Small Form Factor Recommendation

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.

In article , "Jack"
wrote:

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.

It does seem dedicated SFF boxes like to use one PCI and one video.
You may have to go up to a microATX motherboard (9.6"x9.6"), which
could give you three PCI slots.

If you start here, you can see a listing of form factors in the
pulldown menu. A "MicroATX Mini Tower" appears to use a standard
ATX power supply. A "MicroATX Slim Case" uses a smaller supply,
and finding replacements at a later date could be difficult.
Both of these can hold a MicroATX motherboard.

http://www.newegg.com/ProductSort/Su...?SubCategory=7

If building a home system, I would prefer to use mainstream
components to build the first one. As you become more familiar
with what components you really need, and what functionality
is not needed, you can trim the size of the system. A new motherboard
and new case shouldn't be a major expense, if purchased as DIY
components (rather than purchasing "furniture" grade stuff).

If you really want to live within the constraints of a 1 PCI/1 video
form factor, see what functions you could achieve via USB. Maybe a
tuner with a compressed output can do everything it needs to
do via USB 2.0 ?

Paul

In article ,
(Paul) wrote:

In article , "Jack"
wrote:

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.


This Antec Aria case is big enough to hold a MicroATX.
But read the customer reviews, to see some of the issues the
customers had. Quite an eye opener. Makes a larger, more
mainstream case all the more attractive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129146
http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/...82E16811129146

Paul

www.tomshardware.com had an article that may hit the nail on the head for
you:

http://www.tomshardware.com/howto/20051003/index.html

They were trying to prise a SFF into a DVD reader sized box, but the article
may help.

Sorry its not an Asus solution... but if you took say a SFF P4P800 board (is
there one?), adapter and pentium M would it fit together and work OK?

HTH


"Jack" wrote in message
...
I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an Athlon
64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.

On Thu, 20 Oct 2005 19:30:17 -0700, "Jack" wrote:

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.

Have you looked at Shuttle? They have alot of SFF pc's

http://sys.us.shuttle.com/Models.aspx

Gollum

"Paul" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Paul) wrote:

In article , "Jack"
wrote:

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one
AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to
use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots
because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an
Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.


This Antec Aria case is big enough to hold a MicroATX.
But read the customer reviews, to see some of the issues the
customers had. Quite an eye opener. Makes a larger, more
mainstream case all the more attractive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129146

http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/...asp?Item=N82E1
6811129146

Paul

Paul, thanks for the pointer to the Aria case. I may go with this option.
However, I don't think I have the skill set or patience to install the
motherboard. So I'm going to ask Adamant Computers, if they will install a
motherboard, CPU and CPU fan onto the motherboard. I'll do the rest.

"Paul" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Paul) wrote:

In article , "Jack"
wrote:

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one
AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to
use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots
because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an
Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.


This Antec Aria case is big enough to hold a MicroATX.
But read the customer reviews, to see some of the issues the
customers had. Quite an eye opener. Makes a larger, more
mainstream case all the more attractive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129146

http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/...asp?Item=N82E1
6811129146

Paul

Paul could you recommend a CPU cooling fan that will fit in this case with
an Athlon Clawhammer 3700+ chip? I was going to buy an OEM chip, but will
purchase a retail chip that will have the CPU fan included, if that is the
recommendation of this group. I want to keep this puppy as cool as possible,
but know that space is an issue here.

In article , "Jack"
wrote:

"Paul" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Paul) wrote:

In article , "Jack"
wrote:

I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one
AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to
use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots
because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an
Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.


This Antec Aria case is big enough to hold a MicroATX.
But read the customer reviews, to see some of the issues the
customers had. Quite an eye opener. Makes a larger, more
mainstream case all the more attractive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129146

http://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/...asp?Item=N82E1
6811129146

Paul

Paul could you recommend a CPU cooling fan that will fit in this case with
an Athlon Clawhammer 3700+ chip? I was going to buy an OEM chip, but will
purchase a retail chip that will have the CPU fan included, if that is the
recommendation of this group. I want to keep this puppy as cool as possible,
but know that space is an issue here.

The customer reviews of the Aria mention that the stock retail HSF
fits, a Zalman 7000A-CU fits, and a Swiftech MCX775-V.

