Intro
So, I'm looking to down size with my next build, although I love a midi tower, I just don't quite have the room for one, so I thought, a mini ITX would be the best bet as I don't need dual GPU's, and I don't need an insane machine with like 50 storage drives. However, I'd like your guys input on my potential next build, I've listed a bunch of components below and I've also mentioned as to why I've selected those components. But first, I'd like to first talk about cases.
Cases
For the case, I was thinking something that is capable of holding at least 3 storage drives, 1 3.5" though, and one optical drive, yes, I'm old fashioned and I still use those things. I have some of this ancient tech I call DVD's....* silence and awe *..... But seriously, I'd like something that could also house a full size graphics card, now from doing my own homework, the best bet seems to be the Silverstone Raven RVZ01, apparently, if you have an ultra-low profile radiator, then you can actually have a small AIO CPU cooler. Just to prove my point, here's an example, yeah it looks tight, but to be fair, it's still a mini ITX case, so in my personal opinion, that's quite impressive.
Not to mention, this thing matches my needs perfectly, it can house the exact amount of storage drives that I'd like in my next build, plus it can also house a slim line optical drive, and a full size graphics card. Talking about the graphics card, this case also comes with a GPU support, which is a really nice and minor touch to the case in my own opinion, it just reassures you that they thought about how you may use this case to make our mini ITX build a more LAN based system. Despite how practical it is, it also looks amazing, I think it actually looks beautiful, this case makes for an excellent console replacement, as it's only a bit bigger than an Xbox 360.
CPU
Now for the CPU, I'm going back to one of the most annoying steps of picking a CPU, personally I don't know if I'd need an i7, although knowing that my CPU has hyper-threading is nice, but at the same time, I don't actually think I'd really make use of it to justify spending that bit extra. I also wouldn't bother overclocking my system either, I'd rather have a reliable but slightly slower system than a system that's that bit faster and that little bit more unstable. So I think something like the Intel core i5, 6600 (none K version) would be suitable for me, and I assume that you guys would also agree with me on that one.
CPU Heatsink
Now for the heatsink, I think that I could just go for a low profile, fairly quite heatsink, maybe something from Noctua, I mean they're products seem to be pretty great, and I've never heard anyone say anything bad about them. The only thing I've heard people say that Noctua is bad for is the price, and the colour of their products, but as I won't be seeing it, I don't mind the colour. I also don't mind investing an extra bit of cash into a good CPU heatsink/cooler. I'm debating something like the Noctua NH-L9i, I know for a fact that it would be more than small enough.
I guess I could use something like the Corsair H50, but I know for a fact, I would not need liquid cooling in this build, but at the same time, I'd never have to worry about the temps. I think for this build, especially considering I highly doubt I'd overclock, I think that it would be pretty overkill?
RAM
For RAM, I was thinking about getting 1 stick of ECC RAM at 8 GB, although IDK if this is necessary either, I just think it would be a nice feature, I mean that way, if I ever wanted to get more RAM for some reason, then it wouldn't be a problem at all. I have a friend who still swears his life on 8GB of RAM, and he never has any problems, I personally have 16GB of RAM right now, and I think it may be fair to say that quality is a big thing to think about with hardware, not just quantity. But I'm debating the ECC part, just seems like a nice feature to have, I've never had experience with ECC RAM, so if you could let me know if that's unnecessary, that would be great. To be perfectly honest, I'm not even sure if the motherboard and CPU I've mentioned are actually compatible with ECC memory, again, if any of you guys could tell me if I'm wrong, that would be great. But even though I've mentioned that one of my friends uses only 8GB, I swear that I would manage to use up all 8GB of RAM if I only got 8GB, but at the same time, I don't know, because I'm used to having 16GB in my current build. I may get 16GB just to play it safe, but I'm not 100% sure, what do you guys think? - NOTE. I have actually managed to use way over 10GB of RAM before, max I've ever used has been 14GB if I recall correctly.
