Intel Decides to Pull Support for BTX

Back when the Netburst architecture of the Pentium IV was belching heat to all parts of the standard computer case, Intel cam up with a standard that was the ‘cure’ for its ills. When the design turned out to be incompatible with the AMD K8 motherboard placement, and the Core architecture was announced, BTX became a solution without a problem.

Now Intel has held meetings in Taipei, and announced that it will continue to support BTX, for those designs already in the channel, but no new BTX designs will be coming from them.

This means that ATX boxes get another lease on life, and big case manufacturers can once again build quality ATX designs with no worries of lost revenue when a change is made.

BTX never caught on with white-box manufacturers, but large manufacturers like Dell and H-P jumped on the bandwagon. It will probably be awhile before these companies move back to ATX completely, but the decision will be influenced heavily by whether their offerings are largely Intel, or cost and energy savings win the day, and AMD processors are chosen for the bulk of their lineups.

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[tags] computer cases, form factors, ATX, BTX, AMD, Intel, Dell, Hewlitt-Packard [/tags]