Athena IV is the fourth generation in the Athena family of rugged, wide-temperature PC/104 SBCs with Integrated data acquisition, extending back to the original Athena in 2004. Athena IV is an excellent choice for:

• Customers using previous generations of Athena seeking to extend the lifetime of their existing product;
• Customers seeking to replace an obsolete PC/104 SBC with a newer generation one to extend their existing product's lifetime; or
• Customers seeking to build a PC/104 system expected to have a long lifetime.

Maintaining a legacy for long life applications

Each generation of Athena maintained the same physical shape and most of the I/O connectors and features of the previous generations, while updating key features to stay current with the state of the art. In this way the Athena platform has maintained a low-impact migration path for customers with extended product lifecycles that outstrip the lifetimes of the CPU. Many customers have been able to maintain their products for up to 16 years as a result.

Click here to view a comparison chart of the features and differences between Athena II, Athena III, and Athena IV.

Mass storage

Athena IV offers two methods for mass storage:

• An M.2 2230 size SATA socket is provided for onboard mass storage. Modules up to 128GB are available. This is the most common choice.
• A standard 7-pin SATA connector is available for connecting a standard 2.5" or other form factor hard drive. This connector can be used when higher capacity storage is needed. Diamond offers accessory board ACC-HDDMOUNT which allows a 2.5 drive to be mounted on the PC/104 stack.

PC/104 expansion

Athena IV uses the rugged and widely supported PC/104 ISA bus for I/O expansion. Choose from hundreds of I/O modules from vendors all over the world, including our own extensive selection using the links below. Although the board has both top side and bottom side PC/104 connectors, bottom side mounting of I/O modules is preferred to avoid blocking airflow over the top-side heat sink on Athena.

PC/104 specifications are available here.Learn more about PC/104 here.

Analog I/O expansion modules

Digital I/O expansion modules

Serial port expansion modules

Development Kit

Development kits are available to support quick project startup. Each kit includes the Athena SBC, a cable kit, and a programmed 64GB flashdisk with your choice of Windows 10 or Linux operating system, ready to run. Simply plug in the flashdisk, attach the cables, add your keyboard, mouse, and display, and you're ready to boot into a fully functional OS. Configuration files and instructions are provided to rebuild the OS with your application. The Linux kit includes all the tools needed to rebuild the OS. The Windows 10 kit includes a runtime license.

Cable Kit

Athena IV is designed to use most of the same cables as previous generations of Athena, along with upgrades for the latest technology. New with Athena IV is a second gigabit Ethernet port which is backwards compatible with the original board's 10/100 connector along with a USB 3.0 cable.

Cables are normally sold as complete kits. Individual cables may be available in some cases or may be ordered with minimum order quantities; contact us for details.

CK-ATH4-01 includes the following cables:

No.	Qty	Cable	Description	Drawing
1	1	6981009	Power I/O cable	Show
2	1	6981006	Output power cable	Show
3	1	6981011	External battery cable	Show
4	1	6981080	Gigabit Ethernet cable, RJ-45 socket, 10 pin board connector	Show
5	1	6981086	Gigabit Ethernet cable, RJ-45 socket, 12 pin board connector	Show
6	1	6980603	Cable, FCI 2x5 2mm latching to USB 3.0 type A panel mount	Show
7	1	6981012	Dual USB cable, ports 0 & 1	Show
8	1	6981014	Cable Assy, 80 Pin Socket, 2x20 to 4x Serial DB9M	-
9	1	6981030	VGA cable	Show
10	1	6981031	Audio cable	Show
11	1	6989101	SATA Cable, 7-Pin Data, Straight to Right Angle, 500mm	Show
12	1	C-50-18	50-conductor .1" pitch 18" ribbon cable, Data acquisition Cable	Show