ICP Electronics Australia has announced the release of the PICOe-GM45A; the latest half-size PICOe CPU card from IEI Technology. Most half-size CPU cards don’t provide simultaneous support for both the PCI Express (PCIe) and PCI communication buses. This restricts the expansion options available to system developers. Previously the only solution was to either use a full-size CPU card sacrificing space, or accept the limitations and create systems that only supported a PCIe or PCI interface exclusively. The PICOe-GM45A half-size PICOe form-factor simultaneously supports both the PCIe and PCI communication buses.
Features of the CPU card include:
- The 45nm Intel Core 2 Duo processor CPU card is integrated with the powerful Intel® GM45 graphics and memory controller hub (GMCH) through a front side bus (FSB) with a maximum speed of 1066MHz
- The PICOe-GM45A CPU card supports 2x 800MHz 2.0GB dual-channel DDR2 SDRAM DIMM (max. 4.0GB), as well as VGA displays, 18-bit or 24-bit dual-channel LVDS displays and HDTV-out in single or dual-display format
- The PICOe-GM45A CPU card features an Intel ICH9M input/output controller hub (ICH), 4x 3GB/s SATA drives (with SATA RAID option), 2x PCIe gigabit Ethernet (GbE) controllers
- Dual LAN connections ensure redundant network connections can be set up and the integrity of the network links is preserved if one link should fail
- The board also boasts 2x RS-232 serial port connectors and supports seven high-speed USB 2.0 devices, while the Intel ICH9 supports high-definition audio through a peripheral audio kit
The PICOe-GM45A CPU card is an ideal platform for high I/O throughput industrial computing applications where high-performance, flexible expansion options, low power and a smaller footprint are required; and high-end multi-media applications where the video and audio outputs are both critical performance parameters.