I like both choices, but as said before, if you feel you might benefit from a high end gpu, its your call.

I like a lot crucial for memory, been fairly reliable in mulitple builds. Personally i like more the ballistic sport out of really low height and 1.35V, but i also consider the tactical and also almost bought it, here its up to you, the difference will be small in performance.

Its a nice motherboard, i like the layout and design. C2 is just the new stepping of the chipset to avoid the USB3 bug that the C1 had, my motherboard is a C1 and i dont have any issues, but if you can get a C2 to avoid the sleep bug. Weather the Impact or the deluxe are worth it.... is something you have to decide on your own on the features, personally i dont think they are but depends on your needs. The Z87i Pro has 4 fan headers, 3 are CHA_FANs 1,2,3 and one CPU_FAN, so given that it already comes with so much connections, i would suggest you test the NODE 304 fans first, since FanXpert2 will controll all fans individually, you will be able to drop them to the lowest just by running FanXPert2 and its tunning, and if the included fans dont furfill your quiet desires, you can upgrade them later.

I have no experience with be quiet PSU, not that common in the US, but i read good things about them, as pointed before me, Corsair RM450 should be a good option. There are builds that have gone fanless on the Node304 on the PSU, and the 92mm should give some fresh air to it so if you want go fanless i don't think you will have any trouble, that said for gaming builds or 24/7 running, i prefer to have a semi passive PSU that can turn on the fan if its needed. If you want a smaller length PSU, you also have the Seasonic G360 that its 140mm but none modular, so you will have to get a little creative hiding all the unused cables.

Most of the ssds are extremly fast as it is, and i doubt people can tell the difference between brands without checking the hardware. Crucial has been a solid contender in the past years on ssds, i have own mulitple M4 and been perfect, with some issues that have been handled really fast. That said atm im mostly buying samsung because they also have released really good ssds, and its one of the companies that does everything on their ssds, from the NAD, to the controller and firmware so they have control of all the chain. But atm Crucial is clearing the M500 for the M550 so you can find very good deals on the web, either choice is fine.

Scythe Mugen 4 would be a good alternative, just crosscheck the height of the fins would fit with the side daughter board of the Z87i Pro. Another good cooler is the prolimatech Megahelms, but its also a little expensive, but in some countries other coolers are just as expensive, so depends a lot into what you have available. Dont go with Thermalright HR02, while a great cooler, it will not allow you to use the back case fan as its asymetrical and grows toward the back flush from the cpu, another viable option is thermalright true spirit 140 (i would swap the fan for NF-A15 PWM).

On the fans, its up to you, while i didn't like the Fractals, they are not bad, specially if you are running them all on fanXpert2, and more so because you are buying a very capable motherboard with 4 fan headers, so you will be able to control all your fans independently, my suggestion is to test the included fans first connected directly to the motherboard, install AI Suite III, and run FanXpert2 tuning, it will establish the fans rpm range and drop them as low as it can under idle, later you can do your own graphs or modified the existing, and if you find them not to your liking in terms of noise, then its very easy to just buy new fans and swap them out.

Now if you are set on swapping the fans, then consider an Antec True Quiet 140 for the back, and Nexus Basic 92mm for the frontal, both have been reviewed by SPCR and are recommend fans, they should also play very well on FanXpert2, both undervolt very well.

Evil... Evil.... Evil =)

If you have the budget - spend a little more and go for the Straight Power E9 instead of the System Power 7. The latter has a smaller fan that spins at higher rpm and is noisier.

IMVHO it's enough: above all, I'm not aware of low profile RAM faster than 1600.
Broadly speaking, hardly you can exploit larger bandwidth, and on an Intel platform the highest gain would be relatively limited; about timings, they are less important than in the past, and less important than bandwidth.




Exactly.




More probably that not, no: at any rate, you can check the minor differences with the "Compare" feature of the ASUS website.




Power wise, you'll never approach the 150W mark with such a system, so almost *any* ATX PSU is an overkill, nowadays.
With reference to the S7 I'd like to point you out two notes: 1) it's a relatively cheap, solidly built and relatively quiet unit BUT it's not silent. 2) It has 5 fixed big sleeved cables from 55 to 110cm, which is a problem inside small enclosures.
I wouldn't be obsessed about PSU lenght, and a Corsair RM450 would be probably better suited for a very quiet rig.

Broadly speaking, there are no drawbacks using a fanless PSU inside a 304, IMHO, but it won't be cheap (at least twice an S7 I guess): at any rate, a fanned PSU won't give you any additional airflow as the fan is an intake and it's far from CPU and GPU, even better, it might disturb the flow coming from the two front case fans when facing upwards.




