Shuttle XPC Prima SX48P2

Shuttle's popular XPC systems may not be the largest cases - this one is barely bigger than a shoebox - but usually there's a surprising amount of potential performance crammed in, and this latest chassis does not disappoint.

Its motherboard provides support for the very latest Intel processors: everything up to the Core 2 Quad and Core 2 Extreme parts can be installed in the LGA 775 socket. A surprisingly chunky heatsink and pair of fans blow any excess hot air through a circular grill in the side of the chassis. And there's a neat rubber tunnel that connects the processor with the side of the case - a touch that we particularly liked when a similar chassis was used with the fantastic Shuttle XPC P2 3500G.

There's space inside for plenty more high-end components besides a quad-core processor too. Four DIMM offer capacity of up to 8GB of the latest 1,333MHz DDR3 RAM (it won't take the slightly slower, and cheaper, DDR2 RAM). There's also a couple of spare SATA sockets on the motherboard for connecting an optical or floppy drive.

There's even a pair of PCI Express sockets that, at least initially, seem ripe for a potentially explosive SLI setup. However, they're too close together to be practical - even single-height cards will be trading paint - and the amount of heat produced by two GPUs in such close quarters just won't be able to be shifted. A single graphics card is your best bet - the XPC P2 3500G had an ATI Radeon HD 3870 in, so a HD 4870 could be an idea.

The chassis exhibits plenty of the thoughtful design that cramming a PC into such a small space demands. The myriad cables that litter the case are tied to the walls and various struts so as to not get in the way, and two hard disk cradles sit in the top of the chassis with spare SATA and power cables waiting. These can be removed to allow access to the 3.5in and 5.25in bays that sit lower down.

Shuttle has included plenty of useful ports and sockets on the back of the Prima. Six USB sockets are joined by two eSATA ports, two gigabit Ethernet sockets and six audio jacks. There's also an S/PDIF output and a space to screw in a wireless antenna - the Prima has 802.11bg Wi-Fi built in too.

The front of the chassis is, like the rest of the Shuttle, finished in attractive machined aluminium. A couple of doors are ready and waiting to receive an optical drive and card reader - or extra ports, or a floppy drive, depending on what's fitted - and a panel at the bottom of the case reveals two more USB sockets and a pair of audio jacks, for headphones and a microphone.

More intriguingly, this flap also contains a fingerprint reader, which is built into the door and lies horizontal when the flap is open. It's an added security feature that may be fully appreciated by gamers who want to secure their Shuttle when it's taken to a LAN party.

In fact, it's hard to find any major faults with the Shuttle, with any potential problems only being small niggles. DDR3 memory could be an unnecessary expense when the performance boost over far cheaper DDR2 is minimal, and you may be out of luck if you want to fit a TV tuner or sound card into the second PCI Express slot, as a graphics card will most likely take up all of the space.

If you're looking to use the Shuttle without discrete graphics then you're out of luck, too, as there's no integrated GPU. As this is meant as a gaming barebones system, though, this shouldn't prove too much of a problem - and if you're determined to buy cheap, then an old GeForce 8600 GT can be had for around £30.