quiet mITX with mid range hardware

[CA_Steve]

My std comment: Wait a couple of months to let the '97 chipset mobo's firmware settle down and to see if there are any hidden flaws.

[quest_for_silence]

• PSU: I would really need a SFX PSU. The SilverStone Strider Gold Series 450W SFX12V (SST-ST45SF-G) seems to be the most common used one. High efficiency is nice but it seems really noisy. I found another PSU which seems to be very quiet, at least when idleing and office use named Chieftec SFX-350BS. Is there any other PSU to consider? Or maybe go the hard way and buy some high eff, PSU like the SilverStone and change the fan?
• CPU cooler: 130mm heigh max. It cries for top-blow coolers it seems? NH-C14 would be the fast first choice. Such a huge top-blow cooler shouldn't be at any (loudness) disadvantage over a tower cooler?
  I have read a little bit about (AiO) water cooling systems and they always seem to be far from quiet and/or expensive. Didn't I look around enough or is air cooling superior to watercooling in terms of loudness + price?

Briefly: 1) The 300W SFX Silverstone SST-ST30SF is better suited, noise-wise: even if it's less efficient (about 2-3% less in your expected power range), it's semi-fanless. You loose modularity, but IMO it's a minor issue due to the small size.
2) The Noctua NH-C14 is still one of the best choices available among any air cooler (but cross-check the availability of proper fan headers on the motherboard of choice).
3) If you aim at the most quietness, IMHO AIOs are not actually competitive: otherwise, YMMV, at least price-wise (over the C14).

[myselphabet]

[...]Both have the M.2 slot on the bottom of the motherboard, so depending on your needs for storage, you could even place fans on the bottom.

The thread is always open in my browser tabs. Asus (or ASRock) since of the placement as stated, yes. I read about the M.2 slot, but it is more or less unsuperior to a Sata 6gb/s as long as only 2 PCIe lanes are used. There is only one board that supports 4 lanes and this is a ATX ASRock board.
You posted some solution for the Node 304 and 1 SSD and I think I will find a similar one so the bottom vent slots should be free to use for me.
About the cooler problem, I wrote the exact same thread and ofc will check the compatibility with the MB.

My std comment: Wait a couple of months to let the '97 chipset mobo's firmware settle down and to see if there are any hidden flaws.

Oh boy. Can such a minor upgrade have any real flaws besids M.2 support? I wouldn't be surprised if another 1-4 weeks will fly by, several months though isn't planned. If there is a risk I might go to a 87 chipset then.

Briefly: 1) The 300W SFX Silverstone SST-ST30SF is better suited, noise-wise: even if it's less efficient (about 2-3% less in your expected power range), it's semi-fanless. You loose modularity, but IMO it's a minor issue due to the small size.
2) The Noctua NH-C14 is still one of the best choices available among any air cooler (but cross-check the availability of proper fan headers on the motherboard of choice).
3) If you aim at the most quietness, IMHO AIOs are not actually competitive: otherwise, YMMV, at least price-wise (over the C14).

Well, I don't need modularity nor >250-300W so as long as the PSU is very quiet and high quality (both result in cool). It just doesn't seem so easy to find a quiet SFX PSU.
Will read about the 300W SilverStone PSU, thank you for the suggestion.
Ok, so I can drop the AIO completely. Wasn't a friend of this anyway.

According to this post, the NH-C14 will interfere with a second 120mm fan on the side. The layout of the mainboard should be the same as of the latest ASUS mITX mainbords. Maybe I should go one step smaller with the heatsink. Just to keep the option open to fully load the case with fans....

[myselphabet]

The Ncase M1 has arrived and the electrical components should be delivered on tuesday or wednesday.

So if anybody is still interested in this "journey-of hardware-decision":

• CPU: Intel Core i5-4590S - No need for OC, 65W TDP, i like it.
• CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-C14 - I will first try the 3 pin fans. If they don't fit my needs I will consider buying a 140mm pwm fan.
• GPU: MSI N750Ti TF 2GD5/OC Twin Frozr Gaming - Nothing changed.
• RAM: 2 x 8GB Crucial Ballistix Sport VLP DDR3-1600 - Nothing changed.
• MB: Gigabyte GA-H97N-WIFI - With I-9-chipset GB has nice socket placement resulting in the NH-C14 fitting. I need WLAN but no OC hence no Z97. I didn't find any serious reviews so this is rather the most risky component. On paper it should fit my needs perfectly.
• Case: Ncase M1 V2 black - Base of this build. Sexy, small. <3
• PSU: SilverStone Strider Series 300W - Thank you quest_for_silence to point me to this semi-passive PSU.
• SSD: Crucial MX100 256GB - Probably the best pp-ratio out there atm.

