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Hi Carbies.

So its been a few years since my previous ITX build way back in 2012. Linky. I have since moved to a more standard ATX build but haven't liked it at all. 28 May 2017 CUD got the best of me and I backed Daniel Hansen Kickstarter for his Dan Cases A4-SFX v2 after missing the first iteration. Been following his development of the case for some time before and just really like the Lian-Li build style and quality. So I had to have one. Cough its not cheap! :ROFLMAO:

Received my A4-SFX v2 case March 2018 after some parts and manufacturing delays. (recent pics)

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Also placed an order for a Thermolab LP53 Slim & Quiet Heatsink and Noctua NF-A9x14 PWM fan to go with it. Was looking for a Asetek 545LC AIO to go with my build but finding one was harder than I though so had to settle for the LP53. Then it all just went into collecting dust on my shelf :rolleyes:.

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End of 2018 CUD started showing its ugly head and I started looking for parts to complete the build. The Asus ROG Z370i was purchased and a while later the Corsair SF600. Recently, since its that time of the year and I've had a ton of overtime put in, I managed to get the last few parts for the build, Intel i7-8700k, Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4-3466MHz and a 1TB M.2 NVMe Samsung PM981 for storage. The parts that I do have and will be transferred over to the new build are the EVGA GTX1070 SC2 and Samsung 512GB M.2 Pro SSD.

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For the record, most of the parts have been bought off Carbonite ;) that includes CPU, Motherboard, both SSD's, GFX and PSU. Thanks to all who made the deals. Will tag names if that's okay?

The build will start once I received all the parts, outstanding is the CPU and RAM arriving this coming week. Will try and do build in progress updates and challenges, because there will be :whistle:.

Notes:
The LP53 is not a permanent solution. Found out recently that the Asetek 545LC AIO was replaced with the Asetek 645LT AIO and have signed up for when it becomes available and if possible if it will get shipped to SA :whistle:. So for now LP53 and undervolted 8700k will have to make friends. Also, only from the A4-SFX v3 are 120mm rads supported by design and not the v2.
The EVGA GTX1070 SC2 is not an ideal card for this case, rear blower is preferred to get rid of the heat in this tiny case. So I'm still deciding what to do here. Will see what kind of temps I get with the current build and go from there. Also looking for a replacement 1080ti Mini maybe.
Water cooling the entire thing was an option and I did look into it, but the size and parts available for reliable builds was just to hard to find and I would rather settle for simple and clean maintenance.
Ohh and cabling, yes I will do custom cables. Still deciding how to go about this and still need to measure what I need. These should just be plug and play as i will only need 24xPin, 8xCPU and 8xGPU power cables.

So there you go. Hope this turns out good and will be a little challenge to build in. 😁
 
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WTF, en dan maak jy ons nog die donerse spoiler buttons ook nog click om eers te sien :mad:



:p

ek love klein goed :D
 
Nice! Would love to see how you going to do cable management.

Edit: I have an itch for something similar, but based off a Asrock DeskMini 300 (Ryzen).
 
There is another mini PC build I'm interested in but it sports an external GPU and separate case for the other hardware. But with an external GPU setup it opens a whole new world of issues and performance loss.
 
And here we go again. Damn late update :whistle: No more 56K/DSL friendly posts :p
Between work and motivation to do the build I might have forgotten to post some updates. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ For now the build is in a working order and I'm using it as is with things being replaced and changed out as I go along.

First things first, taking the whole case apart. Both side panels and front-to-top panel removed. Side covers will be replaced by modifiable acrylic side panels, later on this.
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Then the stressful part, placing the CPU in the socket with out destroying the socket pins, like so many people do on purpose 😤🙄 #bendersgate Then trowing on a dash of ThermalGrizzly Hydronaut. For now the CPU have not had a delid, this is definitely planned, just haven't had the time to get around too it. Also want to get a baseline on how the CPU runs without delid, else how would I know it worked 😏 Both NVME SSD's have also been mounted, front and back of the motherboard. Note: The back NVME slot is slot 0 and the front is slot 1.
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Ahh yes then the Thermolab LP53 Slim & Quiet Heatsink and Noctua NF-A9x14 PWM fan with cable tie mod goes in. Also the Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4-3466MHz. And now you will start noticing the first of the problems to come 😩
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The problems... The gaps between the RAM and the LP53 heat sink is insanely small, same goes for the VRM sink on the other side. I had issues getting the LP53 in the other direction so the heated air can be vented out to the top and bottom of the motherboard. I will try and see if I can move or change some things when I remove everything again to get the CPU delidded. For now I will not get any less heat than a toaster. 😩

Problem number 01
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Problem number 02
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For now lets move on. Time to mount the tiny PSU in the case. This is my second SFX PSU. Man I love these things. 🤩
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To show you where I have routed the power cable in the case, I have utilized my awesome Windows 10 3D Paint skillz to sketch out the intended route. The cable is pretty flexible and easily managed to fit following this route behind the motherboard. The motherboard standoffs allows for enough space.
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lyk kak



:p

look, I take my hat off to people doing these builds, but it still boggles my mind when you want to use crazy hardware and expect good-great thermal outcome and expect there to not be some kind of problem in regards to parts fitting together

what is the size of those side panels?
 
