Habey USA's passive BIS-6922 proved to be a winner when we reviewed it back in August. Even as the review gathered comments from our readers, Habey was busy building up on it to address concerns and put in improvements. Today, we are seeing the launch of the BIS-6590, the latest addition to Habey's family of fanless i7-based systems. The BIS-6590 uses the B75 chipset, and is meant for Ivy Bridge CPUs, though the chassis itself should find use in future products also.

Amongst the improvements are a newly designed ICEFIN case (with larger fins for better heat dissipation) and support for processors with higher TDPs (up to 65 W, as shown with a i7-3770S). While the system I/O is standard for the market (VGA, DVI, 6xUSB, Audio I/O, 2x GbE ports, 2 COM ports and optionally, four additional COM ports), the more interesting aspect is the ability of the chassis to accommodate full size expansion cards (for powerful routing applications, we could have multi-GbE network cards / GPU-heavy applications can also accommodate video cards, though it remains to be seen as to what the maximum TDP of any such GPU would be). Forsaking the additional COM ports even provides us with two full expansion slots -- two PCI or one PCI and one PCIe. The motherboard does have a mini PCIe slot for a wireless card or a 3G/4G module (SIM socket is on the motherboard, just like it was on the BIS-6922).

When we evaluated the BIS-6922, we found the maximum power consumption to be around 70 W. Habey indicates that the BIS-6590 could operate in a thermally safe manner even with the maximum power consumption around 120 W. The BIS-6590 also retains all the advantages of the BIS-6922 in terms of chassis features such as vent-hole-free design. We are waiting to hear more about the pricing of the system, but interested folks can head over to the source link for further information.

Source: Habey USA

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  • markc22 - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    Anyone know of any non-industrial (read as "relatively cheap") small sealed fanless devices with an Intel quad core chip? I want a few USB 3.0 ports and 1 or 2 GigE ports. I don't need a video out but it should at least have a serial port for initially setting up a Linux install.

    Thanks!
  • slacr - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    Perhaps something from http://www.streacom.com/ might suit you, they have fanless cases for NUC/ITX/mATX. They aren't sealed, but at least fanless. If you can find a motherboard to suit your tastes it'd probably be the cheapest solution available. With recent Intel quads you won't escape without video out though.
  • markc22 - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    Thanks, I'll check out the fanless ITX cases.
  • svejko - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    great small device
    http://www.fit-pc.com/web/products/intense-pc/
  • markc22 - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    I've seen those but I guess they went too small because they can only fit mobile ULV chips in them.
  • asliarun - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    I was looking for something similar for an audio server I've been wanting to build.
    I came across a real nice site for fanless cases: http://www.fanlesstech.com/

    On the software side, OpenElec with XBMC looks real nice. Considering the small footprint of the OS, it should do well even with a weaker CPU.
  • markc22 - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    Nice site, thanks. They seem to focus on setups with 35 W TDP or lower CPUs or using impractically large heatsinks that likely require large or manually modified cases. I'll keep checking the site though. I really want a desktop quad core chip.

    If the Streacom fanless mini-ITX cases don't work out, I'm just going to go with a small actively cooled setup instead.
  • ddriver - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    Hopefully it is not an overheating brick like the last unit reviewed here... Dunno if it is just me, but an "industry" pc implies a little more than "no fan" - it also implies stability and reliability which are simply not there in a unit that runs at peak thermals all of the time. A ticking time bomb...
  • ganeshts - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    Not sure what you are referring to as a overheating brick.. Of all the fanless PCs I have had a chance to evaluate in the labs over here (including ones I built myself), nothing has come close to packing the raw CPU power while not throttling down in this particular form factor.

    If you are going to run at peak thermals all the time, then, the i7-based units are not going to cut the grade (unless you opt for a ULV version). Most i7s dissipate between 35 - 84 W nowadays, and if it is a 'no-fan' system, that heat has to go somewhere :)
  • dac7nco - Tuesday, October 15, 2013 - link

    I don't know, Ganesh... most of the "industrial" systems I've seen are either wall-mounted or in a cabinet, in extremely punishing environments. Around lathes, CNC machines (which have their own cooling)... a lot of crap gets stuck in those radiators, and they do crash because they're seriously hot where they are placed. That's why NASA uses ten year-old conservative, hardened chips/FPGAs for control. Sometimes a Pentium-II/Untrasparc/940 is all you need.

    If used as a fanless Media PC, then Habey and Chenbro both are falling out of a window ugly, need to be covered with a napkin, and will promptly overheat (or set the napkin on-fire). A $8 Rosewill 120mm fan is a beautiful thing.

    Daimon

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