CoolerMaster Elite 120 Advanced Build

The build is designed to replace my outdated CM Storm Scout with mostly gaming in mind.

Coolermaster Elite 120 Case
i5 3570 clocked @ 4.2 Ghz
Noctua NH L9i cooler
2x Samsung Green 4 GB DDR3 1600Mhz RAM clocked at 21XX 10-11-10-30
Asus P8Z77 I Deluxe mini ITX Mobo
EVGA GTX 660 Ti GPU clocked to 3500Mhz
Corsair CX500M PSU
Alpenfohn Touch fan controller
2x Apache Black Silent 120mm PMW case fans
2x 40x10mm slim noiseblocker fans ( just push a bit of airflow round the top of the case, not a lot but something is better than nothing)

Storage was reused
1x WD 1TB Caviar Black
1x 120 GB OCZ Vertex Agility 3 SSD (just died on me )

Build without the GPU before cable management.
You can see the space left by the cooler / PSU/ RAM and extra internal 120mm fan mounted for airflow. The HD cage has been left in ( I tried mounting a 120mm rad however to do this would require deriveting the HD Cage and removing.
I also mounted the PSU to take air from insode the case and exhaust out the back. The small 80mm case side fan was also reversed to act as exhaust rather than intake.



Top view with GPU in place.
you can see air space left by PSU, cooler and RAM. Space laft by fan controller very handy for stuffing all those wires out of the way!



Size comparison w/ CM Storm Scout mid tower

.

And front view showing replaced fan and mounting and fan controller in position. One point I didn't realise is the front fan sits into the case so you can only replace it with 120mm square mounted fans. I originally was going to fit a yellow Viper PMW fan in there with the 140 mm blades in a circular 120mm rim mount but this would not work.



There ya go!

I'm really pleased as a first ITX build.
Most impressive are
PSU ( much smaller and compact than I was expecting,
The CPU Cooler ( 4.2 Ghz OC 24/7)
The Mobo - Unlimited POWER!!

Sadly SSD has gone **** up so I can't post temps etc atm.

That is very cool..

I like that a lot, one of my favourite ITX cases, that PSU 'shelf' makes a huge difference.

I didn't realise that the PSU is meant to hang out the back of that case??!

Looks a good setup, good to see one in the stages of being built as it is one case I had put on the list for my own mITX build.

Looks really smart, nice job!
Do you think this case suits the reference blower style of graphics card better as it takes air straight from outside through the card and out the back rather than blowing the hotter air into the case like some of the non-reference designs?

Thanks for the compliments I'm pretty happy with it so far.
I was very pleased that the air cooling seems to be a viable option with pretty good results as air cooler options that would fit in here without impacting on RAM and GPU slots are very limited and I really didn't want to start chopping about the case if I could avoid it.

Yeah there's a built in braket that you mount the PSU onto then slot that onto the back of the case. Its dead nifty as it gives that extra bit of space for cables and air flow and keeps its heat up away from the Mobo etc. The trade off is a very limited and critical head room for air cooler mounting and general air flow round the Mobo area. I was expecting a realy cable squeeze nightmare but was really impressed with the compact design of the CX 500M. Also the modular bit meant you weren't stuck with lengths of redundant cable to manage. However that said, the cables used / provided are still pretty long and folding them out of the way is a bit of a challenge. I was helped a lot by the space left by the fan controller though. If I had mounted a disk drive in the top front bay there it would have been a lot tricker.

Ref: choice of graphics card, yes I went for the "blower" type cooler arrangement simply because it blows the exhaust out of the back rather than into the grill area of the case on that side. TBH I was going on what others had said was best for this case however it limits choice of graphics cards a lot and sadly I don't think the HIS series "blower" cards will fit as they realy need a bit more space than there is. However It must be said that I haven't tested these things so maybe it would be worth it just to see what different it really does make to internal temps.

As I'm air cooling I tried to keep as many heat generating components exhausting straight out of the case as I could. i.e. PSU and GPU. The case does have a grill on top at the back to allow cool air into the PSU if it is mounted with intake fan facing up. However that way you lose the added benefit of helping to exhaust the heat from around the mobo CPU area. The small grill area above the IO plate at the back of the case below the PSU really doesn't cut it with regards to a passive exhaust cooling option.

It was a fun build to do.

Curious why you picked Noctua NH L9i cooler compared more frequently mentioned coolers (providing they fit) such as Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev B, Prolimatech Samuel 17, etc.

