MINISFORUM Releases AR900i: A Mini-ITX Motherboard with Intel Core i9-13900HX Processor

MINISFORUM has launched the AR900i, a Mini-ITX motherboard in the MoDT (mobile on desktop) form factor. It comes with a built-in Intel Core i9-13900HX mobile processor and a pre-installed cooling solution. The motherboard is available on Amazon for $560, and there is a limited-period $70-off coupon.

The i9-13900HX is a high-performance "Raptor Lake" based mobile processor with 8 P-cores, 16 E-cores, and 36 MB of shared L3 cache. The P-cores can boost up to 5.40 GHz, while the E-cores can reach up to 3.90 GHz. Compared to a desktop i9-13900, the only difference is the power specifications. The i9-13900HX is designed for notebooks with a base power of 55 W and a maximum turbo power of 157 W, whereas the socketed i9-13900 has a power limit of 225 W.

Since the Core i9-13900HX is a mobile BGA1964 package that is permanently attached to the motherboard, it cannot be upgraded. MINISFORUM has developed a specific cooling solution for this processor, featuring a large aluminium fin-stack heatsink and an 80 mm case fan for ventilation. Additionally, there is a secondary fan-heatsink that cools the two M.2-2280 slots located above the processor.

The motherboard includes two M.2 slots with PCI-Express 5.0 x4 wiring. However, using either of these slots will reduce the number of available PCIe lanes for the board's sole expansion slot, which is a PCI-Express 5.0 x16. The board also features an M.2 E-key slot that can be used with a WLAN card and supports dual-MIMO ready antennas. It has two DDR5 SO-DIMM slots that can accommodate up to 96 GB of memory.

Power is supplied to the board through a 24-pin ATX connector and a single 8-pin EPS connector, which is sufficient for the i9-13900HX processor.