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New Nano-ITX 12cm Motherboards

Posted by michael on from the cute-and-cuddly dept.

Kris_J writes "mini-itx.com have exclusive pictures of VIA's new 12cm x 12cm motherboard standard they're terming 'Nano-ITX'. VIA have removed the legacy ports, moved to mini-PCI and SODIMMs and now a new batch of custom PC projects can be produced where previously there wasn't quite enough room for the motherboard. I already have an idea..."

5 of 439 comments (clear)

  1. Bring back the serial port! by grub · · Score: 4, Insightful


    VIA have removed the legacy ports

    I wish these companies would leave just a single RS-232 or RS-422 port. Sometimes you need a simple serial connection to connect through if the network is down. The lack of serial also limits the use for these boards for controlling other pieces of hardware if embedding is your thing.

    Maybe an online petition to bring back the RS-232 is in order :)

    --
    Trolling is a art,
    1. Re:Bring back the serial port! by grub · · Score: 4, Insightful


      Just get a USB->RS232 cable.

      That's another layer of complexity. It may work fine for Rube Goldberg but the less things to break, the better.

      --
      Trolling is a art,
  2. Wonderful! by Doesn't_Comment_Code · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I can't say how many times I've wanted to make a small, embedded controller system, but couldn't do it. Most projects need the ability of pc, but can't handle the space requirements for a desktop sized box. These little babies aught to make my life much more fun, and possibly fully automated.

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    Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
  3. Re:Woohoo! by LookSharp · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Roll your own notebooks!

    Where is the power circuitry? To run from/charge a battery?

    The controller to run a native LCD?

    Be sure to include some room for converters to step down the big IDE down to notebook harddrives and optical drives.

    Oh and that "1 GHz C3?" It has roughly the computational power of a Celeron 600.

    Feel free to invest $1200 in making one of these into a notebook with an LCD, but I'd just assume spend $1000 on a Dell 2GHz and plenty more expansion and connectivity options.

  4. Worst legacy PC item is still there. by Cheetahfeathers · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They haven't removed the worst offender of the old legacy PC, however. The BIOS is still there. PCs need to ditch BIOS and go with something decent like openboot. Also, console on an out of band management line needs to be stardand, so you can administer things remotely or when the network is down.

    It doesn't need to be legacy serial, though that's what everything else uses. Put it on USB for all I care. Just make sure I can get to the system outside the network, and boot/reset/configure it from there.