It's well beyond time I built myself a new PC, so I'm looking around for options. What I want to achieve is: 1) Main unit - smallish, midi-tower or pizza box size. Needs to be able to accomodate an i7-2600K or similar, and enough graphics power to support up to 3 2560x1600 monitors, but will not be used for gaming and won't be overclocked (much), so shouldn't need exotic cooling. I'm looking for a box which can be tucked away behind the desk and largely forgotten about. No need for external drive access. Needs room for 2 SSDs and 2 hard disks. 2) Small Desktop box - something like the size of a half-height 5½ floppy disk drive. In this I want to house a DVD writer (slot loading, ideally), and in a perfect world a multi-card reader, some USB ports, headphone socket and volume control. Ideally also power and reset buttons for the main box. Any ideas for cases? Or for that matter, units that can achieve the remote power/reset/volume/headphone socket?
Could a thin client setup be what you are looking for? The main box would be hidden away somewhere, and the small, quiet client connects to it and directly uses its processing power. More latency than a usual setup but should work, given that the network connection is up to it. 3x 2560x1600 screens may present a problem due to the sheer volume of data flow.
Interesting idea, but I think it introduces more problems than it solves - as you say, the data volume for the monitors being a major one.
Why a two machine setup? (says the man with 2 laptops, 2 desktops and a server all doing different tasks as he types)
The power and reset cables are easily extended using twin core cable, use any switch you fancy... headphone socket can be a simple extension as can the USB sockets, all you need is a 5 1/4 external drive casing and some cables to suit. I see this a merely a remote control not a 2nd PC ... dunx
dunx has the right idea (the rest of us just lack sanity). Extend all those cables to the breakout box. It's an odd modding project, I give you that, but could turn out to be a really neat setup. This could be a good use of e-SATA!
Ok you breakout box will need an eSATA to SATA adaptor. try googling 2meter SATA cable only get eSATA results. or us a USB DVD drive.
For the mini computer have you considered Pico-ITX? It's tiny, and the latest motherboards have dual-core processors for the first time. Downside is it's expensive. http://www.viaembedded.com/en/products/boards/productSeries.jsp?serialNo=6
That sounds much more like what I'm aiming at - the remote control part is exactly right; the external/desktop box is just an external DVD writer and some control extensions.
Spray that item I linked matt black and add a length of slit conduit to tidy all the cables out the back... Sorted ! Sounds good to me. dunx P.S. I use a Griffin Powermate as a volume control for itunes.... it can also mute, switch tracks, and put the system to sleep as well !
