Introduction

The Balanced Technology Extended (BTX) interface specification was developed to provide standard interfaces and form factor definitions to address the electrical, thermal, and mechanical attributes of desktop computer systems. The specification is intended to allow for a wide variety of product differentiation that can be adapted to multiple applications and usage models.

This specification describes the critical mechanical and electrical interfaces for the design of chassis, motherboard, power supply, and other system components necessary for hardware vendors and integrators to build and integrate compliant components, systems, and devices that are interoperable with each other. The intention of this document is not to provide all requirements necessary to design any one of these components, but instead to provide standard interfaces for the components to be designed around.

The following table summarizes some of the key features enabled by the BTX specification.

Table 1-1. BTX Feature Summary

The following table details the interfaces defined in this specification and the section(s) that address each.

Table 1-2. Specification Quick Reference