Video: Intel reveals Moorestown PC motherboard, possibly world's smallest

It was brief but it sure was impressive. With all the hubbub surrounding Intel's launch of Atom, let's not forget what's coming: Moorestown. That fiberglass isn't yet populated with the CPU, chipset, WiFi, GPS, 3G cellular radio, or memory... but it will be if you can wait until 2010. See it revealed after the break.

[Mark @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:11AM]

WHERE'S THE PCI EXPRESS X16 SLOT?

[rndmnme @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:14AM]

Where's the PCI card capable of fitting on the motherboard?

[dj-kenpo @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:19AM]

where's the ISA slot?! fascists!

[jay.viz @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:23AM]

YOUR MOM HAS AN EXPRESS SLOT!

[tom @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:24AM]

stop being a d!ck!

[Saad Rabia @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:48AM]

Diggity.

[Kakkoii @ Apr 3rd 2008 1:39PM]

If you listened. This is for mobile devices. (Phones/PMP's/MID's/etc..)

You don't take those apart and pop cards in. Everything's integrated in mobile devices.

[Chris Macdonald @ Apr 3rd 2008 2:36PM]

no shit kaki

[Timmy @ Apr 3rd 2008 4:00PM]

I may be showing my age here but Mother in the name Mother Board refers to the fact you are meant to attach "Daughter Cards" (as they were called in the day) so how is this a mother board if thing are integrated? I'm sure there is a name that better fits this situation. Would this be more of a integrated Buss card?

[Lechuga @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:20AM]

damnn no SLI ???

[bob @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:21AM]

what we are beginning to see is the end of upgradable pcs, more and more features are being stuck on the motherboard, from wifi, memory to gfx chips and eventually ssd's, the computer will soon be, just another comsumer electronics product.

[jay.viz @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:24AM]

Oh Noes! Teh Sky! It is falling!

[Clive @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:37AM]

Um, the seems like kind of a bold generalization to make. This board will not be going into mainstream desktop or laptop computers. Any device that uses this motherboard would be a consumer electronic device that was never hardware-upgradeable to begin with, like smartphones, MIDs, etc.

[bob @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:37AM]

Im not saying its necessarily a bad thing, this is what apple made the personal computer as in the 1st place, a computer as a consumer electronic device, not something to technical or expensive for the average person. (more 99% of people do not upgrade anything on a pc, and most of that 1% only do the ram).

[telepheedian @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:54AM]

When was the last time you've changed the GPU in your cell phone?

[jon @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:14AM]

by "beginning to see" you mean "have seen since the first laptop was invented."

[ManekiNeko @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:14AM]

I fail to see a problem with that. To many users, a computer IS just an appliance.

[Abuzar @ Apr 3rd 2008 12:00PM]

Bob, that is a VERY bad thing. Apple can go to hell with it's idea of the Computer. The day I am not allowed to upgrade my video card is the day PC gaming dies.

So it's not a bad thing, eh? Ok so maybe my DVD encoding times are getting slow. So I just bought a Quad Core for 230. In your vision of the future I will have to buy whole another computer!

How is that a good thing?!

[bob @ Apr 3rd 2008 12:24PM]

Its not necessarily my view its just the way its going to happen, except maybe for specialist machines, look at a lot of modern laptops (the way the industry is heading) umpc's and mobile phones, also look at devises like the microsoft surface, people (as in the majority, not us geeks) want an instantly accessible machine and don't care about upgrading components. fyi, pc gaming is dying due to overpriced hardware, over specced games and a small specialist market, consoles and integrated set-top / mobile devises are gamings future.

[Fernando @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:23AM]

That is pretty amazing I must say! Keep up the great work Intel.

[tom @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:25AM]

Seeing the size of MBA motherboard, i am not too surprised intel will come up with something like this

[bob @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:21AM]

"by "beginning to see" you mean "have seen since the first laptop was invented.""

the laptops that used pci wifi cards, had upgradable ram, and standard spinning Hard drives that could be removed and arent attached to a mobo? no i don't mean them. I mean what i said.

