Thinkpads Forum

I am thinking of donating my slightly out of date HP workstation and getting a ThinkCentre desktop. My requirements are:

1. Being able to change/install a different video card for dual head display. (Very important)
2. Being able to add another hard drive down the road. (Important)
3. Being able to install a PCI wireless card. (Not very important)
4. Low fan noise. (Desirable)

I know a tower or mini-tower will fulfill requirements 1 through 3 but I am not sure if the same can be met by SFF and USFF models. Do SFF and USFF models have empty PCI or PCI-e slots? Can I change/install a separate video card in them? SATA disk(s)?

Why would anyone chose Tower, SFF or USFF besides some power savings and footprint differences?

Thanks in advance.

I don't know about USFF, but SFF thinkcenters do come with an empty PCIE slot, and depending on the model, you might have space for an extra SATA HDD.

One of the reasons for SFF/USFF vs tower is noise level. There was a thread about that a month or two back, just look ...

Thanks Sri. I did read through that thread and found out that SFF and USFF are much quieter than towers. They mentioned Dell towers for comparison but I think I can safely extrapolate to other brands as well.

Another question, if a SFF and USFF motherboard has integrated video card, can I still install another video card?

syedj wrote:Another question, if a SFF and USFF motherboard has integrated video card, can I still install another video card?

definitely.