I'm building an ITX PC to be my workstation in an acoustically treated studio, so more quiet = more better.
After research, this is my current draft:
Lian Li PC-Q10 w/ Noiseblocker MultiFrame M12-1 120mm
Seasonic Platinum Series 400 Watt Fanless
Scythe Mugen 5
ASUS H170I-PLUS D3
Crucial MX200 500GB
Intel Core i5-7600K
Crucial CT2K8G4DF8213 (2x8 DDR4 kit)
I'm quite happy with it, it's a bit pricy though. Before horsepower, stability and quiet operation are my biggest requirements. The Lian Li case seems perfect for airflow, especially with the fanless seasonic. Possible concern is that the psu will be sideways instead of right way up, which seasonic doesn't quite approve of, but I think in practice this won't be an issue. I'm pretty sure the mugen will fit, bit of a tight squeeze though.
All PC's I've built in the past have been gaming-focused, and I tended to cut corners on acoustics and stability in favour of performance, so I'm looking for second opinions, especially if I can minimise the cost a bit. Parts are being bought in the Netherlands.
Planned ITX rig for music production
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee
-
ImaginaryFreedom
- Posts: 2
- Joined: Mon Mar 06, 2017 11:12 am
Re: Planned ITX rig for music production
Welcome to SPCR.
Here's a couple of thoughts...
Lian Li PC-Q10 w/ Noiseblocker MultiFrame M12-1 120mm - ok. Are there other contenders you'd consider for the case?
Seasonic Platinum Series 400 Watt Fanless - there are semi-passive designs (fan off with lower loads) that may be less expensive..I don't know what brands/models you have access to...maybe you could link your favorite e-tailers.. yeah, the PSU placement is a little wacky in this case...note the max length is 150mm. An SFX PSU with ATX bracket might be easier fit...
Scythe Mugen 5 - 155mm tall - should fit.
ASUS H170I-PLUS D3 - have you considered the newer H270 chipset? That said, I haven't seen DPC latency numbers for this H170I board...or much on H270 boards, yet..
Crucial MX200 500GB - ok
Intel Core i5-7600K - K CPU, but H motherboard - so no overclocking. Do you you need the slight bump in clock speed of the K over the non-K?
Crucial CT2K8G4DF8213 (2x8 DDR4 kit) - couldn't find any info on this kit other than 2133 speed. If you do go with H270, bump this up to 2400.
Here's a couple of thoughts...
Lian Li PC-Q10 w/ Noiseblocker MultiFrame M12-1 120mm - ok. Are there other contenders you'd consider for the case?
Seasonic Platinum Series 400 Watt Fanless - there are semi-passive designs (fan off with lower loads) that may be less expensive..I don't know what brands/models you have access to...maybe you could link your favorite e-tailers.. yeah, the PSU placement is a little wacky in this case...note the max length is 150mm. An SFX PSU with ATX bracket might be easier fit...
Scythe Mugen 5 - 155mm tall - should fit.
ASUS H170I-PLUS D3 - have you considered the newer H270 chipset? That said, I haven't seen DPC latency numbers for this H170I board...or much on H270 boards, yet..
Crucial MX200 500GB - ok
Intel Core i5-7600K - K CPU, but H motherboard - so no overclocking. Do you you need the slight bump in clock speed of the K over the non-K?
Crucial CT2K8G4DF8213 (2x8 DDR4 kit) - couldn't find any info on this kit other than 2133 speed. If you do go with H270, bump this up to 2400.
Re: Planned ITX rig for music production
Only with a long VGA-card...CA_Steve wrote:the PSU placement is a little wacky in this case...note the max length is 150mm
-
ImaginaryFreedom
- Posts: 2
- Joined: Mon Mar 06, 2017 11:12 am
Re: Planned ITX rig for music production
In general access to parts is very good in the Netherlands. I use the website tweakers.net to find parts, it has a very convenient search engine and keeps track of all the webshops that sell the part you're looking up. Some good shops that come to mind are afuture.nl, azerty.nl, megekko.nl and alternate.nl
My main reasoning for picking the Lian Li case is that it seems to have great airflow for the fanless psu and in general, I was looking at the Node 304 and Bitfenix Prodigy too, but compared to the Lian Li a lot of case designs seem to be kind of packed in and inefficient (talk of frail plastic and restrictive grills on the Bitfenix didn't appeal either), and the Lian Li scored great in the spcr review. It seemed like the case with the fewest compromises I could find, other than cost.
As for the board, I thought I should go for Asus for fan xpert, and the only 1151 ITX board I could find that has a 270 (Z270 to be precise) chipset is a Republic Of Gamers which is very expensive and actually has sub-par connectivity compared to the H170I. If I wanted to overclock there's the Asus Z170I Pro Gaming, but I don't think it's worth it. I did look at the Gigabyte GA-H270N-Wifi GA-Z270N-Wifi as alternatives, but I'd like to have full control over the fans.
I'd never heard of DPC latency before, but reading up on it it seems like something I should care about. I'm mostly superficially tech savy when it comes to these things, would the motherboard I pick have an appreciable effect on the amount of audio latency I experience while using a USB audio interface?
CPUs is something I'm kind of unsure about, I don't think most music software utilises multithreading well at all, so I thought an i5 would be the best value for money, but I couldn't really decide whether the €20 premium on the 7600k would be worth it over the non-k 7600. I'm starting to lean on the side of getting the non-k 7600 now though, if I'm getting a board that can't overclock anyway.
