advice on fanless 4k capable system plan please

[corbis]

I am putting together my shopping list for a fanless 4k capable build

silent would be a huge plus as I will be using it at night and have acute hearing

an amd gpu would be prefferred as I'll be using it with linux and they have a better attitude toward open driver development.

current thoughts on parts:


Mainboard; I haven't researched yet but m-atx seems more than adequate for my needs
4 usb 2.0, 2 or more usb 3.0, gigabit ethernet, a headphone jack and 4 sata ports for ssd's
1 pci-e x16

Case; Nofan CS-60
CPU Cooler; Nofan CR-80EH
CPU; core i3 4130
ram probably 8gb, 1600mhz
Psu; Super Flower Golden Silent 500w (eu version of the Rosewill Silent Night 500W)
Hard Disks; One or more solid state drives

GPU; Something able but not overly pricey, I can upgrade later but it needs to be able to manage a 4k display from the start.


this is for wandering around secondlife, offline rpg gaming (not mmorpg), web surfing, watching films and working with documents, spreadsheets, etc. (not very demanding). It should be capable of supporting a 4k monitor at 60hz and may be upgraded to higher spec components (gpu and cpu) sometime later.

Budget; £600 ish is my notion for the end cost but with some flexibility

Any suggestions / reccomendations ?

[Abula]

I wouldn't worry to much about 4k, the industry has some catching to do, we have 4k tv and monitors but media is lacking.

I think the current intel igpus cant handle 4k at 60hz, but i think in time or probably the next gen of igpus should, as long HDMI 2.0 or Display port is implemented. But you can always go with dedicated gpu, i think that even low end from either AMD or Nvidia should be good enough for media reproduction, and in the past they have had fanless versions. Nvidia releases GeForce GT 720 Series, it has support for UHD (4k), the problem would be how you will be rendering, filters and post processing sometimes need beefier cards.

Personally i wouldnt go with nofan stuff, their cpu coolers are good, the rest of their gear seems remakes of others. If you want fanless go with Steacom, HDDPlex, you can build a pretty good setup that will work good and be pleasent to the eyes (although in here is personal the liking on the builds). I do like Nofan95C but not in a a totally fanless setup.

[useful_idiot]

I like your build plans. As far as 4k is concerned I am also looking to go this route. Any "newer" video card can handle 4k but to push 4k at ultra settings it will take a SLI/crossfired setup. To be safe i'd recommend AT LEAST a 280x, I think a 290x would be much better but i cant say from first hand experience. Take a look at my build thread to see how I silenced my 280x. Also great choice on the Nofan cpu cooler, they are awesome!

[bbalex]

Gaming at 4K is fluid enough only when using Crossfire or SLI setups. And even those are not able to run current-gen games with maximum settings. Have a look at this review for instance: Watch Dogs Performance and Image Quality Review. Or here: Watch Dogs review: tested with 32 GPUs.There are no fanless solutions for cooling even one of those top-of the line GPUs, so a fanless dual top-of-the line GPU setup is not possible either.

If instead of gaming, what you want is to have the PC desktop at 4K, and even to watch movies at 4K resolution, then this is possible, but there are some things you need to consider:

1. 4K @ 60 Hz (for PC desktop) is possible only through DisplayPort 1.2 and HDMI 2.0 connections.

All present-day motherboards and graphic cards that have DisplayPort outputs, are version 1.2, so that's ok. However, there is no motherboard or GPU with a HDMI 2.0 output, and according to known Intel and Nvidia/Amd plans, this will not change in the near future either - Broadwell will not have such support, the soon to be on the market nVidia GTX800 cards will not have them, and no such plans are know from AMD, either. So, DisplayPort 1.2 is the only option, an will remain so in the near future.

