Minisforum AR900i Motherboard Features Intel’s 24-Core i9-13900HX In A Mini-ITX Design, $559 US Price

Minisforum has just announced its next MoTD motherboard, the AR900i, which offers Intel's Core i9-13900HX in a Mini-ITX Design.

The Minisforum AR900i series is a MoTD (Mobile on Desktop) motherboard that is designed to offer mobile CPUs from AMD & Intel and package them on a Mini-ITX motherboard with high-end capabilities. We have already seen the AMD BD790i and BD790i motherboards from Minisforum that pack the Dragon Range "Ryzen 7000HX" CPUs and now, Minisforum is extending its range in the Intel domain with their 13th Gen Raptor Lake-HX CPUs.

Starting with the specifications, the Minisforum AR900i motherboard is equipped with up to the Intel Core i9-13900HX CPU with 24 cores and 32 threads, 36 MB of cache, and up to 5.4 GHz clock speeds. This CPU has a base TDP of 55W and a maximum turbo power rating of up to 157W while retaining a minimum assured power of 45W. Minisforum also intends to offer a Core i7-13650HX (14 core / 20 thread) variant with its AR650i motherboard later.

The Minisforum AR900i MoTD motherboard comes with two DDR5 SO-DIMM slots that support up to 96 GB capacities and 5600 MT/s speeds. There are up to four PCIe 4.0 NVMe M.2 slots for SSDs which are great for storage enthusiasts. In terms of I/O, you are getting HDMI 2.0, DP 1.4, a USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C port, 2 USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports, 2 USB 2.0 ports, a 2.5 GbE Ethernet LAN port, a USB 3.2 Gen1 front-panel header, and an HD audio jack. The motherboard also comes with a WIFI 6E and BT 5.2 solution.

The motherboard also features a PCIe Gen5 x16 slot that supports all high-end graphics cards up to the NVIDIA RTX 4090. Unlike the AMD designs, the Intel MoTD motherboards house the HM770 chipset which offers I/O functionalities.

For power, the motherboard houses a single 8-pin connector and a standard 24-pin ATX connector just like any other Mini-ITX PC motherboard. The stock cooler is rated to offer up to 100 Watts of thermal dissipation capabilities and adding a 120mm fan on the top (bought separately) extends that capability. While we are on the topic of cooling, the M.2 slots are also covered by an actively cooled heatsink which provides adequate thermal balance to the storage devices underneath it. Only the front two M.2 slots get access to this cooling while the other two slots are located on the back of the motherboard.

In terms of pricing, the Minisforum AR900i is priced at $559 US / £549 and is expected to hit ship later this month.