It was back in January of this year at the Consumer Electronics Show that AMD first revealed their plans for the DTX open industry standard for small form factor computers.  The focus of those early briefings was to explain AMD’s vision for interoperable small form factor systems.  As it stands today, most SFF systems from large companies like Dell and HP are proprietary designs and only a select few parts can be swapped between them.   On the do-it-yourself front, we’ve got form factors like Micro-ATX, Mini-ITX and SFF barebones systems from major players like Shuttle, Asus and MSI, but again, for the most part you can’t take parts from one company’s SFF design and use it in another’s.

If all goes to plan and AMD’s vision for DTX comes to fruition, there will be a set of industry standards for chassis, power supplies, and motherboards which would not only make it possible for larger companies to more quickly introduce small form factor designs, but do-it-yourselfers would have an array of off the shelf components to choose from as well.

To give us a glimpse into the future of DTX, AMD sent in an early prototype system for evaluation.  However, before we show you the actual hardware, we’d like to give you a bit more background on DTX.  First of all, if you’re wondering where the name comes from, it is simply a natural progression from ATX and BTX.
 

The DTX mechanical interface specifications were developed to define location of things like mounting points, chassis volume, I/O, and keep-out areas for motherboards.   As of today, the DTX specification has provisions for two motherboard sizes, full DTX and Mini-DTX.  According to the current spec, DTX allows up to four motherboards to be produced per standard printed circuit board manufacturing panel sizes and Mini-DTX allows up to six.

We should also note that DTX motherboard size and mounting specifications are designed to be compatible with existing ATX chassis specifications.  And Mini-ITX motherboard size specifications are also compatible with DTX chassis specifications.  Along with the general DTX specification, AMD has also developed mechanical reference designs for a DTX compliant chassis and motherboard.  A small form-factor DTX chassis calls for 7.7 liters or more of inner volume, while mini-DTX requires only 1.5 liters or more.

AMD cites a market need for a smaller, quieter, desktop-friendly PCs as the reason behind the DTX open standard.  AMD's design target for DTX systems are processors with 45w to 65w TDPs.  As such the prototype system we received for evaluation was powered by a low-power AMD Athlon X2 BE-2350 processor that was installed in an AMD DTX motherboard based on the 690G series chipset.

All of the parts were housed in a slim chassis that could be stood horizontally or vertically.  Standing upright, the dimensions of the chassis are roughly 14” high, 13” deep and about 4” wide, which is a fraction of the size of a standard mid-tower.

There are ventilation holes around the rim of the chassis, on both the top and bottom, to help with cooling the system’s internal components.  And on the top removable panel, there are additional ventilation holes cut out for the CPU cooler on the prototype.  We’re told, however, that the next revision will also feature better ventilation for the power supply.

The front of the system is equipped with a simple, lighted power switch and a removable cover that hides a slim optical drive, USB and audio ports, a memory card reader, as well as an empty slot.  The prototype made use of a crude plastic cover, but future designs are likely to have hinged covers.

At the rear of the system a typical array of connectors are visible.  The power supply is vented and uses a typical 3-pin power cord.  The prototype DTX motherboard had an RJ45 jack, VGA and DVI connectors, four USB ports, analog and digital audio connectors in its I/O backplane and the chassis can accommodate two half-height expansion cards.  The array of I/O connectors visible here is somewhat lacking in comparison to many current Micro-ATX boards, but as you’ll see on the next page there is plenty of room within the chassis to accommodate more.  Please keep in mind that the model we tested was an early prototype.

With the chassis top panel removed, you can see the arrangement of the prototype DTX system’s internal components.  Having worked with a number of Micro-ATX enclosures, we can’t help but see many similarities.

 
The motherboard and power supply are mounted using screws and the optical and hard disk drives are mounted in a removable tray / arm.  As you can see the motherboard is designed so that the CPU socket resides roughly in the middle of the system and the size of the chassis can accommodate a good sized CPU cooler.  Between the CPU and PSU, the system’s dual memory slots are visible.  And on the opposite side of the CPU you’ll find the system’s pair of expansion slots (a mini-DTX board would have only one slot).  The design of the motherboard and chassis means only half-height cards can be used, basically because there is no room for a riser.  The slots can be any combination of PCI Express or standard PCI slots, however.  Perhaps if the new DTX standard takes off, half-height cards for Graphics and other functionalities will become more commonplace.

 
To access the various connectors and cables at the front of the system, the tray holding the drives must be removed.  It is held in place by a couple of screws and the tray itself features two small tongues that fit into grooves in the main body of the chassis.  Remove the screws, tilt the tray upwards, disconnect the power and data cables, and the whole assembly comes right out.   We should note that the drives used standard power and data cables.

 
Underneath the tray, there is a secondary PCB that houses the system’s front-mounted ports and card reader.  This was obviously an early prototype, as is evident by the wire jumpers.  Because these ports reside on a secondary PCB, it is likely that future designs will have a varied array of connectivity options.

We’re not going to cover the prototype DTX small form factor system’s performance, because it’s powered by hardware that is available in the mainstream for which you have plenty of performance refernce points already here at HotHardware.  In addition, the system is a prototype after all.  What we can say having worked with the system for a couple of weeks is that it performed just like any other system equipped with a BE-2350 processor and 690G chipset.  If you’d like to see some hard numbers, check out our evaluation of a similar setup in this article.

Power Consumption and Acoustics:
We also have a few notes regarding the system's power consumption and acoustic profile.  At a 1-foot distance away from the system's CPU ventilation holes, it only registered 43dB on our digital sound level meter.  From a few feet away, the system is audible, but it only puts out a slight whir from its fans and it is by no means obtrusive.  The prototype DTX system's power consumption was similarly miniscule.  While idling on a Windows desktop, the entire machine consumed only 45W and under full load that number jumped to only 84W.  Basically, the whole machine consumed less power than some of today's entry-level graphics cards alone.

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