I will try this build without any additional fans first. Maybe I will have to put 2 x 120mm fans in the bottom, connected via Y-split to the one and only case fan on the GB board. I don't see any use in installing a 92mm fan in the back of the case, because it had to spin at very high speed to compensate the air soaked into the case from the CPU and GPU fans.

I will try to post some pictures in this thread but won't promise anything (too excited when putting it all together and forgetting to take pictures)

Thanks to everyone posting their thoughts and tips in this thread, it helped forming my decision very much. It was a pleasure!

myselphabet

[Abula]

Congrats on the components, seems like a very nice build, hope to see some pics.

If you find the time, i would be very interested on comments about the PSU and the motherboard fan control (both bios and easytune).

[myselphabet]

Yeah, probably within a week I will be able to deliver some imformations about the PSU und fan control.
But as stated, the CPU fan(s) is (are) 3 pin voltage controlled, not pulse signal controlled; since I dont't have ANY experiance with fan controls, I dont't know if that does many anything at the moment, but since PWM is way more common today, most people want to see PWM tests.

Will try to deliver anyway.

[quest_for_silence]

But as stated, the CPU fan(s) is (are) 3 pin voltage controlled, not pulse signal controlled;

As said some days ago:

2) The Noctua NH-C14 is still one of the best choices available among any air cooler (but cross-check the availability of proper fan headers on the motherboard of choice).

I hope that EasyTune/UEFI (or perhaps SpeedFan) may be able to control the stock NH-C14 fans, even if I've some doubts about that (in the worst case, you will need a pair of PWM fans).

[myselphabet]

I kind of did.

At least Noctua wrote:

Some mainboards (e.g. current Gigabyte models) are capable of controlling fans not only via PWM, but also by adjusting the supplied voltage.

I think i don't need a PWM, since the C14 isn't available without fans, and the ULNA ("ultra low noise adapter") should be more than sufficient.
If I needed a PWM controlled fan, I would only buy one since two have no advantage over one fan, especially when it comes to quietness two are even at a disadvantage.

As the GB MB was more or less an impulsive decision, I haven't found anything in my short research time, if GB officially can adjust the voltage as stated by Noctua, so only the attempt will tell.

[myselphabet]

WoW, I knew that this assambley would be hard and would take some time, but 5 hours... and it is far from perfect (cable management).
I have been too confused by the 50+ screws and stuff Lian Li sent with the Ncase + a lot of (for me) unnecessary things were installed which i had to uninstall in the progress of the assembley, costing me a lot of nerves resulting in not so many picutes.
Sorry guys, it was a rough night for me. In the end it runs (at 1.30 a.m.) and now I am configurating Win 8.1. Damn this new GUIs are so confusing...
Here is the album to the build. Maybe I will try to get some more pics when I decide to improve the cable management and some other things and if the pics are meaningful I will post them.

For the Fan and PSU opinion: This may take up to one week due to configurate and test everyhting out a little bit but I guess it it worth it to post results in here since there are not so many reviews/opinions on these components. This could help some people.

myselphabet

[morganITA]

This could help some people.

It DEFINITELY could help someone like me! Just read all this thread, really interesting.
I'm trying to set up an itx config (here the link if you want to take a look at my wip) and was pretty sure to use your same Gigabyte GA-H97N-WIFI.
What kind of issues did you find with your pwm/no pwm fans regulation? Does its flat layout helps placing the rest of the hardware or component disposition is a real pain? In general, what are your considerations about this mb?
Please share your thoughts (and some photo too if you want)!

[myselphabet]

Sadly, after testing a little bit with easy tune and only going into BIOS gui one or two times, I really cannot tell for sure, but I wasn't able to set the CPU Fan speed (I have none PWM fans!).
So PWM might be necessary. For my taste, with the ULN adapter, it is pretty quite, but far away from REALLY quite/"silent".
I haven't had any trouble I could remember, assembling the hardware onto the mainboard, only getting it all together and especially wiring everything up was a real pain. 20 mins mainboard assembley, 1.5h+ the rest....
In my opinion, it might be very hard to hit the space capacity limits of the mainboard, but there are some really huge CPU fans out there, that might get than "job done".