2021 06 18                        BOX and COOLING

My computers need names, to reduce the confusion:

• STIRLING 2021 - Built last February, currently running a Ryzen 9 3950X CPU. Stirling is a lovely town in Scotland where my beloved and I stayed overnight on a 2nd honeymoon trip some years back. Three Stirling computers have been built so far, but only Stirling 2021 exists here now. One failed, and another is put to good use elsewhere.
• FORTE - The computer we're building now. The word origin is probably French, meaning "strong point." Usage and pronunciation may be influenced by Italian, as in music. Pronounced for-tay in my office, accent on "for," it is simply the name of my next computer.

So far we have decided on these components:

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5950X CPU, 16 cores & 32 threads, $799.00 Amazon, two on order, one due very soon, one in July.
• Motherboard: ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero, PCIe 4.0 and more, $449.00 Amazon, ordered for delivery Wed, Jun 23.
• Windows 10 Professional, FPP, box pack, full version, USB. Not yet ordered. Some are available for $99, but that price seems low and I'm suspicious that it might be a knockoff. I want the real thing from Microsoft.

The AMD Ryzen 9 5950X CPU which is arriving soon could be used in either Stirling 2021 or the new Forte. We'll see. It depends a little on how soon the second one arrives. It's on order too.

be quiet BK022 Cooler
Image from Amazon web page

A "be quiet" brand BK022 Dark Rock Pro 250W TDP CPU cooler (air, not liquid) was ordered and has arrived. $89.90 from Amazon. It remains to be seen whether that will fit on the selected motherboard in the selected case above/beside the selected memory cards. It's a big honker, weighs 2.4 pounds, and will sit directly atop the 5950X CPU. 

It came with a second fan, not attached but attachable. I'm still a little confused about where the loose fan should mount. There's a space right in the middle of the cooler - the image shows a fan there. Should the loose fan go there? If so, why wasn't it mounted there at the factory? If there's room, should I add a third fan on the back, pulling air rather than pushing? Why not?

Phanteks Enthoo
Pro PH-ES614PTG_BK

The case will be the same as the one used in the Stirling 2021 computer, the Phanteks Enthoo Pro "PH-ES614PTG_BK" ATX Case with tempered glass side panel and integrated RGB (LED) lighting. Ordered from eBay (Newegg store), $109.99, shipped yesterday, should arrive in a week. Size HWD 21.1 x 9.4 x 21.7 inches. The glass side panel is one whole side of the case, so you get a spectacular view of the innards, taking full advantage of any RGB inside. And for other reasons as well, I really like this inexpensive but full-featured case. 

The case has three bays for optical (CD/DVD/BD) drives, and I'm still a believer in optical discs. Many of us still have a library of movies or games on CDs, DVDs, or BDs that can be played on the computer. You can still buy "My Cousin Vinnie" on DVD or BD from Amazon.

Full case with lots of RGB

Much more important, we write some of our backups on Blu-ray M-Discs because they are a genuine archival medium. An M-Disc in a bank vault will last longer than the bank. Even in our own fire-resistant safe they will probably last far longer than anyone now alive, and longer than we will have computers and drives capable of reading them, if they don't fall prey to some risk other than simple deterioration. See the previous post about risks (theft, fire, flood, etc.).

New laptops are too thin to have disc drives these days. USB flash drives are not archival. So it's just a good idea to have a highly competent computer around that can still read and write CDs, DVDs, and BDs. A good LG drive which will do all of that costs $74.99 at Amazon and hooks directly into a standard SATA port on the motherboard. I have two here in Stirling (and can write two backup BDs at once), but Forte can get along with just one. It's easy to add another. One drive is on order.

Perhaps I'll Build Another Computer

Oops - the power went out and my old computer, the nine-year-old one that started this blog, didn't come back up again.  Power supply voltages looked good, but a new mobo didn't fix it, so I'll build a new computer and maybe fix the old one later.  It could serve as a server.

Requirements:

• The old computer seemed fast enough, but the new one should be very modern and thus much faster.
• Quiet.  I was very fussy about this when building the old one, and this one too.
• Cool running - no worrying about CPU or anything else overheating.
• Mobo capacity for at least two BD/DVD/CD drives and four hard drives.
• Must fit under my desk drawer.

  

  Left side view

In other words, a sprightly, silent, cool computer.  I don't play games on it - no overclocking or overvoltage required, just reliability.

Nine years ago I chose the box, motherboard, memory, and everything else, assembling it all myself.   This time I took advantage of a company that builds "bare bones" computers from their stock, then ships the mostly-assembled box.  I visited three of these on the web: 

• Magic Micro, 
• OutletPC, and 
• PortaTech , 

The OutletPC systems did not meet my needs.  Hoping for the quickest delivery, I configured a system from PortaTech, as follows:

• Thermaltake Showcase mid-tower case.
• Intel Core i7 6700 Processor 3.4 GHz, four cores, eight threads, 3400 GHz.
• 16 GB memory, DDR4, 2133 MHz.
• Asus H170 Pro motherboard, 6 SATA ports, one additional M.2 PCI Express (PCIe) disk port, lots more. I'm not yet sure if this means it will support 6 disks or 7.
• Quiet Cooling Package.
• 700W power supply.
• 14x Blu-Ray writer (BD/DVD/CD).  The 16x was not available on the web site.
• No disks.  I have plenty, from the old system.
• No Graphics card (yet) - the CPU includes graphics.

The new bare bones box arrived promptly. At a modest extra cost, they built and shipped it by second-day express the day after they received the order.  Since my main machine was down, that was very cool.

My first surprise was the Thermaltake X31 Showcase case itself.  It is two inches larger in all of the three dimensions than the old Antec box holding my first computer.  Happily, I do have space for it.  It was slightly over-advertised on the PortaTech website, though (now fixed), and it came with only three of the six disk trays. The left-side rack has capacity for three disks, and oddly, there is space on the right side of the bulkhead for three more, but it is nevertheless supplied with only three trays.  

As the case arrived, more or less

Since the right side has no air circulation, and I had no more trays anyway, I asked the PortaTech people for a solution, and they responded by supplying another 3-disk rack, with trays, for the left side.  These racks are stackable (nice!) and there are now six hard disks mounted there, all of which can be connected to the mobo at the same time if the BD drives are not connected.

Both side panels of the X31 are removable, and in fact it is quite necessary to remove the right-side panel to do anything at all with hard disks.  It does come with mounting brackets for two 2.5-inch (laptop) disks, but I don't have plans for those just yet.  In my experience with many computers I have never had a 3.5-inch drive fail (though they ALL will eventually), but most of my laptop drives have failed, and we do not abuse our laptops. Maybe I could use these brackets for SSD drives someday? I suppose that's what they are for, but I have another idea for an SSD drive.

I should have done a little more research on the case before specifying it in the order, but it's very sturdy, well designed otherwise, and I'm warming up to it.  In particular, the buttons, lights, and USB ports are on the top in the very front, front, rather than the front panel, and if the case sticks out from user the disk by an inch I can see them easily.  Especially nice to see the disk activity light sometimes.

Next - Other additions to the hardware.