Low-profile motherboard mount?

[An0maly_76]

Looking into transplanting a couple setups where space will be extremely tight. The upshot is that the space is non-conductive, but does anyone make low-profile plastic adhesive standoffs for PC motherboards?

 

[tabascosauz]

Are you looking for standoffs that are shorter than standard? For what boards and cases specifically?

Pretty good reason why brass standoffs are usually the same height; unless you have a board with a very clean backside (no backplate, no VRM backplate of any kind, no M.2 slots on the rear, no CPU cooler backplate if the case has no cutout, etc.) and a case that completely lacks a rear I/O cutout, anything non-standard will probably cause clearance issues. Especially if it is a modern board with an integrated I/O shield, most have very little flexibility to move in any direction.

 

[An0maly_76]

Are you looking for standoffs that are shorter than standard? For what boards and cases specifically?

Pretty good reason why brass standoffs are usually the same height; unless you have a board with a very clean backside (no backplate, no VRM backplate of any kind, no M.2 slots on the rear, no CPU cooler backplate if the case has no cutout, etc.) and a case that completely lacks a rear I/O cutout, anything non-standard will probably cause clearance issues. Especially if it is a modern board with an integrated I/O shield, most have very little flexibility to move in any direction.

Yes, a bit shorter than standard. I am looking to migrate my PC case to a wooden drawer to save space (see my previous post), and height is a bit iffy, as the drawer height is 6.25" and my CPU cooler is 6.08". I'm not sure if that includes the stand-off / motherboard. It probably won't be an issue, but if I can get it 1/16"-1/8"lower, that might help a bit, and preferably with adhesive standoffs, or plastic

 

[tabascosauz]

Mugen is huge and completely unnecessary for a stock 5900X. Just use anything shorter. C14S, D12L, SS135, Dark Rock TF etc. Way easier and more productive to get 10-20mm out of the cooler than trying to squeeze a millimetre or two out of the mobo standoffs and running into so many potential clearance issues.

 

[An0maly_76]

Mugen is huge and completely unnecessary for a stock 5900X. Just use anything shorter. C14S, D12L, SS135, etc. Way easier and more productive to get 10-20mm out of the cooler than trying to squeeze a millimetre or two out of the mobo standoffs and running into so many potential clearance issues.

I agree, and after reviewing specs for those models, that's certainly a thought, I greatly appreciate the suggestions. I'd actually looked at NH-9 variants, but was discouraged after Noctua's site showed they couldn't handle 5900X base clock. I'd also prefer not to buy a different cooler if not necessary, but apparently while some said cooler height measurements accounted for motherboard / standoffs, they do not. (I'd wondered about this).

However, not to second-guess you, but the best I've seen my 5900X do with the Mugen 5 (running PBO) was around 70-72C under load, even with six Corsair LL120 case fans., and that's 10-15C drop from the Corsair 4000X I started in.

At idle, it fluctuates between 35C-55C, concurring with other 5900X owners' findings regarding temps. While I don't remember seeing much difference at higher fan rpms at given temperatures, your statement tempts me to turn everything wide open and see what it does just to see. Perhaps I'll do that and post my results here.

 

[tabascosauz]

The idle temp is just Ryzen things. There is nothing that can be done. As for max load temps you can just run a near-flat fan curve and it'll be fine.

70-72 is fine for a stock CPU. Default (not custom) PBO settings is usually 160-180W so 70-72 is very good.

U9S will still handle a 5900X barely okay, especially if you even give it just a little bit of CO undervolt. C14S, SS135, D12L will all comfortably handle 5900X at stock. Running higher PBO limits only increases all-core performance - you can get max single thread performance by doing CO and opening up boost override without necessarily increasing limits.

D9L is where a 5900X becomes untenable. I would not go below a U9S, preferably a C14S (basically U12S equivalent when with 1 fan) or D12L equivalent at the very least. C14S will struggle if you are not providing it with direct downdraft airflow (ie. *smothered with a wood cabinet).

In any case, CO makes a big difference. Even a slight offset applied to all cores can enable you to get stock or better perf on less power (ie. 130W). You will notice the improvement in temps. Just don't drop below 100W for ST performance.

 

[An0maly_76]

The idle temp is just Ryzen things. There is nothing that can be done. As for max load temps you can just run a near-flat fan curve and it'll be fine.

70-72 is fine for a stock CPU. Default (not custom) PBO settings is usually 160-180W so 70-72 is very good.

U9S will still handle a 5900X barely okay, especially if you even give it just a little bit of CO undervolt. C14S, SS135, D12L will all comfortably handle 5900X at stock. Running higher PBO limits only increases all-core performance - you can get max single thread performance by doing CO and opening up boost override without necessarily increasing limits.

D9L is where a 5900X becomes untenable. I would not go below a U9S, preferably a C14S (basically U12S equivalent when with 1 fan) or D12L equivalent at the very least. C14S will struggle if you are not providing it with direct downdraft airflow (ie. *smothered with a wood cabinet).

In any case, CO makes a big difference. Even a slight offset applied to all cores can enable you to get stock or better perf on less power (ie. 130W). You will notice the improvement in temps. Just don't drop below 100W for ST performance.

So basically, the 5900X is going to do what it's going to do regardless of cooling. That's interesting. I had considered a Noctua over the Mugen, but don't care much for the brown fans. I was going for a blacked-out look, which the Mugen 5 Black Edition fit. I guess I could always spray-paint the fan and cooler if I really want to. I find black helps to give a heads-up when cleaning is necessary.

I am aware that my drawer idea is not ideal for cooling, but I had considered minor modifications to the cabinet's rear to improve air flow, say, twin 120s drawing in and twin 120s pulling out. I'd have to figure out some sort of dust filtration system, though. I can also mesh over the drawer top and leave it cracked slightly to improve air intake.

