I have two computers in my 400 sq. ft. studio apartment that are inaudible to most of my friends, and quiet enough to live with for someone like myself with overly sensitive hearing. My problem, however, lies in aesthetics, as I hate having my workstation in the middle of the "living room" area, and my girlfriend hates having computers around period, with the exception of our HTPC in an Antec NSK2480.
To remedy this situation, I recently got rid of my server, threw the drives in my workstation, and began looking for two new cases to house each in a way that allows them to blend into my apartment a.k.a. computer cases as furniture. I also figured if I'm buying entirely new cases, something I'm set on, I also might as well work to make them as silent as possible.
I'm pretty sure I found the perfect case in the Lian Li PC-343B, but I've avoided it because of the price; $350 is a lot to spend when I'd still have another case to buy. After weeks of searching for something better, I'm still at square one, and as of today I can get the Lian Li for $315 on sale. With 18x5.25" bays, this case can most certainly handle anything. I could suspension mount every single one of the drives in my server, plus the number I intend to expand to, and still have room to spare.
Before I go ahead and buy I've got a few questions I thought you guys might be able to answer:
-First, obviously, does anyone have any personal experience with this case?
-Does it seem like it would be hard to get this thing running near silent with a low power i5-650 running on its iGPU and 10 suspension mounted 5400rpm 2TB Samsung F3EGs? There are no vents and only rear exhaust. Sealing off the 80mm exhaust, adding some extremely low RPM 120mm fans, and using a solid PSU seems like the perfect combination.
-Here's a big one...is this just a pretty box with simple 5.25" drive cages mounted into it? I've been taking welding classes, and honestly, this thing seems like it would incredibly easy to build. For less money I could use thick steel all around, and build it almost exactly to my needs, but it would probably take me a few weeks. I've got access to every type of machine/tool there is including MIG and TIG welders, and a plasma cutter. I'm also pretty handy with a Dremel for the finer interior details.
I understand high prices in other Lian Li/most other high end cases where a lot of detail goes into the interior, with complex mounting systems, and unique cooling methods, but this really does just seem like a big aluminum box...
Any input on this case would be greatly appreciated, perhaps I'm missing something, thanks!
Lian Li PC-343B worth it for a server or just a box?
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infiniteengine
- Posts: 7
- Joined: Sat Jan 09, 2010 2:53 am
- Location: New York
mini-ITX board?
Why not a mini-ITX board in the Lian Li Q07 (or if you really need lots of drives in the Q08)?
You can get a Zotac (and soon a Gagabyte) 1156 socket board. With a Clarkdale the Zotac gives you built in Video chip and if you really need to you can add a video card.
It's small, its petite (pretty even) and its bookshelf. It's front is about the size of a piece of 8.5 by 11 paper and it is maybe about 6 inches deep. The motherboard mounts on one of the side panels that doubles as a removable motherboard tray.
If you want power, you can use a Zotac 775 socket board, Get a high end 775 quad CPU, remove the PSU (replace with dual fanless winmates for 220 watts).
Removing the internal PSU leaves room for a thermalright HR-01 plus tower cooler. You can use the Thermalright optional duct for this cooler to duct in cool air through a front blow hole.
Top it off with an SSD boot drive and a 2.5 inch data drive (maybe a velociraptor or a laptop drive). They will both fit in the hard drive mount on the case floor.
That is as much computer as you could ever reasonably ask for, in as small a bookshelf form factor as you could reasonably ask for, running as cool as you could reasonably ask for. All with only one fan. The fan feeding the ducted in fresh air to the ThermalRight cooler.
mini-ITX Case with 12T (6 x 2T)
There is a Q08 version of this that can hold, to my recollection, 6 hard drives. It's a little big for my taste, but if your needs run to a lot of HDD capacity, that's not bad.
And the Lian Li mounts for the hard drives are very nicely cushioned. They are in my opinion the best thing out there short of hard drive suspension like that used by the Antec Solo.
This case is an extended version of the Q07 with improved cooling. To get good cooling with the q07, you have to cut a front blow hole. the Q08 comes with a 140mm fan installed in a front blow hole, cooling both the case and your disk array.
It is not as petite as the q07, but should fit on a 10 or 11 inch deep shelf
The PC-343B
I'm not familiar with the PC-343B, but if it is a recent case it uses the same hard drives mounts as the q07.
It's highly unlikely you could approach the build quality of the Lian Li cases unless you were willing to invest the the time and money to build jigs and fixtures to build a one off case.
