X99 on mITX: ASRock X99E-itx/ac

It seems to still be about $ 2,000 at minimum, for not much interesting stuff. These high-end pre-built PC's never work out cheap when you want to strip it down to the bare essentials.

Good find, nonetheless. It's good to see custom-built PC's already use these.

That's about as low as you can get it yeah, but it isn't actually THAT bad of a markup when you add the components together:

For example, this is the case they use: Link

It's a gorgeous aluminum case, but looks like a pain in the ass to deal with yourself. Might not be the worst premium to pay to have somebody else do it.

Also, I would really like to know how they managed to mount the h100i clone on the narrow ILM mobo... if anybody has any ideas on that one I'd love to hear it. Perhaps the ASRock included bracket fits the h100i?
 
That's about as low as you can get it yeah, but it isn't actually THAT bad of a markup when you add the components together:

For example, this is the case they use: Link

It's a gorgeous aluminum case, but looks like a pain in the ass to deal with yourself. Might not be the worst premium to pay to have somebody else do it.

Also, I would really like to know how they managed to mount the h100i clone on the narrow ILM mobo... if anybody has any ideas on that one I'd love to hear it. Perhaps the ASRock included bracket fits the h100i?

Holy crap I had no idea the PC-O series was that expensive.
From what I've heard, it seems to be quite easy to make any waterblocks work with the narrow ILM, but I've not seen anybody do it yet. The included bracket is officially only for cooler master blocks IIRC, but if you take a look at the bracket and the h100i, I wouldn't be at all surprised if they worked well together:

X99E-ITXac.jpg

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If there were a proper compatible high performance top flow cooler for narrow ILM, I might consider it.

It has M.2 Gen3 x4, which I need if my Maximus Vii Impact board doesn't work out.

While totally unnecessary for my application, six cores would be nice still.
 
Hey guys, good news!

1. The Digital Storm variant is actually a re-branded H100 not H100i. The H100 is apparently compatible with the included mount ASRock provides. I'm not sure how different if any the H100i is, but I suspect it will be compatible also considering how similar they look. BUT...

2. Asetek sells a Narrow ILM Retention Kit for $10 (+ shipping) for their most recent round pump (which is on TONS of AIO coolers, including the newest Corsair H100i GTX) if you contact their support team via email. I believe the email is: [email protected]

3. Lastly, if you want to custom cool your Mini, as stated previously EK sells a Narrow ILM mounting plate for their Supremacy water block. I **THINK** (have been trying to figure this out on another thread) that this mounting plate is also compatible with the Swiftech H220x and their Apogee XL water block, since both blocks are nearly identical at 60mm*60mm. I'm confident it could work, but not 100% sure.

Anyway, all those options + the default CoolerMaster Seidon option should be more than enough for anybody interested in this board to work with! :D:cool:
 
That would be excellent news Titansfan, the H100 and H100i are good and readily available CLC's.
If the Asetek bracket would work on most Asetek coolers, this would be another boost in possible cooling solutions.
 
Just ordered mine. Should come Wednesday. Wondering which cooler I should get for my 5820K, right now I have the nhd9dx in mind. Should I go watercooling instead?
 
The problem with the Narrow ILM socket is that it's meant for dense server configurations like this:

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It's designed to have powerful, rediculously noisy fans push air through one side and come out the other, with all the other sides basically blocked. This means most Narrow ILM coolers will not be suitable for home or office use because of their limited heatsink size and with expectance for high power fans. The watercooling bracket fixes this, as most Closed Loop Coolers like the Corsair H100-series or Coolermaster Seidon are for home or office use.

Also, while a 80-90W TDP quadcore processor might be cooled quietly by a beefy aircooler like a few Noctua coolers (or the Kabuto II in my rig), 140W TDP is a whole different ballgame. In that regard, I feel watercooling will be a must with this board and a top-end processor.
 
Also, while a 80-90W TDP quadcore processor might be cooled quietly by a beefy aircooler like a few Noctua coolers (or the Kabuto II in my rig), 140W TDP is a whole different ballgame. In that regard, I feel watercooling will be a must with this board and a top-end processor.

I should have my AIO cooled unit done by next week (ordered the Narrow ILM kit from Asetek) but I think if somebody wants to aircool and has room in their case then the Noctua NH-U12DX i4 should do a more than adequate job. I suspect it will probably even give water coolers a run for their money temperature-wise, and almost certainly noise-wise.

It's only $66 on Amazon right, and you can add a second 120mm NF-F12 for push-pull. I probably would have gone that route if my case could fit it!
 
