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Hey guys I know nothing about SFF PCs so bear with me.

My little sister just graduated high school and is going off to college. My parents and I are buying her a PC and I figured that an SFF PC would be a good choice due to the limited amount of space in the place (plus i'm sure it will make her stand out in the world of Dells, Gateways, and Compaqs).

So i pose the question to you SFF PC pro's: which one do i get?

I'd prefer to have a video card with a DVI port since we will likely get her a 15-17" LCD (she isn't a gamer so i dont need a 9700 pro in this lol). I'd prefer Pentium 4. Its got to have a CD-RW/DVD drive. Its got to be relatively quiet. And its got to look cool.

Input?

Oh yeah: and we'll likely be making the purchase in July.

Seems not so difficult, get a Shuttle cube with nForce2 chipset

element wrote:

Seems not so difficult, get a Shuttle cube with nForce2 chipset

Aren't there like 1000 different Shuttle cubes? Where do I find a place that I can see and compare the different models. Also i'd prefer Pentium 4 but am willing to compromise.

sativa wrote:

element wrote:

Seems not so difficult, get a Shuttle cube with nForce2 chipset

Aren't there like 1000 different Shuttle cubes? Where do I find a place that I can see and compare the different models. Also i'd prefer Pentium 4 but am willing to compromise.

http://www.newegg.com/app/manufactory.a ... g=3&DEPA=1

Here's a pretty good selection. The DVI will probably have to be an add on card.

I can't vouch for the casetronic but it has twoo 5.25 bays.

Also, The last FIC looks pretty good.

hah the review link for the Shuttle XPC SS51G on newegg links to tech-report.

edit: crap i thought it came with a CD-RW/DVD. Why would they put such a wierd front bezel on that no drive could match? I want her computer to look really cool. Beige doesn't go well with light blue glass.

Light blue? Uh oh. Sounds Mac-ish, to me.

What about a laptop? Or a desknote anyway? They're small enough, and do everything else well except the graphics, which are good enough for most uses.

sativa wrote:

hah the review link for the Shuttle XPC SS51G on newegg links to tech-report.

edit: crap i thought it came with a CD-RW/DVD. Why would they put such a wierd front bezel on that no drive could match? I want her computer to look really cool. Beige doesn't go well with light blue glass.

You could always stealth the drive.

41G2...$60 off now at shuttle

do you guys know of a black slot loading cd-rw/dvd drive? slot loading would be woot.

I have two Pioneer 106S slot-load DVD-ROM drives. They have updated it to the new 120S model.

Be sure to pick up Cyberlink's PowerDVD if it doesn't come free with the DVD drive.

thanks JAE but i was thinking more along the lines of a CD-RW/DVD combo drive. I guess finding a black slot-loading one is wishful thinking but I can't seem to find any on newegg at the moment. but i haven't looked extensively yet though.

Laptops are going to be damn affordable this summer, 'cause the market is flooded with them right now. Cubes are cute, but a laptop might be more useful to her, since she can carry it around and especially if the school she's going to has wi-fi access anywhere (I have a desktop and I'm goign to be saving up for a laptop to use the wi-fi system they just put in at my school this summer). The downside is that it could be easily dropped or left somewhere, of course, and you pretty much have to return the whole thing if any one component goes bad.

sativa wrote:

thanks JAE but i was thinking more along the lines of a CD-RW/DVD combo drive.

I have never seen an optical writer of any sort with a slot loading mechanism.

mattsteg wrote:

I have never seen an optical writer of any sort with a slot loading mechanism.

Mac. Didn't some of those Superdrive type of things have slot loading?

All of TR's Shuttle SFF reviews are here: http://www.tech-report.com/reviews/systems.x

That should make any comparisons pretty easy.

well as for the laptop thing for college, well the only person i've really seen put a laptop to good use is a guy i know plays on a golf team and travels alot, other and other than being able to take it home with them i've seen very few that leave a desktop...

well that's from one college guys perspective

getbornagain wrote:

well as for the laptop thing for college, well the only person i've really seen put a laptop to good use is a guy i know plays on a golf team and travels alot, other and other than being able to take it home with them i've seen very few that leave a desktop...

well that's from one college guys perspective

With decent 802.11b coverage on our campus, I know of quite a few people that take laptops there to do stuff between or during classes. If you have a need for real mobility laptops are quite nice. I've also seen a ton that never move, but I guess in my experience I've seen more that move than you. Almost all of that came after our campus got wireless, and I know a bunch of people started bringing their laptops after they saw me using the wireless net (it isn't all that well publicized)

Thanks Diss, I didn't realize you guys had a review of the SN41G2

I think I'm gonna get her the black SN41G2 with a black CD-RW/DVD combo drive from Samsung (52x24x52x16).
I'll probably use the integrated graphics and might purchase a DVI add-on card from Shuttle.

The other componants won't be determined until the time of purchase due to the contant price drops in the pc market (duh). I'll have to think about which speakers to get her. They will probably be black, along with the keyboard, mouse, and monitor. She's gonna have such a nice setup.

Her campus doesn't have WiFi yet so it doesn't make much sense to get her a laptop. Maybe when she gets to grad school lol.

Logitech's MX700 is the best mouse that I've used yet. It's black and silver to match your color scheme. Microsoft's Intellimouse Optical is my second choice.

mattsteg wrote:

getbornagain wrote:

well as for the laptop thing for college, well the only person i've really seen put a laptop to good use is a guy i know plays on a golf team and travels alot, other and other than being able to take it home with them i've seen very few that leave a desktop...

well that's from one college guys perspective

With decent 802.11b coverage on our campus, I know of quite a few people that take laptops there to do stuff between or during classes. If you have a need for real mobility laptops are quite nice. I've also seen a ton that never move, but I guess in my experience I've seen more that move than you. Almost all of that came after our campus got wireless, and I know a bunch of people started bringing their laptops after they saw me using the wireless net (it isn't all that well publicized)

well limited avaiablity and publiciztion is our problem too, well that and state funding limiting expansion but anyways i deffelenly haven't seen anything like the intel comericals

oh and i'll deffelently second the logitech mx700 mouse, it's great even for games

sativa wrote:

I think I'm gonna get her the black SN41G2 with a black CD-RW/DVD combo drive from Samsung (52x24x52x16).

I don't know about the samsung drive but Plextor makes a DVD/CR-RW/CR-ROM drive. You can find it here

I was wondering how loud the SN41G2 is. Does anyone have experience with one and give me a subjective opinion?

Prolly sounds like a AAFuel dragster in the burnout area Seriously tho...there are a couple comments about em in this SFF Station section..he he..

I am running a SN41GS as you are aware from my AGP card powering problem. It is fairly load, especially when you have a graphics card installed. You can set the fan to speed up at a hotter temperature which just prolongs the noise. If you wanted to use the unit for watching DVD's in high end a/v setup it would irritate. Otherwise it is bearable considering the massive plus you get looks-wise!!

spensaf wrote:

I am running a SN41GS as you are aware from my AGP card powering problem. It is fairly load, especially when you have a graphics card installed. You can set the fan to speed up at a hotter temperature which just prolongs the noise. If you wanted to use the unit for watching DVD's in high end a/v setup it would irritate. Otherwise it is bearable considering the massive plus you get looks-wise!!

Thanks for the reply. I guess my sister won't be leaving it on at night lol. You can go for size or sound but not both eh?