Small build but still okay for recent games?

niko86 · 11 Feb 2013 at 12:29

I'm very out of touch as to what is good these days, so I need some help.

My PC is being relegated from our spare room to the living room. And its going to have to shrink to something that can go under the TV or behind it, and become almost silent (or at least as quiet as an older slim PS3) to be acceptable to my wife

I've looked at the sizes of the mini-itx cases and they still seem huge,

~30cm wide x ~20cm high x ~40cm deep

Seems the norm, anything smaller and they seem to need special PSU's and can't take a graphics card.

Being able to play recent-ish games moderately acceptable on a 1080p samsung TV over HDMI is what I need the PC to handle.

Can mine and my wife's expectations be met for about £600?

EDIT: I am liking the look of a Streamcom case and maybe going with a passive cooled gpu. Is there enough performance in passive gpu's for acceptable mid performance in games?

Quddy · 11 Feb 2013 at 14:14

I'm going to build a similar system around the F7C Evo. Was thinking about using the F8C Evo as it offers passive cpu cooling but would probably cause the gpu to overheat.

Not sure if a passive gpu will fit, must be single slot I guess.

I'm going to get the Sapphire Radeon HD 7750 low profile gpu. It's not passive but single slot and should be quiet when not gaming. Has great power consumption figures according to the reviews I have read so should be ok to use with the 160w/150w pico/nano psus. Performance should be good enough for 1080p for most recent games, may need to lower settings slightly.

niko86 · 11 Feb 2013 at 14:56

Quddy said:
I'm going to build a similar system around the F7C Evo. Was thinking about using the F8C Evo as it offers passive cpu cooling but would probably cause the gpu to overheat.

Looking at the F7C it does look as big without the hazards of being passively cooled.

The money saved over the F8 I may buy some silent cooling fans.

Mind sharing your planned build?

Quddy · 11 Feb 2013 at 15:15

Not 100% certain yet:

Streacom FC7 Evo + USB 3 cable for front ports
Streacom 150w nanoPSU
Intel i3-3220T CPU (35w)
Zotac H77-ITX
Sapphire Radeon HD 7750 1GB Low Profile GPU
2x4GB low profile ram (Crucial or Samsung green eco low voltage and low profile stuff)
Noctua NH-L9i low profile quiet cpu cooler (37mm height so maybe close fit with 3.5" HDD installed)
Noctua NF-R8 PWM 80mm case fan
Crucial 64gb mSATA SSD
WD Green 2TB 3.5" HDD

I think this lot comes to between £500-600.

Going to be used for HTPC, light gaming and general purpose pc

Quddy · 11 Feb 2013 at 15:20

If AMD's new Richland/Trinity 2.0 APU appears anytime soon then I may be tempted to go for that in the F1C case instead. Performance won't be as good but should be enough and about £100-200 cheaper.

niko86 · 11 Feb 2013 at 15:56

Yeah I've got pretty much the same build in mind, only difference is going for the i3-3225 3.30GHz 55w as far as I can tell the gpu pulls ~42w on max load so no need to scrimp too much on cpu performance for power savings. As the other components shouldnt pull more than 50w ... at least i hope not!

My biggest worry is pushing 1080p graphics when running games, although could drop down to 720p like consoles do.

Marine-RX179 · 11 Feb 2013 at 23:11

Ignore.

Quddy · 12 Feb 2013 at 03:21

Good point about the power. Not really sure what the total would be. Lots of unknowns such as the motherboard power usage, hdd, ssd, ram, and usb peripherals... they all add up! Should be ok though.

Personally, I always like to run at native res. so if it can't handle 1080p then I would lower the quality setting levels such as AA and AF etc. From the benchmarks I have seen, the card comfortably manages over 30fps at 1080p in most games. Just graphically demanding games such as Crysis may struggle at high quality settings.

If you are sticking with the Streacom case then I don't think there is much choice. Not familiar with the NVidia cards but AMD 7750 is the fastest low profile single slot gpu available I think.

Can always overclock the GPU if enough spare power and cooling

niko86 · 12 Feb 2013 at 14:00

Quddy said:
Good point about the power. Not really sure what the total would be. Lots of unknowns such as the motherboard power usage, hdd, ssd, ram, and usb peripherals... they all add up! Should be ok though.

The Streacom site gives a builder guide and going by their rough figures everything else doesn't take up as much as cpu or gpu so should be fine.

Wondering about using AMD A10-5700 uses 65w and along with its better inbuilt graphics could they be run together with the 7750? Or would the inbuilt one gimp the dedicated card?

EDIT - says the A10 can:

"-Hybrid Crossfire Capable with HD 6670"

Does that mean only a 6670 would work?

Quddy · 12 Feb 2013 at 15:22

Never thought of that. You're right though, looks like HD 6670 is best gpu you can crossfire with. Should theoretically give you better performance than the 7750 but would be dependant on games supporting it.

Bit of a gamble. I would stick with the HD 7750 and maybe upgrade in the future to a low profile HD 8750 if it ever appears.

Also, there do not seem to be many FM2 ITX boards available to pick from. The AsRock seems to be the most available but have read a lot of problems with them cathing fire!

Quddy · 13 Feb 2013 at 05:17

Some of the premium Z77 mITX boards come with Lucid Virtu Universal MVP license and software that will allow you to use the Intel gpu with any other discrete gpu.

Not sure exactly how it works but seems like a good choice as you get to have a superior Intel CPU with AMD or NVidia discrete GPU.