ZOTAC Launches Next-Generation DIY Home Theater PC Motherboards

[btarunr]

ZOTAC International, a leading innovator and a channel manufacturer, today launches the ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme - a next-generation mini-ITX platform for DIY home theater PC users. The ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme combines the latest energy-efficient Intel Atom processor with world-class NVIDIA GeForce graphics processors for superior energy-efficiency and stunning high-definition video playback.

The latest generation Intel Atom D2700 CedarTrail processor with dual cores and Intel HyperThreading technology enables the ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme to deliver snappy multitasking responsiveness for everyday computing tasks. The NVIDIA GeForce GT 520 graphics processor equips the ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme with hardware-accelerated Blu-ray 3D playback capabilities and HDMI 1.4a technology for the ultimate 3D high-definition experience.



“ZOTAC platforms have been quite popular among home theater PC users. “The ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme succeeds our award-winning IONITX series with upgrades to smoothly playback stereoscopic 3D content, output lossless audio formats and embrace Microsoft DirectX 11 technology while maintaining the compact mini-ITX form factor,” said Carsten Berger, marketing director, ZOTAC International.

Expansion is plentiful with the ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme platform, including two DDR3 DIMM slots, a PCI Express x16 (single-lane) expansion slot, two SATA 3.0 Gb/s ports and two USB 3.0 ports. Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11n WiFi and Bluetooth 3.0 networking technologies round out the platform for lightning-fast network connectivity wired or wirelessly.

It’s time to play with the ZOTAC D2700-ITX WiFi Supreme.

[THE_EGG]

Looks like you can solder on a 4-pin molex :/ don't know why you would want to or why you would need to.

[djisas]

They would do better with a fusion, more performance and less money possibly...

[lilhasselhoffer]

Originally Posted by THE_EGG

Looks like you can solder on a 4-pin molex :/ don't know why you would want to or why you would need to.

?

I see the outline on the PCB mask, but that could be anything. Extra power, because the original design used different and more power hungry peripherals, a fan, or an extra power source for older drives. Soldering anything there is a huge risk, and is only begging for your warranty to be voided.


That said, a fan power source would be nice. Those little boards run quite well with a low speed fan constantly pushing air through them, despite the fact that HTPC power supplies often forego Molex adapters...

[blibba]

I'd be interested to see this benchmarked against a Fusion system of similar power consumption.

[Ikaruga]

They would do much better with a modern low-volt mobile CPU than with this atom nonsense which is way too weak to feed the GT520 properly. I wonder if anybody ever use these boards at Zotac, or they just design something out of the blue.

I have a small ionitx 24/7 htpc/server which is a dual core atom + an ion, and no matter how hard I overclock the atom, everything is hopelessly CPU-limited beyond repair. More to that, a friend of mine has a more powerful ionitx-o overclocked to oblivion but it's still cpu limited.

It's great and helps a lot that browsers and other applications are starting the use the GPU more and more, but things would be so much better with a proper mobile CPU which only needs a few more watts and performs 3 times better.

[Frick]

Nice, but I'd still want them to do nano ITX stuff as well.

[TheLostSwede]

Originally Posted by THE_EGG

Looks like you can solder on a 4-pin molex :/ don't know why you would want to or why you would need to.

If you look carefully at the rear of the PCB, it looks like they planned a version with a DC-DC converter and as such the Molex connection at the front would've been to power any storage drives connected to the board.

[newtekie1]

Originally Posted by TheLostSwede

If you look carefully at the rear of the PCB, it looks like they planned a version with a DC-DC converter and as such the Molex connection at the front would've been to power any storage drives connected to the board.

Correct, their older ITX products do this as well. They use the same PCB, but offer a version with a DC jack and the molex to power anything in the case.

[THE_EGG]

Originally Posted by TheLostSwede

If you look carefully at the rear of the PCB, it looks like they planned a version with a DC-DC converter and as such the Molex connection at the front would've been to power any storage drives connected to the board.

Ah, thanks for that. I didn't think of that.