Black Snow - Downsizing from MATX to MITX

[Yummychickenblue]

 

 

 

Part 1: The Parts

 

 

 


This system is comprised mostly of new parts. The only things I'm keeping are the graphics card, PSU, and storage. As fas as new parts go, I've got:

Ryzen 5 1400

Asrock Fatality X370 something-orother-witth-wifi

HyperX Fury Black DDR4-2400 8GB



 

 

As fas the GPU, Storage, and PSU goes, I've got an eons-old EVGA GTX 750Ti, a 1TB WD drive I ripped from an old NAS, and a Samsung 850 Evo 250GB:



(Even though I'm moving ato MITX, MATX is still the best form factor

I'll be glad to be done with this case, it's a Cooler Master OEM case. It acts like one too, the PSU it came with was louder than a jet engine, it has 0 room in the back for cable management, (as you can see based on the sata cable running across the case)  and the PCI shields break if you blow on them too hard. It's served me for 2 years now though so I can't knock it for bad frame construction. It's not normally this clean buy my brother was kind enough to dust it out a few weeks ago. (though he didn't get the details which we'll see later. )

 

 



(Turns out later is right now)

As you can see this card is a little bit disgusting. i may or may not fix that (Hint: I don't)

 



Just a picture of my drives. 

Who wore it better?

I must confess I do really like the clean design on my old HyperX Blues. I'll have to see if I can do anything with them so they live on. That's not to say the Fury doesn't look nice as well, It walks the line between clea, minimalist, industrial design and striking, agressive design perfectly. 

 



it's so tiny!

Asrock advertises this weird Steel PCI slot as part one of this motherboards features. I'm not entirely sur what the benefit of it is, but I doubt my GPU is pwerful enough for it to be relevant. 

 



For the case I'm using the beautiful Thermaltake Core V1 Snow Edition. It'll contrast nicely with my black desk. While it's not the smallest MITX case ever,  almost all the sides are reconfigurable, meaning you could put the window beneath the PSU if you desired. I do kinda want to get some LEDs or something to put around the window or some other baby's first mod.

 
 

 

Part 2: Assembly

 

 




I've heard AMDs Wraith cooler is great at cooling and usable for OC'ing. As of writing this (~a week after completing the build) I haven't actually tried to OC, but the temperatures seem very nice at stock. I also ended up removing the stock paste on that cooler in favor of my own Arcic Silver 5. I bought it almost 2 years ago now and it seems to still be good ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 



this picture is my new asthetic

Well everything seems to work well enough. I'm relieved to know that I put in the CPU in the right direction as that was probably my biggest concner with this process. 

 



I kinda forgot to take pictures of putting the board into the case. soooo sory about that. 

I'd just like to take this moment to talk about front panel headers. They are the worst things I've ever had the pleasure to lay my eyes on. they're small and finnicky and if you don't get them right you're computer will be basically useless. I must say that ram is sexy though! 

 



Probably my biggest criticism of this case is the HDD cages. Thhose little feet on the bottom are flimsy and will break off if you're not careful. Especially because they're under pressure from the motherboard tray to help secure them.

 



This took longer than they should've. Mostly because I couldn't find the screws needed for the SSD. The astute among you may have already noticed this but the SSD is actually backwards, which means I had to take it out, reverse it, and then put it back in.

 



This massive 200mm fan that came with the case is as big as my face!

 



I'll have to reseat this later to fix some white sopts on the display. (Didn't take pictures of that though)

Got my GPU in the case! You can also see the I/O shield. 

 



This is the only decent picture I have with all the components installed. I'm still not sure whether or not this build has too much black in it. 

 



Well it looks like GRUB is broken and I'm too dumb to figure out how to fix it. Guess it's back to Windows for a little while. 

 



Looks like Windows didn't like my hardware upgrade! Now i have this ominous and foreshadowing message warning me of my fate should I use an unlicensed copy of Windows. Hopefully I'll be back on Fedora next week.

 
 

 



my fetish is white cube cases

And here we go! Overall I'm very happy with how this build turned out. For context, I got a new desk and the old system wouldn't fit under there. I figured that while I'm downsizing I may as well upgrade from my old FM2 system that's been kicking since 2014. My first choice woulld've been a node 304, but the white version is currently on sale for the low low price of $191 on Amazon. Luckily white cases and cube cases seem to be more common among MITX cases than other form factors, so I had plenty of options. I still need to find out what to do with the old components, keep an eye on the classifieds maybe? 

 

Just as an aside, where can I buy things related to case modding? I remember there was one site a few years ago but the owner went crazy or something. Where's the new place?

 

Part 4: Misc Pictures
 

 

 


 





 

These are my favorite pictures of the case and probably of the pictures I've taken. 

 





More pictures of logos! 
 

 

 

Tags

 

 


@Daring @vinyldash303 @SuperShermanTanker
 

 

 
 

I don't know how to use this forum anymore so the entire post is in a spoiler

[TheNaitsyrk]

All the pics are dead.

[Nowak]

Pics or it didn't happen.

[Yummychickenblue]

2 minutes ago, Daring said:

Pics or it didn't happen.

 

3 minutes ago, TheNaitsyrk said:

All the pics are dead.

kill me

[SuperShermanTanker]

Nice I used to have 750ti in my first build

[chilicheeseburger]

Nice, I like the case!

Do you plan on upgrading the GPU as well?

 

btw, the steel reinforced pcie slots on the mainboard are more sturdy than the plastic ones you usually find and are meant to reduce GPU sag. Never had a board with these though so I couldn't tell if it actually works. Your GTX 750ti probably isn't that heavy anyway.

 

[Yummychickenblue]

3 hours ago, chilicheeseburger said:

Nice, I like the case!

Do you plan on upgrading the GPU as well?

 

Maybe if I can find a deal on an AMD card. Right now the 750ti does what I need (I'm playing fairly old games right now) so the only reason to upgrade would be a blower style cooler (which is better for small cases like to his one) and better driver support on Linux.