a couple of weeks ago, and it's sweet. Here is a picture of the internals [sourceforge.net].

    • ...but for embedded use or a firewall/mail gateway/proxy/whatever it's close to perfect.
      Which is probably what they have in mind. Why else put two ethernet controllers in such a small box?

      But there are also some tantalizing possibilities that will probably never get exploited. Despite its low stats, this box has roughly the same horsepower as my Linux box [dell.com]. Which has no trouble running KDE, Mozilla, even Kylix. In other words, there's enough computing power here to satisfy 99% of all non-gaming desktop users.

      Think of all the folks who share their lives with a big, noisy, cantankerous beige box. Now think of what a smart IS department could do with the Nano. "Hello new hire. I hear you hate fan noise and technicians. Well, here's your computer. No, I won't come install it for you. Just plug it into the keyboard, monitor and network that's already in your cube. You need local storage? Plug this zip drive into the USB port. You can take it home if you want, but you have to provide your own monitor and keyboard. If you need a software upgrade, bring it back and we'll swap in a new flash card. Good bye!"

      Yeah, I know. IS people aren't that creative. Oh well!

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