Prebuilt [SFFn] ASRock's DeskMini A300 - Finally!

ShamedGod

Cable-Tie Ninja
Apr 21, 2019
147
77
The hieght of that cooler is 60 mm

Anyone knows if a Zalman CNPS8900 could fit?
In the past I've already made some custom am4 brackets for rotate the cooler of 90 dregrees beacuse of ram clearance...

The A300 requires a cooler 46mm or less.

That brings the options down to:
1) cooler provided by ASrock
2) Wraith Stealth with the outer shroud removed
3) noctua NH-L9a

I am unaware of any other AM4 cooler options that would work beyond those.
 

wesbl

Cable-Tie Ninja
Sep 9, 2017
174
115
The hieght of that cooler is 60 mm



The A300 requires a cooler 46mm or less.

That brings the options down to:
1) cooler provided by ASrock
2) Wraith Stealth with the outer shroud removed
3) noctua NH-L9a

I am unaware of any other AM4 cooler options that would work beyond those.

Sorry, I mean on the motherboard, not the chassis.
 

ShamedGod

Cable-Tie Ninja
Apr 21, 2019
147
77
Sorry, I mean on the motherboard, not the chassis.

The NH-L9A maximizes the available surface area of the A300. The side of the heatsink almost touches the ram. I've never used the Zalman CNPS8900 but if it is 6.7 x 10.1 x 3.1 inches as listed on Amazon then it is larger then the NH-L9A, which is listed at 3.6 x 1.5 x 4.5, and would likely have an issue fitting onto the board.
 

Slowjim

Trash Compacter
Mar 12, 2019
53
25
wesbl do you have plans to use the A300 motherboard in a different case? I have a CNPS8900 and would love to do the same. Only case I am aware of that fits are the Silverstone ones that have even less clearance than the OEM case
 

wesbl

Cable-Tie Ninja
Sep 9, 2017
174
115
wesbl do you have plans to use the A300 motherboard in a different case? I have a CNPS8900 and would love to do the same. Only case I am aware of that fits are the Silverstone ones that have even less clearance than the OEM case

I'd like to make a custom 3d printed case for the A300+CNPS8900+LP GPU.
 

Kmpkt

Innovation through Miniaturization
KMPKT
Feb 1, 2016
3,382
5,936
I can print you a Nomad, but needs to use an HP printer through Shapeways to be of sufficient quality. Last time I checked costs around 400 USD > <
 

Slowjim

Trash Compacter
Mar 12, 2019
53
25
I'd like to make a custom 3d printed case for the A300+CNPS8900+LP GPU.

Saw a post on Reddit yesterday of a guy who was trying to use an 8900 in an ITX case and it was hitting ram. Don't think it would work in the A300 unfortunately
 

ShamedGod

Cable-Tie Ninja
Apr 21, 2019
147
77
How does that free up a USB port?

Don't have to use USB speakers for sound. The usb speaker I was using was very basic and using head phones all the time is annoying. Already had a solid 4.1 speaker set from an old gaming rig collecting dust so was cheaper to buy the cable.
 

rfarmer

Spatial Philosopher
Jul 7, 2017
2,668
2,792

wesbl

Cable-Tie Ninja
Sep 9, 2017
174
115
Saw a post on Reddit yesterday of a guy who was trying to use an 8900 in an ITX case and it was hitting ram. Don't think it would work in the A300 unfortunately

Look at this, my creation :)
 
Last edited:

Slowjim

Trash Compacter
Mar 12, 2019
53
25
Nice!

I just use speakers plugged into the front port and when i pull out my bluetooth earbuds the speakers automatically switch off
 

NateDawg72

Master of Cramming
Aug 11, 2016
398
302
From what I've heard from owners, it sounds like there is no option to undervolt. On a previous bios version there was an option but it did not work - the undervolt would not be applied
 

ShamedGod

Cable-Tie Ninja
Apr 21, 2019
147
77
can i undervolt with the asrock stx board? or can i not change the cpu voltages at all?
You can:
- enable PBO
- Change ram voltage from 1.20 to 1.35
- manually tune ram speed and timings
- change SOC voltage

That's about it. If I missed something someone please correct me. Most of that is a "moo" point; especially with a 3400G. With two HDD and an NVME the A300 has been throttling hard under load and stress testing. The maintainable all core speed is between 3600Mhz and 3750Mhz and it spends a lot of time below advertised stock of 3.7Ghz. It's almost exactly the same CPU performance as the 2400G.

I have an open support inquiry with ASRock. They apparently are not able to duplicate my results and are seeing an all core initial boost of 4.2 with higher sustained clocks then stock. I wouldn't have believed them if they didn't provide a photo showing prime95 and HWinfo.

I've asked for the BIOS settings and setup used for testing, we'll see where that goes.
 
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