POSTED BY

AT 2:00 PM
Wednesday July 29, 2009

shuttle

Review: An afternoon with Shuttle's Nano-powered XS29

Shuttle's XS29 barebone PC has a 1.6GHz processor, up to 4GB of RAM, gigabit ethernet, DVI, VGA and standard audio jacks, 6 USB ports and Via Chrome9 HC3 video. It's a Via Nano version of the X27, an otherwise identical machine equipped with an Intel chipset and Atom CPU.

Thoughts follow.

• I haven't tried the X27, but in principle, the difference would be slightly superior performance but greater power consumption. There's also the XS29F, a slower fanless version.

• Equipped with 2GB of RAM and a 150GB toshiba hard drive, desktop performance was fine, but it's not up to (modern) gaming. It just doesn't have the grunt.

• 1080p HD movies worked great, not a spot of chop. The chipset supports MPEG-4, VC1 and WMV hardware accelleration. But there's no HDMI!

• If you're OK with DVI and put in Blu, it would make a great home theater PC.

• Price is TBD, but it'll liekly be $450-ish for a complete system with the basics and $200-ish for just the case, motherboard and CPU.

• All said, it's bigger than a Mac Mini and a Dell Studio Hybrid, but not any better. Unless you like the Shuttle's basic black look, a little more money gets you a smaller and more stylish system in both cases. it's a real PC and you can tinker with it to your heart's content.

• However, what it does have over rivals is upgradeability: the case comes apart in moments without the use of tools. Upgrading RAM or the drives would be a snap. There's even an unused PCIe slot, should you manage to find something that'll fit in there.

• The review unit came with Windows 7 beta build 7057, and it was a little glitchy. So build a system with XP, Vista or Ubuntu until someone verifies all is well with Microsoft's latest.

Web store [Shuttle]

13 Comments

theawesomerobot

#1 – 3:27 PM July 29, 2009

How well does it run Hulu?

Rob Beschizza

#2 – 4:28 PM July 29, 2009

I didn't try hulu, but it was fine with full-screened HD youtubes.

Stefan Jones

#3 – 5:01 PM July 29, 2009

You could put a Hauppauge HVR-2250 video tuner card in the PCIe slot, and turn this into a cute little MythTV PVR.

Aaron

#4 – 5:15 PM July 29, 2009

Really? Full-screen HD YouTube ran OK? I think that's a first for an Atom machine. Is it running the new dual-core 330? Final shipping specs seem to be hard to find on the intertubes.

I've been waiting for a cheap SFF box to use as a Hulu and video front end. The Eee Box 206 was promising, but apparently choked on Hulu and full-screen YouTube HD.

Rob, in the future, I think lots of people (myself included) would be grateful if you let us know how full-screen Hulu (and/or Hulu Desktop) runs on boxes like this that are clearly aimed at the living room.

Rob Beschizza

#5 – 6:33 PM July 29, 2009

Not an Atom.

Will be sure to check Hulu, Boxee and the like on any future models.

obo

#6 – 12:03 AM July 30, 2009

@Aaron: The X2700 Rob links to as the price estimate is an Atom Dual-Core 330, but from what I've read, 1080p is just out of its reach - that GMA 950 cripples it for video.

You could, maybe, stick this $58 Broadcom HD accelerator into the PCIe slot. No guarantees there.

Instead, check out the AspireRevo, about $400 for a full Vista Home Premium system, or ASRock Ion 330 for about $370 OS-less. Both have the NVIDIA Ion chipset for 1080p HD video acceleration and HDMI - the AspireRevo is a single-core Atom, the ASRock dual-core.

north

#7 – 6:54 AM July 30, 2009

"...If you're OK with DVI and put in Blu, it would make a great home theater PC..."
Now I'm not 100% sure, but unless the Via Chrome9 HC3 is HDCP compliant you'll have problems running the Blu over DVI.
(Not 100% sure that chipset is HDCP compliant, but very sure you will have problems with Blu if it's not.)

underwhelmer

#8 – 10:10 AM July 30, 2009

No HDMI kills it for me. I'm currently rocking an AppleTV running Boxee, and it's painfully slow. So I ask: Any recommendations for an HTPC that fits this spec list?

- Enough power to handle HD video/Hulu/Boxee
- Windows or OS X (No linux)
- HDMI out
- IR remote functionality
- Small and quiet
- WiFi
- 250GB or bigger HDD
- Preferably $500-600

Or is that just wishful thinking? I can get a Dell Studio Hybrid in at $675 or so. (Who charges $70 for a wifi card!?)

I'd consider rolling my own, but would hate to do all the work and find out it coughs and sputters on Hulu, or somesuch.

DefMech

#9 – 11:57 AM August 2, 2009

@Underwhelmer: I'm right there with you. I'm trying to find reasons NOT to buy a Mini soon. I spent a while at Newegg trying to piece one out on my own, but I had a surprisingly difficult time getting anywhere near the form factor while keeping similar performance. I could go super small, but I'd be dipping into Ion boards and lose the great C2D and fast-ish Nvidia chip. That might not be a big deal to people who just need it to display video, though. I need to be able to do some mid-range 3D as well.

Shoot, I'd be happy to go up to a VCR form factor if it meant I could OSX86 it.

Rob Beschizza

#10 – 10:44 AM August 4, 2009

Underwhelmer, you know what? I think this model actually does all of that:

http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2009/06/30/review-a-weekend-wit-6.html

Chris Goldsmith

#11 – 8:25 AM August 25, 2009

Where did you buy this?

Rob Beschizza

#12 – 9:51 AM August 25, 2009

It was a review unit. It's not out, yet; you can get the atom one here: http://us.shuttle.com/barebone/Models/X27D.html

Artthurko