Top view of the case with the PSU, I forgot to take a picture with the power cable routed and connected. 🤫 In order to get the kettle plug to fit through the frame, I had to loosen the three screws there in the middle to make the plug fit through and comfortably fit in the PSU. Minor thing really.
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Next in goes the back plate and motherboard. And what fun that was getting it in there without bending or chipping something. 😨
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Then in goes the graphic card and power cables. Man these stock power cables are a schlep, though it was kind of easy to bend them into shape beforehand before plugging everything in. The graphics card power cable runs through a hole at the bottom of the front chassis and, will be behind the front-top cover, to the top and into the card. Realized now that I did not take a picture of this either. 😩
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Top view of the power cable and and graphics card mounted
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Here you can see the power cables 😜 also the front-top cover is back in place. Also the PCIE extender plugged into the motherboard. Was wondering why Dan went with a thermal protected and shielded PCIE extender. That I would realize later. 😏
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And on goes the acrylic side panels with the DAN cutout on the sides. The acrylic windows are actually mounted on four 5MM standoffs on both side panels. So there are plenty of breathing room to bring in air from the sides of the windows. Getting it out again would prove to be the third problem. View from the motherboard side
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View from the graphics card side.
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lyk kak



:p

look, I take my hat off to people doing these builds, but it still boggles my mind when you want to use crazy hardware and expect good-great thermal outcome and expect there to not be some kind of problem in regards to parts fitting together

what is the size of those side panels?

The cutout on the metal part of the side panel is 260mm x 145mm
 
Then onto the mentioned issues. HEAT and LOTS of it! Yes in such a confined space with no airflow of any kind to remove the built up heat will turn this little machine into a toaster in minutes. I mean, the CPU with both covers on will idle at around 65'c and graphics card was around 70'c. Now you can guess what happened when I start up some games. 😱😰🥵 Constant 90'c and 100'c easy in around 30 minutes of gaming with CPU only at 35% load (not all cores). Cant remember graphics card load right now. And its not that an intensive game either.

This build was a terrible idea. 🤪 But then again, this was what I expected. And I'm also still waiting on the Asetek 645LT AIO to replace the LP53. This cooler is definitely not meant to be used with a 8700K.

First things first, decided to set the CPU to a negative offset of -0.060 in the bios to keep the core voltage lower. Haven't changed anything else besides that. This did make a little bit of a difference at load but after 30 minutes it doesn't seem to matter because of the heat buildup. The top of the case over above the motherboard becomes so hot you can't touch it for longer than a few seconds. Now I know why the PCIE extender is shielded. Dan did some proper testing.

So, off comes the CPU side side panel and temps drop to a reasonable 38-41'c idle and 65'c under load at around 35%. So working on this still, will design and laser cut a custom side panel with bigger vents over the CPU and PSU fans. Time to make new enemies, dust bunnies. :ROFLMAO:

Also have this crazy idea to add a blower type extractor fan to the top of the case somewhere and add some vents at the rear to get rid of the hot air buildup when both side panels are in place.

In the meantime, I have decided to make another change. Yeap Asus GTX1080Ti Founders Edition. 🤪 Had to add the additional power connector for this card because it needs more juice. Wait, am I not trying to get rid of heat instead of generating more??? Does this irk you more @Off-The-Chart ? 😜
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And with the side panel on
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Now at least the graphic card is not circulating all the hot air in the case anymore and most of what it generates gets blown out the back. Temps are more stable now for the graphics card too. With the EVGA GTX 1070 SC it would spike allot faster to 70'c. The ASUS GTX1080Ti takes some time now to heat up and tops out at around 62'c with highs at 65'c,

Recently also came across a GoogleDocs Sheet with Dan Cases A4-SFX owners posting temps and configs - Linky. With this build I didn't really have concrete stats to look at, lots of forum posts and YouTube reviews with very mix results made me unsure what to aim for. One thing I notice on there over everything else is "delidded". So guess I have a bigger reason now to do this.
 
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