Researching a Small Gaming PC

[1Wolf]

Hello,

I'm kind of dipping a toe in here and I'm not quite ready to post a full "Request Build Help" thread. I'm just looking for some opinions for the time being...

I'm investigating building my first "small" gaming PC. I'm only an amateur, and have only built 4 or 5 gaming systems in the past. All of my previous systems have been Full Towers, simply because I had the room and I liked the extra space to work in and keep things cool. I've never worked with anything but ATX motherboards.

At this point, I'm not even sure how "Small" I can go, given my requirements as a gaming PC. I'm not looking to make it super-tiny or anything but I know that I'd like it to have a smaller footprint than a mid-tower. Something easy to work inside of, reliable, sturdy, that will be able to keep the parts as cool as can reasonably be expected.

What cases and "Form Factors" would you recommend?

I'm not sure which mobo/CPU's I'm looking at yet. I'd like to stick with an ASUS/Intel combination.

I will most likely will give it a moderate overclock eventually. Certainly nothing extreme.

Regardless of whether I overclock, I'm considering one of the commonly available maintenance free ready-to-go water cooling solutions. Whatever I can get to fit in the case, maybe an H100 or H80 type unit.

PSU and GPU I'm completely clueless as to what I can get to fit reasonably, and how much power I'll need.

Please bear in mind that I'm not building anything yet so don't worry about price or deals. I'm just looking to start researching the parts, and what is available, looking for opinions and recommendations for products that guys have had good luck with who are building smaller than mid-tower gaming machines, and trying to determine where to start so that I'm on the right track.

Thanks!

 

[syncopied]

if you want a small system, you'll have to go with matx or mitx; if you also want a small case, then you will have to most likely mod your case to also allow for watercooling, especially with the larger rad of the h100 (unless you are ok with the size of something like the bitfenix prodigy)

what sort of games do you play and what resolutions- that should help you decide what sort of gpu you need; most cases nowadays will fit a long card so as long as cooling is adequate anything is game

 

[Quartz-1]

Start by looking at the Shuttle SFF systems.

 

[1Wolf]

Size-Wise...it doesn't need to be really small. Just smaller than a mid-tower.

Say...just guestimating at the space here I plan to put it in...

Around 14 inches tall, by 18 inches deep, by 12 inches wide is the absolute maximum I could go...give or take. Something that isn't quite so tall is even better. Also, something that doesn't require any sort of cooling or venting from the left side. If there is something available that is smaller, and better, that will do the job...then thats even better

Games and Resolutions...

Pretty much whatever is most common I suppose. Skyrim, Batman, that sort of thing. Resolution is always 1920x1080.

I'm guessing I should be looking at an mATX form factor Motherboard and maybe mATX Desktop?

 

[medeyer]

Look in the SG05 and FT03-Mini threads. Lots of examples posted in there.

 

[Black5Lion]

I was going to say Node 304, but it exhaust the psus hot air from the left :/
So I'll say SG05, but you would probably need to sacrifice a bit if you want an AIO cooler.

 

[thelead]

Got this in last week:
http://www.amazon.com/Silverstone-T...3?ie=UTF8&qid=1372131731&sr=8-3&keywords=sg02

It's keeping my 7970 5-10 degrees cooler than my a05 lian li atx case (that was a surprise considering how cramped everything is).

I honestly think an itx build is better for most though. I went with a matx build because I use an internal pcie sound card for music production and I like having 4 ram slots.

If you do decide on a matx build (and can wait a few weeks for it to come in; since it's new), I think this case would match your required dimensions:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1389517282&pf_rd_i=507846

 

[Screes]

SG05 or SG08 for itx cases are really popular for gamers. For mATX, look at the tj08-e or the SG10.

 

[WiSK]

I'm not looking to make it super-tiny or anything but I know that I'd like it to have a smaller footprint than a mid-tower. Something easy to work inside of, reliable, sturdy, that will be able to keep the parts as cool as can reasonably be expected.
...
Around 14 inches tall, by 18 inches deep, by 12 inches wide is the absolute maximum I could go...give or take. Something that isn't quite so tall is even better. Also, something that doesn't require any sort of cooling or venting from the left side.