I'd rather the Crucial: better power protection, better NAND, less performance but I bet you'll never notice.
The only advice is that both those drives do not like to be filled, performance wise: if you plan to use more than 50% of it, a Sandisk Ultra, a Corsair Neutron or a Seagate 600 may be probably better suited (but they cost significantly more). Or you may go for the 480Gb.




You may use lots of slim coolers: among the cheaper but quiet you can look for Noctua NH-U12S, Scythe Kotetsu, BeQuiet Dark Rock Slim, but the various Prolimatech Armageddon, TR True and probably the mighty Archon should work very well (the TR deserve a fan swap).




Personally I don't like any of the listed fan, but, among 92mm ones I'd probably go for the Nanoxia, and among the 140mm fans for the Noctuas: I'd advice to ask to Abula about those latter.




Don't be in a hurry right now!

That BeQuiet PSU is 140 mm deep, not 150 mm.

I got the impression that you live in Germany? Link to the heatsink: http://geizhals.de/noctua-nh-u14s-a929404.html

Or is it the UK? http://pricespy.co.uk/product.php?p=1822028

I will not quote everything, because then this post would become enormous.

Allright, I will go for CL9 then. It is the cheapes low-profile RAM I can find.

Corsair RM450, Seasonic G360 and be quiet! Straight Power E9 are PSUs I will look into. Fanless seems kind of risky to me, too. Semi passive should be perfect.
I am definitly mounting the PSU in the way it is getting its "own" system; sucking air from the bottom and pushint it out on the side.

Crucial is also cheaper than Samsung here in Germany. I will stick to Crucial.


Why is that? Abdula suggested ASUS for its very centered CPU sockets. As i finally looked at some brands it also seems to me that ASUS gives the most space into every direction for a huge heatsink. Asrock has the second best position but it is far more on the outside.The only advantage I see is the distance to the PCIe slot, but so it is close to the border of the mainboard/case.


To be honest I will raher go overkill and use every cm³ in this case I can than risk it and get a warm CPU or a noisy system. Will also google the NH-U12S after this post.
The only thing I could consider would be compatiblity with the NCASE M1, but, let's face it: I will not upgrade my case after I've purchased everything. At least not within several months.



I fell in love with the Prolimatech Heatsinks. At least the Megahalems isn't as expensive as the NH-U14S but I have to purchase a fan with it. I remeber that the Megahalems only fits if the brace of the NODE 304 isn't mounted as well. This results in 0 HDD/SSD mountings meaning I would have to tape the SSD somewhere (probably PSU). I might be wrong and will check it again.
I also found this very helpful site for the width/depth of possible the heatsinks (+ fan(s)).


NOOOOOOOOO! I just had a sleepless night thinking about the 750Ti vs R9 270X dilemma. No I tend to the 270X AGAIN. And this post just gives me positive feedback.
61W avr. consuption vs 122W. 2 times the energy but only about 1.5 x fps. I watched some Youtube videos and was shocked about some "low" fps some people got, even with a GTX 760. 70-90fps on 1080p. Again, I am struggleing here, it could become a decision I make while purchasing every item.
Are ~120W of heat that hard to control? Of course 60W are far less but... does it really have such an impact?


Awesome fan control, I love it! You are right, I should try the fans comming with the case anyway. I still can upgrade them later on.


I will be reading this post again if I am going to swap the fans.


Germany. I am buying everything at "Mindfactory" so i try to really get EVERYTHING from there. If there is no replacement for the NH-U14S (whch i doubt), I will order the cpu cooler from another website


So only uncertain items right now are:

1. CPU heatsink (+fan)
2. PSU
3. (GPU is 85% up to me alone )

I will try to look everything up (PSU and CPU cooling) and deliver a list, I'd like you to check.

Again, thank you all for the great ideas and suggestions, it helped me a lot (and kept me a little bit lazier than i thought, tbh )


Are you joking? I wouldn't wonder if this thread is annoying tons of people at this point.

Ok so let's do this:

1. CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K
2. CPU Cooling: Noctua NH-U12S
   Alternative: Prolimatech Megahalems with a Noctua NF-S12A PWM Fan
3. Thermal Compound: Coolaboratory Liquid Pro
   I might delide the CPU and apply some of this liquid metal as well as on the IHS of the CPU. I am sure I can handle the risk (at least of applying the TC )
4. GPU: MSI R9 270X Gaming 2 GB
   Tending to the R9 270X, 122W average consumption. I may decide for the GTX 750 Ti (61W average) but if so, it will be last minute.
   If you guys have anything to say which could comfort me (122W, easy heat handleing - 122W? Are you crazy, that will be really hard to control!), do so, please.
5. RAM: Crucial Ballistix Sport VLP DIMM Kit 16GB, DDR3L-1600, CL9-9-9-24, very low profile
   Yes, it is the cheapest low profile DDR3 I can find and it happens to be very low profile.
6. MB: ASUS Z87I-Pro (C2)
7. Case: Fractal Design Node 304
8. PSU: Sea Sonic G-Series G-360 360W ATX 2.3
   Alternative: be quiet! Straight Power E9 400W ATX 2.4
   Someone told me that the Sea Sonic PSU has the advantage in technology, someone else told me, Sea Sonic tend to emit noise from the coils.
9. SSD: Crucial M500 240GB

