Lian Li Mini-Q Quad Core ITX

neil_g · 25 Jan 2010 at 08:52

entireweb said:
If your not bothered about power, then why go down the route of mini itx?

BTW dont call me stupid, noob.

as stated in my opening post, size and desk space available.

yeah im a noob, if working as an IT tech for coming up to 11 years counts as a noob.

anyway, back on topic.. apparently sh!tty-link delivered my graphics card friday night to work after everyone had gone home. no sign of it and the tracking ref no longer works.... :mad:

tankskun · 25 Jan 2010 at 20:59

Nice build mate. Good job.

neil_g · 25 Jan 2010 at 21:27

next chapter: the GPU that failed to be..

well that didnt go according to plan.

the graphics card turned up in the end, turned out the city link driver decided that as no one was in the office at 5:30 friday night to sign for it that he would sign for it but take it away again and deliver it today.

but alas it does not fit with a 3.5" HD in place..

one card..

one hole..

one clearance issue..

one card not even close to its hole..

so, on order is one scythe 3.5 to 5.25 rubber mounted converter. also a USB header extention cable as the one in the case wont stretch over the card.

oh and i had to remove the top most DVI cable screw post as it fouls on the case.

trouble is, now ive freed up the SSD mount...

sev · 26 Jan 2010 at 11:57

entireweb said:
The fact that the Lian Li uses a standard ATX power supply for mini itx is utterly stupid. A 550 power supply is very inefficient when only drawing 50 watts of power. I have a similar system but it uses a 3ghz wolfdale and total current draw is <50 watts

You are wasting power.

The 550 watt PSU you are using is 80 plus. At 50 watts its loaded at only 10%. The 80 plus spec says that it must be 80% efficient at 20% loading. But at 10% I bet its more like 70% efficient. Thus for every 50 watts you burn, you are wasting 15 watts!!!! Which means your "green" drives etc are utterly pointless. A better choice would be to use a 60-90 Watt Pico PSU. But the Lian Li doesnt even come with a blanking plate for external PSU, which is why I hate the case and any mini ITX project that uses it. Sorry

So in your opinion, ( Neils' 11 years of experience aside ), case notwithsdanding, if you had his setup without a gpu what psu would you have opted for?

and...

If you had his setup with a good gpu such as the 4650 or gt260 what psu would you have opted for?

neil_g · 26 Jan 2010 at 12:27

the thing is with a pico, if i wanted to run the Q9550 at 100% (entirely possible while batch processing 100's of RAW photographs) thatd be 95W on its own. plus youd not be taking in to account initial start up surge which is where most cheap/low power PSUs fail.

entireweb · 26 Jan 2010 at 17:20

sev said:
So in your opinion, ( Neils' 11 years of experience aside ), case notwithsdanding, if you had his setup without a gpu what psu would you have opted for?

150w Pico PSU.

Also already done here in this build. Same motherboard, same processor etc.

Note big empty hole where the power wasting, noisy, heat generating PSU was.

I would have used a smaller case, eg m350. It would take up even less desk space, becuase it would hang on the back of the monitor.

http://www.sevenforums.com/hardware-devices/18858-going-matx-mini-itx.html

sev said:
and...

If you had his setup with a good gpu such as the 4650 or gt260 what psu would you have opted for?

I wouldnt. I prefer to have dedicated machines for singular purposes.

Eg, I run:

1) Gaming machine, i7 860, overclocked to 3.8ghz, with 8gb, corsair 850w PSU, gtx 295, 8800gt as physx. SSD etc

2) HTPC, zotac ION ITX A, mini itx, in m350 case running linux for XBMC.

3) Home Server, Intel mini itx pine trail, running WHS using 6 hard drives.

etc etc.

When I build a machine for a purpose I try not to deviate from that original purpose. Eg, add graphics cards at a later date to my mini itx.

So as an example take the new mini itx pine trail. It uses 13 watts. So perfect for a 24/7 home server. It would be madness and folly to then put in a gtx 295 etc.

entireweb · 26 Jan 2010 at 17:28

Guardsmon · 26 Jan 2010 at 17:41

entireweb. You're points are valid for the most part, but for some of us the cost of 3 computers at those specs are a little out of our range

neil_g - just looking at your photos, if you mounted the hard drive the other way up, would that not give enough clearance? Lian can't be stupid enough that they wouldn't leave room for a PCI card to fit in its slot... *I hope*

neil_g · 26 Jan 2010 at 19:05

Guardsmon said:
neil_g - just looking at your photos, if you mounted the hard drive the other way up, would that not give enough clearance? Lian can't be stupid enough that they wouldn't leave room for a PCI card to fit in its slot... *I hope*

unfortunately not, the rivets used to mount the HD cage to the case stick out too far. i guess i could grind them down but im going to stick with relocating up to the 5.25" area.

neil_g · 26 Jan 2010 at 19:17

entireweb said:
Note big empty hole where the power wasting, noisy, heat generating PSU was.

the bequiet is neither noisey or a heat pump. even when stress testing it ran quiet and cool.

