Shuttle’s been making small form-factor computers for just about as long as anyone, and the company’s latest model is a tiny powerhouse. The Shuttle DS81 measures 7.4″ x 6.5″ x 1.7″ but has room for a 8 USB ports, 2 Ethernet jacks, a couple of display outputs, and more.
Oh yeah, it also features an Intel Haswell processor with support for up to a Core i7 chip with Intel HD 4600 graphics.
Shuttle is positioning the DS81 as a digital signage machine, which is why the company introduced it at the business-centric CeBIT trade show in Germany this week. But it also looks like it’d make a rather nice home theater PC.
The machine supports up to 16GB of memory, has 6 USB 2.0 and 2 USB 3.0 ports, an HDMI jack and 2 DislplayPorts. There’s a 2.5 inch drive bay, a mini PCIe slot and a half-sized mini PCIe slot, and SATA 3 and SATA 2 connectors.
It can support multiple full HD displays or a 4K Ultra HD display.
The system may be small, but it’s not necessarily going to be quiet or energy efficient. It consumes about 90W of power and this is not a fanless computer.
The Shuttle DS81 will be sold as a barebones device for about $250. Unfortunately that price doesn’t include memory, storage, or an operating system. The system should support Windows 7 or later or a variety of Linux-based operating systems.
Just wanted to point out that the units 90W power supply is there for the i7 capability, if you build it with a low power 35W i3 it will be very “energy efficient”. Also, the fans are very quiet. The main strength is that you can do what you want with this unit, powerhouse processing or simple browsing. I’ve sold several of the DS61 units and can’t wait to get this one in house.
Surely an i7 is overkill for a signage box?
Or does “signage” now include showing smooth 4K video?
Just seems like a waste of 85 out of the 90 W, to me.
They are wasting the space with 2 legacy COM ports? really?
Signage, PoS and other more industrial applications frequently still rely on such legacy connections, and that seems to be this machine’s target market.
These Shuttle boxes look a lot better than the ugly shiny Zotac ones. Do these have heat and fan noise issues like the Zotacs?