[plug] Low cost Embedded x86 Boards.

[Brad Campbell]

Dion wrote:
> Hi there,
> 
> Does anyone know of any good suppliers -- pref Aust based -- that offer 
> really small and cheap embedded x86 boards.  I've done quite a bit of 
> searching and only Advantec seem to turn up so far.
> 
> I want to build a nice small formfactor totally silent firewall.  
> Compact flash to boot from ( I already have the ide cf socket).
> 
> Obviously I need hardware thats linux supported.  But I only really need 
> two ethernet ports, one serial port, one ide socket and a pentium class 
> cpu like the Amd Elan and either an so-dimm socket or around 64 meg ram.
> 
> Anyone had any experience with this sort of thing??

Yep.. Buy a mini-ITX, you will save a packet.

the so-dimm style of units are expensive, sourced over seas only and need a relatively expensive 
base board.
I bought a few of them a while ago for an R&D project but in the end found it much more cost 
effective to pick up a mini-ITX board with 12v PSU and build a CF->IDE adaptor.

Regards,
Brad