Enclosure Will Streacom f1c Evo support a 95w TDP cpu

TrevinLC1997

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Apr 27, 2018
7
0
If the rumors are true about the upcoming Zen 2 then I plan on buying the 3600G (8/16, and 20 Navi cu) and putting that in the Streacom F1C. I wouldn't think about overclocking it and may even undervolt it.

I plan on having a noctua pwm 40mm case fan.

I plan on using a m.2 so I am unsure if I can remove the HDD/SSD tray for more room for a cooler. I got the case without the disk drive . (Haven't got the case yet in the mail so I can't look at it)

And I plan on using the Nocuta L9A cooler which I guess works a little bit better than the sister product for Intel Noctua L9i.

I just wanna see what type of beast I can make for a super small PC.
 

scope

Chassis Packer
Aug 6, 2019
19
1
Hi, did you build something with this case?

I have this case too and want to use a 95W TDP 9600K in it.

I expect this case to get very hot inside, towards 70C or so. If that'll be the case indeed, then one can forget about worrying too much about CPU temps It'll get to 100C under heavy load and will throttle. So I'm definitely expecting undervolting and capping the power limit.

In comparison the current 6-core Mac Mini has about half the volume and packs a 150W AC-DC PSU. As far as I know its 65W TDP CPU will get to 100C with stress testing. It doesn't seem to have too much metal for the heatsink in it, on the other hand they channel air through it from the bottom to the rear exhaust with a blower fan, and it looks to be working good for pushing out the heat.

The F1C has much more room for a nice CPU heatsink and fan. But it'll be normal axial fan sitting in the middle and I'd guess hot air will get recirculated inside the case. Getting hot inside is just inherent to the small size so I'd think it comes down to pushing the heat from the CPU out of the case quickly.
Maybe a custom 3D printed sort of channel over or on the CPU fan could be used to help the fan to channel out the heat through the rear exhaust better. Sides would be then intakes and optimally CPU heatsink fins would be oriented parallel.
 
Last edited:

scope

Chassis Packer
Aug 6, 2019
19
1
I did some initial testing.

I got a 69C reading on the MB sensor with the CPU long term power limit (PL1) capped to just 20W after 50-60 minutes of Linux kernel compiling + playing a 1080p movie with mpv with some demanding post-processing for additional GPU shader workout + light browsing.

The config is: 9600K undervolted with -90mV offset, LP53 + Noctua 9x14, Asrock Z370 Fatal1ty, 32GB DDR4-3600, Samsung 970 Pro 1TB in the x16 slot, HDPLEX 200W DC-ATX, Noctua 4x10 on one side of the case.

So I guess if the CPU is putting out 20-25W heat the whole system is around 35-40W when heavily loaded.

There's an important caveat: the intended use case is indefinitely long running full loads on all cores while staying very quiet. So this how I got the 20W power limit.

I don't like the noise coming form the Noctua 9x14 at 40% RPM and above so the CPU fan is capped at 33% RPM no matter how high the CPU temp is. Similarly the small 4x10 case fan is capped at 33%. The fans go to 33% above 90C CPU temp. With these the noise is alright with heavy loads, might be better than most systems, and the system is inaudible when doing light tasks, with the fan at 25% or 800 RPM or so at minimum.

So there must be very little airflow in this already airflow limited case. When idling for a long time, the MB sensor is around 48-50C and the CPU is 55-60C. With heavy load the CPU can boost to 4Ghz an all cores for a short while when starting from a lowish temp, then the PL1 kicks in, it goes to around an average of 3.5GHz for a few minutes, then it goes further down and settles at an average 2.5GHz long term.

The CPU temp then stays mostly in the 88-97C range, with thermal throttling typically not happening. The MB sensor slowly rises towards 70C over time. Only tested for an hour so far though. The SSD without heatsink is reaching 100C on one sensor. The top lid of the case is above 55C, just like the temperature of air behind the rear vents when sticking inside a generic multimeter temperature probe. This is still with 20W long term CPU limit. When idling again the cooling off is very slow, like it needs up to 5 minutes of idling to shed 2C. The CPU goes below 90C quickly and with that the fans go back to minimum RPM which doesn't help with that.

