Size does matter

[Weenus]

I'm going to college next year and i'm gonna live in the dorms, where space will be an issue.

Currently i own This piece, its way to big and flashy imo.

I was considering getting a shuttle but i have 3 sticks of 512 ram, and they dont have any mobos with 3 dimm slots, i dont really wanna lose half a gig considering i gmae alot.

Any tips you could give, as to where i could fine a decent small and quiet case would be greatly appreciated.

Edit:
My current build is:
3 x 512 DDR pc 3200
80 GB 7200 rpm x2
120 GB 7200 rpm
athlon 64 3200+ socket 754
x800 pro AGP
audigy 2

 

[BW86]

link fixed

 

[Weenus]

heh ty, *bump*

 

[Zepper]

Consider the Chenming 118 or the Aspire X-QPack or perhaps the Athenatech A100 series or the Enermax Venus series. Those all take microATX mobos. But you'll want one of those security cable kits so they won't go walking off on you... Can't pick mobo or much else w/o more info from you.
. And good on you for NOT going Shuttle or ilk - those things are too proprietary.

.bh.

 

[Weenus]

Aight ill look into those ty, however i was looking at MicroATX mobos and none of socket 754 ones had 3 dimm slots, am i just blind?

 

[Zepper]

Nope, lots of mATX mobos are down to two RAM slots lately. I had an older mATX that could take two DDR OR two SDRAM. It had four sockets but only two could be used at any one time. The one I found with 4 slots (two pairs of Dual channel) is Socket 939.

.bh.

 

[Tiamat]

you might be out of luck for 3+ mem sticks on a microatx mobo. They are very tough to find, and if you find them they are Socket A or something else - nothing "modern day".

Check out the Antec Superlanboy. I am using it now and its an ok case. Great cooling, barely fits normal ATX boards, and is featherweight when empty. Sometimes you can find it for 50$, but normally it is 75$. Due to its lightweight, it is very thin aluminum and is somewhat "cheap" feeling.

 

[Weenus]

ya i saw that case, the only prob is its roughly the same size as what i have now =/

 

[Zap]

My opinion is that you don't need that extra .5GB RAM, plus you can probably run tighter timings without it on a socket 754 mobo. But if you have to downsize...

Aspire X-Qpack or any mATX tower that uses standard ATX power supply plus whatever mATX board most closely matches your needs. You aren't gonna find a board that exactly matches.

 

[Weenus]

so i should loose the stick of ram n get one of the mini cases n a new mobo?

 

[Tiamat]

either that, or check out silverstone's desktop computers. They have some (LC01, LC13) that are full atx.

 

[alexXx]

i thought the same way as you before my first year of univ. I was going to be living in a conventional residence where i share a room with someone so i wanted a nice quite case.. it never happened and my computer was not an issue in the least. Get a case because you want it, not because you think you need to save space

 

[jfrog]

Originally posted by: Weenus
I'm going to college next year and i'm gonna live in the dorms, where space will be an issue.

Currently i own This piece, its way to big and flashy imo.

I was considering getting a shuttle but i have 3 sticks of 512 ram, and they dont have any mobos with 3 dimm slots, i dont really wanna lose half a gig considering i gmae alot.

Any tips you could give, as to where i could fine a decent small and quiet case would be greatly appreciated.

Edit:
My current build is:
3 x 512 DDR pc 3200
80 GB 7200 rpm x2
120 GB 7200 rpm
athlon 64 3200+ socket 754
x800 pro AGP
audigy 2

Ugly case IMO

The Antec Aria, Aspire X-Pack and Silverstone desktop cases are some smaller cases that also look pretty decent.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: alexXx
Get a case because you want it, not because you think you need to save space

That's some good advice.

 

[Weenus]

The thing is i live 1000 miles away so i need to be able to fit in a duffle bag or something for when i come home in the summers =/

 

[0roo0roo]

sounds like you need a mid range laptop..and forget gaming.

 

[frank84]

any metal midsized cheap cases will be fine.. with 120mm fan that is.

 

[Weenus]

Im thinking about going with this case and this mobo .

Your thoughts?

P.S. can someone plz verify that that mobo supports ide hd's, i see sata and ata so i think it does, just not sure ty =)

 

[alexXx]

if you look at the pictures, there are clearly some ide ports on the mobo. Plus, have you ever heard of a mobo with only sata connections? i havent

 

[Weenus]

k, thats y im asking i dont no that much, ty

 

[Zepper]

. Those look just fine.

. But you had probably better go and read mechbgon's system builters giude, Weenus. It's on his web site .

.bh.

 

[Weenus]

im not that newbish iv built my own comps in the past, but ty