SPCR

Been a while since posting on SPCR - after having a P180 case way back when & then moving to an iMac, SPCR seemed the natural place to start when building an HTPC.

There weren't many posts featuring the PC-C50 case, once of the few cases which would fit inside out home entertainment unit. The doors must remain closed due to a crawling child, so I needed a small depth with 120mm fans. Cabling is relativly simple using tried and tested SPCR methods for keeping those pesky cables out of sight. I've also added makeshift air filters on the PSU inlet as well as the other 120mm case inlet. The fans are configured in a push \ pull way with hot air exiting around the CPU chamber and fresh air being pulled from the PSU and fan near the optical drive bay. (hard to capture these in pics due to the drive cages above)

In addition to WMC7, the rig would also have to run iRacing & F12011 at 1080p with as many details turned on as possible. So here are the specs:

Gigabyte H61M-USB3-B3
Intel i3 2100 (stock cooler)
Asus GTX560 OC
Seasonic 530watt modular PSU
4GB DDR3 RAM
2x 2TB WD EARX SATA drives
1x Kingston 64GB SSD
Pasasonic 50" Plasma connected with mini HDMI

It's 25C ambient today & the doors on the entertainment unit are closed with an exhaust vent cut out at the rear.

Nice build, clean and all (+1 for the looks of the filters )
Temps/noise on load ?

I had the system running without filters for 2 weeks and the inside was filthy – we have a lot of construction near our place.

So as for noise, with the nexus 120mm fans they are pretty much silent at 7v, the loudest component is the CPU fan and the Antec tri-cool on Med (doesn’t start reliably on L) acting as an exhaust above the CPU. With the cabinet doors closed, the system sits at around 40C on idle across all temp sensors & rises up to around 50C under load.

Going forward, a couple changes are planned:

• Move the HDD in front of the CPU over to the optical drive bay to increase room in the CPU area
• Additional Nexus 120mm on the CPU side near the existing fan
• Remove the Antec tri-cool
• All 120mm fans to blow into the case with dust filters & allow heat to find it’s own way out, hopefully reducing motherboard heat
• Possible CPU heat sink upgrade as a last resort, some sort of top down blowing - Noctua or Scythe?

As a guide, the fans in the Panasonic plasma are louder than the PC when sitting 3m away, so it’s quiet by normal standards, but I know that by making a few simple changes I can get both the temps and noise down further.

Thanks for sharing your build. I think it's an interesting case, and unless I'm mistaken there's a review inbound. I've been considering putting together a HTPC around it and a 65W Llano chip, once those finally arrive in stores.

I don't know if this seems useful to you, but I think that Scythe's Samurai ZZ CPU cooler might be a good match for this case. The point being that due to its shape, you can keep the HDD cage in place even if the CPU socket was closer to it than it happens to be on your rather compact Gigabyte mobo. It's also quite cheap, performs relatively well with low airflow, and allows you to utilize the roof opening. Anyway, it's what I had planned on using.

Can you tell about the black piece(s) on the left in the middle picture? Is it perhaps something to prevent resonance in the case, and if so, does it eliminate the problem?

swaction wrote: Going forward, a couple changes are planned:

• Move the HDD in front of the CPU over to the optical drive bay to increase room in the CPU area
• Additional Nexus 120mm on the CPU side near the existing fan
• Remove the Antec tri-cool
• All 120mm fans to blow into the case with dust filters & allow heat to find it’s own way out, hopefully reducing motherboard heat
• Possible CPU heat sink upgrade as a last resort, some sort of top down blowing - Noctua or Scythe?

Have you tried any of these changes? I currently have the same case (and roughly same components, except I have a fanless PSU and a smaller 440 video card) with stock Lian-Li cooling and it's awful. It's not quiet, and there is no cooling whatsoever on the PSU/GPU side of the case. I was going to try pretty much exactly what you are describing above. I'd love to hear the results if you've done it.

Thanks!

swaction wrote: • Possible CPU heat sink upgrade as a last resort, some sort of top down blowing - Noctua or Scythe?

A Scythe Grand Kama Cross works well in that case with the intake fan.

Hi All - Late reply to this thread, mainly because the CPU coolers recommended are no longer available in my area due to their age.

Can anyone recommend a decent passive cooler for this case which will fit around the RAM? I'm now running an i5 and the stock cooler has a habit of stalling on startup at times... it's a bit sticky and I'd rather do away with it all together if possible.

I was looking for the Sythe Kama Cross or Big shuriken, but would like confirmation they will fit before I purchase.... but I also believe these are end of life.

swaction wrote:I was looking for the Sythe Kama Cross or Big shuriken

The Big Shuriken cannot go passive.