Normally cases have the motherboard against the right side, and that means many cases intake on the left. This means the whole Silverstone Sugo range wouldn't suit you, including the SG02, SG05 and SG10 which have been mentioned. This is a shame because otherwise they tend to fit your size requirements well. You could consider a case with reversed motherboard mounting, to get case vents to the right side. But the only "small" ones I know of (Silverstone TJ08-E and PS07) have the normal mini-tower shape and would be a bit tall. Cases with 90 degree (upward) motherboards FT03 and FT03-mini are certainly too tall for your requirements. So I think we've exhausted most of Silverstone products.

Have a look at Lian-Li's new mini-ITX cases:
PC-Q27 approx 8" wide, 12" high, 9.5" deep, GPU limit 195mm
PC-Q28 approx 9" wide, 12" high, 13" deep

They have no side vents, taking air from underneath. Have a good build quality and will be easy to assemble your rig. The second one is not strictly SFF sized, but its depth allows for a full-sized graphics card.

 

[1Wolf]

Thanks for posting those links guys. I'll check all of them out. As I learn more, I'm actually starting to look forward to this project as I've simply just never done it before

I don't suppose its absolutely mandatory that it NOT vent from the left side, I'd just rather have it breathe from the front and exhaust to the rear if I could. I can probably leave a gap of at least a couple inches to its left where I position the unit if I have to....I was just trying to avoid having to worry about breathing room. The unit will be on the left side of a shelf, so the vertical side of the shelf will be to the unit's left. As I mentioned though, if the superior case choices all vent left I can probably leave a couple inches between the unit and the vertical. There is plenty of room behind, and in front of the unit though.

I also should add to my requirements:

• usable with ATX PSU
• usable with Full Size GPU
• I'm guessing that I'll need a mATX motherboard instead of an itx as I'm going to need 4 slots for memory.

In addition...

• I plan on using one of the Corsair type all-in-one cooling solutions, so I will need at least one 120mm or 140mm exhaust fan mount for the cooler and preferrably a second fan mount to use as intake to bring some cool air in over the motherboard. I'd rather not have to mess with modding the case to fit this.

I'm guessing these suck as no one mentioned them here (which usually means they suck) but I'd been looking at some of the Apevia units from Newegg (just browsing to learn and read reviews, wasn't intending to purchase) and they had alot of negative reviews. Most reviews didn't like the PSU which I wouldn't be using anyway. But the fact that some of the units had one cooling layouts that involved 120mm fan mount to rear for exhaust and I believe it was an 80mm intake from front.

EDIT - I've been taking a look at some of those mATX cases recommended, namely the SG10 and TJ08 and so far I'm really liking what I am seeing! The SG10 looks especially handy. I'm thinking that if I can just NOT place it right up against the left vertical of the shelf and give it at least an inch or so of breathing room it might be fine. Looks like it will handle my All-in-One Water cooling and Silverstone even addresses that in their FAQ. Looks like it will also handle an ATX PSU as well as full size GPU's. This might be the ticket So far it looks very nice. The TJ08 looks very nice as well.

 

[Machupo]

Just curious why you need 4 slots of memory? The only reasons, IMHO, to pick uATX over mITX would be multiple GPUs, discrete soumd or other card, or reqs for 32GB of memory. Any single GPU these days can hanle 1920x1080.

 

[1Wolf]

32GB Memory.

I don't really quite need that much for my own uses (although more is always better ), but my wife would like to use this new machine too and for her uses 32GB helps alot.

 

[Quartz-1]

32GB Memory.

I don't really quite need that much for my own uses (although more is always better ), but my wife would like to use this new machine too and for her uses 32GB helps alot.

For the sake of domestic harmony, I would suggest you find funds for two PCs.

 

[Black5Lion]

Maybe get a Shuttle Barebone?
They have Z77 and X79, they are smaller than uATX, and they have 4 memory slots.
They also have nice features like mSata.
However you will have to forget about most coolers since the have their own custom cpu cooler (but I heard you could replace it with an Asetek 92mm AIO cooler)
Oh you will also lose the ATX psu, but they include a nice 500w psu that can handle a 3770k + 7970.

 

[tiraides]

Games and Resolutions...

Pretty much whatever is most common I suppose. Skyrim, Batman, that sort of thing. Resolution is always 1920x1080.

Which games do you want to play (both now and in the future)? What level of visual quality do you like to use for your games?

Size-Wise...it doesn't need to be really small. Just smaller than a mid-tower.

Say...just guestimating at the space here I plan to put it in...

