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Modern mATX Recommendations

Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 8:54 pm
by Edirol
Hey,

I'm looking to build a new system since my Athlon 3800+ is showing it's age.

My goal is to have a small footprint desktop, yet still have the power to play blu-rays/HD content and I'm value conscious. I'm thinking of getting a quad core Athlon II X4.

With that in mind, I think the only components I'd like to narrow down are:
1. Mobo (mATX recommendations?) The last SPCR article was for the AMD785G chipset and only the MSI board was mATX. I was disappointed to read that it offered poor fan control (no support in speedfan). Has this changed?

2. Case. I've never bought a mATX case before so I'm not sure what's a good recommendation. According to SPCR recomendations, the Antec NSK2400 is a good mATX case, but it seems geared towards HTPC functionality. Is there something better that's more desktop pc suited?

3. CPU cooler. I think this would depend on the mobo&case selection.

I also considered just getting a Apple MAC mini, but I'm not sure if it would be quiet enough. I know there's a little fan in there somewhere. It's hard to tell if it's quiet enough at an apple store though. I'd prefer that the only noise I hear would be the idle sound of a 5400rpm HD.

If anyone can provide some recommendations it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
- Edirol

Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 11:28 pm
by Fayd
NSK3480 is a good size case micro-atx case that is desktop suited.

look into the athlon x4 620 or their low wattage x4's

the 3480 will take a full height CPU cooler too. good bonus there.

another option is a shuttle type computer... but i dont know how quiet they are.

with something like the 785G chipset, since it does the decoding in the chipset rather than the CPU, you dont need a particularly powerful processor to play blu-ray.

Posted: Sat Dec 26, 2009 5:27 am
by Mushu
This may be a bit late, but, on the off chance that it isn't...

There are several mATX 785g boards out now :)

I'm building a system based on the ASUS M4A785TD-M EVO, which is a 785g with an AM3 socket, DDR3 support, and 128 MB of dedicated memory for the built in graphics processor.

I'll be putting it into a Lian Li PC-v351 case, which may be to your liking. It's too big for a regular HTPC, and IMO has the look and feel of a mix between an HTPC and a desktop :)

Good luck!