Zotac has announced a new mini-ITX motherboard that should provide a solid foundation for a new HTPC or ultra-compact desktop. The H55ITX-C-E adds USB 3.0 to the existing H55ITX-A-E board, and supposedly features an enhanced power delivery system that improves temperature management and long-term reliability.
The company says it sees a trend where gamers are shifting to smaller form factor systems, but still demand the high-end processing and graphics power – and that's precisely where the H55ITX-C-E is aimed. Gamers can build a complete small form factor system with an Intel Core i7 8xx CPU and Nvidia GTX 400 series GPU.
Besides support for LGA1156 chips and a PCIe 2.0 graphics card, the motherboard can house up to 8GB of RAM via two DDR3 memory slots and it features six SATA II ports, one eSATA connector, six USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 ports on the rear panel, HDMI and DVI outputs, gigabit Ethernet, and an onboard 802.11n Wi-Fi dongle.
Zotac didn't mention when its latest board will ship, or how much it'll cost. For what it's worth, the H55ITX-A-E seems to be priced at around $130.