Mini itx gaming pc

R3v4n · 26 Aug 2014 at 21:44

Hey so I'm looking at doing a mini itx build;

The aim really is to build a relatively small and quiet high performance gaming pc.

Bitfenix prodigy
Gigabyte z97n gaming 5 / msi z97i gaming ac (just noticed the bundle on this Mobo I assume it's largely the same as the gigabyte?)
i5 4690k
R9 290 Vapor-x or xfx dd 290 (it seems the vapor-x is tons better on all fronts)
Team group xtreem 8gb 2666mhz (or 16gb can't decide yet)
Nzxt kraken x31 CPU cooler
Samsung 840 pro 256gb
Seagate sshd 1tb

The main consideration at the moment is power supply some sites have said 650w others 550w. I won't be running crossfire ever had it once before and hated it. I will however want to overclock the CPU and gpu, I've been looking at the corsair RM series PSUs. Which would I actually need?

So any advice on that would be great and if you have any other thoughts about the components (ram especially) please share

.

Also would the above specs be good enough to run 1440p? If so how well? At the moment I only play 1080 but in the near future after getting this new pc I may get 1440p screen.

Thanks.

tamzzy · 27 Aug 2014 at 12:13

what's your budget?

R3v4n · 27 Aug 2014 at 12:17

With the above stuff I'm in for £930. I'd like to keep it around there up to £1kish

.

tamzzy · 27 Aug 2014 at 12:32

YOUR BASKET
1 x KFA2 GeForce GTX 780 3072MB PCI-Express Graphics Card - Retail (78XNH5DN9IST) £323.99
1 x MSI Z97I Gaming AC - Devil's Canyon i5 4690K CPU & Mini ITX Motherboard Bundle **£18 Saving** £265.98
1 x Crucial MX100 256GB SATA 2.5” 7mm SSD + 9.5mm Adapter (CT256MX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x TeamGroup Xtreem LV 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C10 2400MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (TXD38G2400HC10QDC01) £59.99
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 500W Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (SST-ST50F-P) £59.99
1 x Silverstone SST-SG08B-Lite USB 3.0 Sugo Mini-ITX - Black £49.99
1 x Hitachi GST Travelstar 5K1000 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 2.5" Hard Drive - (HTS541010A9E680) £44.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H80 CPU Cooler *Manufacturer Refurbished Unit - 1 Year Warranty £35.99
1 x LiteOn DL-8A4SH-25C Slim SLOT Black 8x DVD-RW SATA Optical Drive £19.99
1 x Silverstone SST-PP05-E Short Cable Set For SilverStone PSU Strider Series 100% Modular £16.99
1 x Akasa Slimline Optical SATA Cable, 40cm (AK-CB050-40) £2.99
Total : £970.48 (includes shipping : £8.00).

re: psu - 500w is more than sufficient.

unfortunately, the gpu and hdd are out of stock at the moment

R3v4n · 27 Aug 2014 at 15:22

tamzzy said:
YOUR BASKET
1 x KFA2 GeForce GTX 780 3072MB PCI-Express Graphics Card - Retail (78XNH5DN9IST) £323.99
1 x MSI Z97I Gaming AC - Devil's Canyon i5 4690K CPU & Mini ITX Motherboard Bundle **£18 Saving** £265.98
1 x Crucial MX100 256GB SATA 2.5” 7mm SSD + 9.5mm Adapter (CT256MX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x TeamGroup Xtreem LV 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C10 2400MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (TXD38G2400HC10QDC01) £59.99
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 500W Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (SST-ST50F-P) £59.99
1 x Silverstone SST-SG08B-Lite USB 3.0 Sugo Mini-ITX - Black £49.99
1 x Hitachi GST Travelstar 5K1000 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 2.5" Hard Drive - (HTS541010A9E680) £44.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H80 CPU Cooler *Manufacturer Refurbished Unit - 1 Year Warranty £35.99
1 x LiteOn DL-8A4SH-25C Slim SLOT Black 8x DVD-RW SATA Optical Drive £19.99
1 x Silverstone SST-PP05-E Short Cable Set For SilverStone PSU Strider Series 100% Modular £16.99
1 x Akasa Slimline Optical SATA Cable, 40cm (AK-CB050-40) £2.99
Total : £970.48 (includes shipping : £8.00).

re: psu - 500w is more than sufficient.

unfortunately, the gpu and hdd are out of stock at the moment

Surprised I can run it with a 500w I thought 550 would be bare minimum.

