Hello all,
About two months ago, I started to plan my very first own PC build, straight into the SFF class. No worry, I'm very thorough and know my way around the components, already started tinkering with PCs in the 90s with my own 386. So I believe I'm not heading into an incompatibility catastrophe with my build.
This is a story of my build process so far, with all the things I've been thinking on the way. It's only been virtual for now, me perusing the web for components and fitting them inside cases.
First thinking about the Thor Zone's Mjolnir I, but then switching over to Streacom DA2, for more room for bigger CPU fans, but with stylishness on par. After perusing quite many components, I decided to try and fit the humongous Noctua NH-C14S into it. A 140mm fan on top of a 170mm Mini-ITX mobo, well, that's ...something. But it would work really well, I think, drawing cooll air directly from the side, then blowing it onto the whole motherboard. Aided with one or two case fans, I believe it would work really well.
Noctua's motherboard compatibility list came very handy. As a result, I crossed out the Asus's Z390-I motherboard, as mechanically incompatible. I believe the huge heatpipe curve of the NH-C14S collides with the VRM heatsinks.
Then onto the Gigabyte motherboards. Their Z390 mini ITX was listed as compatible. However, the fan would only fit in in one orientation, I based on pictures. In two orientations, it would go through the case roof or bottom wall; in other, it would cover the PCIe slot. In the last one, it could fit, but only if the heatsink doesn't collide with the PSU, and the heatpipes wouldn't collide with the VRMs.
So, I started fitting it onto the motherboard photos, but couldn't really be sure if it would fit, as the photos are flat. I asked Noctua to confirm if it would really fit onto the motherboard, and they assured it would. Still I'm not 100 % convinced, but it remains to be seen. Here's an illustration:
So, would it collide with the PSU? I asked Streacom to provided some measurements about the motherboard location inside the DA2, as the currently only provide the outer size of the case. They didn't have them available, but promised to think about it and gave me a link to their SketchUp models of the case. So I took my virtual tinkering onto a whole new level and started putting in components to an actual virtual case! Luckily, it seemed the heatsink and the PSU would fit next to each other quite nicely.
Then arose another problem. As I was planning the top-notch model with the RTX 2080 Ti, I soon found out that the 50 mm room for the GPU card is not plenty. Blower cards? Yes, but no thank you. And if you go open-air, ASUS has no RTX 2080 Ti card that could fit; their thinnest is 54 mm wide. So it was either Gigabyte or MSI. Now, they even have the 40 mm thick cards, but I thought it'd be more optimal to try and cram in the fattest card possible, to reduce the fan noise. So it was either the 50.2 mm wide Gigabyte or the 50 mm wide MSI, and I thought that maybe the Gigabyte could fit in. (The .2 mm overshoot is negligible here, but I also worried about the manufacturing tolerances.)
But they'd be a very tight fit. I wanted to be sure if either of them would actually fit inside. There is the option of removing the bottom dust filter to get a tad more room, but I didn't want to resort into that. So I studied some more of the case and found out that when measured from the PCIe slot, the case has 45 mm room in it, towards the bottom.
This is now where my inexperience might show. If Gigabyte states that their card is 50.2 mm wide, it includes the backplate. But I had a measurement, made from the PCIe slot. There might be a way to deduce from that fact alone how wide the card is, when measured from the PCIe slot, towards the case bottom, but at least I don't know how.
So I thought, based on my good experiences with Noctua's and Streacom's support, that the easiest way might be to just ask the manufacturer.
Boy, how wrong I was.
First round, through Gigabyte's support. I told that I knew that the card in question is 50.2mm wide, but asked if they could provide the width of the card, when measured from the center line of the PCIe slot.
Naturally, their answer only contained facts I already knew: the outer measurements of the card. Ended with - I thought - quite obnoxious: "The information should be sufficient."
Well no, that isn't sufficient, and that was the whole point of me asking them. That I needed more information that is available on their website. Support frustration levelled up immediately. Perks: none.
Round two. I just asked them again, with a request to reread my question and answer what I actually asked for. Their response - they told me this is how the 50.2 mm is measured:
Well, of course it isn't. That is a completely different dimension (in this case, 114.5 mm), which should be painfully obvious for anybody ever seen a modern GPU card.
