Bill of materials
There’s a broken down list at the start of this post. That is no longer accurate. Neither is my original post (source).
| Part | Name | Standard Pricing | Local Pricing | Quantity | Amount Spent | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chassis | JONSBO N1 | $150.00 (source) | $321.78 | 1 | $321.78 | Fuck me. I should’ve just bought a used Dell server, why did I bother with this SFF stuff? |
| Cooling | NOCTUA NH-L9i chromax.Black CPU Air Cooler | $54.95 (source) | $65.69 | 1 | $65.69 | I still prefer the Noctua brown, tbh |
| Processor | Intel Core i9-11900K | $364.99 (source) | $441.92 | 1 | $441.92 | Going to be limited to a The 11900K was cheaper than the 11600 non-K variant for reasons I do not understand. |
| Storage | Sabrent 4TB Rocket Q4 NVMe PCIe Gen4 SB-RKTQ4-HTSS-4TB | $599.99 (source) | $755.07 | 1 | $755.07 | L |
| Storage | Samsung 870 EVO 4TB 2.5″ SATA III 6GB/s V-NAND SSD MZ-77E4T0BW | $448.99 (source) | $508.60 | 4 | $2034.4 | My 960 EVO from 2017 still goes strong. I hope these do too. |
| Storage | 16TB WUH721818ALE6L4 WD ULTRASTAR ENTERPRISE HARD DRIVE | $277.00 (source) | $356.79 | 5 | $1783.95 | …and these were the cheapest in terms of $/TB |
| Storage HBA | SilverStone ECS06 6 Ports SATA Gen3 (6Gbps) Non-RAID PCI Express Gen3 x2 | $78.69 (source) | $55.62 | 1 | $55.62 | The only time I didn’t get fucked |
| Converter | R42SR M.2 Key-M PCI-E x4 Extension Cord | $19.90 (source) | $46.56 | 1 | $46.56 | Shipping and duty makes this… not economical |
| Converter | ASUS ROG Strix Arion Aluminum Alloy M.2 NVMe External SSD Enclosure | $76.68 (source) | $62.49 | 1 | $62.49 | Not going to be able to resell this if I ever want to |
| Converter | Lian Li LANCOOL II-4X 3.1 Type C Cable for LANCOOL II - LANII-4X | $14.99 (source) | $13.67 | 1 | $13.67 | I could’ve gotten it for $12.08 if I went to a different retailer |
| USB Hub | Generic USB 3.1 10-port hub with external power | N/A | $52.54 | 1 | $52.54 | |
| Network Card | Intel Corp X550T2BLK Converged Network Adapter | $398.95 (source) | $475.75 | 1 | $475.75 | Works out of the box, can’t even complain. |
| Memory | G.Skill F4-4400C19D-64GTZR Desktop Ram Trident Z RGB Series 64GB (32GBx2) DDR4 4400MHz | $339.99 (source) | $528.35 | 1 | $528.35 | I downclocked this thing to 3500MHz to match the CPU underclock. Someone end me. |
| Power Supply | Corsair SF600 Platinum Fully Modular Power Supply, 80+ Platinum | $144.99 (source) | $141.54 | 1 | $141.54 | The 600W variant for some reason is still cheaper than the 450W variant |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte Z590I VISION D (rev. 1.0) | $220.97 (source) | $380.48 | 1 | $380.48 | Amazon US lists this for $299.00 (source) |
| eGPU Enclosure | OWC Akitio Node Titan Thunderbolt 3 External GPU Enclosure | $249.00 (source) | $482.82 | 1 | $482.82 | Guess what? 11th Gen Intel processors don’t work with macOS. RX570 from an old rig, 10GbE card, SATA HBA in an ITX case… pick two |
| Total Price | $5947.58 | $7642.63 | ~28.4% difference in price, amounting to $1695.05. |
A trip from my city to LAX and back costs $849.73. I still need a physical fan to keep these machine’s thermals stable and it’s really, really loud.