The other part of the build I'm starting to doubt is the Mugen 5, I read some more through the forums and heard about potential ball bearing noise, I'll replace it with a spcr reviewed cooler, but I'm also wondering about the form factor of it. In one thread I read the suggestion that a slimmer cooler would be better for a more passive airflow, whereas the big blocks like the mugen are designed to have air forced through them. It sounds like to me I might be better off with a cooler with form factor similar to the Kotetsu instead, to leverage the Lian Li's qualities more.
Although I did mention minimising the cost in my original post, I don't mind spending around €1000 on the build. My concern comes more from making sure the money I'm spending is actually increasing the quality of the build in ways that matter to me. Things like practical form factor, good I/O, no sounds that could distract me, clean power that doesn't introduce ground noise when recording synths that are plugged in via USB, low latency and jitter, and enough horsepower to run my average Ableton Live project (but a good i5 is plenty).
My main reasoning for picking the Lian Li case is that it seems to have great airflow for the fanless psu and in general, I was looking at the Node 304 and Bitfenix Prodigy too, but compared to the Lian Li a lot of case designs seem to be kind of packed in and inefficient (talk of frail plastic and restrictive grills on the Bitfenix didn't appeal either), and the Lian Li scored great in the spcr review. It seemed like the case with the fewest compromises I could find, other than cost.
As for the board, I thought I should go for Asus for fan xpert, and the only 1151 ITX board I could find that has a 270 (Z270 to be precise) chipset is a Republic Of Gamers which is very expensive and actually has sub-par connectivity compared to the H170I. If I wanted to overclock there's the Asus Z170I Pro Gaming, but I don't think it's worth it. I did look at the Gigabyte GA-H270N-Wifi GA-Z270N-Wifi as alternatives, but I'd like to have full control over the fans.
I'd never heard of DPC latency before, but reading up on it it seems like something I should care about. I'm mostly superficially tech savy when it comes to these things, would the motherboard I pick have an appreciable effect on the amount of audio latency I experience while using a USB audio interface?
CPUs is something I'm kind of unsure about, I don't think most music software utilises multithreading well at all, so I thought an i5 would be the best value for money, but I couldn't really decide whether the €20 premium on the 7600k would be worth it over the non-k 7600. I'm starting to lean on the side of getting the non-k 7600 now though, if I'm getting a board that can't overclock anyway.
The other part of the build I'm starting to doubt is the Mugen 5, I read some more through the forums and heard about potential ball bearing noise, I'll replace it with a spcr reviewed cooler, but I'm also wondering about the form factor of it. In one thread I read the suggestion that a slimmer cooler would be better for a more passive airflow, whereas the big blocks like the mugen are designed to have air forced through them. It sounds like to me I might be better off with a cooler with form factor similar to the Kotetsu instead, to leverage the Lian Li's qualities more.
Although I did mention minimising the cost in my original post, I don't mind spending around €1000 on the build. My concern comes more from making sure the money I'm spending is actually increasing the quality of the build in ways that matter to me. Things like practical form factor, good I/O, no sounds that could distract me, clean power that doesn't introduce ground noise when recording synths that are plugged in via USB, low latency and jitter, and enough horsepower to run my average Ableton Live project (but a good i5 is plenty).
Re: Planned ITX rig for music production
Ok, this post is going to widen your search rather than narrow it...but, perhaps it'll be useful. 
Case and form factor: If you are going with a 65W CPU and don't have any add-on cards, have you considered going with a passive case? Two mfgrs are Akasa (with NUC and mITX form factors) and HDPlex (ATX to mITX)...there are some others. Small form factors, no moving parts, and decent cooling for your use. Just a thought.
DPC Latency: Unfortunately, the performance is all over the map. Mostly depending on whether or not the mobo mfgr bothers to tune for it in the BIOS and whether or not an included part/driver messes things up..and whether or not Intel tunes for it with each generation of chipset... Here's a graph from Anandtech's most recent Z170 review. Theoretically, anything under 500us is fine...my take is if they can get to under 100us with some boards, what aren't they all?
Case and form factor: If you are going with a 65W CPU and don't have any add-on cards, have you considered going with a passive case? Two mfgrs are Akasa (with NUC and mITX form factors) and HDPlex (ATX to mITX)...there are some others. Small form factors, no moving parts, and decent cooling for your use. Just a thought.
DPC Latency: Unfortunately, the performance is all over the map. Mostly depending on whether or not the mobo mfgr bothers to tune for it in the BIOS and whether or not an included part/driver messes things up..and whether or not Intel tunes for it with each generation of chipset... Here's a graph from Anandtech's most recent Z170 review. Theoretically, anything under 500us is fine...my take is if they can get to under 100us with some boards, what aren't they all?
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
Re: Planned ITX rig for music production
Also, one factor for DPC Latency is all the crap running in the background - more tasks = more procedure calls. So, I always suggest NOT running unneeded background s/w like Fan Xpert, etc... Go with decent BIOS level fan controls instead...if you have fans.
You might look to Ableton's forums (if they have em) or other DAW forums and see what motherboards have worked for others.
You might look to Ableton's forums (if they have em) or other DAW forums and see what motherboards have worked for others.