When I build a machine for a purpose I try not to deviate from that original purpose. Eg, add graphics cards at a later date to my mini itx.

So as an example take the new mini itx pine trail. It uses 13 watts. So perfect for a 24/7 home server. It would be madness and folly to then put in a gtx 295 etc.

i guess thats where we differ (as peoples opinions do), my needs changed and i was lucky enough to be able to adapt the setup. as above, not everyone has the budget or space to run a PC for every different task. i have this box as a desktop - photo editing mainly but now with a gaming option - and i have a HTPC/storage box (i guess that counts as another mishmash box?) with the TV and amp.

RJC · 26 Jan 2010 at 19:36

Nice setup

neil_g · 27 Jan 2010 at 20:46

right then, final installment for hopefully a while lol

new bits - USB header extention and Scythe's rubber mount adaptor

mount fitted to the F1

drive and mount secured in case.. the CD drive blanking plate JUST fits between the drive enclosure and the scythe mount with some "persuading"

USB extention assembled and connected

graphics card installed.. one thing i did notice with this motherboard/case combo is that the mobo sits about 3mm too far in to the case which makes all the connectors recessed. this meant the card took some gentle teasing into the correct position. the DVI sockets on this card are also far enough apart to make the top most cable screw post fouls the case (or at least youd never get the card installed with it in place) so thats been removed and stored for future use.

cables tidied

and so there we go.. back in one bit and powered up

first impressions are the system is louder.. its an extra fan i guess thats to be expected.. did a quick test (cant give it a good going over yet, got 500 odd photos from the weekend i need to get online) on COD:MW2 and its improved playability no end.

hopefully thats the last major update to this thread for a while..

but until next time heres an insite into how it all surrounds me in my TINY box room..

on top of the desk we have (left to right): logitech di novo edge for the HTPC/storage box, JBL Control 1 back left surround speaker for my tv/htpc, cookie monster, pen for my wacom, sennheiser HD25-1 II's, dell 2209WA, logitech MX620 laser.

on the slide out (left to right): wacom bamboo fun small tablet, bogo dell USB keyboard

behind/under me: lian li PC-C32B (passive intel E2200, 4GB DDR2 1066, 4TB worth of F1's, ATI 4550HD 512Mb Fanless, blu-ray, windows 7 64bit) HTPC, Coax SPDIF via motherboard header to Yamaha DSP-A1092 Dolby Digital Amp and HDMI connected to 38" LCD (43" pioneer plasma is being looked after by parents due to space).

neil_g · 13 Apr 2010 at 13:09

bit of an update..

after getting really annoyed with the noise of the graphics card fan i improvised slightly.

introducing ghetto fan mod v1

scythe 80mm S-flex 1000rpm - http://www.scythe-usa.com/product/acc/062/sflf80_detail.html

let the testing commence

MasterPlan1 · 13 Apr 2010 at 19:12

how much overhang did you have when fitting that HSF? just I'm planning on building a ITX system soon and it's already going to be tight like a tiger.

neil_g · 13 Apr 2010 at 20:40

overhang off the motherboard? none if i remember rightly but maybe 1 or 2mm max?

manbearpig · 20 Apr 2010 at 21:00

Very nice build.

Kurisu Makise · 21 Apr 2010 at 04:37

Pendu said:
That case is the dogs ********.

tankskun · 1 Jul 2010 at 06:56

neil_g said:
new bits - USB header extention and Scythe's rubber mount adaptor

Where did you get the usb extention from? did you take out the standard bulky biege usb header?

jmp_78 · 10 Jul 2010 at 22:56

Hey Neil - been looking at getting a Mini-Q myself to complement my main desktop, and just wanna say that I've really enjoyed reading your thread and checking out your ongoing photos!

Good job fella (slightly jealous)

c.ruel · 11 Jul 2010 at 13:24

First of all really nice build neil, I have thought about this case for a future project as it does look very good. But I don't think I will get it for some of the reasons entireweb pointed out. So much space is taken up by the ability to fit an ATX PSU, which also then doubles as the only way of exhausting heat. This means so much power is going to be wasted, as you pointed out this isn't a concern for a lot of people like yourself. But then you can't even fit a dual slot GFX card in it and of course as you have discovered a single slot decent GFX card is going to be noisy. I have to admit the SUGO5 or SUGO6 just seems like a better case (aesthetics aside). It is smaller than the Q07, can fit a dual slot graphics card, has an intake fan for improved cooling and can support an i7. But as everyone has said it does look great, it just seems impractical, Lian li should have made it slightly bigger so it could fit an intake fan and a dualslot card. Q08 is a bit like this but they put so much room in that for HDD that it looks ridiculously bloated for a mini ITX case (at least it does in the pictures) ... I still might get one of those though lol (the Q08 that is).