If you’re building, or thinking of building a miniature gaming PC any time soon, then Minisforum has likely been at the top of your list as a place to pick up your gear. That’s doubly so now, as Minisforum has just released a new Mobile on Desktop (MoDT) motherboard with an included processor and cooler.
The details were revealed in a press release sent to Tom’s Hardware, and it showcases an impressive new product. The motherboard, the AR900i, includes an Intel Core i9-13900HX as well as a pre-fitted cooler. The Core i9-13900HX is a laptop chip, but don’t let that put you off, as it’s a powerful little processor. It has a max turbo clock speed of 5.4 GHz, 24C / 32T, 32 MB smart cache, and four M.2 2280 PCIe4.0 SSD slots.
The cooler, while unnamed, is described as a “customized CPU cooler” that can also fit an additional 120 mm fan on top, with support for up to 100W of power. There’s also a PCIe SSD heatsink with a fan on one side of the CPU heatsink, giving additional cooling power. However, keep in mind the SSD active cooling only covers the front two M.2 2280 PCIe4.0 SSD slots, as two of them are positioned on the underside of the board.
A motherboard is only as good as its capacity, especially one aimed at a gaming crowd, and the AR900i doesn’t fall flat here either. It has two DDR5 SO-DIMM slots with support for DDR5-5600 capacities up to 96GB, and there’s also a PCIe 5.0 X16 connector for the GPU — though keep in mind you’ll need a somewhat smaller GPU to fit on this svelte board.
While this product is aimed at those building their own PC, it’s important to note that the processor itself is soldered to the board, so it can’t be easily swapped out when it comes time to upgrade. However, that may be a price worth paying for you (literally) to get this big thing in a small package. The AR900i costs $559, a pre-sale discount on the MSRP of $689.
