My current rig: Core i5 2500k @4.5ghz MSI P67A-GD55 2x 2TB hdd's GTX 570 8GB DDR3 Corsair TC850 This is currently housed in a p280, but lately I've been considering moving to something with a small footprint. I'm new to mirco ATX, so can anybody tell me the potential pit falls of a move? Recommend a good case and board? Thanks, FuSS
Lack of support for SLI as most matx boards only have one PCI-E x16 slot. Smaller case means potentially more heat build-up. How small a case were you looking for? Try the Fractal Core 1000. Its dinky Edit: Tidy up you thread title you lazy sod. Or I'll steal Frank! P.S. When you coming back online?
Your setup would be fine in a mATX environment. As nealieboyee said, the nature of mATX limits use of things like SLi (you can do SLi, but not with both slots at x16) and the number of hard drives you can cram in there, but to be honest, I've been incredibly happy with mATX. Good case and board? Best board right now is the Asus Maximus V Gene, retailing around £150. It's a full Republic of Gamers board, so has all the high end bells and whistles - Bit-Tech have a review of it, and it's also their current recommendation for builds. Case-wise, I use the Silverstone FT03 which is lovely. It fits 3 HDs and an SSD in terms of storage, as well as a full-size GPU and CPU cooler. The only thing to be aware of is that you will need a slimline optical drive (with associated slimline SATA adapter) rather than a full size one. I'd also recommend bumping your RAM to 8GB for a few quid. 3GB is skimping a bit on a very cheap component.
Here's an idea, buy mdf/decent saw/ drill with 120mm hole cutter and build your own discrete case into your desk?
You'll be fine. I've got my rig in a P182 mini, and it's perfect. Might go smaller when I've got my NAS sorted for mass storage as I'll only have SSD's to house internally then.
I OC too much for ITX, hence mATX seems the route for me as I want to reduce size a little. Thanks for the suggestions, I'll keep an eye out for boards on the forum as the new cost is slightly off-putting. (Oh I do have 8GB, now idea how I managed to type 3!!)
I am online...I just cant be bothered with BF3 much, it's poo! My thread title is fine, meh to you I say, meh!
Asides from difference in amount of available expansion slots there is little difference these days. They don't cut features and only make value crap in matx like 10 years ago. It's not even hard to find matx sli/crossfire boards for some time now. Even the atx boards often have the same bandwidth limitations. Even mitx is catching up with their board designs packing additional power phases and other premium features on. OC capable mitx boards are few now, but I expect they will be more common as time goes on. Hard drives limitation... what? I have 6 hdds in a mitx rig.
Silverstone TJ-08E and Gene-Z montherboard. Cooler, quieter and more flexible than the FT03 and you need to be careful with your hardware choices in the FT03. Check the size of your PSU with mATX cases though as some can be a bit big.
Gene-Z is more than I'm wanting to pay really. An older p67 board will do? Newer chipset would obviously be nice.. It just needs to hold a decent clock one PCIE 16x Sata 3 USB 3 Any slightly cheaper recommendations for a board?