Nice little build Doc. I would like to know what sort of temps you have with that cooler as it was on my shortlist but dropped for the Samuel 17. I have the 3570K @ stock speeds idling around 31-32 degrees most days, however the slim Scythe fan which needs to be used on the Samuel 17 is quite loud.

Any feedback on the noctua cooler would be welcome

Feedback on the Noctua NH9Li: It's brilliant! I wasn't so sure about it at first as it is not much bigger than the intel stock cooler ( 95mmx 95mm x37mm). But I went with the Noctua because of size and Noctua reputation and I wasn't disappointed in the slightest. My first impressions were it's incredibly compact and size-wise perfect for my build.

It does not overhang RAM slots or PCIE x16 slot or impact on the additional vertical power board of the p8z77-I deluxe mobo.

If you look at the photo's above you'll see with the Samsung green ram sticks and the NH L9i it leaves plenty of space around the mobo, cooler and PSU above for air flow.

A note on the Samuel 17: From what I can see you have to find your own fan. This will be critical to performance. In an CM Elite 120 case setup height is critical (you get approx 65mm ) and you could only just fit a 12mm slimline fan on top of the Samuel heat sink and at 57mm you're getting very close the the PSU and taking heat from that. Whereas the L9i comes in at 37mm high complete so no worries for me there. Another side note is I flipped the PSU to take air from inside the case and exhaust it out so having the PSU intake and a heat sink top down aircooler fan with opposing airflows so close is probably not going to be "optimal". However with a bigger footprint, heat sink size and ability to take larger fans I would expect the Samuel 17 to outperform the L9i in a test bench "cooldown" however the Noctua can go places most low profile coolers have no hope of fitting. My biggest criticism of it would be its only compatible with a limited number of intel sockets.

The cpu idles at 34 -36 degrees @ its stock idling speeds at just over 1000rpm

You'll see below from the screen shots that a Prime 95 Small FFT stress test for max heat it runs at 4.2GHz at a steady 56 degrees and mobo temps at 31degrees however my temp sensor on the south bridge was at about 48 -50 degrees after 15 mins.

Another note worth mentioning again is I have two 120mm Asaka Apache Black Super Silent fans. One for intake, one for internal case air flow over the Mobo etc. Which I'm sure benefits the heatsink setup.

Just a note for OCer's I did get the CPU up to 4.7 GhZ with the Noctua and tested stable however it was running a little too hot (around 78-80 degrees) for a 24/7 regular gaming use.


I don't have sound measuring equipment but the ref noise level at max rpm is 23 db. The Noctua does come with a low noise adapter which I don't use. For me the noise level to performance is very acceptable without.

Kieran said:

I'm doing a build soon with this case. So you mounted the PSU so it acts an exhaust for the system. Did you flip the CPU fan? So that it's working with and not against the PSU fan? I.e pulling air through the heat sink and not pushing air into it. The 80mm side mounded fan should supply a decent amount of air direct to the heat sink. - This is how I plan to set mine up as it seems to be the best solution but obviously I haven't tested it.

Click to expand...

Hi Keiran,

No the PSU and Heatsink are opposing airflows. ie the PSU is sucking in heat from above the Mobo / heatsink and the Noctua fan is pushing air down and out from the heat sink. The "cool" thing here is the height and size of the L9i leaves space enough for the air to circulate down through the heat sink, out over the mobo bits and up round and out of the PSU. With the two Apache Black Super silent fans providing air flow into the case and over the mobo and heatsink, with a ~27mm air gap between the top of the heat sink fan and the PSU intake there should be enough space for sufficient airflow.

That was the plan and seems to work ok.

The small 80mm side fan I have used as exhaust rather than in take. The Apaches "should" and appear to provide more than enough air flow over the board and bits. The problem is this case seems to be exhausting the heat quickly enough to prevent too much build up.

Kieran said:

Seems to be working for you then. I'll have a play around with mine when I'm ready to set it up in a couple of weeks to see what I decide to do.

How are you liking that PSU? I had considered that or an XFX.

Click to expand...

Well I don't have any experience of the XFX so can't really compare but I'm very impressed with the price and quality of the Corsair CX500M. I had an old Corsair TX650 in my old mid tower which is 5 years old and it's still going strong and IMO 500W is more than enough for anything you might want to put in this size of case and the modular design is definitely the way to go.