any hardware geeks interested in this?

[Steven Martindale]

At 03:51 AM 1/13/02 -0700, you wrote:
>Fry's got in a cool new barebones box in mid-December called the
>SpaceShuttle.  Here's a link to a nice review of it:
>
>http://www.hothardware.com/hh_files/Motherboards/shuttle_sv24.shtml
>
>It's from a company Shuttle Technologies in Taiwan, and it uses a
>motherboard available from from them called the FV24.  The barebones box is
>around $230 wholesale, and the motherboard is about $100.
>
>I'm thinking ... you could slice the top half of the box off of the
>enclosure and still have room for a 3.5" or notebook drive and a second NIC.
>
>Imagine .... a 1GHz P-III, 1/2-GB RAM, 40GB HDD, 2 NICs, audio, video, 2
>firewire & 4 USB ports, all in a box the size of a 2" thick book ... for
>under $300... not bad for something like a "home server appliance", eh?
>(The ones on the market today are 200MHz Z8 clones.)

The one I've been thinking of is right next to it on the shelf. That being
the FIC Sabre 1815, here's an article where someone made use of it:

http://www.vboston.com/DepressedPress/Content/AfterHours/Articles/SlimPC/FIC
Sabre.cfm

That loads a bit slowly, so heres the official page:

http://www.fica.com/products/systems/Databook/Sabre1815/Sabre1815.stm

Slap a Via CIII processor in that and one could have a small, quiet, and
acceptably fast system. I could put two of those on my desktop in only just
a little more space (width-wise) that my current Linux box.

This little box has both USB and Firewire ports, and a PCMCIA card slot
(type 2). Three PCI slots (two full height, one half height), two slots for
up to 512 MB of memory, and okay not much disk space with only one exposed
5.25 bay and a single internal 3.5 bay (there's a 3.5 exposed bay but the
floppy drive comes as part of the package deal). Only thing is I misread
the price first time I saw it at Fry's. Thought the sign said $199 so when
I noticed the online shops averaging $300 I got pretty excited. Then I got
back into Fry's and noticed that the actual sign for the Sabre's was $299.

But I still might talk myself into buying one.


Steven,
Scary Crossover Idea of the Day: 
"Whoa! Get away from me you freak!" 
Ranma Soatome to James Kirk after meeting him in the rain.