Will be on Youtube in two weeks but if you're a Vessel member, Linus built with this board using 2 x 16GB ECC RAM and the E5-2699 v3 (18C/32T): https://www.vessel.com/videos/Gdb2u0UqC

Interestingly, they got the bracket it comes with working with a Corsair H80i.

0Wy0CED.jpg
 
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Awesome news ! If this keeps gaining momentum, maybe we'll see other manufacturers picking this up !
 
Nice. I assume there is no bracket out there to support Corsair H75 and variant.

Assuming the H75 uses an Asetek block (looks like it) then you can order a narrow ILM mounting kit from them for 10$ + shipping. Mine came in the mail yesterday, just email their support team.
 
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Awesome news ! If this keeps gaining momentum, maybe we'll see other manufacturers picking this up !

Since an AIO water cooler is pretty much required to cool this beast in a mini-itx case, I am surprised to see that you are enthused about it, since you switched from AIO, and now praise the quiet air cooling in your Ncase M1. ;)

I am very happy Asrock has developed this board, but the pump noise from an AIO is what keeps me away. Unless there is a verified silent AIO with ILM bracket. Perhaps Swiftech H140x/H220x (heard they were the most silent ones) with an EK water block and ILM bracket? Wouldn't fit in an Ncase M1, unfortunately.
 
If you don't want to use an AIO cooler or the included cooler, the Noctua NH-D9DX i4 has a Narrow ILM mount and should fit in the Ncase (or anything else with 110mm height clearance).
 
Since an AIO water cooler is pretty much required to cool this beast in a mini-itx case, I am surprised to see that you are enthused about it, since you switched from AIO, and now praise the quiet air cooling in your Ncase M1. ;)
That's because I don't think only the stuff I have is good, everything has its merit. The watercooling setup I had wasn't bad in performance, but I couldn't get its noise down, thanks to the pump.

And after having to return the H220 due to a DOA and a leaking EKWB GPU block, my reality got shellshocked that in a worse-case scenario, I would have had to replace many parts of my PC due to a production error.

I'm happy with my setup now, on air cooling. But I'm not yet sold that we'll be able to keep a 140W CPU cool (and quiet) on the limit amount of aircooling options there are for Narrow ILM.
 
I'm happy with my setup now, on air cooling. But I'm not yet sold that we'll be able to keep a 140W CPU cool (and quiet) on the limit amount of aircooling options there are for Narrow ILM.

I doubt that NH-D9DX i4 will be quiet enough. Definitely no room to overclock and be quiet. Need the biggest air coolers but then the case has to grow as well. So back to AIO if wanting the smallest case, room to overclock, but pump noise instead... And as you said, potential for leakage.

Sometimes going small just means unnecessary headache. I have often wandered about a Define R5 and X99 ATX mobo and be done with it. Yet, that's not what I really want... Can't stand the thought of a giant case. Or can I? Eternal struggle.
 
NZXT S340 is 36L, pretty small for ATX. Not going to really find much smaller than that these days. The acrylic and matte black portions are very scratch prone though.

There are some mATX X99 boards as well, id say the Asrock ones are the best in terms of implementation (they have M.2 PCI-E 3.0 x4).
 
Do you guys really experience pump noise that badly with the AIO stuff? I have the Corsair H100i GTX running on quiet mode via Corsair Link and I can't hear a thing other than my Air conditioning white noise.

If you want to custom cool it, again EK has a mount for it. Go crazy, and share pics :)
 
I've found pump noise is heavily dependant on orientation.. With no way to fill/drain the system, there will always be a bit of trapped air (to allow for expansion, or just manufacturing tolerance). If that trapped air is caught in the pump, it's very noisy. If you tilt and twist the system around to trap that air at the top of a hose loop, or in the radiator, then the pump is significantly quieter.
 
Having possession of the Asetek narrow ilm kit(and an Asetek 545lc) I can confirm the following will work with it just by looking at the 545lc and the narrow ilm bracket.

Corsair
h110
h105
h90
h75
h55
h50

NZXT
X31
X41
X61

ThermalTake
The Water 3.0 line

Zalman
The LQ310/315/320 series

And pretty much any cooler that has the CURRENT round Asetek water block.

And yes, I am crazy, I do intend to use the 545lc on a 5820 and this board. The 545lc has been used by others to cool overclocked 4.4Ghz 3930Ks.

My goal is to cram a system based around this board, a 5820, and eventually a 395x2 into a Node 304. I'll be piecing together the system from now and through whenever the 395x2 is released.
 