Also isn't that a stock cooler on the 780, I would assume that its hotter and louder than the vapor-x?

tamzzy · 27 Aug 2014 at 16:02

how much does your rig need?

and that is at the wall (so the watts the psu supplies is about 10% less)

and re: cooler options. for a mini itx rig, what you'd ideally want is a blower style cooler so the heat doesn't get recirculated in the case. so it's a no go for amd there unfortunately

R3v4n · 27 Aug 2014 at 17:00

tamzzy said:
how much does your rig need?

and that is at the wall (so the watts the psu supplies is about 10% less)

and re: cooler options. for a mini itx rig, what you'd ideally want is a blower style cooler so the heat doesn't get recirculated in the case. so it's a no go for amd there unfortunately

Well that is interesting, learn something new everyday

. In that case I may go for RM 550.

I'll check out the 780s for best coolers n performance see how they compare to the 290.

Funny thing in my old pc 2600k, 256gb ssd, gtx 580, 1.5tb hdd, 16gb hyperx ram I had the hx 850, seems that May have been pretty overkill lol.

tamzzy · 27 Aug 2014 at 18:40

the rm550 is a meh psu. there's better for less.
and as mentioned earlier, you'd want a blower style cooler. ie the only option is a reference 780(ti)

R3v4n · 27 Aug 2014 at 18:57

tamzzy said:
the rm550 is a meh psu. there's better for less.
and as mentioned earlier, you'd want a blower style cooler. ie the only option is a reference 780(ti)

Yeah the 780 is a tough pill to swallow since it's performance is worse than the 290 vapor-x and it's more expensive. While the reference 780ti is certainly better only 11-15% better and they carry quite a big premium.

It just seems a hard one to justify I appreciate what you are saying about the coolers though, will it make a huge difference to overall temps if I had a gpu without a blower? Wouldn't having top mounted exhaust fans mitigate it a bit?

Fair enough regarding the PSU I only went with corsair because I had one before, they do look overpriced though. Which be best the 550/650?

Or rather which PSU brand is generally the best?

Thanks for the help so far btw

.

McGraw · 28 Aug 2014 at 07:41

IMO SSHD's are a waste of money.

I would use that elsewhere.

I went for 16gb as you're kind of locked in with mini itx and I use photoshop and lightroom at the same time.

I also went 4790k as I couldn't bear to spend £900 on a base unit and compromise on the CPU too much. I run FSX and Arma so can justify it to myself, especially as I was going to go 4690k plus h60 anyway.

R3v4n · 28 Aug 2014 at 11:19

McGraw said:
IMO SSHD's are a waste of money.

I would use that elsewhere.

I went for 16gb as you're kind of locked in with mini itx and I use photoshop and lightroom at the same time.

I also went 4790k as I couldn't bear to spend £900 on a base unit and compromise on the CPU too much. I run FSX and Arma so can justify it to myself, especially as I was going to go 4690k plus h60 anyway.

It seemed for games that the i7 4970k offered almost no improvement in games like 2 fps maybe, while it has almost a £100 premium in my current setup I have the i7 2600k but that seems to handle all my desktop/multitasking just fine so I would assume the i5 4690k would do the job as we'll.

I was previously looking at the x31 kraken cooler but apparently the variable pump control thing doesn't make it much quieter and it seems the h100i is quite a bit better so I may go for that I think it will mount to the top of the prodigy case but I'd have to sacrifice the disc drive. Which isn't a huge problem for me since it's very rare I used discs now I could just get an external USB one I guess. It's either that or the kraken x41/h80i + disc drive.

Picking a CPU cooler is tough lol I guess in case of leaks air would be easier but in a small case I would imagine the aio coolers would beat air quite substantially?

McGraw · 28 Aug 2014 at 16:36

Yeah an i7 is overkill for most games but I wanted FSX to run well and a 4790k does the job even at stock.