Sadly the Corsair RM Series RM450 is modular and 160mm long ⇒ it would collide with the video card.
I got a review where I could easily get a feeling on how big the CPU cooler can be. The measurements are: 140 x 160 x 134 mm (W x H x D)

Since someone told me he had problems with ASUS W-LAN I am a little bit in doubt about the mainboard, that's why I asked:


Well, now it really is in the closing stages!
Only CPU cooler and PSU have two possibilities left. If there is anything to add or to consider, please let me know.
Since the weekend is comming I can wait until sunday to order all the hardware.

I'm sorry for my rather terse answer without any pointers. To make the long story short, Asrock motherboards for Haswell CPUs provide fully functional and unprecedentedly fine-grained BIOS fan control. To grasp what I'm saying, you will have to peruse the following thread.

"Quiet gaming setup"

As far as I'm aware, there is minimum PWM thresholds in ASUS motherboards (I'm sorry I haven't ever used any of them) around 20%-25% which lead to chassis/CPU fans rotating at unnecessarily high speeds. However, you can easily (!) circumvent these issues in ASUS motherboards, as far as I have gathered (correct me if I'm wrong). That is, you will be able to fine control fan speeds as long as you opt for only Noctua PWM fans because they rotate at 300-400 rpms (utterly inaudible) at 20-25% with their proprietary so-called "low noise filter", which are nothing more than resistors.

Why am I not entirely convinced that it is really in the closing stage?


I'm unbelievably strongly opposing this choice as I'm suffering from distinctive whining noise from Seasonic SS-400FL2 in my HTPC. It's only bearable because I'm usually sitting at least 2 meters away from it. Not only I oppose this choice, I strongly recommend you to opt for one of Corsair RM Series, unless you are an ardent environmentalist, which I'm not. They are proven to be whining-free & electrical-noise-free PSUs. Well, to be fair, if you attach (literally) your ears to them, you might hear something but they aren't audible as long as you are 10cm away from them.


Whether you go with 270X or 750Ti, it will be the very noisiest component unrivalled with any other part of your suggested build. I think you should consider possible modding of your graphics card in the future, which means that there must be room in the chassis for accommodation of modded bigger graphics card, in light of which, the potential interference between PSU and graphics card in Fractal Design Node 304 does not sound desirable. I haven't even skimmed through SPCR review of Fractal Design Node 304 but why don't you just opt for a bit more spacious chassis? A few other options such as BitFenix Phenom Mini-ITX cross my mind.

For your information, I would personally just go with 750Ti (since you play only one specific less-demanding game), to which I would attach Arctic Accelero Xtreme III without any fan (!). As a disclaimer, I haven't investigated the compatibility between 750Ti and Accelero Xtreme III but they are likely to fit each other (with some manual modding). -EDIT- They don't seem to fit each other: mounting holes in 750Ti are 44mm apart, not supported by Xtreme III. Anyway, my point is that you need headroom for aftermarket coolers for your graphics card just in case.

So the posts where it is getting interesting (for me on this topic) are:

From this thread

Post 2,Post 3
I Ctrl+F the thread for Asrock and read into the first couple of posts which make me struggle again, at least a little bit. I am going to find out what the limit and capability of each "PWM port/connector" on the ASUS Z87i-Pro is.
To be honest, I don't like the idea of switching the mainboard out of my list. But I don't want to buy my hardware blindely, too.


The problem with the Corsair RM Series is that I've only found 160mm + modular cables which will collide with the video card. Otherwise I would have considered them.
I will search, if the Sea Sonic G-Series (G-360) suffers whining, too. You are the second guy who writes this and that makes me really curious. There is still the be quiet! Straight Power E9 400W ATX 2.4 option though.


