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New Nano-ITX Boards Shown At Cebit
Subartik writes "The new nano-itx boards from Via have been shown at the CeBit show in Germany. It looks like it will be a suitable platform for all kinds of small form factor devices. See
VIA embedded and
Linux Devices for the specs and pictures"
An anonymous reader points to PC World articles about the Nano-ITX board itself as well as the first system which will include it.
A few people earlier today were wondering why anyone would need IPv6, since IPv4 "obviously has enough address space". Developments like this should pretty clearly demonstrate that that's not the case. It probably won't be too terribly long before even your fridge will need an IP so you can program your refrigerator to know when it needs to order more groceries and the like.
Absolutely. In fact, your fridge might demand an entire subnet. Smaller, cheaper boards drive appliance makers to a federated, modular architectures in which every new function has its own CPU. Your fridge might need range of IPs addys if it has an ice maker, RFID-reading intelli-chiller, home-message center, Kalory-Kounter terahertz sensor array, Phreshness Gas Sensor, Open-Door SMS alert sender, remote shopping list VPN website, etc.
Its just much easier to make a bunch of modules that sit on a network than create a bloatware central system that has wires for every conceivable add-on function.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Here's some ideas:
-Homebrew $200 firewalls (routers, gateways, etc) with much, much greater capabilities than those little D-Link units.
-Personal NAS devices that, again, are mega-cheap and tiny
-home automation devices: c'mon, who hasn't dreamed of fully automating their house?
-motorcycle-based GPS system anyone?
-cheapass public terminal systems: incorporate one of these into an LCD screen?
-smaller tablets, laptops with longer battery life? Sure there's not much computational power, but if you're just doing surfing or doing office chores...
-add a single wifi chip/small antenna and you have instant access point. I bet Starbucks would love this idea. Instant, easy, cheap wireless internet.
Now, personally, I think these things could be great building blocks for doing distributed computing research. You could build a rather large network of these tiny things into a standard ATX tower, and have yourself a portable beowulf cluster, or hell, nice little units to experiment with distributed computing ideas. I can see it now: a couple of 8-drive HDD external bays, with each slot housing full systems!
------- "From bored to fanboy in 3.8 asian girls" ----------
Design a custom 4U case, and mount these blade-style in the case, each with a tiny little 2 or 4GB flash drive. I'm willing to bet that a 4U half-depth case could support 12 of these things, with a low-power redundant PSU to power the array. Get a 72U rack, fill it with these things, and you have 216 systems on a single half-depth rack, consuming ~600 watts of power.
Oh god, would I love to build such an array...oh baby...
------- "From bored to fanboy in 3.8 asian girls" ----------