Building a mini-ITX PC

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1

I have been wanting to build a mini-ITX PC for a while now. I like my new computer but my days of wanting a big honking full tower on my desktop are over. As much as I love my 8350 for its price/performance, I don't really want a hot chip inside of a small case with few fans. I like having tons of airflow and keeping things cool. I have considered getting a Lian-Li like Logan has used in his videos or something like these  Fractals:

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352011

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352011

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352027

As for mobo, I am liking my ASUS. This thing is packed to the gillz with awesomness and I love the AI suite, but for mini ITX, ASUS only has the Deluxe and Maximum and ~$200 seems like a lot for a mobo. I am open to suggestions in this area. I am also looking at the ASUS GTX760 Mini, is this a good choice for this build? I think their Nvidia cards are mini only.

Also, what are some good alternatives to the 212EVO? I doubt it will fit in most mini ITX cases and I want something with excellent cooling and very quiet since I will probably be OC'ing this build.

Here is my build so far minus the hard drives that will be cannibalized from my current PC so I can sell it as a working unit:

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/1DhKv

As for the 4770k or 4670k, I will make up my mind later down the road. If I do but this build it will be at least a few weeks out and will give me enough time to analyze a couple dozen benchmarks to see which CPU I want.

2

you're not going to overclock right

3

Well, right now that is up in the air. I am currently looking at benchmarks and the 4670k OCed is about as fast in synthetics and gaming as a 4770k stock speed. Problem is that I have been doing a lot more encoding and CPU intense games like Total War and Arma so a 4770k OCed would be cream gravy, but it is getting past the mental block of spending that $100 extra when a 4670k would be pretty close for the gaming part. I also am not up on Intel architecture but is 8 threads going to be n00bing 4 threads later down the road when more programs take advantage of them? To answer your question, yes I will very likely OC either CPU.

4

get the 4770K, you'll be able to cool it with air cooling on stock but, if you do any kind of overclocking on haswell, you'll need to water cool it

if I can get brennen in here he can help you choose the right case and water cooling parts, its really easy, just intimidating

though if rendering is you main thing and you're looking at the define mini, I might suggest you get the socket 2011 Gene with the new ivy-E 4930K