[Bernhard @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:25AM]

That thing still needs a chipset?!

[dervheid @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:27AM]

What's all the fuss about? It's NOT a motherboard, it's just a PCB!

[driids @ Apr 7th 2008 12:35PM]

do you have any idea what goes into designing a PCB? and besides snapping on a few components (and probably soldering some too) is it pretty much a motherboard.

[DeadPixel @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:28AM]

its kind of futile if there isnt not pci or cpu?

[xValentine @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:30AM]

Nvidia's 10xx Series will surely fit on that mobo. Not.

I would like to see this on mobile phones, iPods*, cameras than on a PC.

[aka_gus @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:17AM]

I find myself captivated by the * you wrote after ipods...Care to elaborate?

[Wwhat @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:54AM]

I'd feel real silly showing just a PCB, really.

[fh @ Apr 3rd 2008 9:59AM]

@everybody
I think that's the whole point. These are meant to create powerful pocket devices that have the full x86 functionality (but not upgradability!) of a standard PC. In other words, this isn't a PC that is replacing your gaming desktop at home; this is a PC that is going to replace your cellphone/PDA.

No PCI express? No PCI? No SLi? Why not ask that of any UMPC, MID, RIM or iPhone device?

[Urnamma @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:15AM]

Agreed completely. We've seen the current paradigm for years, and I highly doubt it'll disappear even in our lifetimes. (note that I'm actually a semi-Kurzweilian type of tech & science evangelist as well). First you build something relatively large, but powerful. It is used in correspondingly large machines. Then, that technology is shrunk a bit, and it ends up in laptops a bit later. Then, in mobile devices after that. We're already seeing smart cards (whose whole device is the size of a smashed rice grain) with the power of an IBM-XT.

We shouldn't fear miniaturization, because in the near term, our pc's will still be scores, if not hundreds, of times more powerful than most mobile devices.

Imagine the 'GeForce 10800 GX4', 16GB DDR4, a 512GB Solid State drive, and an 8 core 32nm prorcessor ;)

[Cougar @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:30AM]

http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/09/mtube-does-linux-wimax-weighs-five-ounces/

[Wwhat @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:40AM]

Why force the x86 outdatedness on people when you don't have to?

[fh @ Apr 3rd 2008 1:25PM]

Why force proprietary hardware, higher costs, fewer software options (or higher developer overhead to port software), and limited deployment options, when you don't have to, because x86 is a perfectly capable framework? Especially if we're talking only about modest performance requirements in a handheld device.

Take the iPhone: it broke ground on the way people are beginning to think about their portable devices. But behind the GUI, there have been a host of problems. iPhone-only websites (how Web2.0 is that?). Poor initial SDK, and still limited development support. Limited hardware/accessory support. The point isn't to segregate services or functionality, or to reinvent it because you choose proprietary technology. Everything already works on x86, it's just not all that portable. Until now.

This could forseeably pair well with Android: a-la-carte software development with a-la-carte hardware requirements. "Build your own portable device", suited perfectly to your own needs, and integrated seemlessly with your existing technology. And all at relatively low cost.

[Bruno @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:14AM]

Another mobile phone base, that's all this really is.

[andy @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:19AM]

Another mobile base that is to phone hardware what android is to phone software.

see www.anandtech.com for the full explanation.

It's the second gen chipset to be used with atom for VERY small laptop PC's with VERY long life.



You could install Windows XP on your Qwerty cell phone with Microsoft Office. Think about that for a minute.

[BigD145 @ Apr 3rd 2008 12:30PM]

@Andy
No, you can't. You WILL be able to run a very slow and chopped up version of Vista, though. The cost of putting 32-64 GB of SDHC on it just to run Vista will double the price right off the bat.

[Lowest Ranked @ Apr 3rd 2008 12:35PM]

@Urnama:

"Imagine the 'GeForce 10800 GX4', 16GB DDR4, a 512GB Solid State drive, and an 8 core 32nm prorcessor"

This will seem ancient in 6 years.

