Building a itx form factor computers

[lush6]

After browsing the machines at www.mini-itx.com, I became inspired to research building a mini form factor computer to run software synthesizers for music production. Ideally, the machine would be built into one of those retro portable TV things, replacing the crappy screen with a small LCD. Alternatively, I could purchase a large MIDI keyboard and build the computer into that. That would save even more space on the desktop, only requiring a thin monitor for the software.

Doing a bit more research, I learned of the beauty of CF -> IDE adaptors! I long for the day when hard drives become extinct and high capacity solid state memory is the standard. My dilemna is that high capacity CF cards (<2gb) are at least $100 more than a hard drive with 10x the capacity. However, capacity will not me much of an issue with this machine, since it will only be using a minimal installation of XP, a .vst host application, and the instruments themselves.

Is sacrificing money/capacity worth using a CF as a system drive? Is this feasable? Thanks!

 

[Shorty]

I'd like to see what the performance differences are between a regular hard drive and a high speed Compact-Flash card. I originally had the idea to get a nano-ITX board, one of those adapters, and a Hitachi MicroDrive. And basically use the thing as a portable NES/SNES/Genesis/Arcade emulator... but the availability of nano-ITX is almost none. I'd think the best route for you might to just go for a Notebook HDD if space is a concern.