 Many words fit the Shuttle XPC P2 3500G, but "throughout good performance", "lightweight, low energy consumption and great connectivity" certainly are the most important ones as concluded by the British computer magazine PC World. This "compact, efficient PC suited to middle-resolution gaming" recently paid a visit to their test labs.
With a weight of 6.9kg this SFF PC "weighs less than many big laptops," notice the editors when lifting the box. Despite the "dimunitive size" of the case, a Q6600 Core 2 Quad processor from Intel works as the heart of the XPC P2 3500G joined by 4GB of DDR2-800 memory and a 750GB hard disk. The XPC P2 3500G uses the Intel P35 Express chipset making it "more affordable" than its X38-based brother.
Though the P2 3500G comes with just one PCI-E slot, its chipset "retains most of the features and performance of the X38 to make it one of the best Shuttle barebones around," the editors write. Graphics performance comes from ATI's Radeon HD 3870, the "fastets ATI graphics card with one GPU." While this draws "less power" than a competitive model, the overall system drew "95W when idling" in the tests which is an "outstanding result for a gaming branded system," according to PC World / UK. With a "beefy" score of 8,597 in PCmark 05 "performance was good throughout."
Besides its gaming capabilities, the Shuttle XPC P2 3500G even "does a good job of home theatre PC tasks," write the editors having discovered its wifi interface "fitted neatly inside the chassis." Equipped with a "feast of ports," a DVD writer and card reader, the XPC P2 3500G also shows up with a fingerprint reader built-in the front panel and a USB Speed-Link port which "activates a 480Mbits/sec network connection" between two PCs.
Pros:
+ Speedy
+ Lightweight
+ Low energy consumption
+ Great connectivity |