Mini -ITX gaming build <£700

damianpaul

damianpaul

damianpaul

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11 Aug 2005
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48
Hello, just checked my bio and my last post was back in 2008! Anyway I've decided to build a small form factor gaming pc for £700 or less. Would anyone be able to help with the spec please.

First off what is the trade off for going for mini-itx over a "normal" sized one?

I don't require a monitor (will use a TV), keyboard or mouse. After reading up recently I'm thinking of 8gb ram, 4690K, 250gb ssd. Would prefer it to be really quiet too so can use it to watch movies etc.

Any help greatly appreciated.
 
mitx you pay more have less ram and pci slots, The money saved could go towards a better gpu. I would start looking at following bundle deals.

if you want silent I would look at the 960/970 as the fans will not run when you be watching films. However r290x has some good deals on at the moment and is better value for money.


YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Z97I Gaming ACK - Devil's Canyon i5 4690K CPU & Mini ITX Motherboard Bundle **£12 Saving** £297.98
1 x Gigabyte Z97X-SLI - Devils Canyon Core i5 4690K Bundle **£12 Saving** £277.98
Total : £585.56 (includes shipping : £8.00).

 
It depends how small you want to go, one of the trade offs can be noise, especially if you're using higher end gear like you're after.

This will generate more heat and require improved cooling but in (proper) small cases you can be restricted in how many fans you can fit so the ones you do install need to run at higher speeds to compensate for the lack of fans, higher fans speeds mean more noise.

TBH at idle and whilst doing undemanding tasks like watching films then the fans should be ramped right down anyway so it should be silent, with the noise only increasing whilst gaming etc. which isn't too noticeable.

I'd start by picking a case you really like the look of, the rest of the spec will depend on what will fit in it, plus what resolution you intend to game at.
 
Here is a mATX to get you started,

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte Z97MX Gaming 5 - Devil's Canyon i5 4690K CPU & Micro ATX Motherboard Bundle **£10 Saving** £301.94
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 960 Gaming 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card - Red £164.99
1 x Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x Antec TruePower Classic 550w '80 Plus Gold' Power Supply £59.99
1 x BitFenix Phenom MATX Cube Case - Midnight Black £54.95
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan RED 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLRED38G2133HC11ADC01) £49.99
1 x Raijintek Aidos Direct Contact CPU Cooler - Black £14.99
Total : £754.68 (includes shipping : £23.20).



This card runs passive at idle.

-----------------------

Dont care about overclocking then you can go for a cheaper board and CPU and get a very powerful gfx card,

YOUR BASKET
1 x Asus Radeon R9 290X ROG Matrix 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (MATRIX-R9290X-4GD5) £249.95
1 x Intel Core i5-4460 3.20GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £154.99
1 x Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x Antec TruePower Classic 550w '80 Plus Gold' Power Supply £59.99
1 x BitFenix Phenom MATX Cube Case - Midnight Black £54.95
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TPKD38G1600HC11DC01) £44.99
1 x Gigabyte H81M-D2V Intel H81 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £40.99
1 x Raijintek Aidos Direct Contact CPU Cooler - Black £14.99
Total : £700.84 (includes shipping : ).




This board has USB3.0 front header (rare on the H61 chipset) so that makes the cases front USB3.0 ports usable.
 
Is that psu modular? It is not clear and given the small form factor will there be space for all the wires?
Also is that cooler very quiet? Don't mind increasing the budget a bit for less noise.
Thank you
 
I've built in a BitFenix Phenom recently with a none modular PSU, the one that is linked is none modular, and there was enough room for everything whilst keeping enough room clear for good airflow.
 
You might also want to look at the Silverstone Sugo SG13b-q, Fractal Design Node 304 and the Coolermaster Elite 130
 
I recently built a mini-itx case and struggled to find a cooler decent enough that would fit.... figured id help out with my findings.... i got a Noctua NH-U12S to fit.... barely goes over 30c, i literally can not hear a thing when it's on. my gaming PC on the other hand....

That said it is using onboard GPU and no dedicated GFX card to add additional heat inside the case.

The ram I bought ended up being some of the tallest ram I ever saw in my life... id go for a low profile memory over the ones i used for sure.... you can see in the pic how close the fans sides are to the ram.

Noctua NH-U12S Ultra-Quiet Slim CPU Cooler with NF-F12 Fan
Intel Core i5-4460 3.20GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor
TeamGroup Xtreem LV 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-21300C11 2666MHz Dual Channel Kit
BitFenix Prodigy Mini-ITX Cube Case - Arctic White
Asus H81I-Plus Intel H81 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard
Corsair Builder Series CX 430w Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020058-UK)

See pic...

nqo1va.jpg
 
thanks all
pdaboy - thanks for the alternatives but I think for the price I'll stick with the Phenom
OrionTC - it looks like they are touching!

Do you know if there is much difference between these two:
Gigabyte Z97MX-Gaming 5 Intel Z97 Micro ATX Motherboard
MSI Z97M Gaming Intel Z97 Micro ATX Motherboard
 
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