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Via Now Shipping Dual-Processor Mini-ITX Board
An anonymous reader writes "Via is now shipping its first dual-processor mini-ITX board. The DP-310 features two 1GHz processors, gigabit Ethernet, support for SATA drives, and a media-processing graphics chipset. It targets high-density applications -- according to Via, a 42-U rack with 168 processors would draw about 2.5 kilowatts, or about as much power as two hair dryers." This also looks like the basis for a nice car computer. Also on the small-computing front, an anonymous reader submits "General Micro, meanwhile, last week released what it calls the world's fastest mini-ITX board, powered by a Pentium M clocked up to 2.3GHz. "
Sounds like an excellent-performing midrange desktop replacement to me. Only trick would be marketing it to consumers & businesses who've been indoctrinated in the MHz cult. Two CPUs should give excellent responsiveness.
a 42-U rack with 168 processors would draw about 2.5 kilowatts, or about as much power as two hair dryers." This also looks like the basis for a nice car computer.
I know this is News for Nerds and all, but isn't that a bit excessive? I don't think my car needs 168 1GHz processors. (or is that 336 processors?) What's it going to do with that much power?
How good are these? I remember reading a lot of lovely things about S3 DeltaChrome series (owned by VIA), but never got to see a videocard sporting that chip.
If you want to see what cool stuff people are doing with mini-ITX, check out http://www.mini-itx.com/. Mini-ITX is a form factor where the board is 6.7"x6.7"
This also looks like the basis for a nice car computer.
Why would you need a car computer with dual processors?
"Each time you smile, it'll only last awhile. Life may be scary, but it's only temporary."
It should be noted that the photos do not show the heat sinks that in fact are intalled on the board.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
You'd think that just SATA would be plenty (maybe SAS for leading edge). Why would want to go to small form factor and use parallel ATA drives?
Someone you trust is one of us.
$1800 each for the P620. $850 each for "OEM" quantities. Too rich for my blood.
Its finally nice to see a company moving the pc in the right directions-small, fast, and quiet. For 20 years the desktop computer has stayed about the same size...its 2005 for crying out loud! Lets get some innovation!
Don't they know they need to use giant noisy fans to make a proper pc. What is it with this passivley cooled 486 style mindset?
The article says that the northbride is a CN400, but the photos have a CLE266 northbridge on... What's up with that?
--marmite
I do not represent myself.
Can't we let PS/2 ports die already? Four USB 2.0 ports on this thing, and Via still thought we needed PS/2 ports. I'd rather drop the PS/2 ports and get a FireWire port, or another USB 2.0 port. PS/2 keyboard and mouse ports are as much of a dead end as the MCA bus - it's time to let go.
Blogging Weight Loss, Distance Education, and more at verlin.com
Given Via's history of announcing Mini/Nano-itx boards as "shipping now" and not shipping for anything up to a year or so (anyone actually seen commercial supplies of standard generic 1-processor Nano-ITX boards yet?), does anyone know if this is *actually* shipping? Mini-itx.com doesn't have it, neither does epiacenter.com or linitx.com. I'll believe "shipping now" when someone actually has it...
Beware the psychokinetic mimes!
Useable? Yes. Acceptable for generic web browsing and word processing? Maybe. An excellent-performing midrange desktop replacement? No way.
The benchmark you linked said the single processor handled dvd playback flawlessly, and played divx movies "perfectly with no slowdowns or stutters"
Their conclusion:
"VIA has definitely listened to the users of the EPIA on this one. They've fixed up all of the major problems that stopped the EPIA becoming a perfect TV-Run machine. Anyone who is looking to set up a dedicated TV-Run machine should look no further than the VIA EPIA-M - its high quality DVD and DivX playback make it a perfect choice!"
That sounds fast enough to replace many home desktops
a link to the actual product page
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Sheesh.
Because I really would rather have two underperforming CPUs in my computer instead of one fast one.
I mean, dual proc is really nice for making a desktop system interactive since it drops latency to essentially zero, but you've got to have the speed there for when you need it too. The 1GHz via feels slower than a 1GHz intel CPU.
Something that would be really cool, though probably technically hard to do, is to get a decent processor and run it with a VIA or similar as the second CPU. That way you can cut about $100 off the price of a SMP system while still getting the fast response times from dual CPU. I mean, the acronym calls it SMP right? So AMP must be possible. Right?
What kind of hair dryer are you using?
most hair dryers are around 1800 watts, 1.25 watts per hair dryer won't dry anything.
They come up with the ITX platform so that they could pimp off these horrible processors. From what I have read they are not good for much of anything except single task as an mp3 player.
:)
I had a via mini-ITX board 2 years ago. It was 800mhz. I put a tv tuner card in the box and captured cable tv to divx in real time. That took about 35-40% CPU. That means I was able to watch other divx movies (via the Composite TV-OUT) at the same time it was encoding. Oh, and mp3blaster worked great too!
and no I didn't RTFA
or anything else for that matter, eh?
A bicycle light would consume about 2Watts (rude guess).
A typical light bulb is 60 Watts.
An electric heater is 2000 Watts typical.
And I just went downstairs to check, a hairdryer is 1500 Watts (my mother is a hairdresser, so it's a "professional" version).
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
The M and MII boards have well documented DMA issues There have been many attempts to contact VIA to discuss these, all have been actively ignored (we are pretty sure they are getting the messages).
What concerns me is that the problem has been fixed in windows, but Via wont even talk to linux people about it. That indicates a certain lack of interest in the linuxworld that bodes badly should problems arise with these new mobos. I would be very circumspect about picking up another mobo from them unless I was sure I wouldn't need support.
