SB95P's specification
| Shuttle's XPC SB95P v2.0 | |
| CPU | Most LGA775 Intel Processors, up to: Pentium 4 570J (3.8GHz, 1MiB L2) Pentium 4 660 (3.6GHz, 2MiB L2) Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.73GHz (3.73GHz, 2MiB L2) |
| Northbridge | Intel Alderwood-E (i925XE) |
| Memory Support | 2 slots. 2 x DDR2 (DDR2-533 max), 2GB max |
| Display | None |
| PEG | 16 lane slot from the i925XE |
| PCI Express | 1 lane slot from ICH6R |
| Southbridge | Intel ICH6R |
| Audio | Realtek ALC880 8-channel HD Audio CODEC from ICH6R feed |
| Audio Connectivity | Optical S/PDIF input and output, coax digital output line in, mic output, headphone output, basic speaker outputs |
| PCI Conventional | None |
| IDE | 1 port ATA100 from ICH6R |
| IDE RAID | None |
| SATA | 4 SATA150 ports from ICH6R |
| SATA RAID | All ports from ICH6R, RAID levels: 0, 1, 0+1, JBOD |
| Networking | Broadcom 5751 GigE PCI Express, 10/100/1000 Mibit/sec |
| USB | ICH6R (8 total), 4 USB2.0 (2 front, 2 rear), headers for 4 more |
| FireWire | 2 x FireWire400 (1 rear 6-pin, 1 front 6-pin), from VIA VT6307 |
| PC Card | None |
| Other I/O | PS/2, Serial, integrated media reader |
| Disk space | 2 internal 3.5" bays 1 external 5.25" optical bay 1 external 3.5" bay |
| Batteries/Power | Internal 350W PSU |
| Weight and dimensions | 6.22 kilo laden with two HDD 210mm wide 325mm deep 220mm high |
While the SB95P v2.0 doesn't support Intel's latest dual-core Pentium and Pentium 4 processors (Intel drop the 4 from the Extreme Edition 840 branding), it supports everything else. You can drop in any other Pentium 4, Celeron or Extreme Edition that you can lay your hands on, provided it's LGA775. Intel's premier core logic supports DDR2 for system memory at up to 533MHz. The 266MHz front-side bus frequency is a fine pairing for the maximum memory clock, given that there's two memory channels to feed the front-side bus, which is sampled four times per clock; in other words, they match up in terms of peak theoretical bandwidth.
Intel's push for PCI Express on the desktop is well documented and the SB95P v2.0 benefits by being provided by Shuttle with a full 16X electrical slot for discrete graphics (which can also work with 1X peripherals according to the manual), a 1X slot for add-in cards, with the Broadcom 5751 network chip also riding a 1X lane connected to the ICH6R. Shuttle use PCI Express whenever possible inside the SB95P v2.0, a design decision that makes sense. The first wave of PCI Express 1X add-in boards are just around the corner, so Shuttle's inclusion of a slot is forward-thinking.
After that, the SB95P v2.0 is heavily SATA-focussed in terms of disk drive connectivity. There's a lone PATA port which is cabled up for connection to any optical drive you might install. Using a hard drive with the cable is not only a fussy activity in terms of routing the cable to a new part of the chassis, it also leaves you sharing the cable with an optical drive, unless you possess a SATA optical drive. While they exist, they're uncommon, and the chassis really doesn't make it easy for you to use that PATA cable for a hard disk.
So if you're contemplating the SB95P v2.0, make sure you're using SATA hard disks in the chassis. Being a P-series XPC, you've got the potential to install three 3.5" disk drives into the chassis. There's room at the top for two, and you can forsake the use of a floppy drive to install another one in that space, too. Pair that with the space you've got for an optical drive and you've got the most capacious XPC from the Taiwanese weeny PC masters, to date. Not even their i-Series, which actually has a larger internal volume than the P-series, can cram as much inside.
Allied to that CPU and memory support, PCI Express expansion and all the internal drive bays, you've got USB and FireWire400 ports front and back, as you'll see soon, along with an eight channel audio CODEC that feeds into the ICH6R. You've got a range of analogue and digital inputs and outputs connected to the Realtek ALC880, with which you can connect your speakers and other audio devices.
Quite the feature packed small PC, I'm sure you'll agree. Time for a pictorial look.
