My first SFF...

[Tetsuo316]

...isn't even for me.

My little sister is graduating high school and her gift is a computer. Both myself and my older sister got a computer when we graduated. She received an Apple Performa or some such thing. This was '94. I graduated in '98 and receive a PII 350 w/ 64 MB of RAM and an 4 MB video card. Man that thing was flying. Keep in mind that both of those ran about $2000 at the time. Well, check out what $2000 gets you now:

• Black Shuttle XPC SB51GB

• Pentium IV 2.66 Ghz

• 512 MB Corsair XMS PC2700 RAM w/ Heat Spreader

• 80 GB Seagate Barracuda V HDD

• Black Plextor DVD/CDRW Combo Drive

• Black Sony Floppy Drive

• Gainward GeForceFX 5200 w/ Passive Heatsink, DVI, and S-Video Out

• NEC 1760V-BK Black 17" LCD Display

• Logitech Z-340 2.1 Speakers

• HP DeskJet 5550

• Logitech Wireless Comfort Duo Keyboard and Mouse

• Windows XP Home Edition w/ SP1

• MS Works 2003

• Cyber Power 880 Surge Protector

The idea was to keep it cool and quiet. The cooler it is, the less work the adjustable fan will be doing in turn keeping it quieter. I wanted a passive heatsink on the video card to help keep the noise down, and I hope the heat spreader on the RAM will dissipate some heat. The Seagate HDD is also supposed to be very quiet.

I ordered black drives in case I get too lazy to stealth them. I figured they'd have to look better than beige.

At a cramped dorm desk, the lack of wires is going to be great I think.

Anyway, there she is. Let me know what you think.

 

[JackHawksmoor]

Are you sure that's a Barracoda V and not a IV? I bought some parts a few months ago, and the V was only coming in 60 and 120GB versions. The V is supposed to be quieter than the IV, and it IS really, really quiet. If I had quieter fans, it would sound like a Powermac

 

[Tetsuo316]

er, I guess it's a Barracuda 7200.7 - whatever that is.

However, by looking up the model number through Seagate's site I did find that they do make a Barracuda V in 80 GB flavors. I'm sure I saw them listed at Newegg before and figured that they were the same. Does anyone know if the 7200.7 flavor of Seagate HDD's is still on the quiet side?

<me crosses fingers>

 

[Smoke]

I thought about going this route. Recently I set all of my office systems back to nominal and turned all the fans down to their quietest setting.

Quiet is Cool!

 

[loup garou]

Very nice system. I love having a SFF system + LCD.

 

[Tetsuo316]

Update!

We now have pics of the lil' beauty.

 

[Tetsuo316]

This is my first post from the new machine. It's quieter than my regular desktop but not absolutely silent. I've yet to hear the I.C.E. fan power up to full speed, but I haven't yet run SETI on the little monster. My idle temps are around 45C. Does this sound about right? It seems a little high to me, but I don't know what the regular temps for a P4 2.66 would be.

Anyway, it's really dreamy. Everything matches even! LCD, printer, speakers, powerr strip and computer are all black. It looks very nice.

 

[Armoth]

That'll be a nice rig for college. I mean the printer is bigger than the XPC really. If you want it quieter, I would suggest installing speedfan or motherboard monitor and have it run as a service. That way you can really control the ICE fan and any others by setting thresholds and speeds. The other option is installing different fans. Check out the Sudhian forums for more info, they are very helpful for SFF's and especially Shuttles.

I've got a SN41G2 and love it. I still need an LCD though...

 

[nanyangview]

oooooh nice system there
is ur sis hot lol?

 

[Tetsuo316]

I ran SETI on the machine for a day or so and temps never crested 52C. That's well within reason and it also means that the fan won't crank up to full speed (I've set it to do so at 55C). It's quiet enough that I don't really feel like going through the hassle of setting up more monitoring programs, but thatnks for the suggestions, Armoth. I lurked at the Sudhian forums for a long time, so I've read a lot about these little machines. If I only read these forums, I doubt i'd have ever purchased one.

My main concern was space, since she'll be in the dorms. Ok, well space was my second concern, the 'Wow' factor was my primary concern.

Oh, and I've already warned her about potential computer nerds trying to get at her computer by pretending to be interested in her as a person - so tough luck.

 

[Armoth]

Yeah, I had to buy a few usb2/firewire enclosures for some optical drives and a hard drive. They match pretty well, and at least I can use them on my other machines as well.

There's a lot of great info over at Sudhian, isn't there? Yeah, my buddy couldn't believe it was a full PC...I guess he was just used to my old setup too much.