A thin mini-ITX board has the same PCB size as a regular mini-ITX board (170 x 170mm) but with approximately half the height of the standard IO shield. This enables a low-profile board that is suitable for AIO integration.

Intel® Atom™ processor-based PCB

The board features that make a thin mini-ITX board are:

• Desktop CPU support up to 65 watt TDP
• Internal display connectors (LVDS or eDP)
• SODIMM memory support
• External power supply (through back IO panel)
• Mini PCIe* expansion

A small and thin board not only works well for AIOs but also for other form factors that can take advantage of a low-profile board like a thin media PC, a VESA mounted PC, or other vertical usages such as hospital carts, ATMs, and casino gaming machines. This kind of broad application for this board helps keep the cost low and availability high.

Even with a standards-based approach for the system components inside the AIO, the standard allows for enough flexibility in the external industrial design of the system. A systems ODM or an AIO enclosure vendor can choose the size of the panel they want to support (18.5” and up), whether they want to support touch screen features, the placement of walk-up IO, and also the board orientation for easy back panel IO access.

An elegant and sleek AIO industrial design based on the standard

The diagram below shows an example of an AIO system layout using a thin mini-ITX motherboard, a standard 3.5” hard disk drive, a slim optical disk drive, and an external power adapter.

The thin mini-ITX-based AIO system can ship either as a barebones system with the motherboard preinstalled in the AIO enclosure, or as an AIO chassis only in which a system integrator can install the thin mini-ITX board of his choice. Since the thin mini-ITX boards offer form factor flexibility and can also go into other desktop and vertical usage chassis, starting mid-2011 these boards will be available in retail just like mATX and mini-ITX boards are today.