Shuttle launches first Media Center barebones

Small form-factor PC specialist Shuttle launched its latest barebones system this week, pitching the product at system builders keen to enter the media centre market.

The XPC SB83G5M is Shuttle's first barebones rig designed specifically for Windows XP Media Center Edition, the company said. The unit employs Shuttle's Silent X cooling system for "unobtrusive" living room use.

The unit also features Shuttle's note Versatile Front-panel Display, which hooks into the OS to provide access to Media Center components without the need to show the full screen UI - handy if you're interested in building a music-oriented system, say.

Inside the familiarly styled box, there's an Intel 915G integrated chipset ready for Socket 775 Pentium and Celeron processors operating across an 800MHz or 533MHz frontside bus. There are two DIMM slots supporting up to 2GB of 400MHz DDR SDRAM.

Graphics come courtesy of the integrated Intel GMA 900 engine, but there's a 16x PCI Express slot to allow high-specced graphics cards to be added. The mobo features six-channel audio, with analog and digital SPDIF I/O.

The unit contains room for a single 5.25in drive and two 3.5in units, with a single ATA-100 header, twin Serial ATA headers and a floppy drive connector.

Connectivity is provided through a Gigabit Ethernet port, a Firewire 400 connector and two USB 2.0 ports.

Available immediately, the XPC SB83G5M costs around €369 (£252/$475). ®

Related review

MV Cubik GamePro small form-factor PC