After announcing a branding initiative to counter Intel's Centrino and vPro platforms, AMD has now revealed that it is developing a new, open case standard. The notion may remind some of Intel's ill-received BTX specification, but AMD's standard—dubbed DTX—is a different effort entirely. BTX was a completely new design intended to help cool Netburst-based processors quietly, and it happened to include small-form-factor variants. By contrast, DTX will essentially be an extension of the ATX standard for small-form-factor systems. AMD says its prime goal with DTX is to broaden the adoption of small-form-factor PCs, and the company stresses that the standard will be backward-compatible with ATX, allowing processors from itself and from "other hardware vendors."
AMD plans to make the DTX specification public later this quarter. However, the company has already received backing from motherboard makers Asus and MSI. Since AMD also says case makers will be able to build DTX products that are interoperable with ATX components, this standard could be adopted more enthusiastically than Intel's BTX.
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