This review shows a picture of the clearance.

http://techreport.com/reviews/2004q2...a/index.x?pg=4
http://techreport.com/reviews/2004q2...a/bracket2.jpg

Techreport lists 2.75" height, as the clearance for a heatsink
assembly. That is your Z-axis limit. You also have to consider,
when using "oversize" heatsinks, issues with x-y axis limits
as well. The Zalman 7000 series, needs a 55mm clearance radius
about the center of the socket pin area. It looks like the Aria
PSU more or less intrudes as much as the depth of the I/O connectors
do, so I don't expect a conflict with the lower recessed section
of the PSU.

What this means, is you will need to get a good quality picture
of your prospective motherboard, then do a scale drawing with
a drawing tool, inscribing a 55mm radius on the drawing. I've done
several of these in the past (I have two 7000A heatsinks here, so
I've used them) and you need a good quality motherboard picture
in order to do it. I would assume in this case, that overhang of
the heatsink, past the edge of the microATX form factor is not
allowed, but once I find a picture of the Aria with a microATX
motherboard in place, that may become clearer.

There is another picture he
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article146-page4.html

I downloaded the manual for an Asus K8V-MX, which is an microATX
S754 board. Using the layout diagram in the manual, I took that
into a drawing tool. The outside edge of the motherboard is 9.6"
by 9.6", establishing the scale of the drawing. By placing a 110mm
diameter circle on the picture, and making sure the center of the
circle lines up with the center of the pins on the socket (this is
not obvious, without looking at a real picture of a S754 socket
first - the tiny square in the Asus socket outline is incorrectly
positioned, and cannot be used as the center), it looks like a
Zalman 7000 hangs over the edge of the motherboard profile by 2mm.
Which means the Zalman 7000 might just fit on that board, but with
little room to the side panel. (As a double check, I repeated the
exercise with an off-axis picture from the Newegg site, and that
time, the radius of the Zalman perfectly fit right to the edge
of the motherboard.)

The height of the CNPS-7000B-Cu is listed as 62mm. But that does
not include the height of the S754 socket plus the CPU itself. I
measured with my caliper (feeler gauge mode) from the top of the
7000A on my Northwood S478 board, and the top of the heatsink
is 2.695" (a hair under 69mm"). The Techreport article says
2.75", leaving not a lot of room for any differences between
my stackup and whatever yours ends up being.

http://www.zalman.co.kr/eng/product/...41&code=005009

As the size of the case shrinks, there are more mechanical issues
to contend with. It means, just farming out the installation of
the motherboard, to a shop, is a very small part of the project.
I could forsee having to remove and reinstall that motherboard
multiple times, until all mechanical issues are resolved.

For example, you could do a test fitting of the motherboard, using
the AMD retail heatsink. Get a caliper and measure from top of
processor die to underside of PSU, to see whether the Tech
Report article was accurate or not. See whether the clearance from
top of silicon die to PSU leaves room for the 62mm figure listed
on the Zalman site. If there is room, order a Zalman 7000B. Be
prepared to remove the motherboard one more time (depending on
how the Zalman is fitted to S754). I see in the Zalman installation
Flash presentation, that the S754 uses a stiffener plate underneath
the motherboard, to prevent flexure. And that means the motherboard
has to be removed to fit the plate.

I wasn't kidding when I suggested using a larger form factor case.
That takes the pressure off the mechanical issues. When you get
down to the size of a large DVD player, you'd have to keep a
Dremel in each hand, being willing to grind stuff to get it to
fit. It's all a question of "pain vs gain". What is a small case
worth to you ?

Paul

Jack wrote:
I'm in the market for a SFF PC that has at least two PCI slots and one AGP
slot? I would also want it to be a socket 754 motherboard. I want to use
this PC for a Windows Media Center 2005 PC. I need two PCI slots because I
want to have dual tuner capability and HDTV. I'll probably use an Athlon 64
chip with 1 gig of DDR 400 memory and two 300gig SATA drives.

I've only been able to fine one that has one PCI and one AGP slot.


I have a K8MM at the office that seems very fast and stable with A64 3200+.
I'm running linux though..

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