Raspberry Pi: it's a geek's low-cost dream for a basic HTPC, but due to the time difference between the U.S. and Britain I've yet to be able to get my hands on one in the brief windows that they've been available for. Sigh. So my hopes skyrocketed when VIA announced its Pi look-alike, the $50 APC 8750. And joy of joys, it went up for preorder today! …then promptly sold out in a matter of hours, before I was able to snap one up. Double sigh.
First at PAX East and then at the inaugural Intel Platinum Summit in London, a diminutive PC designed by Intel managed to get a lot of eyeballs back in April. Dubbed “Next Unit of Computing” by Intel, this small PC stood out due to both its small size and powerful entrails. At 4x4”, it lies somewhere between the Raspberry Pi and traditional mini-desktop PCs, but has just about enough space for powerful Ivy Bridge innards.
One of my earliest gaming memories involves trading illegal goods, hunting down pirates, mining asteroids and generally gallivanting around the galaxy as the intrepid Commander Jameson in the Amiga version of Elite. Unfortunately, the Amiga was killed off soon afterwards -- or so we thought. It turns out that the Amiga brand, kind of like Cthulu, was just biding its time. Commodore USA just announced it's releasing a new small form factor PC sporting the Amiga name, but packing a much, much bigger punch than its predecessor.
Zotac's ZBOX line of itty bitty mini-PCs must be doing well; new models have been popping up on what seems like a biweekly basis. Nothing changed at CeBIT! Zotac spent its time at the German tech conference showing off three new ZBOX mini-PCs announced earlier this week -- one standard-sized Sandy Bridge-sporting model, another ZBOX nano offering, and a third with a Blu-ray drive.
Not too long ago, Sapphire rolled out the diminutive Edge-HD Mini PC, which was hailed as the teeny-tiniest PC in all the land. (The company also oddly claimed the PC's "less than half a liter in volume!" You know, in case you wanted to fill it with Kool-Aid or something.) Despite its small size, the Atom-based Edge-HD packed a decent punch and racked up a lot of fans. Now, Sapphire's pulled the curtain off the Mini PC's follow-up. The aptly named Edge-HD3 ditches Intel for a 1.6GHz AMD E450 APU that gives the PC a performance boost over its predecessors. 
Go ahead and accuse the folks at Zotac of being small minded, so long as you're referring to their penchant for kicking out tiny PCs you can fit in the palm of your hand. The Hong Kong maker of mini PCs announced three new second-generation Zbox models today at CES in Las Vegas, including the Zbox ID81, ID80, and AD04, each with an external Wi-Fi antenna, integrated Bluetooth 3.0, and bundled Media Remote with USB IR receiver for use with Microsoft Windows Media Center, XBMC, and other media player applications.
Wondering what Rick Moranis is doing these days? The "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids" star hasn't appeared on the big screen in awhile and is reportedly enjoying retirement, but we wouldn't be shocked if he was secretly building PCs for Stealth Computer, makers of some of the smallest systems around. The company's latest creation is the LPC-125LPFM, which is a rugged, fanless system for industrial, mobile/in-vehicle, and embedded applications.
Taiwan-headquartered mini PC outfit Shuttle Inc. has launched the new Shuttle XPC H7 5820S mini PC in Europe. This diminutive PC is only 19 centimeters (7.5 inches) in height, but has just about enough muscle to drive 16 displays at one time. Shuttle, in fact, is claiming the XPC H7 5820S to be one of the “smallest and fastest PCs ever developed.” Specs after the jump.
Stealth Computer played the part of witch doctor and shrunk the PC as you know it, that is unless you're used to holding full-fledged dual-core PCs in the palm of the your hand. That about sums up Stealth's new LPC-125LPM, a rugged small form PC that that can handle extreme temperatures and boasts energy efficiency by drawing less than 20W in operational power.
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