Regarding display types, you're ok if you plan on using a 4K display monitor, since these have DisplayPort 1.2 inputs. But if you want to use a TV, then you're again limited - the only 4K TV sets that have DIsplayPort inputs, are the Panasonic 4K TV sets. All the other big brands: Samsung, Sony, LG - offer only HDMI inputs (and even those are not all HDMI 2.0, or do not support all that's needed from a HDMI 2.0 port in order to be future proof).

2. 4K @ 24 fps (movies) is possible through DisplayPort, HDMI 2.0, and existing HDMI 1.4 connectors. Current gen motherboards and GPUs have DisplayPort 1.2 outputs, and the HDMI ports are very likely 1.4 - which should allow you to view movies at full resolution.

3. Available 4K video content is somewhat missing - and when you do find some, it's usually encoded with H265. Again, there is no hardware support for full hardware accelerated H265 decoding in current-gen hardware, and there is no support planned in the near future either. Just like with the support for HDMI 2.0, neither Intel, nor the GPU manufacturers have announced full hardware H265 decoding acceleration. That means you will have to rely on the CPU for decoding, and depending on the bitrate and encoding options, it could be either ok, or not ok at all: 4K H265 video decoding can either be very light on the CPU, or can use 25% of an i7 4770 or even more. Still, this means that a passively cooled current-gen Haswell CPU can be used to play movies at 24fps, so at least this is possible.


This is just not the right time to look for future-proof 4K hardware, I'm afraid.

[useful_idiot]

Very informative and spot on post bbalex. I will pull the trigger on a 28 inch 4k monitor when an IPS panel @120hz is available but as you say it seems it may not exist for a few years. If that is the case then maybe a 4k 28 inch TN panel will have to do. Now that leads me to maybe saying forget 4K for now and just go with a really nice 27 inch 2k IPS monitor. hrumph...decisions...decisions!!!

I setup crossfired 280x's for a few hours just to test it out on my current system. The problem i ran into was the slot speeds went to x8/x8 when the first and second slots were filled. When i filled the first and third slots it went to x16/x4. I would prefer to use the first and third slot but is x16/x4 going to be a bottleneck on 4k or even 2k?

Passive cooling a decent gpu is impossible. The best you will get, according to SPCR users, is mk-26. I use the Artic acceleros and am now a big fan of them.

[quest_for_silence]

I would prefer to use the first and third slot but is x16/x4 going to be a bottleneck on 4k or even 2k?

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Inte ... ng/23.html (but there are other sources about, like Anandtech or THG, IIRC).

[bbalex]

I'm glad I could be of help.

Like "quest_for_silence" showed, games don't seem to make graphic cards use more than the bandwidth offered by a PCIe 3.0 x8 slot. I don't know if that's because the graphic cards themselves can't really handle that much bandwidth, or because the software (games/apss) don't need that during their operation.

I also know of two more similar reviews: Test: what amount of PCI-Express lanes is optimal for SLI? and PCIe Bandwidth Comparison with HD 7970.

The number of PCIe lanes is limited on consumer-level (aka Haswell, Ivy Bridge, ...) CPUs, and it looks like it's the same on the upcoming entry-level slot 2011 Haswell-E CPU, so there can be only one PCIe 3.0 x16 slot connected to the available lanes from the CPU - and when two graphic cards are used, those 16 lanes are split between the two PCIe 3.0 slots in a x8 / x8 configuration. There is nothing we can do about this.

[useful_idiot]

quest_for_silence's chart shows that between pcie x16 and pcie x4 crossfire the difference is like 5%. I can live with that. I'm holding off on 4k because its now obsolete! 5k monitors are now coming or already here, i forget which. My main problem right now is that i cant find a crossfire bridge long enough to go between the first and third slot. I dont think they exist.

[quest_for_silence]

My main problem right now is that i cant find a crossfire bridge long enough to go between the first and third slot. I dont think they exist.

Usually long crossfire bridges are about up to 100mm, whether they are rigid, and about up to 90mm whether they are flexible: do you need longer ones? Check it out.