Smallest, durable mITX rig you can build me - Page 3

The 450w can power a hdd, ssd, 3770k, gtx 680, and a couple 120mm fans with power to spare ~40w or more. Dont worry, tons of people have it and had no problems.

Your power requirements are out of whack. Judging by your system in your sig, they've been out of whack for a bit.

The 450W PSU in the SG05 is completely sufficient for a quad core and a high end single GPU graphics card, even with overclocking.

The case ventilation in the SG05 is actually quite good. It has a 120mm filtered intake fan. The only cooling limitation is the size of the CPU cooler. The stock cooler fits fine, however, and if you end up with the i3 and/or the H77 you won't be overclocking so cooling is not an issue.

Is this your Asus DirectCU GTX 460? If so, then it should fit just fine length-wise as it is listed as 9.8" long. I would be more concerned about the heatpipes sticking out the top. I think it will still fit, but will be a close thing.

Here's a pic of this card listed at 10.24" long, sitting pretty inside an SG05.

I was running a Core i5-2500K (stock speeds) with a Radeon 6670 and three SSDs on 150W in an Antec ISK 300-150 case.



Yes, the 450W PSU that comes with the SG05-450 can power any current single GPU graphics card (that physically fits) and a quad core Intel CPU. Even overclocked. For instance people have shoehorned some of the smaller GTX 680 in there. Those cards use two 6-pin PCIe power plugs that can deliver 75W each, which combined with 75W from the PCIe slot means the card can draw between 150W and 225W. What is the TDP of the CPU?

If you don't believe me, how about a major review site?

Load power consumption - OCCT

Note that this is for the ENTIRE COMPUTER with a quad core CPU, and is for what it pulls from the wall. Here are some examples.

My LAN box (see pic above of ISK 300-150)
Radeon 7750 - 160W
In theory a couple watts less than my 6670

GTX 460 - 270W
Your existing card

My wife's new computer which uses a Silverstone SG05-450
GTX 660 Ti - 290W


The most powerful card you can fit in this case
GTX 680 - 333W
Note that not all will fit, but there are some that do

You should buy a Kill-A-Watt. It will tell you how much power your system is really using (as well as your TV, stereo system, etc). The cheaper model is currently on sale at Newegg for $17 shipped. It isn't 100% accurate, but should give you a ballpark number.

Note that this doesn't mean you can't use a more powerful PSU. Not all PSUs are able to put out what they claim on the label, plus for the more hardcore overclockers some PSUs get more voltage droop or ripple (anomalies in the power output) as they get near their limit. However, getting two to three times what the system actually needs is kind of a waste of money. Additionally, PSU efficiency usually drops below around 20% of the output. This doesn't mean much at load, but all the times your computer is NOT under load (when you are not benchmarking/torture testing/gaming) then a high wattage PSU can be very inefficient. Web browsing? Watching movies? Messaging/video chat? Yeah, your modern higher end multi-core computer is essentially idling during those times.

Regarding Windows licensing, "officially" the older key still goes with the computer that you put the upgrade on. Will it still work on a second computer? IDK.

Do you live near a Micro Center? You can get the Core i5-2570K bundled with an ASRock Z77E-ITX (IMO the best choice of Z77 ITX motherboard on the market) for $265+tax in-store only. I was able to OC a 3570K (in my wife's computer) to 4.2GHz undervolted and using a cheap $16 low profile air cooler. As Ivy Bridge is more powerful at the same MHz as Sandy Bridge, average performance should be near a 2500K @4.4-4.5GHz. So, not necessarily any need for an expensive AIO liquid cooler unless you start adding a lot of voltage and go for higher clocks.

The chipset doesn't have much to do with performance, other than allowing you to use your choice of CPU and GPU as well as overclocking (or not).

Will an i3 game at 1080P? Depends on the game. Most games? Yes. Battlefield 3? Yes, with some settings turned down.

It probably doesn't run too much hotter than the 3570K. What you need to ask yourself is whether Hyperthreading is worth the extra $60. That's the street price difference between a gTX 660 Ti and GTX 670, and almost the difference between a 128GB SSD and 256GB SSD (sale prices).

I guess as long as you aren't cutting back elsewhere where it counts.

Yeah, if its for gaming, just get the 3570k. And put that saved money towards a better gpu or something.

Sounds good. Grab that case now at $119.00 shipped at Amazon, as it is normally a few bucks more ($125 shipped). Pricing fluctuates quickly, so when it bottoms out, buy!

The combo deal is still going on at Micro Center, but they changed the pricing. Used to be that the CPU was $180 and the combo was -$50. Now CPU is $170 and combo is -$40. So, same price at the end of the day for the combo with the motherboard being $105.

Buy the RAM from Newegg. Currently $38.99 shipped. However, you can get the individual sticks for $18.99 shipped each, making it $37.98 shipped for the pair instead of the "kit" for $1.01 more. Additionally, there's a coupon code floating out there good today (11/13) for an additional 10% off.

For the SSD, check Micro Center. Don't know if the deal is still going on, but they had Samsung 830 128GB available for around that price.

Have you considered Windows 8? There's a 15% off coupon code at Newegg today, making it $85 shipped. The real big differences between 8 and 7 is that it doesn't have a start button (but you can add it through 3rd party utilities) and it doesn't have media center. However, it will get DX11.1 support, which supposedly no older OS will get.