Rumors have circled for months about joint efforts between Shuttle and Soldam Corporation on a brand new small form factor system. It appears as though the fruits of this labor are starting to appear with the launch of Shuttle?s new SB75S XPC.

As you can see, the new streamlined case appears, at least externally, to be a significant shift in style from Shuttle?s earlier XPC case designs. What you?ll find on the inside of the SB75S however is very similar to the popular Shuttle SB75G2 XPC, powered by the top-of-the-line Intel i875P motherboard chipset. Except for a few minor changes which we?ll touch on later, the SB75G2 and SB75S are essentially identical on the inside, but certainly look, and sound, quite a bit different.

The S in SB75S stands for Soldam Corporation, a high-end Japanese small form factor case manufacturer. This system represents the first joint engineering effort between Shuttle and Soldam, marrying Shuttle?s high-end SB75 system with an exclusive Soldam case design.

So why should you consider the SB75S? Well certainly for looks. That is, if you?re a fan of the new case design. This system will also soon be available in multiple colors including black. But don?t judge a book by its cover. Like it?s brother, the SB75G2, the SB75S comes loaded with high-end features including dual channel DDR400, Gigabit LAN, Serial-ATA RAID, HyperThreading support, Shuttle?s proprietary 250W SilentX Power Supply, as well as one key feature the SB75G2 lacks, official Shuttle Prescott support. We?re told that future versions of the SB75G2 may get the Prescott stamp of approval from Shuttle, but at this time, the SB75S has full “official” support for Intel?s latest CPU.

Whether or not you?d actually want to purchase a Prescott though to go with any SFF at this point is certainly a question worth discussing. We?ll delve more into the SB75S?s Prescott support later on in the review. For now, let?s start by taking a look at what Shuttle has packaged along with the SB75S.

You?ll notice the typical Shuttle accessory kit, including a single Serial-ATA cable. Those of you who already own Shuttle XPC?s though may notice something new in the above image. With the release of the SB75S, Shuttle has started packaging Mandrake Linux with their systems. You?ll find two Mandrake Linux CD?s as well as some propaganda encouraging you to register (and pay) for support on Mandrake?s website. Fortunately the website also includes quite a bit of free support information.  See our Shuttle and Mandrake Linux Article for more information.

Before we get a closer look at this new Soldam case, lets get a refresher on the SB75S?s system specifications:

Processor	Intel Pentium 4 / Celeron 478-pin 533/800MHz FSB
Chipset	Intel i875P Canterwood + ICH5-R
Memory	2 x 184 pin DDR SDRAM up to 2GB at DDR400
Audio	Realtek ALC650 AC?97 5.1 Channel Audio Controller
LAN	Broadcom 5788 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet
PSU	Shuttle SilentX 250W 110/230V AC
Dimensions:	305mm(L) x 218mm(W) x 184mm(H)
Parallel ATA	Two UDMA-100 Dual Channel PATA Ports
Serial ATA	Two UDMA-150 Serial-ATA Ports + Intel 82801ER SATA RAID 0/1/0+1
On-Board Video	None
PCI	1 x 33MHz
AGP	1 x AGP 4X/8X
Other Internal Headers	1 x Floppy Disk 3 x Fan 1 x CD-In 1 x Parallel Port 1 x IrDA 1 x WKMC

Front Panel Connections

2 x USB 2.0 1 x Firewire 1394a (4-Pin) 1 x Mic In 1 x Line Out 1 x Headphone Out 1 x Power Button 1 x Power LED 1 x IDE Activity LED

Rear Panel Connections

4 x USB 2.0 1 x Firewire 1394a (6-pin) 1 x PS/2 Mouse 1 x PS/2 Keyboard 1 x Audio Front Out 1 x Audio Rear Out 1 x Audio Center/Bass Out 1 x RJ45 LAN 2 x Serial (9-Pin) 1 x SPDIF In 1 x SPDIF Out 1 x PCI Slot 1 x AGP Slot

Now, let?s have a closer look at this new case!...

 

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• External Design (1 of 9)
• Internal Design (2 of 9)
• Chipset, PSU, and Cooling (3 of 9)
• Bios (4 of 9)
• Testbench Setup (5 of 9)
• Benchmarks & Overclocking (6 of 9)
• Prescott Benchmark Comparison (7 of 9)
• Performance and Noise Comparisons (8 of 9)
• Conclusion (9 of 9)