Why are there no highend microATX boards?

[blakehew]

Ive been looking into helping my brother build a new computer. He does video editing and needs a fairly highend system with reasoable expansion, but he would also like as small a formfactor as possible because he spends about 2 days a week in a different office so he has to tote his computer with him. Anyway i was thinking a good option for him would be to build his computer using one of those very small Anspire X-QPack cases that use a micro ATX motherboard. In looking at motherboards i noticed that there seems to be a lack of highend options in the MicroATX form factor. Why is this? Personaly i would think that this formfactor would be very desirable for games/lanparty goers because you get the best of both worlds. you get pretty good expansion (usualy 4 slots) and much smaller size.
Any ideas why there arnt more high end options in that space?

 

[Aluvus]

The short answer is that most Micro ATX motherboards are cut-down versions of regular ATX motherboards. They're meant to be cheap.

Shuttle's XPC barebones generally pack a lot of features, and are a bit smaller. But not cheaper.

Are there particular features you're looking for?

 

[emilyek]

Matx boards are fine as long as you don't need lots of bios options (like vcore, high HTT-- because you want to overclock) or a lot of PCI slots.

Enthusiasts do want those things, so no 'killer' matx boards are made.

That's my take on it, anyway.

 

[furballi]

There's not much room for cooling and connectors with a small factor case.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Aluvus
Are there particular features you're looking for?

That's the question we need an answer for.

Why no high end? Because manufacturers think there is no demand. Well, there is, but perhaps not enough for any to make an effort.

There are a couple of overclockable mATX boards. I've got four of them.