Fanless build

[1llusion]

Hi,

 

I am in a process of building a home recording studio and I got to the point of figuring out what computer I am going to need.

Since the music recording will take place in the same room as where the computer will be, I need the computer to be as silent as possible.

 

 

At the moment, I am considering the Streacom FC10 or FC 5 evo case, however,  I am not sure how powerful processor I could safely fit in there...

I will be recording into Pro Tools 12.5 (http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/compatibility/Pro-Tools-12-System-Requirements).

 

What would be your processor/motherboard recommendation? Or would you recommend a different approach?

 

Thank you very much!

 

 

 

[Tedster]

5 minutes ago, 1llusion said:

Hi,

 

I am in a process of building a home recording studio and I got to the point of figuring out what computer I am going to need.

Since the music recording will take place in the same room as where the computer will be, I need the computer to be as silent as possible.

 

 

At the moment, I am considering the Streacom FC10 or FC 5 evo case, however,  I am not sure how powerful processor I could safely fit in there...

I will be recording into Pro Tools 12.5 (http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/compatibility/Pro-Tools-12-System-Requirements).

 

What would be your processor/motherboard recommendation? Or would you recommend a different approach?

 

Thank you very much!

 

 

 

For the FC10, it says it can handle up to 95w TDPs in a room with good ambient airflow. So that's pretty much any recent non-enthusiast grade Intel chip, or some recent AMD chips.

For the FC5, it says 65w.

 

I'd personally go with the FC10 and probably go with a locked Core i5 to be on the safe side. Perhaps a 6500. For a motherboard, I don't know. Something with a nice VRM heatsink.

[diapersarefullofshit]

I think the best approach could be to mount a computer in another room or mount the case in a box with alot of soundproofing.

[1llusion]

10 minutes ago, Tedster said:

For the FC10, it says it can handle up to 95w TDPs in a room with good ambient airflow. So that's pretty much any recent non-enthusiast grade Intel chip, or some recent AMD chips.

For the FC5, it says 65w.

 

I'd personally go with the FC10 and probably go with a locked Core i5 to be on the safe side. Perhaps a 6500. For a motherboard, I don't know. Something with a nice VRM heatsink.

 

So in theory, it should handle a recent locked i5? Would you have any particular recommendations? Thank you very much

6 minutes ago, diapersarefullofshit said:

I think the best approach could be to mount a computer in another room or mount the case in a box with alot of soundproofing.

 

Mounting in another room is unfortunately not possible

Wouldn't the second approach have similar limitations regarding cooling?

[diapersarefullofshit]

6 hours ago, 1llusion said:

Wouldn't the second approach have similar limitations regarding cooling?

I think not. You can make a box where 100% of all the sound produced always has a path that hits soundproofing material and components yet is still open for airflow. I think the picture below is too complicated but i was thinking a similar design but with less airpressureloss.You can buy a cooler master silencio (which already has soundproofing material installed and place that case with silent fans in a box based on the same principles as shown below.

 

 

As you can see, they have tried to optimize an airpath that maximizes the soundproofing distance greatly reducing decibels. But i would opt to go with a bigger airduct approach, without 180 degree turns only 90 degree turns, both to reduce pressure-loss.

[ard1998]

Watercooling? Or Low Power component like http://ark.intel.com/m/products/89612/Intel-Pentium-Processor-4405Y-2M-Cache-1_50-GHz#@product/specifications (apu with a tdp of 6W)

[Stefan1024]

There are some nice 45 and 65 watt CPUs this case should be able to hande just fine.

An i5 is a very unspecific recommodaion as there are i5s with only two cores and locked to 15 watts.

Just have a look for a 4 core i5 or i7 with 45 watts (the one with the T suffix) and you should be fine.

If you are ok with 90 degree C when running prime 95 you can also use a 65 watt part.

 

And get enougth RAM and don't dare to use a HDD.

[Streetguru]

8 hours ago, 1llusion said:

 

What budget/country?

 

What exactly do you need it to do? You'll probably want an i7 T with an HR-22 cooler and a fanless PSU


Although the better option is probably just buying a USB 3.0 ultra dock like this and just running a single cable into the room keeping the PC in another room all together.

http://www.amazon.com/Plugable-UD-3900-Universal-Docking-Ethernet/dp/B00ECDM78E

[1llusion]

1 hour ago, Streetguru said:

What budget/country?

 

What exactly do you need it to do? You'll probably want an i7 T with an HR-22 cooler and a fanless PSU


Although the better option is probably just buying a USB 3.0 ultra dock like this and just running a single cable into the room keeping the PC in another room all together.

http://www.amazon.com/Plugable-UD-3900-Universal-Docking-Ethernet/dp/B00ECDM78E

 

Budget is... well not too much of a concern as long as it serves the purpose right. The country is United Kingdom.

I need it to run ProTools 12 (link in op) smoothly and a little headroom for possible audio tinkering.

 

While I understand that the PC in another room would be the best option, it would be very difficult to do in my case.

[Streetguru]

9 hours ago, 1llusion said:

Budget is... well not too much of a concern as long as it serves the purpose right. The country is United Kingdom.

I need it to run ProTools 12 (link in op) smoothly and a little headroom for possible audio tinkering.

 

While I understand that the PC in another room would be the best option, it would be very difficult to do in my case.

Might be a better fanless cooler for 1151 if you look around, but in any case you're going to need at least one fan to move some air, so maybe get this hardware fan controller to constantly control the speed, and maybe get a different fan at some point.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182348

Also dunno if you need more motherboard features, but those MSI budget boards are pretty solid
 

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Wpbsbv
Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Wpbsbv/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($299.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Silverstone NT01-PRO Fanless CPU Cooler  ($46.99 @ Directron)
Motherboard: MSI B150M Pro-VD Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard  ($63.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory  ($54.00 @ Newegg)
Storage: Mushkin ECO3 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($59.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Cooler Master Silencio 352 MicroATX Mini Tower Case  ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic 520W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular Fanless ATX Power Supply  ($117.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $702.94
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-05-05 14:08 EDT-0400

If this zalman cooler fits on 1151 I'd get this instead, Just check to make sure they'll fit in the case

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=13C-0007-00002&cm_re=Zalman_fanless-_-13C-0007-00002-_-Product

[1llusion]

44 minutes ago, Streetguru said:

Might be a better fanless cooler for 1151 if you look around, but in any case you're going to need at least one fan to move some air, so maybe get this hardware fan controller to constantly control the speed, and maybe get a different fan at some point.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182348

Also dunno if you need more motherboard features, but those MSI budget boards are pretty solid
 

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Wpbsbv
Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Wpbsbv/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($299.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Silverstone NT01-PRO Fanless CPU Cooler  ($46.99 @ Directron)
Motherboard: MSI B150M Pro-VD Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard  ($63.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory  ($54.00 @ Newegg)
Storage: Mushkin ECO3 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($59.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Cooler Master Silencio 352 MicroATX Mini Tower Case  ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic 520W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular Fanless ATX Power Supply  ($117.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $702.94
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-05-05 14:08 EDT-0400

If this zalman cooler fits on 1151 I'd get this instead, Just check to make sure they'll fit in the case

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=13C-0007-00002&cm_re=Zalman_fanless-_-13C-0007-00002-_-Product

 

That looks really good! Thank you very much for your help. I might just have a look around for a motherboard that has thunderbolt just for the sake of low latency with my audio interface.