Concept External (sort of) GPU case

[cleveland]

I've been thinking a lot about SFF problems and everytime i end up with the same idea:

For me, that live in a tropical country, cooling and properly dissipating the heat generated by a GPU is the first and biggest concern in a SFF case project. With that in mind, i started to do the reverse enginering of most ITX motherboard's design: the PCI-e area is almost always clear (and obviously should be, since GPU compatibility depends on it a lot!).

So i started to think about a case that is made to house all the computer component's, except for the GPU. That is advantageous in several ways:
1) thermal headroom: most of the GPU heat will spread to the external enviroment and wouldn't need any active cooling to be manageable;
2) overall volume reduction: if the case is meant to be used without PCI-e extender/riser, the GPU dictates case's height. on the other hand, if the GPU is housed externaly, the height of the case is bound to CPU heatsink and memory heights, that tends to be way smaller than expansion cards.
3) easy clean-up and overall maintenance: need to clean GPU heatsink? no problem! need to upgrade/replace GPU? no problem?

And here are my inicial thoughts for such a case:

* interchangeable (or adjustable) PCI-e bracket - or whatever name that piece that holds the back of GPU - capable of accommodating low profile and standard GPUs, as well as dual and single slot versions too;

* HTPC style. the smaller the height, the better;

* dual layer storage. SSDs and slim HDDs accommodated underneath mobo;

* one-piece-ish case. two pieces of cut'n'bended metal conected together by a couple of hinges;

I guess that's all. Please, feel free to criticize and give your feedback on the idea.



oh, and i'm trully sorry for the bad english too. this text was writen in a hurry and english is not my first language!

 

[owliwar]

I guess a lot of low profile cases/ apu cases would fit in this cryteria but I think that one thing that holds future e-gpu enclosures is a conection that is reliable / looks future proof.

I have no idea on how to set up an external and reliable pci-e x16 conection(or even x8). if there is a way to solve that, and its not ridiculously expansive, then I think it would be awesome indeed.

another massive bonus would be that the GPU dock would handle GPU power, and that would make powering the main rig a LOT easy.
I am all in for that

 

[cleveland]

I get your intended point there, @owliwar.

This case is oriented for GPUs powered exclusively through PCI-e slot (GTX 1050 - Ti or not -, GT 1030 and AMD ones...). The reason is a bit obvious, but must be made clear: to use GTX 1060 and more power hungry GPUs you'll need a good PSU and that requires room that a small HTPC does not have.

To illustrate the issue, compare the combo [G4560 + GTX 1050ti] vs [G4560 + GTX 1060 6GB].

The first one is clearly able to be powered by a HDplex 160w DC-ATX PSU + external brick and have a GPU that comes in low profile. No extra cables needed and clearly superior in therms os space efficiency.

The second one sits on the gray area. Outervision indicates 286w top consumption, so the 160w DC-ATX PSU does not seems to be a viable alternative. That plus the cable burden and extra PCI-e height...


and to make the things clear: the GPU will be mounted directly to the PCI-e slot. I called it "external GPU" 'cause the GPU (and the PCI-e slot itself) would be left outside the case.

 

[cleveland]

I imagine this case within the size range of a M350.

 

[owliwar]

Oh!
now I get it. That's interesting

I'll wait for more concepts then x)

 

[el01]

I've been thinking a lot about SFF problems and everytime i end up with the same idea:

For me, that live in a tropical country, cooling and properly dissipating the heat generated by a GPU is the first and biggest concern in a SFF case project. With that in mind, i started to do the reverse enginering of most ITX motherboard's design: the PCI-e area is almost always clear (and obviously should be, since GPU compatibility depends on it a lot!).

So i started to think about a case that is made to house all the computer component's, except for the GPU. That is advantageous in several ways:
1) thermal headroom: most of the GPU heat will spread to the external enviroment and wouldn't need any active cooling to be manageable;
2) overall volume reduction: if the case is meant to be used without PCI-e extender/riser, the GPU dictates case's height. on the other hand, if the GPU is housed externaly, the height of the case is bound to CPU heatsink and memory heights, that tends to be way smaller than expansion cards.
3) easy clean-up and overall maintenance: need to clean GPU heatsink? no problem! need to upgrade/replace GPU? no problem?

And here are my inicial thoughts for such a case:

* interchangeable (or adjustable) PCI-e bracket - or whatever name that piece that holds the back of GPU - capable of accommodating low profile and standard GPUs, as well as dual and single slot versions too;

* HTPC style. the smaller the height, the better;

* dual layer storage. SSDs and slim HDDs accommodated underneath mobo;

* one-piece-ish case. two pieces of cut'n'bended metal conected together by a couple of hinges;

I guess that's all. Please, feel free to criticize and give your feedback on the idea.



oh, and i'm trully sorry for the bad english too. this text was writen in a hurry and english is not my first language!

What would be super cool is to use 2 M.2 slots and software to get better bandwidth without compromise. It's a good idea, though. I would take pointers from http://airtop-pc.com/