Motherboard
For the motherboard, I was thinking about something like the motherboard from Gigabyte, the GA-Z170N-WIFI Intel Z170, now a lot of you may think that this is overkill, and I may even agree with you on that one. But I've had some bad experiences in the past from going slightly cheaper on the motherboard, and boy has that backfired on me.
Not only does this seem like a really good quality motherboard, but it also has a tonne of really cool features for a mini ITX motherboard. Like having 6 SATA ports, I think that's pretty awesome myself, plus the one PCIE x 16, as I do only need and only want one. I mean even if I was going for a system that was huge, I probably wouldn't bother with SLI, yeah that's right, I like my Nvidia cards.
GPU
Now for my GPU, I was thinking about waiting until my current GPU really does start to struggle, I mean it's still a pretty beastly card, it doesn't struggle with anything I throw at it, I currently have the GTX 780 Super Jet Stream card, although I will have to check to see if the case can hold my GPU. Although, I am pretty damn confident it can, I mean I'd be pretty damn surprised if it couldn't, I'm worried about the actual thickness of the card more so than the physical length of the card or the cooler.
PSU
Now, for the PSU, I think I should've mentioned in the case section that in order for that case to work with all of the above components, you need to get an SFX PSU, however, there is another version of the exact case that does house a full size PSU, but I doubt I'll even need a full size PSU, personally speaking. For the PSU, I was thinking of getting something from Silverstone, specifically the SST-SX700, why this one exactly?
Well first of all, it'll fit in the case, second of all, it supplies 700W, third of all, it has an 80 plus platinum rating, which in my opinion, sounds like one hell of a damn fine PSU. Not to forgot, this PSU is also fully modular, which yet again makes it seem even more attractive to buy, in my very own personal opinion, and as this build is mini ITX built I like the fact that it's fully modular as it allows you to buy and use your very own custom cables, which I may actually consider doing.
Storage
Now as this PC will not be just an entertainment centre, but it will also be my little workstation, I think it would be best for me to consider getting multiple drives, now for my boot drive, it's going to be quality over quantity. Meaning I'll without a doubt be using an SSD for my main boot drive, something like a Samsung 750 EVO with 500GB of storage, then as the second 2.5" drive, I was thinking of something like a good old WD Blue 1TB SSHD. Then as the main bulk of my storage, I was thinking of something along the lines of a 2TB WD Blue drive, this way I'm assured to never run out of storage, plus the blue drives are slightly slower than the likes of a Black drive, so I guess that's better for noise. I would also like to mention that if I were to hit any issues with storage, I think at that point I'd just consider investing into external storage drives. I mean using up all of the ~3.5TB, that's pretty insane.
Optical Drive
I'd like a slim line Blu Ray player, with both read and write capabilities, however, surprisingly, I seem to have issues finding an optical drive that would sit in this case just fine. However, I have found one that seems to be okay for this case, but I've never heard of this make. If you guys can find anything better, or just as good, that would be great, and could you also let me know some of the details about z optical drive?
I say that I'm only able to find one because a lot of the Blu Ray slime line drives have that little tray that comes out when you eject the disk, well looking at this case, that wouldn't work, at all. I don't think that the case could support the tray that comes with such optical drives.
Review
For such a small PC, I think that this PC would be pretty amazing, especially for my needs, I haven't done a price check as I haven't had a detailed browse. Plus I'm not quite ready to upgrade just yet, I need to make a bit more cash before I can consider it, I'm also thinking about getting an ultra wide monitor, but then again, I don't know if that would be necessary, as I already have 2x1080p monitors, although they're very cheap quality and it's true, you get what you pay for.
Finally, could you guys give any input or could you suggest how I could improve this system?
Just remember, the goal is to get a pretty beastly PC into a pretty tiny case, but at the same time, I don't want the nightmare of morbid cable management that you get with most mini ITX builds, but this case seems pretty great for that.
So yeah, any suggestions would be highly appreciated! :)