Other Blame Tree. He went bigger so now I must go smaller !

At home I am fine with my big PCs. However, I am kinda tired of having a great big PC here at mum's too. The room is tiny and it is stuffed full of electronics so it is time for a cull. The main thing here is an IPC uplift, and a 2080ti. I want my rigs at home (3950x, 32gb ram, 2080Ti Kingpin) to somewhat match my "away" rig. Obviously they ain't gonna match match because I have nearly £400 of RAM in my rig at home (two 16gb kits of 8 pack Extreme 4133) but what I do have is just as lustworthy, especially on looks.

OK. So basically this is the rig I planned to move over here.



It's massive, it's heavy. Very very heavy. I CBA. So I am removing the GPU out of it.



And putting the stock cooler back on. Which was more than enough for 2ghz, BTW. I'm "only" running it at 2100 now (it was a pants clocker compared to the Kingpin, I wonder why ) so air is more than adequate. Plus it is absolutely gorgeous.

OK so huge hefty GPU, wanting tiny rig. Not easy. First thing I did was look at boards. Mostly because they are usually hard to track down. This still sells for £100, absolutely perfecto !



Being gorgeous really helps too ! Hard drives will be yoinked from various rigs. One thing I do not need is RAM. Thank god. Mostly because I have four 3200 Dom Plat. So I will be using two.



One thing I did want was a PSU. SFX. Ouch. My balls. Etc. so, after having found out the case I want will take a 150mm PSU and this is 140? yeah it was on. Cheap as chips too.



I then wanted a CPU with a similar IPC to my 3950x. I initially nearly cheaped out and paid £140 for a 2600. Then I spotted this for £30 more (3600)



I will need to manually OC it, but once I do? it will be identical in games.

OK. So what case did I pick? well, in terms of you SFF guys it is probably feckin huge lol. However, to me it will be bloody tiny !



Jonsbo V10. Apparently it comes with the riser too, for £88. It better, but if it does? oh hell yeah, epic bargain. I know the build quality will be wonderful too !

As for fans? well I ordered these for my WC build at home two days ago.



And a fourth.



all I need now is a compact 120 AIO. Which I don't need straight away. What I do love about this case? and this rig? it will be almost like a mini me version of my killer PC at home

Stoked on this. Having the RAM etc has made it pretty dang cheap, especially as I have the GPU.

 

Welcome to the small side!

 

You called?

 

Cooler got.



I have just spent two hours looking at AIOs. Then I remembered that a 120 would have probably been enough to achieve what I need to, the fans will end up in the bin and so I may as well buy a cooler, rather than paying extra for tat that will go in said bin.

Quite probably even that basic 240 is overkill, but it wasn't expensive @ £52. Like, £7 more than a 120. My buddy was telling me how good his Arctic one is, but after seeing the small fan pack up on the one GN had and what a PITA it was to disable? yeah, no thanks.

I've also sold the TR and the board once it comes out. So I am on my way.......

Edit. Yeah, the case does come with the riser. There is one video in French I think on the tube of poo, so it seems I'm OK.

 

More on the case.



Ignore the glass mine has vented alu. This is how the GPU goes in.



CPU side.



I think the closest comparison I can think of is the Louque Ghost with the top hat on. Only it costs about 1/4.

 

The PSU appears to be second hand. I was furious, but hey, it works.



And TBH? it was really cheap so maybe they just forgot to label it as Warehouse? IDK.



Cooler and case arrive tomorrow apparently. Lovely little motherboard. Really is very nice.

 

Right so the cooler went on the GPU last night.



Pads were wrong though. Need to change those tomorrow when they arrive. Case arrived today, it's absolutely gorgeous.







The cooler is arriving later today. I also decided to treat myself. At home (on "Big me") I have a Huntsman Elite. TBH? and I do not say this lightly as a Razer hater, it's easily the best keyboard I have ever had. It's beautiful, and it's robust and the opto switches are incredible. Right now I am typing this on browns, and they are so much harder to press. So naturally when I saw this on Prime Day for £78 I snatched it up.



It's the Huntsman Tournament Edition. Same switches, same keys etc just smaller. Perfect for here. I also bought a Viper Mini.



And a Goliathus XXL RGB which cost me £27.99, rather than the usual £59.99.

 

Man. ITX cases have come a long way. I've not sworn once and all of my knuckles are still intact.



It's inverted just like Big Me at home.



