Soltek EQ3901A - A Top Barebone for Athlon 64
Soltek is on a strong track after Shuttle in the field of barebone-kit production: each more or less decent chipset is used for a regular Qbic model, so that no customer goes away offended. Moreover, the company has recently decided to diversify appearance of its models as well, because the three standard options of the effective design (mat, mirror, or dull-metal front panel) still cannot satisfy tastes of all customers. Now almost all models are offered in classic designs, Mania series (toy plastic finishing) and Spring Collection series (refreshed classics, tender colors). More series are to be expected in future. Thus, Soltek Qbic is presently one of the most attractive barebone-kits on the market.
Design
Absolutely nothing new should be expected from the appearance of the model named EQ3901A. We have already reviewed the EQ3401A barebone-kit and you can see with your own eyes that these models do not differ in appearance: the same aluminium case (counterpart of those used in Shuttle XPC), the same aluminium front panel faceplate. However, invariability of the appearance is none of the worst features of Soltek barebone-kits: dull-reflecting surface of the front panel looks advantageous and, unlike "-M" models with mirror plastic, it's completely "fingerprint-proof". Brand feature of Soltek Qbic is two 5-inch external bays; by the present moment the company has completely given up models with one bay: this does not enlarge the dimensions too much (WxDxH – 215x330x200 mm versus 200x300x185 mm in Shuttle XPC), while this functionality is practically unique on the market.
External bays and connectors in modern Soltek barebone-kits are hidden under covers, 5-inch bay covers are spring-loaded so that they open when the CD/DVD-drive tray ejects and automatically close after a disk is loaded. The trays with a very non-standard faceplate in some drives may block the cover and prevent it from opening – in this case you should either remove the faceplate from the tray or give up this drive model. To make up for it, the plastic extension of eject button on the front panel of the barebone-kit is equipped with a simple alignment mechanism in case the location of the corresponding button on the installed drive is shifted relative to the standard position.
Covers on the 3-inch external bay and on the group of connectors on the front panel are opened manually, silvery power and reset buttons, as well as a HDD activity indicator are located between them. A set of interface connectors is typical for modern Qbic models: one S/PDIF Out port, two standard audio connectors (Mic-In port and Line-Out port), two USB (2.0) ports and one FireWire port. All these connectors (except for S/PDIF-Out) are duplicated on the rear panel of the kit, which is very convenient, as it allows a user to choose between connection convenience and appearance of the system.
The rear panel looks as most modern barebone-kits, but the typical narrow row of cooling vents on the left gives away the fact that the EQ3901 uses another proprietary Soltek technology – Icy-Q. We shall discuss it in detail later. As this model is based on a discrete chipset, there is no VGA-Out and the set of standard interface connectors looks like this: mouse and keyboard PS/2 ports, 2 x COM-port (parallel port can be installed on a bracket, which has to be bought separately), FireWire port, 4 x USB (2.0), LAN port (Gigabit Ethernet) and 5 x Audio connectors to output 8-channel audio. The motherboard of the kit allows 2 additional USB ports (the corresponding rear panel bracket is not included into the bundle) and two expansion cards.
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