Swiping the hardware from the PC Authority test bench, we went about putting together our Shuttle XPC. Immediately we were confronted by one of the idiosyncrasies of small form factor PCs: squeezing all the hardware in the tiny space inside.

Given that, if you want to join the next generation of micro personal computing, small form factor is the way of the future - easily integrated into a home theatre or lounge room environment with minimal intrusion. Only slightly larger than a shoebox, the chassis is covered in an attractive brushed metal finish, almost woodgrain-ish.

Being a barebones system, it comes with the case, power supply, motherboard, fan and integrated video, which is designed for basic graphics functions. The front faceplate allows room for a single optical drive and a floppy disk drive to be installed; combo drives may be your best bet here, as you'll conserve space and not limit your playback functionality.

Once up and running we ran the machine through its paces and found it performed quite well, returning a very reasonable 230 overall SYSmark 2002 score with our testbench P4 2.53GHz, roughly 10 points higher than the MSI MEGA651 in our September issue (page 46). Front audio and USB connectivity makes it easy to plug and unplug without reefing the system out of its place, perfect for connecting peripherals such as joysticks and gamepads.

Dual is order of the day, Shuttle hitting the nail on the head with the SB62G2 boasting dual 10/100 Ethernet for an incoming broadband connection and allowing you to share it with other machines on the network without the need for purchasing additional hardware. Also included is dual DDR support for the gamers and system tweakers amongst us.
At the reasonable price of $615, this represents great value and would make a great second machine for gaming, LAN usage or as an entertainment PC without breaking the bank.