ECS Reveals Bay Trail-D Mini-ITX Line
by Ian Cutress on October 23, 2013 3:32 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Mini ITX
- ECS
- Silvermont
- SoCs
- Bay Trail
With Intel's Bay Trail platform and Silvermont Atom cores in the news for tablets, we have spotted their use in mini-ITX platforms as far pack as Computex 2013 where model numbers of Celeron Silvermont systems were on display. While these platforms are aimed at embedded systems on the desktop side, there is a small inkling that SFF PCs and AIOs will benefit too. To this extent, ECS (Elitegroup Computer Systems) has revealed their initial mini-ITX Bay Trail-D lineup, codename 'BAT-I'.
The difference in designation will be the CPU name in the product: the three products will offer a Pentium J2850 (quad core, 2.4 GHz), a Celeron J1850 (quad core, 2 GHz) and a Celeron J1750 (dual core, 2.4 GHz). All systems are paired with Intel HD Graphics (Ivy Bridge based), one mPCIe 2.0 x1 slot, one USB 3.0 port and two SATA 3 Gbps, as well as two COM ports.
Aside from the passive heatsinks (the SoCs have a Max TDP of 10W) these systems will need DDR3L-1333 SODIMM memory, and the HDMI/VGA will support 1080p and BluRay playback. Due to the price point and feature set, they fall under ECS' 'Essentials' range like the KBN-I, whereas the Deluxe/Pro ranges are reserved for more prominent builds.
I have requested release dates and pricing, update to follow.
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Kevin G - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
It looks like there is no notch to dremel out. This would allow a 16x physical card to fit, though I doubt that it would actually provide the necessary 75W of power to it.Kevin G - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
And like that I'm taking back what I said. There is a notch on the PCIE 1x slot.Shivansps - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
That pci-e x1 is 3.0 or 2.0?nathanddrews - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
Looks like the best x1 GPU out there is the Radeon 5450. Honestly, I'm not sure if that would be better or worse than the Intel IGP...ShieTar - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
With 4 EUs at <800MHz, performance should be at around 50 GFLOP/s, so gaming would be a non-option. The Radeon 5450 is rated at 104 GFLOP/s, so it is an actual improvement. And as Ian has seen some drawbacks in Performance even with Dual-Channel DDR3 1333 for gaming, single channel memory might criple the iGPU even more. Technically, there is also a 6450 with around 200 GFLOPs availabe at PCIe 2.1 x1, which should get you almost to the level of Intels HD 4600.Then again, the 6450 might already be more than the CPU can support. A 30W TDP dual core may be good enough for gaming, but a less than 10W quad-core probably won't be very helpful, specifically not in games that are badly threaded.
Jaybus - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
The pic shows a regular x1 slot, as well as what looks like a mini-PCI-E slot. Maybe both? That would be great for some embedded applications, since it would allow adding a WiFi card in addition to an open x1 slot for data acquisition or motor controller hardware.Arnulf - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
The article mentions two COM ports yet I camnot see them anywhere among the connectors at the back of the board. Are they present as pin headers only ?extide - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
I would expect, yes.jasont21 - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
Anyone know of any upcoming Intel Bay Trail mini boards (ie. 3.5" SBC, Nano-ITX, Pico-ITX, some custom format, etc.) with dual gigabit ethernet?moojoo32 - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
Ya, I'd like to see some Bay Trail boards smaller than mini-ITX. They'd be great for some projects I have in mind.