This is the slide out fan/AIO tray that goes in the top.



And the back.



It's a bit of a fatty when it comes to ITX, but I test fitted the GPU and it literally just fits. Had I got the glass panel version? I'd have been in trouble.

 

I have always had mid tower cases (rather than full atx) but took the plunge into SFF with the NZXT H1 and its frankly daft to have anything bigger. The H1 hasn't got the greatest thermals but the footprint is tiny and the performance is effectively the same as if I had a larger case (unless I went full custom WC loop and OC the hell out of it).

Before anyone says it - yes I know about the riser issue in the H1 and have resolved it (new riser arrived a few weeks back).

 

I'm glad they sorted you out. Bit of a debacle that. Pretty sure this is bigger than that, but still absolutely tiny. I've now fitted the rad, fans etc. Just need to put TP on the pump and mount it. It's mounted, but I didn't put the TP on in case I needed to change something. Will get some pics shortly. I will be glad when I am done "CPU side" because that is where all of the work needs to be done. It's been quite challenging getting all of the wiring in. That said nearly all of it is in there now. Bit pissed that the board only has two fan headers, but that's ITX I guess. I will have to pinch the hub that came with the Phanteks case and use that. It doesn't matter, the case has a date with the recycling bin any way once I have stripped it.

 

I have the same board and resorted to splitter cables to power multiple fans in a previous case. Something like this:

https://www.scan.co.uk/products/aka...pwm-fans-from-a-single-motherboard-pwm-header

Fairly sure you can get 1 to 3 also. Its not a good idea to put too many things off a single fan header as you can overload them but fans aren't during tons of power.

 

If I can find my soldering iron (I am sure it is all here) I will make them myself. I have lots of fan extensions kicking around. Some Noctua ones too IIRC.

Missed one. Every wire is in there now that needs to be in there. Can't fit the drives just yet, as I need them in there tomorrow night for game night.



Managed to make the FP audio reach, but still might do away with it.

 

Balls. I knew there was a splitter built into the Phanteks case I could have stolen. Sadly it isn't PWM.

Bought this.



Not looking forward to hiding it, but needs must. Should arrive tomorrow.

 

OK so that is the first time I got a bit warm and started boiling a little. Thankfully the deed is done. I ran extensions around the case for the fans so they all meet in the same place. I also had to fit the dreaded Molex cable because I have a SATA extension but it's Molex on the other end. It's the silver cable. I could not fit a entire SATA power cable through the side of the PSU without removing it, and I wasn't doing that. I basically cut off the Molex connectors all apart from the very first one, then connected that to the extension, taped it together and sent it up the side of the PSU.

]

The rest of the wire is hanging out, because there is no point stuffing it all back in etc until the drives go in. I am hoping the hub (it should) will fit in this space here.



If it does I can 3M tape the back of it and stick it to the front of the case there at the end of the rad.

 

Aaaand another dead crap PCIE riser

 

Looking good VT, how did you kill the riser?

 

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat? I have a 200 or 250mm one if you want V-T...
**EDIT** Too short dammit

 

I didn't, it just didn't work at all. Seems to be common with them, so will see what happens (have emailed OCUK). I have a feeling though that I will be buying a Phanteks one, as those are the only ones I have never had issues with.



That is what it will look like that side finished. Sadly I had to gut some of it just to get it running. Oddly enough with a Phanteks riser. That won't work in the case but at least I can continue setting it up.



I then had about two hours of crashing and instability. I cleared CMOS, set XMP again and it seems to be OK now. But yeah, real pain in the dick.

Thermal pads did not arrive, hoping RM brings them tomorrow.

 

Couldn't be arsed, have ordered the Phanteks one.

 

Pads came today.



In 0.5 and 1mm. I used 0.5 on the VRAM, and one other area. I noticed the other day that there was a serious impression left in one other place on 1mm, far too deep tbh. So I changed that to 0.5 having looked at the pic of the stock card split again and realised that it was actually thinner. I was immediately treated to excellent idle temps.12c cooler.



So I had a feeling I was onto something. Ran Port Royal and the card did not even make a sound.



70c max, fans were below 50%. I'm so relieved, gosh. Oh and you may be wondering how I managed this without the new ribbon. It's not sketch, not at all mate no sireebob.



I just invented EITX is all. Oh and the ribbon I ordered, yes. That looks like this, and should be here Monday I reckon.