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The second incarnation of the AGP for AMD doctrine in Shuttle's series of XPC brings a full-fledged nVidia nForce2 chipset to the table, including IGP and MCP-T featuring the GeForce 4MX core and nVidia's APU. Some minor adjustments to the SFF caused the demise of the second Ethernet port, otherwise, all the goodies are there, including an abundance of memory bandwidth. Unlike conventional integrated graphics, the nForce2 architecture does not take a performance hit proportional to the desktop resolution, courtesy of the "Twin Bank" architecure. Using a triple phase VRM with asymmetric FET switches, the FN41 as the heart of the SN41G2 appears well prepared for coming generations of AMD Athlon and Barton processors. Specs are specs and paper is patient, so where are the pitfalls? Or were there none?

One of the hidden blessings of reviewing computer hardware is the anticipation of the next ever re-occurring rush of adrenaline when first powering up any new system. After about 500 reviews, none of this has changed, it is still the great adventure that we embark on every single time something new comes up. Or out. There are different degrees of anticipation, though. Within the same platform, well, we just want to know whether brand X works as well as brand Y and whether there are any bugs to watch out for.

The entire thing is about the size of a cosmetic kit, barely large enough to hold a toothbrush..... Click for full view and the rest of the caption

The real kick is, however, a new platform, new chipset, processor or GPU that we haven't gotten out hands on yet. Another kick is, despite the known entities of ingredients, a new combination of hardware. The greatest kick, however, is whenever we are getting one of the new Shuttle XPCs, there is something special about them that beats all the beige boxes including modded cases. Getting a new platform packaged as XPC is almost unbearable. Add the thrill of it being the nForce2 full version with IGP and the reaction is pure and simple denial like in: "No, I won't open this box yet .... "

After due procrastination, there always comes the moment of truth, irrevocably and unconditionally associated with the fear of "what if", spanning all the way from "if it is only mediocre" over "it really sucks" to "it simply blew up and took down with it another $1000 of hardware or irreplaceable engineering samples ....."

For the record, we had no such experiences with the SN41G, everything we thought we had blown could be reversed and that is a good thing. By the end of the day, we were looking at one of the finest pieces of computer hardware you can fit into any carry-on bag.

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