Preview: IWILL ZMAXd2 SLI SFF

Here is a close-up shot, showing the familiar copper heatpipe coolers, through which air is drawn and expelled through the PSU. Visible on the left are the pair of 6600GT cards in SLI - you can see just how tight the manufacturing tolerances are in a system like this by the SLI bridge PCB touching the PSU casing.



Here is the rear view, and your eyes are immediately drawn to the twin DVI ports of the SLI. However, look more closely and you will see a very similar ATX backplate to the ZMAXdp, but with a couple of key changes. Present are the familiar 4 x USB 2.0, Gigabit LAN, and PS2 ports. Curiously, there is now not one but two serial ports, when some manufacturers are removing them completely. Firewire is there and the rectangular gap above it is an external SATA port. But the biggest change is the upgrade to 7.1 surround sound; the previous generation made do with only 6 channel audio.

Of course, unlike most cases, hidden away under the desk, SFF boxes are small enough to sit on the desk, which raises the question: what colour is yours? Armari circulated a a system amongst the press painted a very eye-catching red, and the stock black model looks suitably bad-ass. But these first photos of the ZMAXd2 reveal a new Lamborghini-esque green, and with a few quick minutes' work in Photoshop, I can show you an "artists impression" of what this full system would look like:

Admittedly, it is missing the tradement "shark-fin" wifi antenna at the back, but it's the best you'll get until we see the real thing next week in Taipei. Many thanks to IWILL for supplying the photos.