

Intel's 4-inch "Next Unit of Computing" to cost $400 - phren0logy
http://techreport.com/discussions.x/23066

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astrodust
I would've thought that Intel could make something like this for a much lower
price-point. That's not even price-competitive with a small Dell unit.

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riffic
What you see now is an initial price. This is not what the machines will cost
6-12 months down the road. In all likelihood you'll see these drop in price
pretty quickly, perhaps after xmas.

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astrodust
If it's a product for industrial applications, I doubt there's a _Santa_
factor.

For whatever reason, embedded components seem to fight Moore's Law tooth and
nail.

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kenrikm
The Raspberry Pi seems like it would make a much more cost effective system
for digital displays (1080p support + linux/Web backend) Having built several
digital signage systems myself with off the shelf parts for < $200.. $400
seems really steep.

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joezydeco
Do your systems typically run off Wifi or hardwired ethernet? There's no wifi
built-in on the Rpi. Personally I'd get a Pandaboard ES instead.

~~~
whyenot
A PandaBoard ES is $182 from Digi-Key. A RPi with a usb wifi adapter is $50
($35 + $15).

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joezydeco
I can get a PandaboardES shipped to me tonight. How about the Rpi?

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whyenot
If you can afford to wait for intel's board, which won't begin shipping for
months, one would assume waiting for the RPi to become more widely available
wouldn't be a major inconvenience.

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reitzensteinm
I was down voted earlier for suggesting it was going to be an order of
magnitude more expensive than the R-Pi (until I argued my case):

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3909113>

While the difference in price between the two is negligible for any serious
commercial work, this isn't nearly the game changer the R-Pi is. You're not
going to put one of these in your garden powered by solar.

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sciurus
"Inside the box, you'll find a mobile Core i3 processor paired with the HM65
chipset"

This is nice. I wish Intel would sell mobile processors (or motherboards with
integrated mobile processors) directly to consumers. The lowest voltage Intel
Core desktop processor I can find is the i3-2120T at 35 watts; most are 65
watts. Intel's Core mobile processors go as low as 17 watts.

~~~
cheatercheater
They're not as fast though. And unless you really care about size, a 65 watts
doesn't matter. I've got a dead silent system with an 85W gpu and a geforce
9800 gxt+. (one fan in it, but it's a low voltage Noctua that can't be heard
even with my ear right against it. psu is fanless)

I appreciate your sentiment for colder hardware. I do hope it's going to get
there some day, but not at the cost of speed. I think we've reached a
situation where it's becoming more and more practical to have silent PCs.

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mey
At 101.6mm x 101.6mm it makes this smaller than a Nano-ITX and just slightly
larger than the Pico-ITX

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nano-ITX> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pico-
ITX> <http://www.mini-itx.com/>

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tantalor
"Next" might not be the best choice for a computer hardware trademark. I'm
going to bet somebody else owns that trademark already.

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fuzzythinker
Reduce it further and pair it with Google glass or similar device, minority
report style interface that can sense your arm and head movements and it will
truly be a "personal" computer you can bring anywhere.

~~~
IsTom
And battery-backpack. Perhaps in some near future we will have a better power
source.

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bitwize
Yep. Definitely not a RasPi contender.

It looks just like a PC104 board -- and is priced at a point that's dirt cheap
for PC104 kit but still nowhere near in RasPi's league.

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brightrhino
Oh look, intel invented a mac mini without a hard drive.

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rhplus
The Mac mini is 7.7 x 7.7 x 1.4 inches. That's almost four times the volume of
this thing (4 x 4 x ? inches).

<http://www.apple.com/macmini/specs.html>

~~~
brightrhino
The mac mini is also available with a quad core i7 and a hard drive. Cooling
is already designed into the mac mini enclosure, which the article mentions
has not been finalized in the version shown. I don't see this as much of an
accomplishment.

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excuse-me
"Primarily for digital signage" It has a core i3 cpu, 4Gb RAM and will have
USB3 and thunderbolt.

Perhaps I'm out of touch - but since when does a moving sign display need
gigaflops? Wouldn't a Raspberry pi for 1/20 of the cost, and which can drive a
full HD video, be sufficient?

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underwater
I've seen a lot of signage that runs on Flash. This is probably because that's
what designers use, and also because new adverts are delivered over slow
connections (GPRS?)

At any rate, the $400 cost would be minuscule compared to the cost of the
screen itself, housing and installation costs. Why try and save a little money
and risk having to retrofit or replace the displays in a few years when
socially integrated, augmented reality, realtime 3D ads are in vogue.

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seanalltogether
Correct. All the digital signage I've worked on in the past couple years was
Flash/AIR based.

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wavephorm

      Inside the box, you'll find a mobile Core i3 processor 
    

What? That's 2 generations ago. I have a 3 year old Atom system about that
size. Sure, an i3 is faster, that's nice, but just let me know when Intel's
top-of-the-line chip can run on a motherboard this size. If Intel thinks they
can still produce new CPU's for the ATX form factor, they're nuts.

~~~
zokier
"Core i3" is just a brand name, it doesn't refer to any specific
chip/generation/architecture. I fully except that Ivy Bridge i3's will be
released eventually. And Sandy Bridge (what this box probably has inside) is
just one generation behind. And I don't see any reason why you couldn't make
similar box with Ivy Bridge i7.

If you think that Intel could now stop producing new CPUs for ATX form factor,
you are the one who are nuts. As far as I know, Intel has no plans to leave
the desktop market.

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cheatercheater
Any idea if the new version will use a mini-dp port for the thunderbolt
output? I think that might be a bit unreasonable for such a platform where the
connector needs to be fairly robust? I can imagine a lot of those hanging by
the cable.