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Having possession of the Asetek narrow ilm kit(and an Asetek 545lc) I can confirm the following will work with it just by looking at the 545lc and the narrow ilm bracket.

And pretty much any cooler that has the CURRENT round Asetek water block.
Excellent news ! Now we see the benefit of the "just another Asetek design" reviewers talk about.
 
Thank you for sharing! Asrock customer support was not very helpful for me.

That's odd. They responded to my request the same day and I sent the money via PayPal and it was shipped the next day. I guess they kind of got tired of people emailing about the kit so they put it up on their eBay store.
 
A dedicated RAID controller is generally a bad idea unless you're running an enterprise SAN. You're better off with software RAID, ideally using ZFS or similar filesystem. That makes it very unlikely you will lose an array due to drive failure, boot media failure (use a static image loaded to RAM so you can just slap in another stick with the same image, but anything that can handle the same ZFS level can also import the zpool) or hardware failure elsewhere.
It's not redundant against user error (or catastrophic multi-component failure), but nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool. You still need a backup.

I strongly agree that RAID is indeed a good idea, ofcourse realising it is not a backup in itself. But it is redundancy, speed and in some cases like ZFS it also offers other valuable storage benefits like versioning. And you don't need/want a RAID card.

www.datamation.com/data-center/the-zfs-story-clearing-up-the-confusion-1.html
 
I just received my Astek Narrow ILM kit (ordrered directly from Astek), for those who are wondering what it does look like :


 
Hey guys. I built my first rig using this motherboard. Thought I would share a few pictures of the completed product if anybody is interested:

;
8DoX3v7.jpg

SXRFXxI.jpg


Cable management is not the best by a long shot I realize, but I'm pretty new to desktop building, and the case is rather difficult to work with (lian li PC-05SX)

Has a:
ASRock x99 ITX MOBO of course
Corsair H100i GTX w/ 2 Noctuas
5820k CPU
980 Strix GPU

If anybody has any questions or feedback I'd be happy to respond :)
 
Nice, you seem to be one of the first people to make a build with the board. Lian Li is known (atleast to me) to have a troublesome installation with their mITX cases, often having small oversights that make a world of difference in installing and reinstalling. Luckily their quality is top notch.
 
Hey guys. I built my first rig using this motherboard. Thought I would share a few pictures of the completed product if anybody is interested:

;
8DoX3v7.jpg

SXRFXxI.jpg


Cable management is not the best by a long shot I realize, but I'm pretty new to desktop building, and the case is rather difficult to work with (lian li PC-05SX)

Has a:
ASRock x99 ITX MOBO of course
Corsair H100i GTX w/ 2 Noctuas
5820k CPU
980 Strix GPU

If anybody has any questions or feedback I'd be happy to respond :)

How did you mount the H100i on narrow ILM? Is there a special bracket? Or have you got it custom made?
 
How did you mount the H100i on narrow ILM? Is there a special bracket? Or have you got it custom made?
If not needed, don't include images in quotes. With large images it is very annoying.
Your question is answered in this topic:

2. Asetek sells a Narrow ILM Retention Kit for $10 (+ shipping) for their most recent round pump (which is on TONS of AIO coolers, including the newest Corsair H100i GTX) if you contact their support team via email. I believe the email is: [email protected]

I just received this link for purchasing the Narrow ILM bracket from Asetek's customer support today. Figured I would share it with you all.
 
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@Titansfan - We need bigger pictures!!

Sure!

Imgur Link: http://imgur.com/a/00z48/all


The board is excellent imo, and lacks for nothing other than quad channel ram, which isn't all that important depending on what you're planning on doing. My biggest gripe is that even with Noctuas everywhere, I still hear the faint refrigerator-like noise of the H100i GTX when the room is silent, even on quiet mode. Granted, whenever my actual refrigerator or the A/C are running (I live in a loft, so pretty big open space) I can't hear the computer at all, at load or idle. I guess it was a bit naive of me to expect an AIO to run 100% silently at idle.

That being said, if you either A. don't mind a faint whirring noise (imagine the tiniest mini-fridge you could purchase) or B. live in a place where the A/C is pretty much always on anyway (like me) then the H100i or similar AIO is great. CPU overclocked to 4.5 and never hits above 60 degrees at maximum load.
 
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If not needed, don't include images in quotes. With large images it is very annoying.
Your question is answered in this topic:

Sorry for quoting pictures ;) and not noticing the info about H100i - good to know. Seems like overall the possible WC solutions for this board are not that limited :)
 
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