|
iMac Intel Core 2 Duo 24" Desktop |
Compare the top 5 lowest prices by hovering your mouse over the product names on the left |
$1794.00 |
|
iMac 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 20\"... | $1288.99 | |
|
TouchSmart IQ504 Desktop | $1299.99 | |
|
Pavilion a6400f Desktop | $479.96 | |
|
Aspire M5100 AM5100-EF9500A Desktop | $571.77 |
- Solaris Computer Systems PCs: A New OEM Emerges
- Boutique Graphics PCs Duke It Out
- ABS Ultimate X9 Firefox Extreme - Gaming Performance for Less
- Gateway Gamer Gets 8800GTX
- Vigor's Quadfather Uses AMD Quad FX CPUs
- iBuypower's $5,500 Ultra Gaming System
- Gateway Goes Gaming: FX530XT Review
- iBuypower Dream 2006 CrossFire Gaming System
- iBuypower's 2006 Dream Quad-SLI Gaming System
- Game On With the Ultimate X9 from ABS Computers
First Impressions, Design, And Style
Source: Tom's Hardware US – Keywords: shuttle, kpc
Syndication:
First Impressions, Design, And Style
The KPC has an MSRP of $99 for a barebones and $199 for a complete system, although we couldn’t find one available at the time of writing; all we could find was deactivated listing on Newegg for the KPC. Once it does become easier to find, it will initially be available in black. Additional colors should be included in the second batch of KPCs that make it to market.
Shuttle KPC
The KPC is in a Shuttle form factor (small form factor) measuring 6 7/8" in height, 11 3/8" in length and 7 ½" in width - slightly larger than first reported. This size still makes it is appealing as an inexpensive PC, HTPC, or other appliance.
Anyone who sees the hardware typically asks: "is that really a PC?" The KPC is so small that it’s hard to imagine it is a functioning desktop PC.
Side View
Immediately noticeable is the removable front plate. This is a clever integrated picture mount, so the user can easily customize the KPC by installing their own photographs. The only issue I noticed here is that the front plate requires a Torx 10 driver to remove the screws - probably not something the average homeowner has lying around.
Picture installed
Notice the highly reflective surface, which looks nice but it is a fingerprint magnet. In any case, Shuttle has fulfilled their "customizable" promise with the ability to change the face of the KPC.
Black KPC
Smiley Blue
Red Flower
A Cup of Coffee
We can see that the KPC is a visually appealing box, and its visual customization will certainly appeal to a lot of users. But what’s under the hood?
- Previous page Shuttle's Korporate Perfect Cube...
- Next page The KPC's Hardware: Overview, CPU HD,...
Six months ago I installed Ubuntu 7.10 on a compact barebones for my wife, a computer novice. I reconfigured Gnome to look a lot like XP with only one toolbar at the bottom and created desktop icons for common programs: browser, word processor, spreadsheet, media viewers/players, etc. I automounted our NAS and created an icon for that, too. Used CUPS to easily connect two networked printers (yeah, my house is fully networked with a GB backbone
She's as happy as can be and uses it everyday for routine "mommy", tasks including classroom rosters, art class schedules, saving/viewing picture and videos, etc.
Bottom line is she loves it. As the home IT admin I like it too because it's rock solid and gives me less to do than maintaining the kids and my XP machines. So except for playing games, I see no reason to buy Windows in the future.... and I won't.
Cons: barebone comes with no processor fan, no case fan, no cd-rom. Room for only 2 hard drives. NO CASE FAN
Rumor has it that they will offer the ICE Genie as an optional separate purchase, which is nice for the processor but I don't know if it's sufficient enough to cool the HDD's. I built one with a celeron 420 and a stock core 2 duo proc fan. (the stock proc fan that came with the celeron was DOA) The fan size on the back is 92mm, I bought an antec 92mm case fan and it's very quiet, the loudest fan on the system is the small power supply fan. It has the slot under the faceplate for a slim dvd/cd-rom. You would have to dremel mod the front clear plastic to make it look right, but it's easily doable. AT LEAST it has the option.
I built it for a Windows Home Server and it works perfect.