Aopen Pentium M Micro-ATX motherboard Appears in Japan

[Omega65]

AOpen has launched an interesting Pentium-M micro-ATX mainboard in Japan, with 2 x GB Ethernet, Serial ATA, Firewire.

A 2GHz Pentium-M has the same integer benchmark ratings as a 3.4GHz P4, but much lower power consumption.

Source: Akiba PC Hotline. (http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/akiba/hotline/20041009/etc_i855gme.html)

[muddocktor]

Looks like it has some overclocking options in the 1 screenshot they posted of a bios screen. Too bad it's still based on the i855 chipset, which is a single channel solution though, but the P-M might be more like an AMD proc that doesn't need the extra bandwidth like a P4 too. One of these motherboards combined with a 1000 or 1100 (P-M 723 or 733) Dothan running on a 200 fsb speed sounds extremely interesting to me. I think a combination such as that at 2200 MHz would surprise a lot of people on how well it kicks a P4's ass.

[mmonnin]

This thing could prolly OC like a little bitch too, at least heat-wise.

Thats the craziest socket design I have seen lately. Never seen one a CPU socket sideways in the normal HS retention bracket.

[Thrax]

/me arches an eyebrow with great interest

[Gargoyle]

Interesting board. And that northbridge heatsink is too cute.

[mmonnin]

Yeah another different design with the Norhtbridge heatsink.

[GHoosdum]

Seems like a winner!

[Armo]

there is only 1 *that i know of* socket T p4 with a diagonal socket compared to the HS/F adapter, intriging, i like the chipset cooler, i like all chipset coolers that arent active cooling :)

i didnt know you could buy a p4-m chip, i guess i havent really looked for them that much :D

[muddocktor]

That board is for a Pentium M chip, not a Pentium 4 mobile chip, Armo. Pentium M (Banias and Dothan versions) are a totally different architecture than P4 and much more like an AXP or A64 (without the 64 bit extentions). It's the way Intel should have gone instead of netburst IMO.

[ryko]

I want one.....how much is 29,800 yen?

I agree that it's 855 chipset somewhat sucks---would be nice if aopen had cross-bred an 875p chipset with that little socket to see what a dothan can really do....

...Thats the craziest socket design I have seen lately. Never seen one a CPU socket sideways in the normal HS retention bracket.

fyi, abit ai7 has a sideways socket in a square hsf retetion bracket... see pic