[andy @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:21AM]

I can't wait for atom and Moorestown in the desktop form factor though.

I could have an always on, fanless Windows Home Server that consumes less than a watt at idle, and 10 watts or whatever when the drives spin up.

[Neoprimal @ Apr 3rd 2008 10:38AM]

That kind of reminds me of that movie A.I, when they look inside that really lifelike Teddy Bear and find an Intel chip. I'm not quite sure WHY this reminded me of that, but it does.

Also, what's wrong with this? I like the idea of having my cell phone run like my PC does....and who says we'll be using PCI-E and internal cards by 2010. For all we know we could port everything to external equipment to be used through bluetooth, wifi or usb etc. Your PC could simply be a small box with a mobo and a processor/some memory. Someone also mentioned PCs not being upgradeable....and? Many laptops are nowhere close to as upgradeable as computers, and they still sell like hotcakes. Some people even prefer laptops over computers. There's even a market for these all in one pcs now, some that run on laptop boards. Nothing's wrong with a firmware upgradeable device. Who out of us upgrades their system piece by piece? I may buy a hard drive or more ram...maybe a better CD/DVD drive. CPU and Memory would really have no reason to be soldered into an after market/retail mobo, so I don't see that happening. The fact is, PCI slots are not entirely necessary for anything but GPUs now, and since those may soon be ported to CPU like chips then, hey who knows...slotless boards may come sooner than later. 'Upgradeable' can easily pertain to external devices nowadays. Most things you find inside a PC(except for CPU/RAM) can be found outside a PC now. I for one, prefer my hard drives and such external. And there are pretty kickass sound systems that are usb now. Only video needs to catch up on that front....otherwise you have wireless, bluetooth, more usb slots, etc. etc. all able to be hooked up externally.

Our cellphones, umpcs and mp3 players are all devices with often one board inside along with a processor and memory and they're generally pretty reliable. As long as smaller or 'integrated' doesn't mean less powerful/slow in comparison to/plain crappy or more expensive, then I don't have a problem.

Anyway, my point is that I think it's progress. Eventually PCs as small as say, the mac mini may be as powerful as say, a Tower with 4 cpus, 4 gpus and lots and lots of pci cards.

[R1cebrner @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:28AM]

I see a fully functional computer the size of a usb hub, with external hd, dvd, sound, connected and powerd wirelessly. Followed by (insert company of choice) placing all the items back inside one case to reduce clutter and being praised for there innovative design and idea,

[cw @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:24AM]

I think he totally missed an opportunity for a Steve Jobsian moment here. He should have pulled it out of his wallet. Someone please alert the PR firm to pay attention to potential of on stage theatrics to generate buzz.

[ReggieXuk @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:35AM]

someone at

[ReggieXuk @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:41AM]

... apple smells a challenge, Looks like it could fit into a Gameboy SP.

[Shinigami @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:53AM]

Intel MID - the reason you need a BIG pocket ;)
Remember, its just a motherboard. And nope, it won't fit in iPhone.

[boe @ Apr 3rd 2008 11:55AM]

Great - the Q9550 which was released in January should be available by then!

[thehumanyawn @ Apr 3rd 2008 1:13PM]

There's something out similar to this, and it's available now. It's called the VIA Pico-ITX.

[DJZeratul @ Apr 3rd 2008 1:27PM]

the pico-itx board is the size of a CD (120mm square), this is much smaller

[DJZeratul @ Apr 3rd 2008 1:29PM]

Oops, thats nanoITX i was thinking of. PicoITX is pretty small (3.9in x 2.8in)

[fh @ Apr 3rd 2008 1:34PM]

Even Pico-ITX sucks relatively large amounts of power, and is targeted at non-battery dependent applications (kiosks, cars, etc). Read the whitepapers on what Intel is doing with this chipset/platform with regard to being able to selectively shut off power-sucking resources during idle, without shutting off the whole system.

Miniaturization is one half of this. Extremely low and versatile power consumption is the other.