Tranquil PC has shown off photos of a forthcoming new design for its media center systems, and it's incredibly thin. The MMC-12 is set for release soon, and is around the same size as a slimline DVD or Blu-Ray player at less than 1.5 inches tall. It's constructed from metal and finished in satin-textured matte black, with only a power button, name badge, and slot-loading optical drive breaking up the front panel. It's set to be powered by Intel's Sandy Bridge processors, so shouldn't be a slouch when it comes to transcoding video. This isn't the first low-profile system from the company, but previous models like the T2e were powered by relatively puny Atom or Pentium M chips, making the MMC-12 a big step forward.

Previous media centers from Tranquil have garnered praise for their focus on passive, silent cooling, though they've never been quite this design-oriented before. We're also not sure whether the MMC-12 is set to replace the current ixL-S, or whether they'll be sold alongside one another as a range. One criticism that has always dogged Tranquil's computers is high prices — a detail yet to be revealed about the MMC-12, but don't expect beauty to come cheap.