December 28, 2001
Let's take a look at the
front exterior of the SV24. On the front, we have a 5.25 inch bay
for a cd-rom, cd-rw, or dvd-rom. Below that we have the ubiquitous floppy
space. The bays are filed with aluminum blanks that match the front
bezel which is nice if you decide to not install anything in the two bays,
you'll still have a good looking machine.
This leads to a problem commonly
encountered when dealing with aluminum cases. A beige cd-rom and
beige floppy drive look really bad against the silver front bezel.
It simply doesn't match. Some people get around this by spray painting
the faceplates of their cd-rom and floppy drive silver. However,
most people don't want to go to that trouble and end up ordering silver
parts at online stores or leaving the white drives in the silver box.
This is really a shame since the white on silver really doesn't look good.
As much as I like the silver look of the SV24, I think that a plain beige
box (steel case and plastic front bezel) version of the SV24 would
be a great option. It would probably be a bit cheaper to purchase
as well.
On the front panel is the
standard power and reset button, which are both are silver colored.
Earlier versions of the SV24 had white buttons (yuck). I'm glad Shuttle
responded to customer requests and made the buttons silver. There
are also two USB ports, an audio output, and microphone input. This
is very handy so you don't have to reach around the back and fumble with
the ports and wires.
Click image to enlarge
The back of the SV24 contains
the bulk of the connectors. At the top we see an exhaust fan, which
pulls air through the case. This fan is fairly strong, but unfortunately
also loud. 60 mm fans such as this one, don't move as much air as
80 mm fans do, and in order to compensate, they have to run at higher RPM's.
This causes this particular fan to be fairly loud, although it is bearable.
Based upon its position, it would appear that the fan is inside the power
supply, but this is not the case. The power supply is actually located
in the front of the case below the 3.5 inch bay.
Below the case fan is a removable
tray that holds the hard disk. The two screws on either side of the
tray allow you to slide the tray out.
Next comes the PCI punch
out slot. Notice that it runs parallel to the motherboard.
There is an angled PCI riser card that allows this to happen.
At the bottom is the I/O
from the motherboard. It is jam-packed compared to most typical motherboards.
The ports in order from left
to right:
-
Top row:
PS2 for mouse, serial port, printer port, 10/100 NIC, audio line in.
-
Bottom
row: PS2 for keyboard, SVGA, S-video, Composite, 2 IEEE1394 Firewire,
2 USB, audio line out
Click image to enlarge
Let's take a look at what
this system comes with in the retail package. The SV24 comes in a
very nice retail box with the name "Spacewalker" on it.
Click image to enlarge
Here we have the power cable,
FV24 motherboard manual, driver CD, and assorted screws.
Click image to enlarge
These data cables are noticeably
shorter than the ones that come with most motherboards. The IDE cables
only have one header each. The top cable is a floppy drive cable,
the middle is for Ultra 100 for the hard drive, and the bottom is a regular
Ultra 33 cable presumably for the cd-rom/cd-rw/dvd-rom. I would have
liked to see Shuttle include two Ultra 100 cables instead of the Ultra
33 cables. This would useful for people who plan forgoing the cd-rom
and sticking an additional hard drive in the system. I know it's
probably not that common, but it would have been nice.
Click image to enlarge
This is the PCI adapter that
allows PCI cards to run parallel to the motherboard.
Click image to enlarge
A nice surprise that I found
in the retail package was a low profile heatsink and fan by Arkua.
Kinda looks like a mini ThermoEngine doesn't it? Another nice surprise
was that the packet of white thermal grease in lieu of a thermal pad that
typically comes with heatsinks. Nice.
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Click image to enlarge
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