Frustration levelled up. Perk: my eyes roll without control now.
Round three. I provided them with an illustration. I though this ought the clear all the avenues for misinterpretation. I even gave them a hint that as the card is 50.2 mm wide, the correct answer should be somewhere around 44 to 48 mm.
Naturally, I was wrong. This time, they answered me that the, and I'm quoting, "that the component detail is confidential".
At this point, I couldn't decide whether to roll on the floor laughing or weeping. A confidential component detail that anybody with that card could readily measure without even opening the heatsink or anything.
Round four. As I'mblessedcursed with a lot of resolve when trying to get people to get it, I went on. I told them how silly it is to claim that it's confidential and asked once more to reread my question.
Still, they invented one more way to misinterpret my question. This time, they claimed that because I wrote in my first illustration that "I don't know its exact position", they cannot make the measurement, as they don't know from where exactly to measure it. Escaping their minds was the fact that the whole purpose of me asking them was that while I don't know its exact location, they do. It's their card, after all. Even now, I really cannot fathom how my illustration can be misinterpreted so glaringly. It should be painfully obvious what I'm asking, shouldn't it? Do you agree?
Round five. This is still waiting for an answer. Now I really decided I cannot keep this going any further. This has to be the last try to make them get it. Once more, another illustration:
</vent>
At this point I'm quite sure I won't be buying a Gigabyte GPU. This abysmal level of misunderstanding is just unbearable. Maybe MSI, then. It remains to be seen when I continue with the build design. At this point I've also decided to give it some more time. My current laptop with - ironically - a Gigabyte's GTX 1080 Gaming Box eGPU hooked into it is just good enough for now. Meanwhile, some new RTX 2080 Ti designs might be introduced. Here's hoping.
Still, I thought it'd be nice to share my story of my virtual SFF build, with all the things that I faced when starting from experience level 0 and trying to cram in the most powerful components I could find. It's not an easy task, and a lot of challenges that aren't obvious, but still it's quite fun in itself, making all that research
At some point I will build my Dream Machine. You can count on me posting pictures of it then. Cheers!
About two months ago, I started to plan my very first own PC build, straight into the SFF class. No worry, I'm very thorough and know my way around the components, already started tinkering with PCs in the 90s with my own 386. So I believe I'm not heading into an incompatibility catastrophe with my build.
This is a story of my build process so far, with all the things I've been thinking on the way. It's only been virtual for now, me perusing the web for components and fitting them inside cases.
First thinking about the Thor Zone's Mjolnir I, but then switching over to Streacom DA2, for more room for bigger CPU fans, but with stylishness on par. After perusing quite many components, I decided to try and fit the humongous Noctua NH-C14S into it. A 140mm fan on top of a 170mm Mini-ITX mobo, well, that's ...something. But it would work really well, I think, drawing cooll air directly from the side, then blowing it onto the whole motherboard. Aided with one or two case fans, I believe it would work really well.
Noctua's motherboard compatibility list came very handy. As a result, I crossed out the Asus's Z390-I motherboard, as mechanically incompatible. I believe the huge heatpipe curve of the NH-C14S collides with the VRM heatsinks.
Then onto the Gigabyte motherboards. Their Z390 mini ITX was listed as compatible. However, the fan would only fit in in one orientation, I based on pictures. In two orientations, it would go through the case roof or bottom wall; in other, it would cover the PCIe slot. In the last one, it could fit, but only if the heatsink doesn't collide with the PSU, and the heatpipes wouldn't collide with the VRMs.
So, I started fitting it onto the motherboard photos, but couldn't really be sure if it would fit, as the photos are flat. I asked Noctua to confirm if it would really fit onto the motherboard, and they assured it would. Still I'm not 100 % convinced, but it remains to be seen. Here's an illustration:
So, would it collide with the PSU? I asked Streacom to provided some measurements about the motherboard location inside the DA2, as the currently only provide the outer size of the case. They didn't have them available, but promised to think about it and gave me a link to their SketchUp models of the case. So I took my virtual tinkering onto a whole new level and started putting in components to an actual virtual case! Luckily, it seemed the heatsink and the PSU would fit next to each other quite nicely.
