Final thoughts and rating

Shuttle set out to raise the barfor small-system performance. In creating the XPC SX58H7 last year and now augmenting the high-end line-up with the XPC SX58J3, the company has provided the basis upon which some of the world's fastest mini-PCs will be built.

Supporting Intel's quickest CPU and AMD's most powerful GPU, the £440 SX58J3 facilitates a hardware combination that provides blistering performance.

The fact that Shuttle has managed to squeeze a proprietary X58 motherboard and a 500W power supply into a small-ish chassis, with adequate cooling no less, has to be applauded.

We'd liked to have seen USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gbps connectivity, as well as mounts for 2.5in SSDs, but let's face it; you'll do well to find a more powerful mini-PC than this. It looks rather sweet, too.

The Good

Allows for exceptional mini-PC performance
Easy to build into
Smart and modern design

The Bad

Pricey for a barebones unit
No USB 3.0

HEXUS Rating

Shuttle XPC Barebone SX58J3

HEXUS Awards

Shuttle XPC Barebone SX58J3

HEXUS Where2Buy

The Shuttle XPC Barebone SX58J3 can be purchased from SCAN.co.uk priced at £439.98.

HEXUS Right2Reply

At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.

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Good review. Shame they haven't changed that much, but it still looks very classy.

Slight editing typo in that you've repeated the phrase about the 5870 on page two.

hexus
That's joined by a dual-slot Radeon HD 5850 GPU - which, as you can see, fits in quite easily. There's plenty of room to attach the required power cables, but SLI/CrossFire configurations are, of course, restricted to single-slot cards.

If you're wanting to get the most out of your mini-PC, you'll also find that AMD's quickest single-GPU card - the ATI Radeon HD 5870 - is just about able to slot into place.

It takes a fair bit of manoeuvring to get it in, but once it's there, you can easily attach the six-pin power connectors.

The geekbench score is also hard to read on page three - the x-axis labels are overlapping.

Kalniel,

Thanks. The two pictures show the Radeon HD 5850 first and then the Radeon HD 5870 second. This is why we make mention of the HD 5850 in the first line of the paragraph and the HD 5870 in the second. As you will no doubt know, the latter card is longer.

We're working on a newer graphing system that will eradicate the overlapping.

They don't call them toaster ovens for nothing. The Radeon HD 5800 cards would run cool if they had adequate ventilation around the fan. They use DHES to exhaust the hotter air outside of the case.

The pricing has always been the turn off for me with Shuttle XPC cases. I can usually get a very high end motherboard, PSU and amazing ATX mid-tower for the same price. There was just never any incentive and I place my tower underneath my desk anyway.

Tarinder
Kalniel,

Thanks. The two pictures show the Radeon HD 5850 first and then the Radeon HD 5870 second. This is why we make mention of the HD 5850 in the first line of the paragraph and the HD 5870 in the second. As you will no doubt know, the latter card is longer.

DOh.. I didn't spot the difference :p

kalniel
Good review. Shame they haven't changed that much, but it still looks very classy.

Slight editing typo in that you've repeated the phrase about the 5870 on page two.

The geekbench score is also hard to read on page three - the x-axis labels are overlapping.

The only changes are those to reduce production costs! The SX58H7 costs around £450 and has been this price for a while. Many long term Shuttle users(like me for example) and have been put off by this so called “new” Shuttle.

The case is actually made of steel and is almost twice the weight of the older SX58H7.

This is the previous high end SFF system, the SX58H7:

http://www.shuttle.eu/fileadmin/resources/download/docs/spec/barebones/SX58H7_e.pdf

This is the replacement,the SX58J3:

http://www.shuttle.eu/fileadmin/resources/download/docs/spec/barebones/SX58J3_e.pdf

SX58H7 rear panel