Just one jilted dudes opinion.
(via the Composite TV-OUT)
strike that. it was a pci geforce2 MX400 card with tv-out. so, most the graphics processing was offloaded onto it.
My previous primary computer was a first-generation Alienware laptop that I'm still paying for. I assume I'll use it more once I clear out some space for it. It has an amazing screen. For now, though, the Mini is doing most everything I need it to (except Half-Life 2), and I'm easing myself into Unix while I'm at it.
Honor Among Slackers. A veri
Those pictures don't match what's on via's site:
EPIA DP
Note the orientation of the processors, and the lack of PS2 ports on the (official?) pictures.
.
2.5kW was for the ENITIRE RACK. A single unit is pulling about 60W, which is only 5A in a car.
I do that. For near-line archive, several 1U boxes, each with an M10000 Epia board and four 300GB HD. Another box with a database and a web frontend to manage it, and goes like a charm.
not much processing needs, but lots of storage space with little heat. unfortunately the next drives (400GB) are only at 7200 RPM, no longer 5400RM
-Kz-
... you've got serious beowulf potential. /.
In 10 years it will be like: "Imagine a traffic jam of these." here on
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
AMP has been done, and (possibly) predates SMP.
SMP is an O/S design choice, not a hardware thing. An SMP system is one in which all processors can be given all jobs. Assymetric MP systems are those on which this is not true: for instance Sun's first multiprocessor OS could run user code on all processors, but kernel code (including interrupt handlers) could only run on processor zero.
It's harder to write an SMP kernel than an AMP kernel if you start with a uniprocessor kernel - you don't need to introduce any new locks if you go the AMP route.
As to your proposal, I think dual-core desktops are close enough to make it irrelevant. Sorry.
Phil
I guess today is a passable day to die.
I have been using an Epia M10000 board (single Nehemiah processor, previous generation chipset -- mpeg-2 hardware assist) as a PVR/multimedia computer with WinXP Pro for the past year and a half, and it is MORE than adequate.
512MB PC2100 DDR ram, 120+160GB IDE hard drives, Hauppage PVR250 tv-tuner PCI card, 90W power supply (used to be a 60W until I added the 2nd hard drive).
For a system that can handle recording, pausing live TV, video editing, DVD burning, and yes, even WEB BROWSING, text editing, minor picture manipulation and instant messaging, I highly prefer my little shoebox sized system to some power-hungry behemoth that sounds like 747 at takeoff.
I don't use Photoshop or modern 3D gaming on it, because I wouldn't use those period. I normally use the free utilities that come with WinXP and Pinnacle Studio that came with my DVD burner for video editing, because they are all I need. If I really want to screw around with something, I'll usually try running it first on my 450MHz K6-2+ WinME box (which, for reference, IS much slower than my mini-itx system) so I won't risk messing up my properly functional PVR setup.
If someone can build an equivalent system using modern Intel/AMD processors that requires only 2 small fans (40mm on the processor, 60mm case fan), and can operate flawlessly off of a 90W power supply, I'd like to see it (and hear it).
Mini-ITX, at least Via's approach, is not about cramming the most powerful components into a new motherboard form factor. It's about creating a platform that has enough capabilities and utilizes the smallest amount of resources (power, space) to get it done.
For those of us who keep our systems on 24/7 in our bedrooms, low power/noise are a critical factor in deciding our computing platform. I'm thankful to Via for pushing along in the low power/density arena.
"If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice!" -Rush
Noise I agree with, but power? What do I care if the system in my bedroom corner is sucking down 200w or 90w? Not like that's $50 more a month, or even $10 for that matter. You're talking a couple bucks at most.
Check out the electricity calculator. Enter the watts and your kw/hr and it'll tell u you how you're spending.
At 8 cents a kWh this is what I got:
200w = 38 cents a day... $11.52/mo, $140/yr.
90w = 17 cents/day... $5.18/mo, 63.07/yr
Sorry, that $6 more per month is nothing to cry about, although after seeing that $80 yearly difference I think I will keep downloads going on the laptop from now on and only fire up the desktop when I have serious work to do, especially since my PSU is closer to double that rating so double that cost. Still, doesn't justify buying a laptop for downloading or paying extra for a power-saving system with no processing power.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
[rant]It is more than just your electricity bill! The more energy you use the more oil, coal and atomic power will be used. Your electricity is porbably not generated by oil, but it is about a mind set. If you start thinking about energy is some thing limited and not only money things might change. I just read in the news that oil demand is up, basically due to larger demand of USA and China. Creating more and more dependencies on countries like Irak, Iran, and other large oil producing countries.
It is up to YOU, do you want to be depended on those countries for your life style? If not, stop thinking about the few (tens) of bucks you pay per month for gass or electricity and think about where that energy is coming from.
For example switch of your home server and let your web server be provided by an ISP where you can have a more efficient use of the cpu/energy. Many do ofer mysql and other nice to have tools too.
Buy a car that has a milage of 30 mpg or better. There is really no use of a car that consume more than that. Why do you need 200+ horse power, while that speed limit is 65mph anyway? My 130hp can do 120mph easily and not consume more than 15mpg at that speed. At a more normal speed it uses 30mpg. (if you want to know it is a 2.2 liter turbo (HDI) diesel) And I still have about the same room inside as I used to have in my Explorer.
I can improve on many things myself, and I will. In short, think about where the energy is coming from and if you want to depend on that. And I even did not start about the environment, there I know many people do not care about that....[/rant]