Parts is Parts
If you do build your own case, it is possible to buy Lian Li hard drive cages. You can also buy their motherboard trays for two of their models. An uATX tray and an ATX tray.
even if you are able to build a motherboard tray, why would you if you can just buy one. They don't look that easy to fabricate to my eyes.
Why not a mini-ITX board in the Lian Li Q07 (or if you really need lots of drives in the Q08)?
You can get a Zotac (and soon a Gagabyte) 1156 socket board. With a Clarkdale the Zotac gives you built in Video chip and if you really need to you can add a video card.
It's small, its petite (pretty even) and its bookshelf. It's front is about the size of a piece of 8.5 by 11 paper and it is maybe about 6 inches deep. The motherboard mounts on one of the side panels that doubles as a removable motherboard tray.
If you want power, you can use a Zotac 775 socket board, Get a high end 775 quad CPU, remove the PSU (replace with dual fanless winmates for 220 watts).
Removing the internal PSU leaves room for a thermalright HR-01 plus tower cooler. You can use the Thermalright optional duct for this cooler to duct in cool air through a front blow hole.
Top it off with an SSD boot drive and a 2.5 inch data drive (maybe a velociraptor or a laptop drive). They will both fit in the hard drive mount on the case floor.
That is as much computer as you could ever reasonably ask for, in as small a bookshelf form factor as you could reasonably ask for, running as cool as you could reasonably ask for. All with only one fan. The fan feeding the ducted in fresh air to the ThermalRight cooler.
mini-ITX Case with 12T (6 x 2T)
There is a Q08 version of this that can hold, to my recollection, 6 hard drives. It's a little big for my taste, but if your needs run to a lot of HDD capacity, that's not bad.
And the Lian Li mounts for the hard drives are very nicely cushioned. They are in my opinion the best thing out there short of hard drive suspension like that used by the Antec Solo.
This case is an extended version of the Q07 with improved cooling. To get good cooling with the q07, you have to cut a front blow hole. the Q08 comes with a 140mm fan installed in a front blow hole, cooling both the case and your disk array.
It is not as petite as the q07, but should fit on a 10 or 11 inch deep shelf
The PC-343B
I'm not familiar with the PC-343B, but if it is a recent case it uses the same hard drives mounts as the q07.
It's highly unlikely you could approach the build quality of the Lian Li cases unless you were willing to invest the the time and money to build jigs and fixtures to build a one off case.
Parts is Parts
If you do build your own case, it is possible to buy Lian Li hard drive cages. You can also buy their motherboard trays for two of their models. An uATX tray and an ATX tray.
even if you are able to build a motherboard tray, why would you if you can just buy one. They don't look that easy to fabricate to my eyes.
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BlackWhizz
- Posts: 266
- Joined: Wed Mar 31, 2010 8:19 am
- Location: OV, The Netherlands
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davepermen
- Posts: 19
- Joined: Mon Oct 05, 2009 12:54 am
- Location: Switzerland
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infiniteengine
- Posts: 7
- Joined: Sat Jan 09, 2010 2:53 am
- Location: New York
Thats exactly the kind of thing I'm thinking about; very nice!davepermen wrote:i just put them into a cupboard and a drawer.
girlfriend approved and silent
I realized that the concept of the 343 is completely backwards, so I nixed it as a potential server case. It seems designed for those who do a lot of customization and/or modding. Using solely 5.25" bays means that unless you're doing suspension using the built in cages, you're likely going to have to add on anywhere from $50-300 on HDD cages as an extremely low estimate.
This was going to be for my server, which at present houses six 2TB F3EGs, one 2TB Seagate LP, and a Samsung 1TB F3 OS drive that could be replaced by one of my 60GB OCZ Solid2s if it creates any noise or heat issues. I'm adding on F3EGs as I'm able, being that they run the coolest and have been very reliable, with an expectation to max out my internal storage at about 14-16 drives.
Motherboard is undecided, but I'll be using an i5-650 on a Gigabye P55-UD2 mATX for now, until I upgrade my workstation, and move its i5-750 into the server. As for the CPU cooler, I'm torn between a Megahalem and HR-01. With internal fans a likely necessity on the hard drives, a low RPM fan on a Megahalem might not even be noticeable...
Looks good to me. Why not use it with some minor modifications.davepermen wrote:i just put them into a cupboard and a drawer.
Get a small test bench:
http://www.highspeedpc.com/
or
http://www.lian-li.com/v2/en/product/pr ... _index=127
I think you want to limit yourself to uATX boards, but some of the Lian Li test benches can take full ATX.
and then supplement it with some Lian Li hard drive cages:
http://www.lian-li.com/v2/en/product/pr ... sc_index=5