NCASE M1: a crowdfunded Mini-ITX case (updates in first post)

Skott said:
Sometimes its best to put the rig together outside of the case first to make sure everything works. Then install it in the case. Sucks when you have a faulty component and have to pull it all apart and send something back.
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sound advice. i got full of myself (thinking "i had done it before many times; it's going to be okay"), so i went ahead with full assembly...and nada!

AFD said:
Yeah, this might work..

http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-power-up-an-ATX-Power-Supply-without-a-PC/

Hopefully just a DOA power supply. I know mine shipped from Amazon last month with absolutely zero protection in the shipping box, and not much of anything protecting the PSU inside the retail box.
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thanks for the link. will try that. i hope nothing is DOA and that i've made a mistake somewhere. we'll see...

OverRated said:
Just use a paper clip to link the green with a black wire, Also make sure you haven't put the cables around the wrong way on the PSU because they do fit both ways. another thought have you plug the front panel power button in right? also could be the cpu or socket.
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will check the ATX cable(s), sure. thanks for mentioning that. i tried my best to figure out which side attaches to which component (PSU/MB), but maybe i've made a mistake somewhere.

yes, i have plugged the front panel power button cable. there is a picture at the top of this page where i highlighted the two pins i used to connect that cable. it's a bit confusing though as it shows three GND connectors. i will also have to try testing the power switch on the M1 to make sure it is not the source of the problem.

WiSK said:
The 24 pin would lose its sense function if reversed (pin 20 is intended for the PSU side), but it's not vital to operation.

Apart from that you can't actually physically plug these things in incorrectly. The sockets are all keyed with unique combinations of square/hex holes that stops any short circuit.
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yes, they are hex/square-shaped sockets/plugs, so it's not possible to plug them incorrectly. i'm still not sure if it matters which end connects to which part though, but i'll give it a try.

thanks everybody for helping me.
 
darxider said:
ok. assembled the parts in the M1...and it doesn't turn on at all. there is absolutely no sign of life when i press the power button on the front panel.
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AFD said:
Had a similar issue with my build.. got everything done, then no post, no beeps, no video.. nothing.
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Same for me... just nothing, not even fans. I took out everything except motherboard, ram and psu, then reseated/plugged in everything again and tested it step by step. One day it didn't turn on, the next day it did. Are you using the SFX psu? Maybe this is completely off-base, but I wonder if the internal switch setting can get messed up in those initially, until it resets itself.
 
yes, the Silverstone 450w Gold SFX. i can't work on it till next weekend, so the PSU will wait a week and will have ample time to reset itself ;)
 
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No, it is split into 4-pin and 20-pin, look closer at the picture on the left plug. You can see it at where you expect it to be.
 
cowsgomoo said:
I did various tests to get the best temps for my GPU which is a Powercolor PCS+ R9 290. Note that this has a non-reference cooler.
Tests done:
Note that shroud here means the shroud plus the GPU fans.
1) With shroud on and 15mm thick fans as intake
2) With shroud on and 15mm thick fans as exhaust
3) With shroud off and 25mm thick fans as intake
4) With shroud off and 25mm thick fans as exhaust

I got the best temperature with 4).
2) fared the worst because the GPU fans and the exhaust fans are fighting for air - they're blowing in opposite directions.
1) and 4) fared slightly better than 2) but not by much.
Temperature difference between the best and worst configuration is 8C when playing Civ5.

This seems to imply that the best way to cool the non-reference GPU is to get the hot air away from the GPU by the shortest route possible, which is through the bottom.
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In the results I don't see 3) ever mentioned. Is there a typo in there somewhere or some other missing info?
 
Finished up the fully watercooled build after many headaches and hardships.

Most of my photos are elsewhere (not public), but here's a few near the tail-end when the ending was in sight:

http://imgur.com/a/vS6TU

Not going to lie - between the ST45SF-G's horrible coil whine and loud fan, it was kind of pointless watercooling the CPU and GPU other than for the challenge. Pretty fun though :)
 
Vittra said:
Finished up the fully watercooled build after many headaches and hardships.

