The SB86i is Shuttle's first BTX form factor XPC and above anything else, its beautiful to look it- as if its been designed by Apple. The milk white front with the blue LED and the curvy face will definitely make you keep this XPC where people can see it. Lets find out if there's much brawn behind this beauty.

The SB86i comes in a standard shuttle packaging which is a good thing as Shuttle packs things neatly and securely.  The XPC is well protected with the accessories box on one side and the power cable on the other. The box holds the manual along with drivers and feet for the XPC.

The looks

The SB86i looks pretty darn good. In our opinion, it's the best looking SFF PC that has hit our labs. We love the milk white front of the unit with minimal buttons. Shuttle has moved all the front panel connectors to the left side while the power button and 8-in-1 card reader are on the right side. The Optical drive bay is hidden through a front cover which prevents the spoiling of the look.

When the unit is powered up, a blue horizontal line lights up making the unit look very cool. Unfortunately, Shuttle uses an orange LED light for hard drive activity placed in the middle of this blue light which does not look that great. We think that Shuttle should've used a different shade of blue for this purpose. While the front of the unit is white, the sides are steel which also looks good but we think that an all white design might've looked better.