HD in Your Hands

VIA Technologies has launched its latest DIY PC kit that puts HD video in the palm of your hand. The VIA ARTiGO A1100 is a tiny PC that crams a 64-bit processor, HDMI and VGA connectivity, and five USB ports into a rather small, hand-sized PC chassis. The kit retails for a meager $243 USD, however VIA said that the first 10 customers will get an "early bird" discount price for $199 USD.
So how small is this thing? 5.7-inches x 3.9-inches x 2-inches. The VIA ARTiGO A1100 kit includes the 1.2 GHz VIA Nano processor, the VIA VX855 media system processor, a Gigabit Ethernet port, an additional USB device port, three audio jacks, and options for wireless IEEE 802.11 b/g connectivity and an SD card reader module.

"The VIA ARTiGO A1100 is aimed at enthusiast customers who dare to explore beyond the confines of regular PC building," the company said. "The VIA ARTiGO A1100 offers easy installation of system memory, hard drive, wireless module and SD card reader. Supported operating systems include Microsoft Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP and a variety of Linux distributions."
VIA added that the A1100 supports H.264, WMV, VC-1 and MPEG 2/4 at high bitrates and display resolutions (up to 1080p) with "very low CPU utilization." The company's VIA Vinyl HD audio codec also provides 6 channel DTS capable audio. All in all, this little mini-rig should be a blast to put together and a tasty little mini-theater for the bedroom or den.