Most of my photos are elsewhere (not public), but here's a few near the tail-end when the ending was in sight:

http://imgur.com/a/vS6TU

Not going to lie - between the ST45SF-G's horrible coil whine and loud fan, it was kind of pointless watercooling the CPU and GPU other than for the challenge. Pretty fun though :)
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Gorgeous, what gpu is that? I couldnt agree more about the sfx psu. Lets hope the upcoming 550w will have noise problems solved. Im still running my bronze model and its without a doubt the loudest component in the system.

E: ah, nvm its in your signature. A bit bald running that beast on a 450w.
 
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Indeed, it's the 690 listed in my sig. I have no intention of sticking with this PSU longterm - once the 550w/600w make their appearance the 450w will be moved over to an htpc, as was always planned. For now, no OCing other than a pittance on the GPUs to put each core back up to it's 680 counterpart!
 
Vittra said:
Indeed, it's the 690 listed in my sig. I have no intention of sticking with this PSU longterm - once the 550w/600w make their appearance the 450w will be moved over to an htpc, as was always planned. For now, no OCing other than a pittance on the GPUs to put each core back up to it's 680 counterpart!
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You might want to do the fan mod then. I think the noise of the psu would drive me even more crazy in htpc use. Unless of course the rig would be far away to hear it.
 
Fortunately it will in fact be far enough that I won't have to hear it, otherwise you can count that I'd be ripping the thing apart to do just that :)
 
dvsman said:
Has everyone already received their cases? I'm in Washington, DC and - according to the tracking info I have.- there's no sign of it other than when it left Asia. Not a big deal, but my parts have been sitting around for a while and I'm anxious as heck to put it all together.
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If you have your Dispatch # (acquired by going to the Taiwan Post website with your tracking number), that helps to compare results, as that tells you whether or not you were on the same boat with someone else who may or may not have received their case. If you were Dispatch 25 or 26, for example, you should probably be contacting your Post Office, because those arrived at port in the US 2 months ago or more.
 
vipz said:
In the results I don't see 3) ever mentioned. Is there a typo in there somewhere or some other missing info?
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Ha, typo. Just corrected my post.
"I got the best temperature with 4).
2) fared the worst because the GPU fans and the exhaust fans are fighting for air - they're blowing in opposite directions.
1) and 3) fared slightly better than 2) but not by much."

4) is exhausting air out the bottom with case fans, with GPU fans and shroud removed.
 
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Could someone with the ASUS z87i-Deluxe motherboard please download HWiNFO64 and screencapture your temperature for this group? I have no clue what component HWiNFO64 is measuring for Temp3-6. I'm overclocking at 4.7GHz with 1.25V but running on adaptive voltage.
 
Ace of Six said:
Could someone with the ASUS z87i-Deluxe motherboard please download HWiNFO64 and screencapture your temperature for this group? I have no clue what component HWiNFO64 is measuring for Temp3-6. I'm overclocking at 4.7GHz with 1.25V but running on adaptive voltage.
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Looks just like mine..

http://i.imgur.com/U2zg12p.jpg

So.. how in the hell did you hit 4.7GHz on a 4770k at all, let alone on air?? :eek:
 
cowsgomoo said:
Ha, typo. Just corrected my post.
"I got the best temperature with 4).
2) fared the worst because the GPU fans and the exhaust fans are fighting for air - they're blowing in opposite directions.
1) and 3) fared slightly better than 2) but not by much."

4) is exhausting air out the bottom with case fans, with GPU fans and shroud removed.
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Interesting. I'd love to see a pic of the setup. I'm curious just how much of a gap there is between the 25mm fan and the heatsink. Have you considered adding a shroud between them?
 
AFD said:
Looks just like mine..

http://i.imgur.com/U2zg12p.jpg

So.. how in the hell did you hit 4.7GHz on a 4770k at all, let alone on air?? :eek:
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I delidded my i7, I posted an album a few pages back on how I did it. I must have gotten lucky with this chip to get 4.7GHz, I haven't seen my temperatures go above 70C on a stress test yet. I think I can push it to 4.8GHz but I don't want to waste any more time on watching a stress test.
 
Vittra said:
Finished up the fully watercooled build after many headaches and hardships.