Well, I aim for quiet while gaming and very quiet while not gaming/idleing. For a real silent build I wouldn't even consider such hardware and go completely passive.
Yes I could get obsessed with lowering the noise level but I think and hope this will be enough for me. At the moment I am living in a small town which means really low noise level. But since I discovered this forum at night I am listening for other source of noise where I have no influence. And there are some.
This being written I plan on moving into a city (again), where noise levels will be much higher and the "quietness" of my build will be more than enough, at least I think and hope so.
BitFenix Phenom Mini-ITX is 1.5x as big as the Node 304 and I wanted to go as small as possible. After some days of research and thinking (some older posts ) I found myself pleased with the Node 304, a good trade off between volume and air flow.
I am feeling at least as uncomfortable about switching the case as switching the mainboard.


As written I don't aim for a nearly silent rather than a very quiet build. I hope I am not shooting myself in the foot ignoring your advice.
For the space: Does a 2.5 slot graphic card fit in my Node 304?
By far not enough for a Prolimatech MK 26 but enough for some other aftermarked coolers.


Don't assume such thing, please!

I don't understand/agree with your (semi)final choices: IMVHO you're taking the risk of a not so quiet and hot system for a considerable amount of money with those parts. But it's your money and it's your call, so I hope to be wrong (my thought is simple, you know: to run quietly, you need relatively small parts, a neat cabling, and the lowest heat, so the right way for a really quiet rig is going with the Corsair RM with a GTX 750Ti, maybe passively cooled with an Accelero S1 Plus).




Stay slim, do not overcrowd the available space with either a larger heatsink or big cables. Slim fans would help also.




Good luck: in my experience, among thermal pastes the Liquid Pro and Diamond 24 are just expensive crap.




It might not be a good idea pairing a 270X with a G-360: you're out of PSU quiet range (so you might have two source of noise, the card and the PSU). If you want to stick with a powerful GPU, look for the Power Color SCS3, as it's quiet and short, you might add a slim fan if needed, but with a different PSU (like the Cooler Master Vanguard V550S, for example).




SPCR reviews told you that in such a cramped space you will have about 120-130W of "quiet" power from a G-360, so with a R9 its fan will ramp up. It won't be unbearable noisy, but far from silent.
The BeQuiet might be better but I maybe would rather the CM version, among the 150mm units the already quoted V550S should be better, noise-wise.




If you dig into the quoted OCN thread, there are lots of people pairing 160mm PSU with 25-28cm long video cards (just one of the many examples).
I don't want to convince you about that Corsair, just to let you think about the questions one more time.
If you should need some more space, you can remove the PSU bracket (four screws) and use velcro or dual sided tape: besides, if you are able to do so, you could try to fix the bracket into new screw holes (you have to made them, of course).
It's probably worth to mention that the RM450 when the fan is facing up should have the main connectors under the card level.

Though it is undeniable that almost-closed front panel design of Cooltek U2 (ITX) and Cooltek U3 (mATX) is detrimental to the thermal situation inside the chassis, it strikes me that quest_for_silence has been a bit excessively emphatic about its adverse effect. Since you are planning to go with i5 Haswell CPU, the ventilation problem incurred by Cooltek U2/U3 will not be as severe as i7 CPUs as long as you don't overclock them. Also, I have used Lian Li PC-Q11 twice for my builds and PC-TU100 (perhaps the smallest among all chassis discussed so far) and I don't think you need to be concerned about ventiliation issue in case you use proper CPU & VGA coolers. In other words, although ventiliation mechanism of chassis surely affects thermal condition inside chassis, they are never as essential as coolers/heatsinks directly conducting heat from CPUs and graphics cards, especially for mid/low tier CPUs.

I suggest that you reconsider Cooltek U2 and Cooltek U3 (for triple or quadruple slot graphics card possibly with aftermarket coolers). I once researched about Cooltek U3 for quite a long time and I believe it's one of decent options for small builds with Haswell i5/i3 CPUs. As you know, they are made by German company and may be sold at lower prices in Germany.

I have built myself a system :

Asus Z87i-Pro in a Node 304 case, Scythe Mugen 4, RM450, and Ballistix VLP

Some points :

the RM is too long, in the normal position, fan down, it's too long



fan up, the 24+4 is nearly in the middle of the PSU, not sure how high the bottom clearance is for the card.

For the Scythe, no problem with that memory and sideboard :



the memory modules are sooo tiny, the clamps to hold them in place are taller, and the side board has a healthy clearance. Only the fanclamps have to be placed carefully not to touch that sideboard(with the Mugen 4)

Furthermore, the USB3 internal header connection on the Z87i-Pro board is somewhat problematic, the cable from the case is pretty rigid and the header is covered very slightly by the Mugen 4



My experience with this new build. But do take a look in the OCN thread that has been mentioned, lots of good things to read.

Thanks a lot for sharing!

Definitely a 160mm modular PSU should - in case - be paired with short cards (like the GTX 750Ti: IIRC the PCB should be about 17cm, just around the motherboard PCB), in order to not incur in some clearance issues.

