Passive Cooled NUC Sized Plex Server with 3.5HDD

pc-guy · 4 Dec 2020 at 12:30

Building a 24/7 tiny plex server & file deposit with 4K transcoding capability. data is already on my ironwolf drive so need a small and discrete machine to put it inside

starting this one off with the parts list first

Case: Silvertstone Milo 10

PSU: picoPSU-150-XT DC/DC PC ATX with 240v AC to 12V DC 60W Power Brick 5/2.5mm jack

Motherboard and CPU: Asrock J4125-ITX with intel celeron gemini lake J4125 with 10bit HEVC encode/decode (passive cooling)

RAM: HyperX 2x8GB 2400 SODIMM (16GB in case i need to use the machine as a temporary work machine for remote into work)

Storage: 6TB Ironwolf (probably upgrade to 12TB down the line at some point as it is pretty full and I am getting more 4K content) and MP510 M.2 (the M.2 will need to be a bit creative as the board doesnt have M.2 so I need to use PCIE extension cable and run it to the drive which will be glued to the case cover somhow)

altogther around £240 (exclude the HDD and M.2). it will be interesting to pull this one together and have it as a PLEX server.

AyeAyeAhoy! · 5 Dec 2020 at 07:41

Looking forward to seeing this go ahead

pc-guy · 5 Dec 2020 at 09:08

Motherboard is arriving today but the rest is coming on Tuesday. Should be done by Wednesday.

tempted to shuck a WD D10. It’s sub £200 atm.

pc-guy · 7 Dec 2020 at 16:25

update: everything arrived other than RAM. So i have put all the components in. turns out the case is a lot more spacious than the spec says.

I managed to get a 2.5inch SSD and a 3.5inch HDD (a spare HDD not the 6TB drive) installed with PLENTY space all around. clearance to the CPU Heatsink is excellent. however the RAM is not installed yet as it will be the tallest internal component.

One snag is that the board and CPU is only rated to 8GB total system ram, but from the site I have been doing my research as well as some German site, the CPU can take upto 32GB ram. just need to wait and see when ram arrives.

pc-guy · 7 Dec 2020 at 16:33

iPhone 8 for comparisons

pc-guy · 11 Dec 2020 at 08:40

The 16GB ram was accepted no problems, however the ironwolf i taller than the HDD i used to test fitment

so it was rising above the lid at the top which meant i had to use the supplied stand off in the case to rise the HDD rack in order to hung the HDD above the CPU HSF. there is still enough clearance between HSF and HDD to get a 2.5 SSD in there (which was my first test run whichhad the SSD stuck to the belly of the HDD). another issue is that i had to fit a HDD cage to the rack in order to get the HDD in with cable connections.

All of the above meant the SSD is now just jammed on the side.

ran it for a few hours, the HDD got very hot - into 60C. so I have temporaily strapped a 120mm case fan outside the case and has broght the temp down to 43/44c under usgae (a few hours being on etc). therefore the next step is to have 2 50mm fans gently bring in some cold air from the side to cool the HDD and CPU HS which should still be relatively quiet as the ironwolf seems to be making most of the noises.

the fans will be in the same location as the SSD currently shown. so the plan is to open up the SSD, cut the casing down so i can leave it in the front portion of the case just behind the front panel where there is a lot of cavity and current just used as some kind of cable management hold.

total power draw at wall is only max 27w, that is with the HDD busy and the case fan running at full. the CPU turbo has been turned off and windows power plan has been changed to power saving but the CPU max state is still set @ 100% which is 2GHz. when it goes to sleep, it draws 1 watt as the fan stops also. idle is around 8-9 watt.

Angelwolf · 11 Dec 2020 at 10:42

It's a shame full passive cooling isn't looking likely, but this seams like such a neat project!

pc-guy · 11 Dec 2020 at 11:48

Angelwolf said:
It's a shame full passive cooling isn't looking likely, but this seams like such a neat project!

i am gonna test it a bit more with the HDD. that 60C was a bit of an abnormal condition so gonna try run it with fans off and run a couple of streams for 1hr and 2hrs see what that HDD temp goes upto.

my concern really is in the summer it will be hot...so those fans will have to kick in

also i have contemplated on have 2x2.5HDD which can give me capacity of 10TB but they are seagate barracuda drives, which i have had a number of failed over the years, so not entirely confident. the alternative is to have 2x 4TB QLC SSD drives. but considering the large file sizes stored on the drives, if i ever need to migrate the data, i reckon it will be dreadfully slow.

but certainly there are a lot of options with that case, and I am amazed how flexible it is.

Angelwolf · 11 Dec 2020 at 12:47

I know you can get passive coolers for HDDs but I'm not sure how they'd fit into that case or how much of an effect they'd have. I don't really know much about passive cooling, but I know you can get some coolers that attach to the case itself to help dissipate heat - whether or not that's of any use I have no idea. Might only be for CPU and/or GPU cooling.

I saw a video on it here, though the case itself was also designed for this purpose.

Good luck with the next test, hope you get better results! Keep us updated, will be great to see how this goes.

pc-guy · 13 Dec 2020 at 02:37

done some further work... SSD cannot be trimmed as the PCB is the full lenght of the casing. so if anyone is interested in getting a SSD for this build worth checking what the PCB status is.

however, i still managed to jimmy it into the front panel and left the 50mm fan bay as below. however after some hours of operation the HDD has not reached high temps under pure passive cooling (no fans). although this is only with basic loads. not tested completely with streams.

fan bay cleared with SSD moved into cavity of front panel and cable relocated

close up of future fan bay

Current strapped on 120mm fan (turned off)