Holes in the motherboard plate under the processor, and how to hold a graphic card?

The short question why is there a hole under the processor in and is it important to have that ?

If you mount the motherboard on a metal plate. what is best practice to secure the video card and other extension cards ? D.i.Y options only not well buy this product. :stuck_out_tongue:

That is the questions i have, and here is why.

I havenā€™t been on this forum for a while. The honest truth i got a drum kit. And i was really busy with that and my neighbors still donā€™t hate me :slight_smile: I recently acquired a 19 inch rack on wheels, and the final plan is to make a tardis out of it with my computer and audio equipment in it.

My computer case is an Cooler master Haf, that is old enough to vote. There is nothing wrong with it and i really love it (nothing wrong with that because again its old enough to vote, it even got a bay empty for the flopy disk drive that sadly past away) Needles to say its to big to mount in the 19 inch rack

And if i look around for solutions for in a rack. They simply not work for a workstation home PC setup. Server racks. are no options because the way they cool that is simply to noisy. and i can give the build some room. Iā€™m thinking of a compartment of 8 u or even bigger. But i got that rack secondhand and i got a lot of spare parts. Including some metal shelfā€™s, i was thinking of making a case out the shelfā€™s in the rack, with some plexi-glas in front so i can nicely see all the rgb. And create some stuff around it that makeā€™s it fit in the tardis theme. While i have a idea how i want to do this. But of course the expensive video card scareā€™s me. How to securely fix this to the place. Of course i can get a pci-e extender thingy. But i just donā€™t feel like going that route. I was thinking of something with treathed steel rods from the bottom to the top of the case, and some bolts. and then have ā€œsomethingā€ of two strips of metal where i can secure the video-card.

For harddisk iā€™m thinking of using those caddy bays. same with usb on motherboard i would route that to a 2 u something in the rack under where iā€™m going to place the main compute .

For the on off button. and reset and some temp measurements, doesnā€™t that sound like a really nice pi project

But if I look to other motherboard trayā€™s i always see a hole under the processor. Doā€™s it have any other function then only cooling ? and mounting coolers. Iā€™m going to cut it out anyway but I donā€™t know why and that is bugging me. Why is that hole there ?

Not true. I am looking at a Sliger rack mount and that has 3x120mm fan option in the middle, meaning you could get a noctua fan (or buy their noctua fan option) and it will keep it both cool and quiet.

Usually servers have 80mm fans loud and annoying to have on a living room

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If its looks and special effects you could do a lot with some old panel guages and led lighting,
Misc. Conduit or copper tubing loops from the case , or small lcd screens displaying graphic effects.
Really blow peoples minds a bit.

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Flat cases eliminate the need for extranonsense, word of advice from an xb Evo owner

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Iā€™m still in doubt of water cooling or air cooling. liquid i think is scary because of the other audio equipment. And visually i might also really like the look of air cooling.

Fans i want to have some to do some airflow over the mother board. also i want some extra fans to cool the entire rack very large or 4 times 240 mm just slow rmp

The slinger looks nice. But i think with all the rgb on modern hardware, and that iā€™m a nerd and i want to see my computer but not in a tower on my desk. The goal is i want to build this computer my self. I want easy acces. And i want to be able to look at this system and enjoy it. Because i think there is beauty in modern hardware. :slight_smile:

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On other issue is iā€™m also going to upgrade to am5. and i always have build my PCā€™s with asus motherboardsā€¦ But with the resent storyā€™s iā€™m not sure if I want to build this one with an asus board.

Iā€™m thinking now about going with an ASRock X670E Steel Legend. are there any other motherboards in that price range that i should pay attention to ?

I would not bother with water if you are doing a 4U or taller case because at that size a good quality air cooler will fit and AM5 wont dump nearly as much heat as anything on the intel stack.

There are a few good short depth full sized ATX based cases like the Sliger suggested before.

I would take a serious look at rack mounting .

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Are you doing a complete screw to plate build then? Looking back at your OP it looks like youā€™re a bit like me in that stock is never good enough.

I wouldnā€™t do metal, personally Iā€™d get a piece of particle board and recover it so you can drill anywhere to put mounts easily.

Power switchā€¦ Well that depends on what your board can do really. I like my pcā€™s to have detect-power-on in the bios so when the psu is on the pc is on. That way I can have a bay of machines on and off with the power strip. Some of my stuff is Plan9 based, so itā€™s really quite useful.

If you want a simple power switch for normal stuff, literally any Dell pc will give you a 6 pole power switch. Some have lights even. You can get blue red yellow or green ledā€™s out of dellā€™s and hpā€™s alike.

If you hacked the IO error lights off a Dell for activity lights Iā€™d pay you to build one for me too xD thatā€™d be too cool

Drive bays, idk if you thought of this, get an old server, rip the drive bays and h a out (I want to do this with my r510 for parts), and then you have your pc and drives on a tray. Could do all ssdā€™s and build a stabilization cage out of knex or whatever.

Be creative, I wanna see what you do. This is exciting.

Edit: also water ainā€™t that scary. It is if youā€™re an idiot, but assuming you donā€™t play Bob the builder and actually read things / do research / ask for help when valid, you could build an external cooling box for your rack with 2 big af rads and stick it in front of an AC unit, or if in a basement, a box fan. Alternatively, rack built.

I was scared at first too, but then the thermal capacity made we shut up and read documentation.

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