...HOWEVER, for those folks who want to build an small board computer for
supporting the Flex family of firewire devices, the Intel motherboards
are your only choice. You need the PCI slot to get the firewire support...
For DttSP apps it's not a real choice. You will need a PCI slot, either for FireWire audio like the Edirol FA-66 or the PreSonus FireBox, or merely for some other halfway decent soundcard like the M-Audio Delta 44. This is a required configuration for effectively using sdr-shell, sdr-core, and the sdrTEC board, for example. A reference Linux implementation for this combination, with a cost of around $800US total for the RF front end + computer, is about ready to go up on CGRAN.
The FireWire+Flex option is moot for dttsp-linux and vrk, but the other FireWire/PCI addons are critical. DttSP apps using the USRP1+GNU Radio are fine. USRP2 is an open question, for now.
Short form: for dttsp-linux and general RF hardware, the Atom 330 is unquestionably the more utilitarian alternative. This is especially so when, given Nvidia's history regarding Open drivers, Linux support for ION is very uncertain in the near term (6-9 months).
73
Frank
AB2KT