Out of the Box
Looking at some of the CubeSystemZ products on their web site, which are very similar to the G-Box that was around mid last year you could be forgiven for questioning the look of the products. With excessive use of clear plastic and the practical, but useful carry handle most people seem to either love or hate the look.
Taking the CF-S968 from its box we found that our review model looked fantastic. The case is made of very high quality aluminium and Perspex is limited to the front only.
Only two concerns remain with regards the look of the box. Firstly the carry handle, which can easily be removed if needed and secondly the thickness of the front Perspex. The front Perspex is approximately 1cm thick and makes the holes for connections seem cavernous.
Compared to the Shuttle the CF-S968 is basically the same depth and width but a little higher.
The CF-S968 came very well equipped with a DVI output card, Manual, Driver CD Rom, Selection of drive cables and an excellent quality slim line heatsink.
The DVI output card attaches to the AGP slot and enables use of the on board graphics with digital output. The quality of DVI is a great deal sharper than using the analogue VGA connector.
A very simple manual was included which was lacking in both quality and content. The driver CD contained the basic chipset and peripheral drivers, but nothing else. We feel that the manual is an important part of machines such as these and the CF-S968 really lets itself down in this department.
As you can see a good selection of cables were included. Two IDE cables and one floppy. Both IDE cables are only for attaching a single device. This means that you can only attach two IDE devices without replacing the cables. As most users will only want to attach a single hard drive and a CD/DVD drive this is not a major problem, although it does mean running two cables rather than one, which in a box as tight on space as this is a shame.
The supplied heatsink is of very high quality and fixes easily to the motherboard. It is the same as a traditional heatsink but with a very low profile. Unlike the Shuttle that has its special ‘ICE’ heat pipe solution, the CF-S968 fan blows air down onto the CPU. The air is then expelled from the case via a second fan at the rear.
