ARCTIC MC101 – slim HTPC with AMD Trinity

ARCTIC is best known for its cooling solutions, but before AMD’s launch of the new processor family Trinity the company has some new goodies coming. ARCTIC MC101 will be one of the first complete Trinity systems to launch and takes aim for the HTPC market.

ARCTIC MC101 will launch in three versions where all have a clean case with brushed aluminum. MC101 measures 200x160x30 mm (BxDxH) and houses all you need for a powerful HTPC. This is possible thanks to AMD’s deep integration of the new Trinity architecture where the processor maker have merged the Piledriver processor architecture with the graphics architecture Northern Islands, used in the Radeon HD 6000 series.

Besides baking in the graphics circuit into its processor AMD’s chispet supports USB 3.0 and SATA 6,0 Gbps. ARCTIC have also made sure to add support for 802.11n WiFi, memory card reader and a digital TV-tuner.

ARCTIC will use processors from the AMD Trinity A8/10 series sporting 4 CPU cores and a Radeon HD 7640G or Radeon HD 7660G graphics processor, with a max TDP of 100 watt. With 4 to 8GB RAM and 1TB harddrive ARCTIC MC101 will be capable of playing and storing even the most high resolution videos you ca find, and it does it in Windows 7, but the systems are compatible with Windows 8. ARCTIC will also launch a version of MC101 that completes the 1TB mechanical drive with a 128GB mSATA SSD, and there is room for a third 2.5″ device if you want to expand.

ARCTIC claims that the coming MC101 HTPC will be more or less inaudible and ships with an external power supply. The launch is slated for shortly after AMD releases Trinity, which should be sometime in Q2. Prices were not revealed.