New Player - Low Profile Intel DH61AG mini-ITX - G4 Cube

[neilhart]

I found this mini-ITX motherboard on the web last week and thought it would be great for a G4 Cube hack or the like.

The test rig is:

Intel DH61AG
Intel i3-2125 CPU (selected for the HD3000 support)
Patriot 8GB SO DIMM 1333MHz
OCZ Vertex 3 120GB SSD
Dual 2.5" mobile rack
Dell 19.5VDC Laptop Power Adapter

In my web search I did not find anyone with this motherboard running OS X. So that was my first concern; this turned out to be a non-problem, Lion 10.7.2 is very happy on this thing.

The parts arrived yesterday and the following is a quick photo story of the system bring up.

 

[neilhart]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

Poor planning. I ran out of attachment space. So the first attachment are here.

 

[minihack]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

Wow, that looks very compatible. Do I take it from the screen shot that the Intel Ethernet works too?

 

[neilhart]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

I took short cuts to get the new motherboard up an running. I cloned Lion 10.7.2 to the SSD, used Chimera 1.6.0 for a bootloader and Multibeast 4.1.0 to tweak the kexts.

What works: (see the extensions attachments for the actual kexts)

Boots OS X 10.7.2 fast to the desktop.
Ethernet
HD3000 - DVI and HDMI (have not looked a sound over HDMI)
Sound
USB 2 and USB 3

I need more time on the system to fine tune it. But the main worry is over; it runs and appears stable (this base upon about 6 hours of run time).

Now to find another G4 Cube to hack.

neil

 

[neilhart]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

Wow, that looks very compatible. Do I take it from the screen shot that the Intel Ethernet works too?

I am very surprised. I thought that Ethernet and sound would be the killers here, but not the case.

And this is bare Easybeast setup.

The board was $105 from Amazon. There is a very short list of CPUs due the max 65W requirement and HD3000 support.


neil

 

[powerpcg5]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

Thanks for posting.

Can you explain this?
>Dell 19.5VDC Laptop Power Adapter

Did you use a DC-DC converter to convert this to +12, +5V for the mobo and hard drives?

 

[neilhart]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

Thanks for posting.

Can you explain this?
>Dell 19.5VDC Laptop Power Adapter

Did you use a DC-DC converter to convert this to +12, +5V for the mobo and hard drives?

The major attraction of this motherboard is the on-board PSU. The input is 19VDC. The common as nails (at least in my world) Dell 19.5VDC laptop power adapter fits the specification and even has the correct connector to mate to the MB.

This means that you don't need a standard PSU or even better you don't need the space for a conventional PSU. You do need to understand your power budget.

neil

 

[minihack]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel H61AG mini-ITX

Yes, I think personally that you have really found the killer combination for the Cube conversion. A picoPSU and a powerful enough external brick to drive it can eat up a lot of pounds (or dollars). Also being able to not have to have any plug in PSU at all to the motherboard means a whole lot less to worry about.

A simple laptop type external supply for a low power set up means you win all around.

Excellent news for Cube hackers.

 

[beelzebozo]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel DH61AG mini-ITX

I found this mini-ITX motherboard on the web last week and thought it would be great for a G4 Cube hack or the like.

The test rig is:

Intel DH61AG
Intel i3-2125 CPU (selected for the HD3000 support)
Patriot 8GB SO DIMM 1333MHz
OCZ Vertex 3 120GB SSD
Dual 2.5" mobile rack
Dell 19.5VDC Laptop Power Adapter

In my web search I did not find anyone with this motherboard running OS X. So that was my first concern; this turned out to be a non-problem, Lion 10.7.2 is very happy on this thing.

The parts arrived yesterday and the following is a quick photo story of the system bring up.

What about power management? Does it sleep/wake?

 

[eelhead]

Re: New Player - Low Profile Intel DH61AG mini-ITX

Yeah we where discussing this board but the Power Management kept me from getting it.
If you get it all going awesome!!! Maybe the second Cube mod I do will incorporate that mobo but I have the one already for the mod I am doing now.

Also Gigabyte has a Thin iTX board in the pipes as well.