Just to know more from your first hand experience/feeling: did the flat cabling really help routing connections within the limited space of your 304, or according to you did it show no decisive advantage over a more traditional sleeved cabling, particularly in not obstruct the air flow?

Director9 im a little confused on the picture and the writing, from what i see with the fan down the connectors you plugged are all the way to left no?

@abula : the first peripheral/sata power connection starts at about 1/4 of the PSU, so I measured and you should comfortably fit a 23cm card and still have 2 peripheral/sata connections free. The C-link will also not be availalbe, but don't know how far that connection sticks out.

@quest_for_silence : the flat cabling that came with the psu, pretty stug, find it very hard for tight cornering and twisting. Placement of the sockets on the board mean they come up right before the fan. The PSU itself already sits partially in front of it. To have as much unrestricted airflow I have put most of the excess cabling where a GPU card would sit.

A fuzzy picture here, but showing only the powerconnection cabling on the PSU and where it's neatly tucked away(but no room for a card) and how tight it's folded just to give the fan as much breathing space as possiblle.




I guess a much shorter powercable would be better perhaps.

The Node is so small, it pretty much boils down to finding a perfect combo to get everything very neatly installed, ranging from the psu to mobo(location of the headers on the board), cooling,....


For the fans, the 4 fan channels, they are all able (Z87i-Pro) to treat all fans as PWM fans, and controllable. I can't get the casefan(non-PWM) to slow down enough with stalling, meaning there's more extraction. There's some small dust build up around exhaust/intake around the sides(which don't really have any dustfilters).

I'll be getting a real PWM fan(probably a noctua) for the rear exhaust, and then either get 2 smaller PWM fans for the intake or get a filter installed on both sides(removing the 2 intake fans and giving me more room in that part).

Keeping the temps around 30°C now, initially had the fans run really low on idle, but a littel extra CPU increase caused them to rev up and slow down(which was audible). By upping the the speeds a bit(lowering temp SP for the lowest revs) means they spin up very slightly with a very small load, calmer and less audible. With the new rearcase fan, I'll be able to lower that too, and should have some impact on how I can set the idle settings too.

The PSU, with what I have installed (1 HDD and 1 SSD) and that i5 with barely any load, that fan doesn't even come into play

The SSD is what does it in terms of annoying noise that used to come from the HDD(which is now only used for mass storage).If I can ever afford a 4TB worth of SSD storage, I will buy it.

Well, I came to this forum so I get your advice and I appreciate it. Since I tend to be a man of word and you delivered a reason to drop the R9 (in fact two with the PSU) then I should do so.
I am/was (depends on the day) just afraid that framerates will drop really low in teamfights. I had a test @ 1080p where fps dropped about 25%. If I apply this on 60fps average @ 1600p this would result in 45fps minimum which shouldn't be noticeable. Everything (but the cost efficiency for the performance) is in favour of the 750 Ti.


Then the Noctua NH-U12S should be sufficient and not taking too much space?



The 160mm aren't the problem here, the modular cables are. I don't like the idea of not screwing the PSU in place, it is rather a least choice if everything else seems to fail. Also I would like the PSU to have its own air flow system meaning, fan facing down.


I could only consider the U3 since the 750 Ti 250mm long. I would have decided for the U3 if there wasn't the silver power button and a nice incomming airflow. I will force myself to reconsidere.


So quite interesting hardware for me. Even big coolers fit and no matter what, working in the case will be kind of a pita.


Yes I am looking into the OCN thread now and then but it is really hard for me to stay focused in there and it has 320+ pages Hard to find what really interests me.


At least the PCB of the MIS GTX 750 Ti Gaming is nearly as long as the cooler resulting in a 250mm length: picture
There are 750 Ti up to 170mm in length but I like the MSI one the most:

24dBA idle and 25dBA load. That should be sufficient I think. Source: Techpowerup review
I know I could buy a <170mm long card and get a aftermarked cooler. I will lose warranty and end up with an expensive solution. I will consider this if either the card is really too loud or there are just no other possibilities in the first place.


One of the most interesting features of this PSU.


Now let's cut down to the... mainboard: I searched and found some things. Some say they only are PWM connectors and don't behave like the CPU PWM connector. Fact is at least until mid April it was not possible to get the chassis fans below 40% speed. A Asus coworker wrote that this is due to some users who don't know that some fans need a minimum voltage to start rotating. Seems legit but could be easily fixed (run 100% and then slow down to the speed the user wants).
Is it possible to controll the fan speed neither via bios (minimum 60%) nor fan xpert 2 (minimum 40%) but via SpeedFan?
If not I have to reconsider switching every case fan with other fans and a "silence adapter".
I am not yet sure to switch to a ASRock Z87E-ITX. Can I controll all fans (3 case fans and 1 CPU fan) with this board from 0%-100%?
I really like the ASUS and am kind of gridlocked with this choice.
I know ggumdol likes ASRock the most:


And Abdula is tending to ASUS and likes to work around the
fan control issues.

