Hello friends,
First of all I have to make a confession: I have been infected by the SFF bug around September 2017 after looking for a new small PC, initially laptop, and accidentaly reading reviews for SFF cases in various sites and especially after discovering NCASE M1 at hardforum and SFF forums. The build components selection finalized a few months later after countless hours of reading and the final build completed a year ago. It took me a year to publish this but I think it is never too late when you really want to share.
So, here are the components:
NCASE M1 v5.0
ASUS ROG STRIX X370-I GAMING
Noctua C14 with replacement fans: NF-A15 PWM + NF-A15 HS-PWM Chromax
2 NF-P14 FLX case fans (the ones taken out from the original C14)
MSI GeForce GTX 1070 Aero ITX 8G OC
Samsung SSD M2 nvme 512GB Pro
2 x 16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX Black CMK16GX4M2B3600C18
CORSAIR SF600
Silverstone SFX to ATX adapter
CableMod custom black PSU cables
The build is accompanied by an EIZO EV2451 monitor and a Dell KM714 keyboard. As you see, I tried to build a silent and not overstuffed build, this was the main reason of selecting a mini but powerful enough for my needs GPU.
As you noticed I was so obsessed with the C14 for the CPU cooling that I managed to find and buy online a B-grade C14 that was anyway unused and like brand new. And on top I exchanged the original NF-P14s with NF-A15s and as you noticed of different max speed (1200 & 1500 RPM), this is why the one from Chromax line, to minimize, according to Noctua, the turbulence caused if you choose fans spinning with the same RPM and therefore reduce the noise further. Noctua kindly provided me with additional fan clips to match the NF-A15s shape. The C14 is used as a Top Flow blowing air towards the MB, i.e. keeping the C14 default setup.
I also placed the original NF-P14 fans at the bottom of the case (why to leave unused such excellent fans!), positioned as intake to improve the case airflow. As you see in the pictures below the fitting is almost perfect, I have just used some modified rubber pads to avoid vibrations and make the 2 fan setup exactly fit the base. And to give some numbers here: if I set the ASUS Fan Xpert 4 app mode to SILENT, i.e. leave only the C14 fans ON in quiet mode, the CPU temperature is increased by 3-4 degrees Celsius in idle while the PCH temp by 10 degrees and more! BTW, the room temp is now 22-23 degrees. I had initially started with 1 NF-P14 on the free side of the case bottom but then added the second one under the GPU and it significantly improved temps.
As I am not a gamer, I cannot provide detailed benchmark scores, I will just try to give you an idea: using the ASUS AI Suite 3 app (no overclocking in BIOS manually) I managed 4GHz stable max for the Ryzen 7 1700 and CPU temp not exceeding 75-80 degrees. In idle with a room temp ~23 degrees the CPU temp is 32 degrees but with the bottom fans spinning at ~500RPM. It is important to say that the RAM's clock is default and when I set it manually to 3600MHz through BIOS, the system was perfectly stable BUT the CPU temp increased in idle by 5 degrees! I had also installed for testing an NF-A9x14 PWM as intake on the rear but it did not improve temps in normal RPMs and when it did by 2 degrees it was spinning at max RPM and was too noisy for my taste, so I abandoned this. Regarding cabling I tried to arrange and leave as much space free as possible, for better cooling and appearance.
My future plan is to replace the MSI GPU stock cooler with an Accelero III (I know, maybe it is an overkill but I like the setup and maybe improve temps in intensive GPU usage), switch the C14 fans into exhaust mode (I am almost sure that this will improve temps for a case like M1) and maybe replacing the SF600 fan with the NF-A9x14 cause my SF600 produces this clicking noise whenever its fan stops. A dream is a custom loop but this will need time and money altough I have done my pre-study?.
Finally, I cannot describe how happy am I with the result and how much I want to thank people like @Necere and @Wahaha360 for their passion that triggered an exciting journey for so many people, myself included. Some pictures of the build below.
Apologies for the big images, at least they are detailed! I hope you will enjoy it as I do.
Keep in touch.