Then arose another problem. As I was planning the top-notch model with the RTX 2080 Ti, I soon found out that the 50 mm room for the GPU card is not plenty. Blower cards? Yes, but no thank you. And if you go open-air, ASUS has no RTX 2080 Ti card that could fit; their thinnest is 54 mm wide. So it was either Gigabyte or MSI. Now, they even have the 40 mm thick cards, but I thought it'd be more optimal to try and cram in the fattest card possible, to reduce the fan noise. So it was either the 50.2 mm wide Gigabyte or the 50 mm wide MSI, and I thought that maybe the Gigabyte could fit in. (The .2 mm overshoot is negligible here, but I also worried about the manufacturing tolerances.)
But they'd be a very tight fit. I wanted to be sure if either of them would actually fit inside. There is the option of removing the bottom dust filter to get a tad more room, but I didn't want to resort into that. So I studied some more of the case and found out that when measured from the PCIe slot, the case has 45 mm room in it, towards the bottom.
This is now where my inexperience might show. If Gigabyte states that their card is 50.2 mm wide, it includes the backplate. But I had a measurement, made from the PCIe slot. There might be a way to deduce from that fact alone how wide the card is, when measured from the PCIe slot, towards the case bottom, but at least I don't know how.
So I thought, based on my good experiences with Noctua's and Streacom's support, that the easiest way might be to just ask the manufacturer.
Boy, how wrong I was.
First round, through Gigabyte's support. I told that I knew that the card in question is 50.2mm wide, but asked if they could provide the width of the card, when measured from the center line of the PCIe slot.
Naturally, their answer only contained facts I already knew: the outer measurements of the card. Ended with - I thought - quite obnoxious: "The information should be sufficient."
Well no, that isn't sufficient, and that was the whole point of me asking them. That I needed more information that is available on their website. Support frustration levelled up immediately. Perks: none.
Round two. I just asked them again, with a request to reread my question and answer what I actually asked for. Their response - they told me this is how the 50.2 mm is measured:
Well, of course it isn't. That is a completely different dimension (in this case, 114.5 mm), which should be painfully obvious for anybody ever seen a modern GPU card.
Frustration levelled up. Perk: my eyes roll without control now.
Round three. I provided them with an illustration. I though this ought the clear all the avenues for misinterpretation. I even gave them a hint that as the card is 50.2 mm wide, the correct answer should be somewhere around 44 to 48 mm.
Naturally, I was wrong. This time, they answered me that the, and I'm quoting, "that the component detail is confidential".
At this point, I couldn't decide whether to roll on the floor laughing or weeping. A confidential component detail that anybody with that card could readily measure without even opening the heatsink or anything.
Round four. As I'm
Still, they invented one more way to misinterpret my question. This time, they claimed that because I wrote in my first illustration that "I don't know its exact position", they cannot make the measurement, as they don't know from where exactly to measure it. Escaping their minds was the fact that the whole purpose of me asking them was that while I don't know its exact location, they do. It's their card, after all. Even now, I really cannot fathom how my illustration can be misinterpreted so glaringly. It should be painfully obvious what I'm asking, shouldn't it? Do you agree?
Round five. This is still waiting for an answer. Now I really decided I cannot keep this going any further. This has to be the last try to make them get it. Once more, another illustration:
</vent>
At this point I'm quite sure I won't be buying a Gigabyte GPU. This abysmal level of misunderstanding is just unbearable. Maybe MSI, then. It remains to be seen when I continue with the build design. At this point I've also decided to give it some more time. My current laptop with - ironically - a Gigabyte's GTX 1080 Gaming Box eGPU hooked into it is just good enough for now. Meanwhile, some new RTX 2080 Ti designs might be introduced. Here's hoping.
Still, I thought it'd be nice to share my story of my virtual SFF build, with all the things that I faced when starting from experience level 0 and trying to cram in the most powerful components I could find. It's not an easy task, and a lot of challenges that aren't obvious, but still it's quite fun in itself, making all that research
At some point I will build my Dream Machine. You can count on me posting pictures of it then. Cheers!
