Having been inspired by the Tek Everything video, I've been busy on pcpartpicker and overclockers spec-ing my own variant.
I plan to use the system to replace a NUC5i7RYH that I've been using as a HTPC and Plex Media Server for a couple of years. Whilst it's dinky small and uses minimal (in theory 7W idle) power, when Plex starts a transcode or 2 in parallel it maxes out the CPU for a short while and the fan becomes noticeable (~43dB) and annoying.
So, for my build I want to aim for silence rather than power/OC (8th gen processors will easily cope with the Plex load - testing on an 5820K I don't get over 4%) while still having the ability to play games where I wont mind some noise.
Welcome to the forum!
This use case is pretty much exactly why I designed the case, I wanted a system that used high end desktop level hardware yet ran silent under idle to medium usage and quiet under gaming or high load.
The 140mm chassis fan in combination with the "wind tunnel" layout eliminates heat re-circulation, so even a very gentle low rpm breeze from the case fan is enough to keep temps in check so all the fans in the system can spin slowly for a nice and quiet system. A motherboard with good fan control options is important for this.
Based upon sticking to the SF450 (rather than a DC PSU with external brick)
For silence the SF450 is the perfect choice, it runs fanless even under full gaming and Synthetic stress load in my own personal system which has been tested with a GTX 1070 in combination with both the Ryzen 5 2400G and the Intel i7-7700.
I wont be able to go for a watercooling option so the NH-L12S seems to be the way to go for performance and silence,
I wouldn't recommend water cooling even if you did end up going for the DC-DC PSU and panels, my testing showed that the Noctua NH-U9S setup outperformed the Corsair H60 in both temps and noise tests.
When it comes to SFX PSU's though, the Noctua NH-L12S is definitely the cooler of choice in my opinion. It is a very well balanced cooler providing low temps, low noise and can be run silently with the right fan curves under moderate usage for a 65W CPU.
8700T has some appeal as the 35W TDP will allow 24/7 lower power consumption, especially when BIOS limited.
8700 at 65W TDP should be cool enough with the L12S and keep silent in most conditions (GPU fan more likely to be source of noise based upon reading so far)
8700K even at stock seems likely to get too hot under load, pushing the L12S higher than the ~28-31dB range I'd like to hit
I don't think you need to drop down to a 35W CPU in the LZ7 even if you are looking for slience under light usage, with the right fan and CPU cooler setup this can be achieved with 65W CPU's.
I've not tested a 95W CPU in the LZ7 personally, so I don't have any data on how these K chips perform under idle/light usage.
And then the subject of delidding arose......and I started wondering whether a delidded (DIY or from AWD-IT) 8700K could stay as cool, if not cooler than an 8700 and thereby maintain a lower fan speed safely under load. Anyone looked at delidding in this case (on air) from the perspective of lower noise/silence ?
I have no experience with de-lidding sorry, I'm not aware of anyone in particular that has done this inside the LZ7.
...plenty of time for answers to come in as Overclockers can't tell me when they'll have more stock of black left hand side corner brackets for the Lazer3D LZ7
I am sorry about that, I delivered 40 sets of black corners just over a week ago and they've sold out already! I think they had quite a few back orders that were waiting as well before I delivered them. I am waiting on another delivery of around 40 sets of black corners (and another order lined up after that) which I expect to receive in the next 1 - 2 weeks. Its then a matter of inserting all the brass threads ready to be sent to Overclockers which will likely be another week after receiving them. Sorry for the delay.
I know it doesn't really help your situation, but from September onwards I will be focusing on Lazer3D full time which I hope will allow me to reduce lead times and also get ahead of the demand rather than playing catch up. Hopefully I will be posting more updates on this over the coming months.
...they also don't have an ETA for the SF450 Platinum....
I believe the Platinum versions are quite new so they probably sold out pretty quick, hopefully they will have some more stock soon.
oh and to top it off the Vengeance LPX memory I was looking at a decent price on ebuyer on has gone up by £80 overnight, lol
Yeah memory prices have become a major slice of the build cost compared to a few years ago, I hope this trend starts to reverse sometime soon.