First of all I have to make a confession: I have been infected by the SFF bug around September 2017 after looking for a new small PC, initially laptop, and accidentaly reading reviews for SFF cases in various sites and especially after discovering NCASE M1 at hardforum and SFF forums. The build components selection finalized a few months later after countless hours of reading and the final build completed a year ago. It took me a year to publish this but I think it is never too late when you really want to share.
So, here are the components:
NCASE M1 v5.0
ASUS ROG STRIX X370-I GAMING
Noctua C14 with replacement fans: NF-A15 PWM + NF-A15 HS-PWM Chromax
2 NF-P14 FLX case fans (the ones taken out from the original C14)
MSI GeForce GTX 1070 Aero ITX 8G OC
Samsung SSD M2 nvme 512GB Pro
2 x 16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX Black CMK16GX4M2B3600C18
CORSAIR SF600
Silverstone SFX to ATX adapter
CableMod custom black PSU cables
The build is accompanied by an EIZO EV2451 monitor and a Dell KM714 keyboard. As you see, I tried to build a silent and not overstuffed build, this was the main reason of selecting a mini but powerful enough for my needs GPU.
As you noticed I was so obsessed with the C14 for the CPU cooling that I managed to find and buy online a B-grade C14 that was anyway unused and like brand new. And on top I exchanged the original NF-P14s with NF-A15s and as you noticed of different max speed (1200 & 1500 RPM), this is why the one from Chromax line, to minimize, according to Noctua, the turbulence caused if you choose fans spinning with the same RPM and therefore reduce the noise further. Noctua kindly provided me with additional fan clips to match the NF-A15s shape. The C14 is used as a Top Flow blowing air towards the MB, i.e. keeping the C14 default setup.
I also placed the original NF-P14 fans at the bottom of the case (why to leave unused such excellent fans!), positioned as intake to improve the case airflow. As you see in the pictures below the fitting is almost perfect, I have just used some modified rubber pads to avoid vibrations and make the 2 fan setup exactly fit the base. And to give some numbers here: if I set the ASUS Fan Xpert 4 app mode to SILENT, i.e. leave only the C14 fans ON in quiet mode, the CPU temperature is increased by 3-4 degrees Celsius in idle while the PCH temp by 10 degrees and more! BTW, the room temp is now 22-23 degrees. I had initially started with 1 NF-P14 on the free side of the case bottom but then added the second one under the GPU and it significantly improved temps.
As I am not a gamer, I cannot provide detailed benchmark scores, I will just try to give you an idea: using the ASUS AI Suite 3 app (no overclocking in BIOS manually) I managed 4GHz stable max for the Ryzen 7 1700 and CPU temp not exceeding 75-80 degrees. In idle with a room temp ~23 degrees the CPU temp is 32 degrees but with the bottom fans spinning at ~500RPM. It is important to say that the RAM's clock is default and when I set it manually to 3600MHz through BIOS, the system was perfectly stable BUT the CPU temp increased in idle by 5 degrees! I had also installed for testing an NF-A9x14 PWM as intake on the rear but it did not improve temps in normal RPMs and when it did by 2 degrees it was spinning at max RPM and was too noisy for my taste, so I abandoned this. Regarding cabling I tried to arrange and leave as much space free as possible, for better cooling and appearance.
My future plan is to replace the MSI GPU stock cooler with an Accelero III (I know, maybe it is an overkill but I like the setup and maybe improve temps in intensive GPU usage), switch the C14 fans into exhaust mode (I am almost sure that this will improve temps for a case like M1) and maybe replacing the SF600 fan with the NF-A9x14 cause my SF600 produces this clicking noise whenever its fan stops. A dream is a custom loop but this will need time and money altough I have done my pre-study?.
Finally, I cannot describe how happy am I with the result and how much I want to thank people like @Necere and @Wahaha360 for their passion that triggered an exciting journey for so many people, myself included. Some pictures of the build below.
Apologies for the big images, at least they are detailed! I hope you will enjoy it as I do.
Keep in touch.