Most of my photos are elsewhere (not public), but here's a few near the tail-end when the ending was in sight:

http://imgur.com/a/vS6TU

Not going to lie - between the ST45SF-G's horrible coil whine and loud fan, it was kind of pointless watercooling the CPU and GPU other than for the challenge. Pretty fun though :)
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Nice to see another custom loop but man you have some crazy long tubing.

Like a pro ;)

20140206_160309.jpg

20140206_160256.jpg
 
Ace of Six said:
I delidded my i7, I posted an album a few pages back on how I did it. I must have gotten lucky with this chip to get 4.7GHz, I haven't seen my temperatures go above 70C on a stress test yet. I think I can push it to 4.8GHz but I don't want to waste any more time on watching a stress test.
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What stress test are you using seems like your not stressing the FPU if your not getting over 70c ether that or you live some where cold.

PS sorry for the double post.
 
vipz said:
Interesting. I'd love to see a pic of the setup. I'm curious just how much of a gap there is between the 25mm fan and the heatsink. Have you considered adding a shroud between them?
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My heatsink is resting on the fans, because my GPU is a 2.5 slot card. Without the shroud, the heatsink is about 1.8 slot thick. Fans are also elevated with 7mm thick silencers. There's about a 1mm gap between the actual heatsink and the fans because there are two 1mm protrusions for securing the shroud.
I'll post pics later.
 
OverRated said:
What stress test are you using seems like your not stressing the FPU if your not getting over 70c ether that or you live some where cold.

PS sorry for the double post.
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I'm using AIDA64 with the default settings. My ambient has been 21C lately.
 
Vittra said:
Not going to lie - between the ST45SF-G's horrible coil whine and loud fan, it was kind of pointless watercooling the CPU and GPU other than for the challenge.
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Since this week, the fan of the ST45SF-G has also reared it's ulgy, noisy head in my model. I've had it for 3-4 months now and I never noticed it. Now I can suddenly hear it. NoiseBlocker fan is already on it's way :D
But the coil whine is new, I haven't heard people complain about it on the ST45SF-G. Are you sure it's not the GPU ? Because it is most common with GPU's. It's a miracle you can actually use a GTX 690, because it is "close" to the limit of the PSU.

46202.png


Although this uses an overclocked i7-3960X and is measured at the wall.
 
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Well, the 690 isn't new - I've had it since release, and it's never exhibited any whine in previous rigs before putting it into this one. When attempting to isolate where the sound was coming from, it seemed to be from the PSU.

Ended up adding a few better lit photos to the album I linked previously.

http://imgur.com/a/vS6TU


OverRated said:
Nice to see another custom loop but man you have some crazy long tubing.[/IMG]
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Yeah - it's intentional. I wanted plenty of slack so I could remove the radiator side mount and have plenty of room to swap/move components as needed, without needing to drain the loop.
 
Good decision on not using that coolant. Mayhem Aurora was specifically made for temporarily showcasing water cooling builds and is not meant for long term use. Why don't you go with Mayhem's Pastel or X1 instead?
 
Vittra said:
Yeah - it's intentional. I wanted plenty of slack so I could remove the radiator side mount and have plenty of room to swap/move components as needed, without needing to drain the loop.
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That is true but really the only parts you can swap out with out taking the loop apart is the ram and PSU which u can do with sort tubing.


Ace of Six said:
I'm using AIDA64 with the default settings. My ambient has been 21C lately.
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21c is will help your temps a lot instead of default settings you should only run the FPU test with the others un ticked.

Phuncz said:
Since this week, the fan of the ST45SF-G has also reared it's ulgy, noisy head in my model. I've had it for 3-4 months now and I never noticed it. Now I can suddenly hear it. NoiseBlocker fan is already on it's way :D
But the coil whine is new, I haven't heard people complain about it on the ST45SF-G. Are you sure it's not the GPU ? Because it is most common with GPU's. It's a miracle you can actually use a GTX 690, because it is "close" to the limit of the PSU.


