Gaming ITX for a friend

lostmyoldname · 19 Feb 2014 at 19:21

I got some sound advice from here a while back while building myself a new machine. I've since forgotten the password for that forum account, and the forum password recovery is just returning an empty web page. Anyhow, one new account later...

I'm back looking for spec check for a friend. They are bounced around the country quite a bit with their work so were looking at a gaming laptop to replace an old one that is dying. Gaming laptops being wildly expensive for what you actually get, I suggested they look at the small form factor cases, and they liked the idea as they've always had a TV available wherever they end up.

So, just a box and contents (no OS - have a Win 7 Home Premium, peripherals etc. needed). To be used for gaming at 1080p. Budget is approx £850-900.

Case & CPU etc I think Intel i5s are still the best choice if you can afford. Not sure how interested in overclocking they'd be, so would consider a non-K chip and a 'H' mobo.
1 x BitFenix Prodigy Mini-ITX Cube Case - Midnight Black £69.95
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - OEM £169.99
1 x MSI Z87I Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard £104.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £71.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache WD10EZEX - OEM ** Single Platter ** HDD £43.99

Can Haswell make use of the fast RAM, and would a single 8GB stick be better then 2x4GB?
Insert 8GB of RAM here. @ £60 to £75

Used to be that AMD offered more for the money, but wondering if there is any difference between team red and team blue these days. I've seen the blower type cards recommended for the small cases, would these be better than the Gigabytes?
1 x Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X Rev2.0 WindForce 3X OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with Battlefield 4 PC Game £289.99
1 x Gigabyte GeForce GTX 770 WindForce 3x OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (GV-N770OC-2GD) £259.99

Modular PSU for the small case. A power draw calculating website says the build draws around 410 Watts, the Gigabyte website says the GPUs are recommending 600 Watts though. Will probably up it to a 550W version just to be safe.
1 x Seasonic G series 450w '80 Plus Gold' Modular Power Supply £65.99

Looking at closed loop cooling, as being able to bolt the radiator to the case should keep it in place and stop anything vibrating loose. Is there any real difference between either of the following (or a better choice)?
1 x Corsair Hydro H60 V2 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler £59.99
1 x Zalman LQ310 Ultimate Liquid CPU Cooler £59.99

Thanks for reading, and looking forward to seeing your comments and tweaks.

-
A

BinnsY · 19 Feb 2014 at 20:13

I personally think you can do better than the prodigy if you really want a small system. Something like this would be my suggestion you could even do mild overclocking.

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Radeon R9 280X Gaming Edition OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £259.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - OEM £169.99
1 x MSI Z87I Gaming AC Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard £134.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £71.99
1 x Antec ISK 600 Small Form Factor ITX Chassis £64.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £59.99
1 x SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £59.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £55.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £17.99
Total : £905.51 (includes shipping : £8.00).

If you want to go prodigy size, you might as well go MATX and have something like this. Not much changes other than being bigger and having a better CPU cooler which would let you do a big overclock. It's also a tiny bit cheaper.

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Radeon R9 280X Gaming Edition OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £259.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - OEM £169.99
1 x MSI Z87M Gaming Series Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £109.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £71.99
1 x Xigmatek Aquila Micro-ATX Case - Black £69.95
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £59.99
1 x SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £59.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £55.99
1 x Raijintek EreBoss High Performance CPU Cooler £26.99
Total : £894.47 (includes shipping : £8.00).

hawkhench · 20 Feb 2014 at 15:07

A Prodigy is portable, but isn't all that small. I have one, it gets transported up and down the country every couple of months, and I love it. But I don't notice a really significant saving in boot space over my old midi tower. I'd echo what BinnsY said if he wants something more convenient.

Banzai_Joe · 20 Feb 2014 at 15:10

Silverstone SG05, like the rig in my sig.

BinnsY · 20 Feb 2014 at 20:09

Banzai_Joe said:
Silverstone SG05, like the rig in my sig.

I started with this case before building my other suggestions, but what graphics card would you suggest? The limit on the SG05 seems to be 10.5" at the absoulte most (official specs suggest 10") and most 770's / 280x's seem to be 10.8" and up.

LePhuronn · 21 Feb 2014 at 17:22

Cut a hole in the SG05 and you get an extra 3/4 inch - 0.6mm steel isn't hard to cut if you take it slowly. The plastic facia has a lip of about 1/2 inch so once the hole is cut everything gets covered up. Plus the 450W PSU that comes with the SG05-450 will run everything (or get the SG05-Lite and the gold-rated modular PSU separately).

I did that to fit my Titan and it's worth it.

lostmyoldname · 21 Feb 2014 at 18:55

Thanks for the comments, hadn't spotted that Aquila. Looks good.

BinnsY said:
I started with this case before building my other suggestions, but what graphics card would you suggest? The limit on the SG05 seems to be 10.5" at the absoulte most (official specs suggest 10") and most 770's / 280x's seem to be 10.8" and up.

Yeah, it was pretty much this that pushed us down the Prodigy route. Most of the ITX couldn't fit the longer GPU cards, or power supplies. Wasn't particularly wanting to go down the amateur metal working route either. Will have to have a poke around the rest of m-ATX cases now as well.

JediFragger · 21 Feb 2014 at 19:12

CoolerMaster Elite 130 as the build in my sig, will take a nigh-on 13" gfx card

I have a 290 in there and is room to spare!!

jimbaw · 21 Feb 2014 at 20:52

If it were me, I'd go for a matx build over an itx one just for extra performance potential

lostmyoldname · 22 Feb 2014 at 00:08

Cheers for the feedback. Past on your comments to my friend and she's looking into this lot. ... she also was thinking about stencils on the case.

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Radeon R9 280X Gaming Edition OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £259.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £179.99
1 x MSI Z87I Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard £104.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £71.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H60 V2 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler £59.99
1 x SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £59.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £55.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 130 RC-130-KKN1 Mini ITX Case - Black £45.95
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache WD10EZEX - OEM ** Single Platter ** HDD £43.99
Total : £892.46 (includes shipping : £8.00).

Tute · 22 Feb 2014 at 00:27

If you're not fussed about having an optical drive, how about something based around an SG05 with a GTX770 and an H6O?

It should all fit, I had a GTX680 inside mine and it's the same card. Better than a Prodigy, which is three times the size and not at all small form factor.