Biostar NM70I-1037U
I have finally found my replacement for my old, broken E-350 HTPC. I tried the AM1 platform with the Athlon 5350 but support was lacking so I returned it. This time I went with the Intel 1037U Celeron and so far I’m pleased with the results.
It’s a nice motherboard design. It has more than I want for my HTPC; plenty of SATA ports, 3 types of video output ports (VGA, DVI, and HDMI), full-sized ram slots and a PCI-E slot.
The position of the ram slots are different from the 2 AMD (E-350 and AM1) configuration. This motherboard has it on the side instead of towards the front. With this configuration, it gives me more room to plug in my pico psu and route the cables more easily.
The CPU and heatsink of the 1037U is as short as the AMD E-350. I can move my hard drive tray on all available configurations.
I installed Ubuntu 14.04 LTS with XBMC 12.3. I used a full OS instead of XBMCbuntu just in case I needed the machine to do something else later on. There are 2 users on the machine, one is mine with admin privileges, the other is for the HTPC with standard permissions. It also has no password and auto login. Once logged in, XBMC is the start up app that runs. It’s a nice setup and fast with the SSD. Here is a list of the hardware I am using.
- Biostar NM70I-1037U: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138393
- M350 case: http://www.amazon.com/Universal-Mini-ITX-enclosure-PicoPSU-compatible/dp/B003DXI288
- Kingston Hyperx 4GB (2x2GB): http://www.amazon.com/Kingston-Technology-Modules-KHX1600C9AD3B1K2-4G/dp/B00433L23O
- PicoPSU 90W: http://www.amazon.com/PicoPSU-90-Cyncronix-90W-DC-DC-mini-ITX/dp/B00316RGD4
- AC Adapter: http://www.amazon.com/Kinamax-AD-LCD12-Monitors-Adapter-Supply/dp/B000VE7GQQ
- Kingston V100 96GB: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820139638
- iPazzPort KP-810-10-A: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004SQ5OYO
I also posted a video on Youtube.
