Forum Rules - Formats - Spotlights  -  Home - Library - New Additions

Credit Card-sized Motherboard

ThumpThump
edited April 2007 in Hardware
It's not out yet so it was too late for Bash's Cigar Box Server.

"Taiwan's Via Technologies on Thursday released details of
its upcoming Pico-ITX motherboard, which is roughly the
same size as a credit card and opens the door to very small
PC designs.

Measuring just 10 centimeters (cm) by 7.2 cm, the Pico ITX
is designed for Via's C-7 and Eden microprocessor families,
and uses chip sets like Via's VX700, which packs the
memory controller, integrated graphics, and I/O hub into a
single chip instead of two. The motherboard has a single
memory slot that can hold up to 1GB of DDR2 (double data
rate 2) memory."

Credit Card-sized Motherboard

Thump

Comments

  • QQ
    If it's that small, I'm going to assume it uses SODIMMs.

    -Q
  • anantha92anantha92
    That's small enough to be procccessor size.
  • netznetz
    If it's that small, just the mobo and the RAM will cost a lot of $$$.
  • anantha92anantha92
    i would stay safe and say about 2500$?
  • netznetz
    :shock: Ouch, I think I'll stick with normal sized hardware for a LOOONNNGGE time.
  • Lupinthe3rdLupinthe3rd
    Depending on the speed and stuff I'd put it inside an old gameboy case with built in LCD screen the same size and play GB roms:P.
  • ThumpThump
    They haven't given out a price but VIA is usually very cheap.
    This is new though so I don't know. BlueSun said it could make
    a really hot hand held computer.

    Thump
  • QQ
    I could make alot of things, including a really interesting means of espionage!

    -Q
  • UglynGreyUglynGrey
    A Via CPU has nowhere near the raw power that most of us insist on in our desktops and laptops. It's still quite useful however, especially for mainstream non FPU dependant applications (think office type apps like mapping software)

    I can see a lot of use for things like this, easy to burn the firmware for a car onto a ROM and extend the capability of current ECM and body control modules with something that can be customized on the fly by coding with standard libraries... especially used in conjunction with embedded OS's from ROM (not flash)

    Imagine a PC running a car and all it's systems available with full multimedia and DVD decoding on the fly off something this size....

    Possible problems are temperature ranges and what not... still... could be done I think

    I like this kind of tech, I hate HPC's the way they are...
  • ThumpThump
    UglynGrey wrote:
    A Via CPU has nowhere near the raw power that most of us insist on in our desktops and laptops.
    It's still quite useful however, especially for mainstream non FPU dependant applications (think office type apps like mapping software)
    Yeah, I don't know how up to date you are on them and I'm a
    couple of years behind but they'd really come along. I was
    extremely pleased with the last one I had. I don't even know
    what it was called now but it was after the cyrix. Via kept
    developing the smaller sizes of CPUs for years after the other
    companies quit even making them. I believe that my last one
    was about a 900 and it ran really well.
    UglynGrey wrote:
    Possible problems are temperature ranges and what not... still... could be done I think
    Well that's where VIA excels and they've made a special
    chipset for the mobo and I'm sure they'll use one of their
    really cool CPUs. My machine with VIA ran so cool that
    it blew cool air out of the PSU all the time and didn't even
    have a separate rear case fan. Fred Langa said it really
    didn't need any fans at all. They'd slowed down the PSU
    fan so much sometimes the hair would stand up on the back
    of my neck and I'd jump up and put my hand in the back to
    see if the fan was even running.
    guzzle.gif
    Thump
  • anantha92anantha92
    I would say this is designed mainly for security purposes. Like advanced biometric scanning systems, would use one of these. Compact and powerful (Well not entirely).
  • QQ
    Something makes me shirk those (The example described above, not the systemboard itself).

    -Q
  • anantha92anantha92
    ...?
  • QQ
    anantha92 wrote:
    Like advanced biometric scanning systems, [...]

    Was what I was referring to.

    -Q
  • UglynGreyUglynGrey
    why you don't like your alien implanted RF chip? (ala Coast to Coast Radio)
  • anantha92anantha92
    Thumb scanners? Eye scanners?
  • QQ
    UglynGrey wrote:
    why you don't like your alien implanted RF chip? (ala Coast to Coast Radio)

    I missed the reference.

    -Q
  • UglynGreyUglynGrey
    biometric scanning used to track the movements and goings on of every man woman and child... a global conspiracy of surveilance on a massive level.....said to be based on (possible alien) implantations of chips in newboarn and hospital visitors.....

    References:
    X-Files
    Costs to Coast AM (nighttime radio formerly with Art Bell)
    Every nutty conspiracy magazine ever printed

    In response to:
    Something makes me shirk those (biometric scanners)
  • anantha92anantha92
    Haha, i ddin't mean it like that.
  • QQ
    UglynGrey wrote:
    Costs to Coast AM (nighttime radio formerly with Art Bell)

    Ahh, OK. Thankfully I've never run across them. My grandmother, on the other hand, has something that's probably just as bad.

    Anyway, I do recall a rather funny MST3King of such a one, this one was "The UN is hiding [those things] in potholes!"; repsonse: Iowa must be full of them.

    -Q
Sign In or Register to comment.