Around 14 inches tall, by 18 inches deep, by 12 inches wide is the absolute maximum I could go...give or take. Something that isn't quite so tall is even better. Also, something that doesn't require any sort of cooling or venting from the left side. If there is something available that is smaller, and better, that will do the job...then thats even better

Are you more interested in your overall gaming performance or the size of your entire system?

 

[1Wolf]

Which games do you want to play (both now and in the future)? What level of visual quality do you like to use for your games?

Thats a trickier question to answer than you'd think....

This is a "secondary" machine for me. I already have a "main" machine that I built in September that works terrific. This SFF one I'd like to build will live on a cabinet in my den, but I want to be able to fairly easily move it upstairs or downstairs for whomever wants to use it at any given time. That way my wife can take it upstairs to play her games, or even use it to play an MMORPG or something else multiplayer with me.

So, in a nutshell, it doesn't need to replace my main machine...but especially for my wife's uses, it does have slightly different requirements than my own machine. I'll mention what my wife would use it for below....

For me...I'm not much for fast-action games but I really do like the "Battlefield" series of games & the Batman series. I like tactical shooters that are slower and tactical like the Ghost Recon series but when they start getting really fast paced like the Call of Duty series then those aren't quite my thing. I like very involved Single Player RPG's with large sweeping settings and beautiful visuals like Skyrim, or Oblivion before it. I've enjoyed those all the way back to "Arena".

I used to play mostly just MMORPG's but over the past couple years they all started feeling more of the same and I got a bit bored with them. Thats too bad because both my wife and I enjoyed playing those together for many years, but they just got a bit stale. One of these days I might try out some of these new wave of "zombie apocalypse" survival type MMO's that have become popular.

I also do alot of Flight Sims: FSX, the DCS Series, etc. Those are at a whole separate level though and I won't be using this new SFF machine for Flight Sims. Those are the realm of my "main" machine though and I'd never mess with those on the new SFF one.

Now, as previously mentioned, my wife will be using this machine as well. I'll usually be using my "main" machine so she'll probably use this SFF one more than me. She doesn't play alot of the more demanding games like battlefield, but she does like to play MMORPG's and she also likes to do stuff in a virtual world "Sims" like game called "Second Life". She used to be a 3D Animator working on video games for a living a few years ago and was forced to a new career by the economy...so she gets her "fix" by building and animating things in that game. That game never seems to be very hard on the video card but it is really CPU based/limited and wants gobs of memory. She logs in alot of characters at one time and it just sucks up memory. Also...she wants to do photoshop stuff and movie editing...also CPU and Memory intensive.

So, for this SFF build...video card probably takes a back seat to CPU and memory. As mentioned previously, I'll probably be running 32 Gigs of memory on it and putting at least a moderate OC on it. My wife's uses actually seem to work that CPU pretty hard.

Are you more interested in your overall gaming performance or the size of your entire system?

I'd like to keep it at least fairly small. It needs to fit inside the footprint mentioned above as we've got a perfect spot on a shelved cabinet in our den where this thing will usually live. It doesn't need to be X-Box sized or win any contests for "small". Just small enough to fit in that footprint or slightly smaller would be fine.

I'd simply build another full size machine but we just don't want to dedicate the space to it. However, a SFF machine that fits in the footprint defined above would be perfect.

 

[Machupo]

If you wanted to be ridiculous, you could build off the Shuttle X79 system w/ an i7-4930K... plenty of photoshop horsepower there

 

[tiraides]

This is a "secondary" machine for me. I already have a "main" machine that I built in September that works terrific. This SFF one I'd like to build will live on a cabinet in my den, but I want to be able to fairly easily move it upstairs or downstairs for whomever wants to use it at any given time. That way my wife can take it upstairs to play her games, or even use it to play an MMORPG or something else multiplayer with me.

So, in a nutshell, it doesn't need to replace my main machine...but especially for my wife's uses, it does have slightly different requirements than my own machine. I'll mention what my wife would use it for below....

Does this thread here tie into your other thread? I don't want to reinvent the wheel if I don't have to.

 

[1Wolf]

Yup.

At the point of posting this thread I was just peeking into the idea of some good cases and looking into it.

At the point I'd posted the other thread I had decided I was going forward with it and putting together my build list. At the top of the other thread I linked back to this one for information that had been discussed on cases, but I probably should have edited this one as well to point back to that one.

I apologize for any confusion. Once some of the guys here in this thread had pointed me in the right direction of some case options that might meet my needs, I gave it a "thumbs up" and went ahead with a thread to design the entire build.