I personally like the layout of ASUS and the quantity of USB ports very much. ASRock seems to have the better fan control and the better W-LAN (not confirmed by my researched nor this forum).

As Abula said with other words some posts ago, we do not want to force you to a choice of which you're not really convinced.
You can't have small dimensions, performance (reliability is a performance) and silence all together, especially if there are also some non-functional reasons to drive your will. You have to relax some requirement.

If you ask to the SPCR community which is the most quiet system inside a 304, probably it's a 750Ti with an S1 Plus, along with a Corsair RM: unfortunately all the most quiet PSUs are 160mm or longer, and with modular cables.

Would you rather performance over the most utterly silence? It's your call: pick an R9. We've seen some trade-offs by now: if you want to pursue some silence, you may pick a passive Power Color with a Corsair RM, along with a Node 304. You're taking the risk that you should raise the case fans speed, even if it's far from certain.

Whether you should rather reliability and pursuing a lower case fans speed, you may either go for a longer MSI Gaming with a shorter PSU than the Corsair RM: the increase in power requirement rules out most of small and cheap PSUs, like the G-360, so you have to look elsewhere, maybe to some newer units like the CM V550S; or you may go for the same graphics and a longer PSU but inside a different enclosure than the Node 304 (like the Ncase M1, or some Cooltek).

But, summarizing, do not do a mixed bag: choose your way and go straight, or you may end up with a relatively unsatisfactory system.




The U12S is expensive but otherwise almost perfect: give a look at this thread.




Just for your information: in that OCN thread I see some people using Seasonic Platinums and the likes; it's a tight fit, indeed, but it's doable *given* the right graphics card: most of MSI TF-IV are unfortunately too long, but there's not just MSI on the market. Even with reference to PSU orientation, with an high quality unit IMO it is almost pointless having it straight or flipped. But again, it's your call: just be coherent.




Use the thread gallery to skim over it: I've already given you the link.




The MSI PCB (it's what that matter most, for the cabling issue) should be around 22cm: anyway, the reference Nvidia PCB is just 15cm long, while most of the custom cards are between 17 and 18cm (with their coolers extending up to 21-22cm).




That's the most rational choice IF you choose to pursue quietness above all: the cheaper GTX 750Ti and the Accelero S1 Plus (on the GTX thread there's one co-forumer which already do so, you can read there his first hand report).

Anyway, as already said, there's not only MSI for video cards: ASUS is a perfectly viable choice, for example.

@myselphabet : concerning fancontrol, I can take it down real low. The scythe has a real PWM fan, and I'm able to take it down to 180rpm, the others are voltage controlled but the asus board can use voltage I guess to control the rpm. I'm not using fanxpert, but linux/fancontrol. According to specs that scythe operates between 400 and 1400 rpm, so yes, the board doesn't hold me back to get it low enough

There is no one motherboard that is the best of the world, all have different features and assets that some people value others don't, that's why we have so much brands and models. Asus is not a bad choice, nor AsRock is better, niether is, both are good depending on your needs. For me AsRock and MSI would be better because i control my fans on pure bios, where Asus has way to high restrictions for my liking, but if you plan to use AI Suite III, FanXpert2 is a wonderful tool to control all fans individually (as long as you have fan headers and chose the proper fans for each). Asus seems to offer some of the most robust mini itx mobos, from the Z77i it was one of the most used on the Fenix Prodigy and Node 304, to their current line that they now offer like 4 mini itx for different markets, this is not to say MSI or AsRock are worst, just different from the socket placement to the fan control, etc. Its more a matter of chosing what would fit your needs better.

@ quest_for_silence, I really appreciate your advices but I think we just have different views on "what is quiet enough?", since I only have expirience with OEM computer systems I will be excited about the quietness of the upcomming one. If I am wrong I will strongly consider your modding choice and PSU choice, hopefully it won't come to this in the near future.

