Sometimes searching for just the right product for your project or system can be like finding a needle in a haystack.  Most searches on the big three search engines for computer parts and systems will return tons of results.  And 98% of those results will be for commercial hardware.  Not very helpful. GlobalSpec to the rescue! GlobalSpec, found at www.globalspec.com is product spec search engine and company directory that caters to the industrial, automation, and production fields.  It allows you to search by company, product features, categories. We found Advantech on there, Global American, and a bunch of familiar faces.  And that's just in the industrial computing section. I'll be back tomorrow with more details.

Mini-ITX is an ultra-compact (6.7 x 6.7 in.) mainboard form-factor developed by Via Technologies Inc. Mini-ITX targets a new generation of quiet, small footprint, connected, information and entertainment systems and enables the creation of an exciting new generation of small, ergonomic, innovative, and affordable embedded systems through its high level of integration and vastly reduced size of less than 33% that of the FlexATX mainboard form-factor. The mini-ITX form-factor, as originally defined by VIA [caption id="attachment_14" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Mini-ITX - The 2801450 Model from Global American, Inc."][/caption] VIA launched mini-ITX as a way to showcase its inexpensive chipsets for computer hobbyists, but the form factor has since gone into many other embedded markets. Its success has brought a vast proliferation of cases, power supplies, slim-line drives, Flash-to-IDE adapters, and other handy computing components that have helped drive the form factor into applications such as living room PCs and commodity hardware-based dense computing applications. Additionally, the charms of mini-ITX have not been lost on industrial board vendors such as Kontron and others. Of course, it's important to note that mini-ITX motherboards from industrial single-board computer (SBC) vendors typically offer thicker PCBs, more rugged designs, and better build quality, compared with mini-ITX boards aimed at the consumer market. They also have correspondingly higher prices and minimum order volumes. Real or a Hoax

[caption id="attachment_18" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="PICMG 1.3 Form Factor SBC"][/caption] Single-board computers (SBCs) are complete computers built on a single circuit board. The design is centered on a single or dual microprocessor with RAM, IO and all other features needed to be a functional computer on the one board.   See Wikipedia, Single-board computer, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-board_computer (optional description here) (as of Sep. 23, 2008, 18:19 GMT).

1707650 - Wall Mount/Desk Mount Barebone Mini System with wall mounting brackets for 3.5" Embedded Controller with Socket P for Intel Core 2 Duo Mobile Processors

A Panel PC is a computer which has the display and chassis incorporated into one device. The traditional panel pc was made up of a chassis, power supply, backplane, SBC (single board computer), expansion cards (when applicable through backplane), cooling system, and a display panel. These panel pc's offer many expansion opportunities to customize the panel pc to the customers needs. Recently panel pc's have been getting smaller and smaller with the use of mini-ITX motherboards. These mini-itx mother boards provide a smaller form factor to suit limited space requirements as well as consuming less power than the older panel pc's. Most panel pc's you will find these days will use a touchscreen display panel as the HMI (human machine interface) rather than the mouse and keyboard. This touch screen technology has many advantages such as reliability, clarity, accuracy, responsiveness, and ease of installation and use. Panel pc's are used in a variety of sectors such as medical, industrial, commercial, and military.

1707650 - Wall Mount/Desk Mount Barebone Mini System with wall mounting brackets for 3.5" Embedded Controller with Socket P for Intel Core 2 Duo Mobile Processors