SFF build with enough airflow for 4.6 ghz+ overclock on air?

[tigim101]

Hello everyone,

I currently own a Node 304, with a Xeon e3 1230 v2, (basically an i7 without igpu and turbo boost to 3.6ghz, cant overclock) 16gb of ram, gtx 670, 1tb 3.5 hd + 120gb 2.5 ssd, and a seasonic 550w gold psu.

I am graduating with a bachelors of engineering in May 2016 (fingers crossed) and I want to upgrade my build a bit by then, as a present to myself. I mostly want to get an i7 that I can overclock, i'm thinking Devil's Canyon 4970k (skylake looks like the same performance but you need more expensive ddr4, but maybe that will change), so I can get pc master race single core performance for those older games that I play, a big one being Vindictus, which only uses one core and is very cpu intensive. I want something quiet and I was thinking of getting a define r5, since it would be big and easy to work with. But as you all know, once you catch the SFF bug there is no going back. I've made 3 SFF builds so far and seeing what new cases are out there and how much I can fit in is so much fun, recently I've discovered Nova, and good god is it beautiful.

Thing is with almost all these SFF builds everyone does a mild overclock or none at all, because of the space constraints. I want to get a 4.6 or 4.7 ghz overclock, or as high as I can get in something of this size, but I'm not sure if it's possible in the smaller cases while staying quiet. I also don't want to go custom water cooling, only AIO if I have to.

If I go with a case like Nova, do you think I could get that kind of overclock with an air or AIO cooler on the CPU? I'm most likely going to stay with one GPU, and with the size of the case I'd have to pick whether I'd go AIO on the GPU or the CPU. If there are other cases where I could achieve a high overclock that are small I'd be open to them as well. The biggest I'd go and what looks like a good choice would be the Silverstone TJ08, or the new TJ08 Pro/PS07-E coming out. Theyre small (ish) and with careful fan and component selection I'm guessing they would be pretty quiet. I also could reuse my existing PSU and RAM, (i'm not rich yet). That would be the safest choice, but ideally I'd like to go as small as possible.

Any help/suggestions would be appreciated.

TDLR; I need MATX or MITX cases that can hold one high end GPU and overclock an i7 to 4.6ghz+ without using a custom loop. The smaller/sexier the better.

 

[jeshikat]

In Nova I'm running a 5930K, and it draws about as much power at stock settings as a 4790K would overclocked, maybe a bit less if the 4790K is heavily OCed. With a 140mm AIO on the side bracket the CPU temps are fine even with the fans adjusted for low noise levels.

Some SFF cases are just terribly designed for airflow but many, like the M1, Dondan's A4, and Nova, have intake vents right up against the major components and can actually run cooler than much larger cases since the parts directly draw in fresh air and then the small volume of the case means the hot exhaust gets pushed out fairly quickly, instead of lingering and heating up the interior.

Of course I think Nova is a nice design but if you don't need more than a single video card and are fine with 16GB of RAM then I'd stick with Mini-ITX and get the M1. You could go for a 240mm for the CPU or dual 120mm rads, one for the CPU and the other for an AIO on the GPU.

 

[tigim101]

Oh wow, Nova's designer replied to my post, what an honor. You did an amazing job on that case, you should be proud.

Hmm, if that's the case with your build I may be able to do this after all. I have 2 8gb Gskill Ripjaws, do you know if those would be too high profile for the Nova? (well on second thought, you would know, you designed it lol). While I think that I most likely won't really be doing SLI, I would probably want to go for 32gb of ram, and have that added piece of mind that would let me go SLI if needed. Theyre both tiny as it is, and the handle on the Nova seems pretty handy (oops).

As far as using AIO vs air on the CPU/GPU, what combination would be the quietest while giving temps that wouldn't allow for throttling? I think using a 240mm for the CPU and using a reference blower type cooler would allow for best temps for overclocking the CPU, but those blower coolers, even the newer nvidia ones, might be loud during load. Then again I might be overestimating the amount of cooling I need to run 4.6ghz stable on a 4790k. I'm guessing browsing through the Ncase thread on hard forum might be a good idea of what cooling I would need to overclock that kind of CPU.

 

[jeshikat]

The RAM will depend on the motherboard and the cooler. With the NZXT X41 for example, it's a thicker rad so that leaves less room for tall RAM, and then I have a X99 board with RAM slots on both sides of the CPU so tall RAM isn't very suitable. Ripjaws aren't too tall compared to some others so with a 115x socket board I think it'll be fine with a single fan at least. Trying to do push-pull with a thick rad wouldn't work.

The reference coolers are loud at full load. I've tested a non-reference GTX780 though and it held up well. You can check out all the thermal testing data I've done at the link at the bottom of this page: http://www.kimeraindustries.com/blog/2015/2/13/thermal-testing-announcement

If you're not hypersensitive to noise and don't mind a bit of pump buzz then AIO for each the CPU and GPU will probably give best temps at fairly low noise.

 

[Vittra]

Here are some points I think are relevant for you.

1) DDR4 will be significantly cheaper by the time you build, if it is indeed May 2016 that you are planning to build.

2) Skylake should offer significantly better overclocks on average with the removal of the FIVR from the CPU. With the lack of availability, we won't know for sure until Sept/Oct at which point more people will then have it. It is very difficult to get above 4.4ghz on many Haswell/Devil's Canyon chips, let alone in a SFF rig which usually means increased thermals.

3) Silence is a subjective thing. Very subjective. Regardless, in a SFF ITX build, choose between silence or extreme performance. You aren't getting both in the M1 unless you mimic Phuncz's build pretty much identically, and even then, his was a fairly modest overclock.

 

[Phuncz]

3) Silence is a subjective thing. Very subjective. Regardless, in a SFF ITX build, choose between silence or extreme performance. You aren't getting both in the M1 unless you mimic Phuncz's build pretty much identically, and even then, his was a fairly modest overclock.

Oh my system has 0% overclock At the moment I'm not feeling I need more performance and 10% more performance is certainly not worth the >10% noise. But as you already said: noise is subjective. For me it is silent, since I can only hear it if I want to hear it by focusing on the noise and not playing games with sound or something ridiculous. Though I would expect my build is not silent enough for the extremely noise sensitive people. But I can say it is by far the most quiet system I've built.

 

[Edward78]

http://www.lian-li.com/en/dt_portfolio/pc-v800/ sadly it is discontinued, if they still made it it is mesh all the way around (almost) looks like it would have decent airflow...