Ok, today I am going to purchase the hardware.
Why do I have such a crush on the MSI 750 Ti Gaming? Because it seems to be very quiet and should be perfect for me. And I hate the fact to modify the video card...
Video card + CPU = 60W + 80W = 140W. Add the mainboard, SSD, fans and put some USB devices ending up at like 200W at full power max.! With the rule never below 20% or above 80% of the PSU max. a lot of PSUs will be over kill.
The Sea Sonic seems to ramp up the fan above 200W. So even when I'm gaming (and I doubt there will be 100% load on the CPU) the PSU fan should be very quiet.
But there is also the option of the be quiet! Straight Power E9 400W.
I've done some reseach and the fan was described as one of the most quiet one. The cables are kind of long but that should be manageable.
Well and to be low energy I found the be quiet! Pure Power L8 300W ATX 2.4 which should also be ultra quiet.
Since I refuse the option of modify the video card from the beginning the CM is no option anymore...
I have the feeling lot's of PSUs suffer from wheezing every now and then. Some are just lucky/unlucky to get a wheezing PSU. I can return a wheezing PSU and get another one.

Asus vs. ASRock: Can I controll the (3 pin fans I guess) case fans of the Node 304 with a ASUS board? I still like ASUS more but if I cannot control the case fans without switching to PWM fans I have to reconsider and would definitly tend to ASRock.

Summed up: I like (and would risk) to buy the Sea Sonic G-Series G360. I like the ASUS mainboard but would consider the ASRock one, too, depending on the fan behaviour and my mood.

The 4670 is closer to 40 W AFAIK.

Maybe get a pico psu? You know it would make it much more easier to pick a case.

Ok, I am not ordering today but probably/hopefully/realistically/... tomorrow, waiting if there is anything to add or change there.
I think it would be very satisfying in terms of quietness for me:

• CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K
• CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U14S
• GPU: MSI N750Ti TF 2GD5/OC Twin Frozr Gaming
• RAM: 2 x 8GB Crucial Ballistix Sport VLP DDR3-1600
• MB: ASUS Z87I-Pro (C2)
• Case: Fractal Design Node 304
• PSU: 360 Watt Seasonic G Serie 360 Non-Modular
• SSD: Crucial M500 240GB
• Fans: 2 x Noctua NF-A9x14 PWM 92x92x14mm + Noctua NF-A15 PWM 140x150x25mm; inlcuding 3 Y PWM splitter to connect to the ASUS mainboard

Noctua NH-U14S finally available at the shop I am buying. Mainboard still the same, would like to run exhaust + cpu fan at the same speed -> Y-splitter, as well as the 2 front fans.



I took the official TDP as a lead, just to be sure (everything worst case).
It is very hard (for me) to find a non-oversized (pico)PSU. Additionaly the fan of <250W PSUs are typically small and I am afraid that would result in the PSU being the loudes component, at least at load. If there are any suggestions I would look into it, but I doubt I would change the PSU.

As I've written I will risk a wheezing from the PSU and if it happens return and change for another brand.

Sometimes there are some branded computer (more often from Dell, HP, Apple) which may run surprisingly quieter than the average OEM level, but that's not the point.

The point is we can have a relatively noisy system even mixing some good parts (just as an example, the proposed G-360 should work quieter with a GTX 750Ti, than with an R9 270X, even if both sport a TwinFrozr cooler).
Or even, for the same money, we can have a sub-optimal result, noise-wise.

With reference to that point, I think the question isn't really the expectations, but some experience: so I adviced you at the best of my little experience, not just according to my expectations about "what is quiet enough".




As a matter of fact, I told you there are shorter graphics cards (ASUS) which may give comparable results but at the same time which can be of help when space is limited: but it's not that important.
I think you are enamoured with some relevant reviews, that's why I talk about "non-functional reasons to drive your will", and counteracting such feelings often does not lead toward a greater overall satisfaction (we must all be free to fall in love with an idea).
On the other hand, given that MSI card is undoubtedly quiet at stock (so you have not to work around it), providing that G-360 can power it within its own quiet range, there are enough reasons to pursue your option, even if a more quiet PSU - like perhaps an RM450 - can maybe lower a bit the overall noise, as it is also true that power supply costs considerably more (the cost is also a key factor, along with computing performances, dimensions or noise level).




I bet you'll never see more than 120W under any not-synthetic load.




For sure: to be honest, speaking about 3-pin fans, any motherboard has its own lower limit in the fan speed control. IIRC ASUS should be about 60% using the UEFI control or 40% using FanXpert 2, but you can get rid of those limitations using SpeedFan at system startup.




I hope so too, anything look like in the right place.

This is a picoPSU (old review from 2006): http://www.silentpcreview.com/picoPSU

They're all fanless, and leaves the usual place for the PSU empty in the case, thus making more room for a bigger heatsink in smaller cases.
It's always a two part solution, you need a laptop style power supply as well.

http://geizhals.de/?cat=gehps&asd=on&asuch=pico%20psu

http://www.mini-box.com/Power-Supplies-Kits

Yes, the asus motherboard can control the 3 included fans (1x Fractal R2 140 and 2x Fractal 92mm) with its CHA_FAN 1,2,3, via AI suite / FanXpert2, and it will be able to drop them as low as the fans can go, and individually. Whatever CPU cooler you end up buying go with one with a PWM fan, and connect it to the CPU_FAN header, its the only real PWM fan header of all, so its the ideal for cpu heatsink fan (thats if it is PWM fan).

