Project Oracle - Dual CPU, 1080 SLI mid-tower

[TantrumEU]

12 hours ago, srmarkovic said:

I used Phanteks Enthoo Pro and I like it, but my build is just a fraction of this!

At 60l it's yuuuuge, i'm more in the market for something I could take on an airplane with half that size

 

12 hours ago, srmarkovic said:

Water is overkill because Xeons could not go over 64 degrees with cheap air coolers 100% load!!!

You're just not utilizing them to the full potential. Beefy chips like 2696/2699 v3/v4 even at stock settings (18-22 cores at 2.8GHz) are rated for a respectable 140W and can actually reach that thermal dissipation and go even higher with all-core-turbo hack.

 

5 hours ago, Zhanming12 said:

Not sure about the specific 2U board you have in mind, but the Z10-PA/PE series rush SLI just fine

I'm considering ATX form factor boards, of which there basically only two noteworthy options: Asus Z10PA-D8 and Supermicro X10DAL. Both claim to not support SLI officially. Good to hear Asus's board supports it away, and it looks like for the Supermicro board its BIOS probably also can be coerced into supporting SLI - https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/6841zw/til_nvidia_sli_support_is_drm/. I'd probably go with Supermicro - it's more featureful, whereas Asus is a really barebone server without even onboard audio.

5 hours ago, Zhanming12 said:

 

If you want to turbo-hack the 2696 I'm not sure if any 140mm air cooler would work without a lot of thermal throttling. Without all-core turbo with an ATX 2U board you're still looking at a tiny amount of real estate per CPU, so the only option is probably dual blower coolers. Going to EEB means you can fit a pair of Noctua U12's which should handle 140-150W just fine, though.

Yeah I fear thermals and cooler would be a problem for a small ATX board and case. Water cooling however is a big no-no if I were to board with it on an airplane. U12's should fit even on ATX, this guy managed to fit two U14S just fine: https://pcpartpicker.com/b/D6QZxr. Both are >160mm however, more than 140mm supported by the tiny Lian Li case I'm considering, so I might have to compromise on overclocking or the small case in the end

 

Edit: found Jonsbo U4 - similarly small case, airflow a little worse but supports 170mm coolers, cheaper and available right now, it just might be my new case