What piece of know-how are you continue to utilizing from 1995? Your pc case. Yes, if you happen to run a desktop tower, it’s doubtless constructed on the Intel ATX specification first launched in 1995—virtually 25 years in the past. But Asus’s radical Prime Utopia prototype re-imagines what might be with an out-of-this-world idea PC.
Definitely watch the video above to see this beast in motion. Asus determined to relocate the graphics card from its normal PCIe slot to the again of the pc. It’s mounted vertically alongside the motherboard for added stability when delivery or shifting the system.
With the GPU moved to the again, Asus makes use of the freed-up entrance area to mount 4 M.2 solid-state drives and a 7-inch contact OLED. The display comes with Wi-Fi enabled, so you may detach it and put it in your desk as effectively.
Adam Patrick MurrayAsus’ Prime Utopia includes a Wi-Fi enabled removable display the place the video card would go in a normal ATX motherboard.
With the OLED show utterly masking the growth slots, Asus envisions most add-in {hardware} (of the longer term, clearly) going into replaceable modules located close to the I/O defend. These modules could be constructed across the Mini-PCI-E normal and might be used so as to add 2.5GbE modules or extra USB ports, for instance.
The Asus Prime Utopia doesn’t mess with the RAM or CPU format, but it surely does transfer the voltage regulation modules to again of the motherboard, the place they are often water cooled. The prototype PC additionally strikes the primary energy connector to the again of the motherboard.
Adam Patrick MurrayIn this alternate timeline imaginative and prescient of the longer term, Asus mounts the GPU on the again of the motherboard, in addition to the VRM and essential energy connector.
Of course, none of this can work with the way in which that as we speak’s normal ATX techniques and motherboards are designed. There simply isn’t room, neither is ATX designed to deal with any of those alterations. You know, because it’s a 25-year-old normal designed for {hardware} designed 25 years in the past.
Before you get triggered, pondering that Asus goes to go away the ATX normal behind, take a breath. It isn’t.
In reality, the corporate simply launched new traces of each AMD and Intel motherboards utilizing the venerable ATX spec. But Asus is clearly hoping to begin a dialog about the concept the spec must be modified.
Adam Patrick Murray
