Verdict: The Vauxhall nova of Barebones systems
Ever since Shuttle first had success with small form factor (SFF) bare bones systems, others have been queuing up to follow suit. The latest is Chenming, a Chinese company that, although pretty much unknown over here, has been building PC kit since 1985. The Fur Fusion SOHO HK7N is one of its first forays into the world of bare bones systems, and certainly dares to be different, at least in terms of design. The corrugated pressing and blue shell successfully distinguishes it from most XPCs, but it does make it look like a dodgy, torpedo-shaped 1950s caravan.
The trend with many new bare bones systems is to cram in the latest features and newest chipsets, to provide a platform that can match up to full-sized desktops. A good example of this is Shuttle's brilliant XPC SB75G2 (see Issue 5, p38), which featured Intel's 875P chipset. Initially, it appeared that Chenming has a similar objective with the HK7N, but a closer inspection reveals that its attempt is more than a little half-baked.
For starters, the tiny MK7N motherboard is based around the nForce2 chipset - still a good, quick chipset for Athlon XP processors - but instead of the latest nForce2 Ultra 400 chipset, Chenming has gone for the older nForce2 IGP. This limits you to an Athlon XP 3000+ with a 333MHz front side bus - all the chips with a 400MHz FSB, including the flagship 3200+, just won't work. Aside from crippling future upgradeability, it also restricts overclocking slightly, as you can't easily install a 2500+ and run it at 3200+ speeds by sneakily upping the FSB to 200MHz. On a more positive note, the board will support up to 2GB of PC2100, PC2700 or PC3200 dual-channel memory, although you need PC2700 to run everything in sync.
But while Chenming's choice of chipset is uninspiring, its custom cooling system is far more interesting. Taking its cues from Shuttle's ICE setup, Chenming use a heatpipe-based CPU cooler and a single fan to expel hot air from the chassis. However, cleverly Chenming has arranged the cooling assembly so that the single fan cools both the power supply and CPU simultaneously, removing the need for a separate PSU fan, al la Shuttle. It's an innovative design, but with one fundamental flaw: it's incredibly noisy.
With a high-end processor installed, the fan needs to run at full power, and it's a big fan, so at full power it's particularly unpleasant. Chenming seems to have recognised this, because in an attempt to reduce noise the motherboard can dynamically control the speed of the fan depending on the CPU temperature. Thankfully, this feature works well, and set to Quiet mode the HK7N sounds as diminutive as it looks. If overclocking is your game, though, don't even bother with Quiet mode, because it simply doesn't offer enough cooling.
The fan also has an Automatic mode, which has the annoying characteristic of switching between low and high speed every few minutes, generating an irritating pulsing noise as it changes. On the motherboard is a spare header for a case fan, which can also be controlled by the BIOS. However, there's little space inside the case to install one, although you may be able to fit an array of 40mm fans at the front. Then again it would be easier to just whack yourself repeatedly on the head with a rolling pin.
Although an AGP slot is provided, you also have the option to use the integrated GeForce 4 MX graphics. This is a pretty old DirectX 7-class GPU, so don't expect Halo to run at anything like a reasonable speed, but it works well enough for older games. It even successfully completed our Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory benchmark - something that Intel's Extreme Graphics has thus far failed to achieve. The on-board sound is also serviceable using a C-Media chip that provides six-channel audio. Connected to this is a pair of S/PDIF sockets, with an output at the rear of the case and an input at the front.
Expansion is naturally pretty limited, but there is an external 5.25in and 3.5in bay. An internal 3.5in bay is provided for a hard disk drive. All the I/O cables are already neatly routed around the case to each drive bay. Four USB 2 ports provide connectivity and, along with the two front-mounted FireWire ports, should keep you and your peripherals happy.
PERFORMANCE
At the default frequencies the HK7N performs pretty much spot-on for an Athlon XP 2500+ system. The main highlight was the impressive score of 1.10 in the video encoding test, which is a full 10 per cent faster than our KT600 reference system. This performance difference is no doubt due to the superior memory bandwidth provided by the dual-channel memory architecture of the nForce2 chipset.
As we hinted earlier, the HK7N can actually be overclocked pretty well, which is surprising considering that it's hobbled by a measly 166MHz FSB. The saving grace is that you can tweak the multiplier, and we managed to overclock a 2500+ up from 166MHz x 11 to 166MHz x 14. Unfortunately, the performance gain isn't as much as the 498MHz increase in clock speed suggests, since the relatively low FSB still restricts memory bandwidth.
We also implied that the on-board graphics chip isn't all that great, and the score of 10.5fps in our Wolfenstein benchmark says it all. That said, dropping the test down to 1,024 x 786 with 0x AA 0x AF gave us a playable 26.4 fps. With a Hercules Radeon 9800 card in the AGP 8x slot the HK7N happily stormed through the test with a healthy score of 38.5fps at our default settings of 1,280 x 1,024 2x AA 4x AF.
CONCLUSION
The Fur Fusion SOHO is very well made, with snugly fitting panels, and is a decent first stab at an SFF bare bones system. Its looks may not suit everyone, though, and while we admit beauty is in the eye of the beholder, personally I still think it looks like a corrugated caravan designed by someone with a hangover. It's a fair bit longer than most SFFs we've seen, and the unusual dimensions caused a heated discussion in the Custom PC offices. Some of us think that the extra ventilation provided by the holes in the bottom of the chassis is essential to good airflow within the case. Others think that the extra length looks a bit odd and the chassis should be reduced in length to match more 'traditional' SFF dimensions.
However, one area we all agreed could use some extra design work is the cooling system. We know from our testing that the system can handle heavily overclocked CPUs, but it can't do it without sounding like a Chinook helicopter.
It also lacks the modern features of newer Shuttles, such as Serial ATA support, and the older nForce2 chipset is a flaw too, but these faults are offset to some degree by the low price of £168. If you were to match this bare bones with a budget processor and memory, and configure the fans for acoustic performance, you'd have a very low-cost, capable SFF system.
If you were then to add a reasonably priced 3D card you could make a decent games machine too.
It's not the fastest, the best looking, or indeed the smallest SFF bare bones on the market, but it's cheap, generally well made and quite quick - a bit like a Vauxhall Nova. If you can't afford a Shuttle, then it's a fair compromise.