If you are going with PWM fans, go with Asrock motherboard, if you go with Asus, go with only 1 PWM fan, the CPU FAN (or two if you wish like NF-A14 PWM for the back, it has the same rpms as the fan included on the NH-U14S, so you can use the Y splitter than comes with noctua fans, and connect both to the CPU_FAN header, both will run at the same rpms always), the frontal i wouldnt go for NF-A9 PWM, the main reason is that the other 3 headers (CHA_FAN 1,2,3) are 4pin fake, so no pwm control on them, but they are controlled by voltage, they can be fully controlled fine, don't worry, but they wont be on PWM but on voltage, for this i would recommend to go with the none PWM version of the fan, but i strongly recommend you test the included fans first, specially with a motherboard like the Asus that has 4 fan headers, if its not quiet enough for your liking, just upgrade the fans later.

Yes, i forgot to write about the experience, too. Experience ⇔ expectations are kind of related in both ways.


So SpeedFan is the most powerful tool then? Awesome!


And that's, what I finally wanted to read, an approval.

@ Mats: Wow! They are really small. But I don't wanna change the PSU now and I can only find <120W PSUs (via geizhals). Anyway, thanks for the hassle.

@ Abdula: Ok then, like some posts before; I will not order additional case fans and first try the ones that come with the Node 304.

BTW: I browsed the OCN thread a lot and found something interesting (for me): Nocuta says the NH-U14S only fits on the Asus Z87i-Pro when turne 90° (and on the ASRock with an additionally backplate which I have to order seperatly from Noctua for 0€). It seems they are wrong and there is enough space.


Anyway, hardware will be ordered at midnight (free shipping). Thank you guys for your great help, ideas and advices!

myselphabet

Well they could be talking about the hdd cages pair with the cpu cooler, in some cases the cables are really right next to the fan, thats my guess. My suggestion if you are only using an SSD on the build is to remove all cages, and just connect the ssd to the front, here is a picture of what i mean,



or on the top,



or if you are planning a mechanical in the short term, you can also suspend them

Yo, hello again after some... days

It is kind of embaressing, but you have been so right!


The upcoming Hashwell refresh (also posted in this thread) and the need not to buy the system on tick (yeah, new month, new (enough) money!) were the reasons.
So here I hopefully don't annoy you with the updated idea:


The NACE M1 is available again! Which means I am dremaing, thinking and considering getting one...
This is resulting in 2 (5) questions I have:

• PSU: I would really need a SFX PSU. The SilverStone Strider Gold Series 450W SFX12V (SST-ST45SF-G) seems to be the most common used one. High efficiency is nice but it seems really noisy. I found another PSU which seems to be very quiet, at least when idleing and office use named Chieftec SFX-350BS. Is there any other PSU to consider? Or maybe go the hard way and buy some high eff, PSU like the SilverStone and change the fan?
• CPU cooler: 130mm heigh max. It cries for top-blow coolers it seems? NH-C14 would be the fast first choice. Such a huge top-blow cooler shouldn't be at any (loudness) disadvantage over a tower cooler?
  I have read a little bit about (AiO) water cooling systems and they always seem to be far from quiet and/or expensive. Didn't I look around enough or is air cooling superior to watercooling in terms of loudness + price?

The rest of the system stays as it is (probably a Z97 chipset becuase they are cheaper than Z87). If i can forget to get the system quiet because of the PSU and/or the cooling/heating problems which may occure, I will stick to the initial Node 304 build.
This is more an idea and I would have to borrow a case from a friend for the several weeks, before the Ncase might arrive.

I would build on NCase M1v2, its just a really nice looking case imo, truly small and seems there is not much compromises, even SPCR reviewed NCASE M1: Crowdfunded Enthusiast Mini-ITX Case, from there,
So be careful into what motherboard you chose, i think Asus center cpu socket placement works better, but you should try to check other threads like NCASE M1: a crowdfunded Mini-ITX case (updates in first post), for confirming what motherboards people are using on their builds with the NH-C14.

Crosscheck the following motherboards,
ASUS Z97I-PLUS LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Mini ITX Intel Motherboard
ASUS H97I-PLUS LGA 1150 Intel H97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Mini ITX Intel Motherboard

Both have the M.2 slot on the bottom of the motherboard, so depending on your needs for storage, you could even place fans on the bottom.