Need some advice

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MusicMan
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:19 am

Need some advice

Post by MusicMan » Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:32 am

HI,

I was wondering if anyone could help me. I've been surfing this site for sometime, and the reviews are great n' stuff. But well at the end of the day I'm still a little bit confused.

SO here's what I'm trying to do, maybe someone out there can help me do it.

I compose music at home through a couple of DAW's, and libraries. I also game, not heavily, DA-I, WoW(maybe).

I have a home built already so its not foreign territory per say.

Current Build:

I5-2500
P8z77-v
2 x 4 gb @ 1333, 2 x 4 gb @1600 (I think its G.Skills red & blue, but I'd have to crack the case to double check)
1 x GTX 760 4GB (Zotac) with 242mm length
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.as ... 6814500312
1 x 250GB Samsung Evo SSD
1 x 1TB WD - Black
1 x Asus Blue Ray
1 x PSU - OCZGSX700 (700w PSU / silent & modular)
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/OCZ/GameXStream700W/

its all sitting an Antec 300 tower, with about 5 fans running. I hear the fans as a hum. Its not really offensive per say, but it is noticeably audible.

Anyway...

That tower is just taking up tooo much space. and I'd like to upgrade the CPU chip, to an i7-4790 (no k needed as I don't overclock)

SO

What I'm trying to sort out is, how small a case I can go.

micro ATX
mini-ATX
Micro-ITX

I'd like to bridge over the PSU, RAM, GPU, SSD, HDD, with consideration, I will probably add a second SSD of 512GB, and 2nd HDD of 2tb.

So that's 4 slots.

I like the look of Liam Li 354 silver/blue. But it doesn't appear to be the most appropriate case. I'm also hoping for something that can sit on my desk, instead of the floor on my digital piano with wires come out going every which way.

I'm running Windows 7-64, but could upgrade to 8.1

Also are there any blue ray players that have a silver face? I really would like to go silver...

Ideas...thoughts...

thanks a bunch...

MM.

CA_Steve
Moderator
Posts: 7650
Joined: Thu Oct 06, 2005 4:36 am
Location: St. Louis, MO

Re: Need some advice

Post by CA_Steve » Tue Jan 13, 2015 10:35 am

Welcome to SPCR.

Here's a few quick thoughts:
- Take a look at the recent Micro ATX and Mini-ITX Gaming build articles to get a feel for what you can do when you want to cram a gaming card into a small enclosure and still be quiet.
- Your Zotac reference design GTX 760 will be noisy. No way around it. Are you using a fan profile tool, like MSI Afterburner, to lower the fan rpm? It would be useful for you to set up 2 profiles: one for DAW work with minimum fan and one for gaming that can go a bit higher.
- Get a new high efficiency/quiet to silent PSU. Yours is an 8 year old design with relatively low efficiency and while it was decent for noise back in the day, it's not now. Your stressed power load is in the 310W range, with gaming load ~250W and DAW load in the 150W range.
- Get an H97 or Z97 mobo. The 9 series fixes the DPC latency issues that cropped up in the 7 and 8 series boards.
- Go with an i7 if your DAW software supports hyperthreading and you are doing orchestral levels of voices/tracks. Otherwise, an i5 is fine.
- The WD Black is another big noise source. Consider going with an SSD for OS/Apps, another as a scratch disk and then a large 5400rpm media drive for storage.

boost
Posts: 661
Joined: Wed Jul 12, 2006 10:29 am
Location: de_DE

Re: Need some advice

Post by boost » Wed Jan 14, 2015 3:10 am

MusicMan wrote:That tower is just taking up tooo much space. and I'd like to upgrade the CPU chip, to an i7-4790 (no k needed as I don't overclock)
The 4790K is 10% faster than the 4790, runs cooler and is almost the same price. Get the K version, even if you don't overclock.
MusicMan wrote:What I'm trying to sort out is, how small a case I can go.
micro ATX
mini-ATX
Micro-ITX
There's ATX with up 7 slots for add-in cards micro Atx, up to two and ITX only only 1.
Micro Atx is a good place to start when you still want to be able to upgrade in the future.
SilverStone Temjin TJ08-E is a good case for a mATX build.
You should look in to hard drive decoupling for the HDD.

quest_for_silence
Posts: 5275
Joined: Wed Jun 13, 2007 10:12 am
Location: ITALY

Re: Need some advice

Post by quest_for_silence » Wed Jan 14, 2015 4:02 am

MusicMan wrote:Also are there any blue ray players that have a silver face? I really would like to go silver...

Ideas...thoughts...

What about either the Jonsbo W1 (ITX) or the Jonsbo W2 (mATX)? Not so small, but no black bays on front.

mehimu
Posts: 21
Joined: Sun Aug 03, 2014 6:33 am
Contact:

Re: Need some advice

Post by mehimu » Wed Jan 21, 2015 7:53 pm

CA_Steve wrote:Welcome to SPCR.

Here's a few quick thoughts:
- Take a look at the recent Micro ATX and Mini-ITX Gaming build articles to get a feel for what you can do when you want to cram a gaming card into a small enclosure and still be quiet.
- Your Zotac reference design GTX 760 will be noisy. No way around it. Are you using a fan profile tool, like MSI Afterburner, to lower the fan rpm? It would be useful for you to set up 2 profiles: one for DAW work with minimum fan and one for gaming that can go a bit higher.
- Get a new high efficiency/quiet to silent PSU. Yours is an 8 year old design with relatively low efficiency and while it was decent for noise back in the day, it's not now. Your stressed power load is in the 310W range, with gaming load ~250W and DAW load in the 150W range.
- Get an H97 or Z97 mobo. The 9 series fixes the DPC latency issues that cropped up in the 7 and 8 series boards.
- Go with an i7 if your DAW software supports hyperthreading and you are doing orchestral levels of voices/tracks. Otherwise, an i5 is fine.
- The WD Black is another big noise source. Consider going with an SSD for OS/Apps, another as a scratch disk and then a large 5400rpm media drive for storage.
Thanks for this information, i got something new knowledge from your reply.

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