Although this uses an overclocked i7-3960X and is measured at the wall.
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Its the power supply as i moved my whole system over to the M1 and i never had it before and i was using a coolermaster 550w before the case change.
 
batmanwcm said:
Good decision on not using that coolant. Mayhem Aurora was specifically made for temporarily showcasing water cooling builds and is not meant for long term use. Why don't you go with Mayhem's Pastel or X1 instead?
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I thought about it but decided to go cheap. After reading all the possible issues with coolants, distilled water is the safest bet especially for this being my first attempt ever at water cooling.
 
Also, in case anyone was wondering. I emailed FrozenQ yesterday about the custom M1 Reservoir I ordered early January. They said it should shipped by end of this week.
 
Neffy said:
I thought about it but decided to go cheap. After reading all the possible issues with coolants, distilled water is the safest bet especially for this being my first attempt ever at water cooling.
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I went this EK clear as i trust there waterblocks i don't trust coolant with dye in it though thats why i went clear.

charww said:
What is the total external length measurement of M1-with-reservoir, please? Thank you.
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5inchs

EDIT:

Sorry length is 3.5 inch's and height is 5 inch's.
 
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lemkeant said:
Today isnt off to a good start...

Once I got up this am and turned on my cpu, my H220 pump was stuck maxing at 100%. Long story short, looks like my cpu header has gone semi-bad and is stuck at 12v but the fan header still works correctly. Tried old BIOS, BIOS reset, etc.

Whats even better is I have the AsRock z87 and I cant get hold of support/ RMA it for at least a couple of weeks due to the Chinese new year. I just ordered a fan controller off FrozenCPU so I guess I wont be using the fan headers on the board anymore. I going to have to put the fan header in the SSD slot of the case. There goes my clean case

Better than paying for shipping and waiting for the board to be sent back I guess
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Update from the past 2 weeks. Turns out it was my H220. Then thing was stuck wide open at 100%. i was just dealing with it until the RMA could show up. Two issues now. 1. Swiftech is out of H220 pumps so they're waiting on parts and 2. the pump died on me over the weekend. It still functioned ok, but controlling temps was fairly difficult. Especially since I upgraded to a used GTX680 with an EK waterblock.

Time for people to get jealous :D yesterday I stuck my old 12v 350 pump inline and I'm back in business. Check out the pics

l64HdVBl.jpg


sDNF0uKl.jpg


Temps are great though. 4670k (stock) and the GTX680 (oc'd to 150% and 1206) are both staying under 50C while stress testing and gaming. Only 2 GT's keeping the whole thing cool
 
milkcow said:
Not really possbile, as the case alone is already 12.91 inches long ;)
32.8 / 2.54 = 12.91
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My bad that's the height not the length, The length is 3.5 inch's.




lemkeant said:
Update from the past 2 weeks. Turns out it was my H220. Then thing was stuck wide open at 100%. i was just dealing with it until the RMA could show up. Two issues now. 1. Swiftech is out of H220 pumps so they're waiting on parts and 2. the pump died on me over the weekend. It still functioned ok, but controlling temps was fairly difficult. Especially since I upgraded to a used GTX680 with an EK waterblock.

Time for people to get jealous :D yesterday I stuck my old 12v 350 pump inline and I'm back in business. Check out the pics

Temps are great though. 4670k (stock) and the GTX680 (oc'd to 150% and 1206) are both staying under 50C while stress testing and gaming. Only 2 GT's keeping the whole thing cool
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HAHA nice i use the same pump but the PWM version you should just mount it under your GPU like i did, The H220 pump just cant live up to a real pump performance.
 
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milkcow said:
charww asked for the total length (M1 case + reservoir) i.e. from the front panel to the side of the reservoir sticking out on the back ;)
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I really should of seen that "with" you put in there haha sorry its been a long day, 14.5 inch's total.
 
OverRated said:
HAHA nice i use the same pump but the PWM version you should just mount it under your GPU like i did, The H220 pump just cant live up to a real pump performance.
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I'm really thinking about just getting an Apogee Drive. How'd you mount your pump though? With the long barbs from the pump, it make tubing routing fairly tough
 
Here is my current worklog:

Sweclockers: Worklog NCase M1

The site is in swedish but I used a link that uses Google Translate to get it to english. Its not 100% but better than nothing ;).

@Necere or Wahaha360:

Can I get permission to use your promotional pictures on your website?

If not I will remove them on the worklog.

Thanks!
 
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