Will it settle at 70C on the MB sensor when running for many hours is still a question. Otherwise what should be the TDP limit for the CPU then. We're almost in fanless NUC case territory here. Another thing, when running so hot, after a while you can smell that the system is running hot, which is unfortunately not very nice, there's probably some outgassing from some components at those temps.
 

scope

Chassis Packer
Aug 6, 2019
19
1
Took off the lid and increased PL1 to 50W. About 15 minutes into kernel compile the CPU settled at 2.8GHz and CPU temp maxed out at 85C. Then set the PL1 to 20W again and interestingly the CPU showed higher temps, oscillating between 88-100C with the freqency going back and forth between 2.5-3.8Ghz or so, resulting in a higher average of 3.2GHz (as showed by powertop) than the 2.8GHz of the higher PL1 limit. Then set PL1 to 30W which behaved similarly to PL1 of 50W, maxing out at 2.8GHz with similar temps.

So this is not very straightforward. Maybe it's the Reliability Stress Restrictor and that it uses voltage (CPU is undervolted), temps, PL1 limit all as variables and governs the CPU so it limits it at 2.8GHz when PL1 is 30W but when the PL1 is 20W it happens to allow it to go momentarily higher? I don't know. Possibly the kernel compile is not a good test either for extreme CPU load, but used it so far because it was the actually the quickest to crash an unstable system.
 

sgsharkie

Cable Smoosher
Dec 16, 2019
8
2
Took off the lid and increased PL1 to 50W. About 15 minutes into kernel compile the CPU settled at 2.8GHz and CPU temp maxed out at 85C. Then set the PL1 to 20W again and interestingly the CPU showed higher temps, oscillating between 88-100C with the freqency going back and forth between 2.5-3.8Ghz or so, resulting in a higher average of 3.2GHz (as showed by powertop) than the 2.8GHz of the higher PL1 limit. Then set PL1 to 30W which behaved similarly to PL1 of 50W, maxing out at 2.8GHz with similar temps.

So this is not very straightforward. Maybe it's the Reliability Stress Restrictor and that it uses voltage (CPU is undervolted), temps, PL1 limit all as variables and governs the CPU so it limits it at 2.8GHz when PL1 is 30W but when the PL1 is 20W it happens to allow it to go momentarily higher? I don't know. Possibly the kernel compile is not a good test either for extreme CPU load, but used it so far because it was the actually the quickest to crash an unstable system.

I'm looking at this case for a build with a 3400G, what PSU did you end up using?
 

scope

Chassis Packer
Aug 6, 2019
19
1
I'm looking at this case for a build with a 3400G, what PSU did you end up using?

It's somewhat complicated: the PSU is the HDPLEX 200W DC-ATX but it only fits when taking off the nice heatsink on one side, because the black mounting plate in the front of the case that holds the power button assembly is in the way. When taking off the heatsink of the PSU it's a very tight fit, you have to bend the black mounting plate a little while placing the MB into the case. With the PSU plugged into the MB beforehand. I have a thick soft silicone thermal pad, which could go between the plate and the bare PCB side of the PSU, which I'd guess could improve the thermals of the PSU a little and might be a nicer fit mechanically to have some cushioning between the PSU and the plate, but I haven''t tried it out yet.

The DC jack that comes with the HDPLEX 200W DC-ATX doesn't fit this case, which I did know before buying. The case has a 8mm hole for the DC-in jack. For that I have a Switchcraft 712AH (and a Switchcraft 760H DC plug for a custom external DC power cable). So you need a custom power cable inside the case with wires soldered to the 712AH one end and crimped to a fitting Molex connector on the other end to connect to the DC-ATX PSU.

Otherwise you need a DC-ATX PSU that comes with a DC jack that fits the 8mm mounting hole of the case. But as said I believe without some mods to improve the airflow you need to strongly limit the CPU wattage in this case, so like a 150W PSU would be certainly enough as well.
 
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