I did have another idea tonight... I found this wall mount, which looks trick.

I wonder about the possibility of piggybacking this from my TV stand VESA mount. It would put the system out of the way and hidden just as well without sacrificing cooling. However, the stand's weight capacity is 110 lbs, and the TV is listed at 88 lbs, a 22-lb differential, so I'll have to figure out my collective component weight and the wall mount itself to see if overload is possible. This approach, however, would mean modifications to keep dust out, or a lot more work in cleaning.

Honestly, I like the idea of a rack mount-type case for the display to stand on, but I'll have to pull the display down again to adjust stand mounts for a max of 8" to play with (currently around 3" ceiling clearance). And even at that, a 4U is on the edge of what will fit. Further complicating things, I'm considering dual systems, using a 2nd-gen Intel I have lying around as a media NAS. I'll have to get pretty creative on that one.

 

[An0maly_76]

So I ran across this beauty, which has been around for awhile, apparently... The Silverstone Grandia GD11.

Still has a similar height restriction, but at just under 7" H, 17" W and 15" D, two would fit perfectly side-by-side topside, but the side exhaust is a problem. A little pricey, but stylish without being too flashy. Still won't fit the Mugen, but it does allow for liquid cooling, which is a thought.

I'm wondering about something as well. I've considered running dual systems to save power, one a dedicated media NAS, the other strictly for gaming. I have two systems in mind for a NAS, an i3-2100 (2C/4T) / EVGA GTX750ti SC 2GB, and an i7-2600 (4C/8T) / GTX1050 SC 3GB, both with 16GB DDR3-1333 and 500GB MX500 boot drives. Handbrake's renderings look like thermal imaging shown in different patterns of plaid, and thus useless. I find I get higher quality with less space using OBS Studio for lossless video recording to HDD, then exporting with compression using VideoPad.

So here's the real question on that. I've read indications the weaker setup would have trouble recording with OBS. Is this true, and would the other one do better with the same RAM speed / amount?

@tabascosauz

Is that wow about the case, or wow about the older platform for the NAS? Not enough power? Bad choices, perhaps?

 

[tabascosauz]

Just wow about the case. Haven't seen Silverstone's traditional HTPC stuff in a hot minute.

It does sound like a good opportunity to use an AIO. At the same time, as long as you have powerful enough fans to pull air through that front panel, a shorter tower should also work.

Not too sure on OBS, but I would be a bit leery of that Sandy Bridge i3's ability to do just about anything demanding. If you are being realistic about resolution and whatnot I don't see why the 2600 and 1050 wouldn't do the trick.

Wall mount looks good, probably don't combine it with a TV on one mount though.

 

[An0maly_76]

Just wow about the case. Haven't seen Silverstone's traditional HTPC stuff in a hot minute.

It does sound like a good opportunity to use an AIO. At the same time, as long as you have powerful enough fans to pull air through that front panel, a shorter tower should also work.

Not too sure on OBS, but I would be a bit leery of that Sandy Bridge i3's ability to do just about anything demanding. If you are being realistic about resolution and whatnot I don't see why the 2600 and 1050 wouldn't do the trick.

Wall mount looks good, probably don't combine it with a TV on one mount though.

Yeah, that case really wowed me, and it's about the only one that really seems feasible.

I think an AIO would be overkill for a 2nd-gen Intel. Maybe not for an overclocked 1700 or a 3600X on PBO (have both setups), but think they'd be overkill for a NAS. Now, I can see the i3-2100 struggling with its iGPU, but you're saying it would struggle to encode even with a GTX750ti? I can see where it might struggle if trying to stream and record simultaneously, though. Is that what you're getting at? Not that using the 2600 / 1050 is a problem, I just wonder what I'm going to do with the 2100/750ti if it's not really able to do this.

What I do, essentially, is display capture live fullscreen DVD playback at 1920x1080, use OBS Studio's internal settings to choke it down to 1280x720 (sometimes 853x480) in FLV, remuxed to MP4, then use VideoPad to trim and export either the FLV to MP4, or MP4 to lossless if possible (I've found it won't always let me do it).

It takes longer (not an issue with a dual or dedicated system) and even with a single system, I usually just watch Plex, Roku or something on my TV while it's running. I find it's better quality than a standard rip, especially on my 75" A6, which tends to make typical 480p rips look like they were recorded with a potato. A couple movies I found that pushing to 1440p on capture further improved quality, but not enough to be worth the extra file size. Even though I tend to favor quality over file size.

I know this sounds ridiculously complicated, but if Handbrake wasn't so absolutely useless in its renderings, I'd certainly go the easier route. Trouble is, no one can tell me why it's doing that.

I kind of see your thoughts on not combing the wall mount with a TV. Not sure what it specifically weighs, but my 5900X components weigh in around 22 lbs. The Intel builds weigh around 13 lbs. Not much headroom for the weight of the wall mount. Which is why I was glad to find that case, because it's about the same price as the wall mount.

 

[LabRat 891]

Something like:

Standoffs | BusBoard Prototype Systems

www.busboard.com

?

If you already have a 3D printer, this might be modifiable into what you want too

Snap-in motherboard feet (standoffs) for desktop use by Printing Programmer | Download free STL model | Printables.com

Plastic feet to make it safe and simple to use bare PC motherboards (ATX/mATX/mini-ITX) on your desktop. | Download free 3D printable STL models

www.printables.com

 

[deb]

So basically, the 5900X is going to do what it's going to do regardless of cooling. That's interesting. I had considered a Noctua over the Mugen, but don't care much for the brown fans. I was going for a blacked-out look, which the Mugen 5 Black Edition fit. I guess I could always spray-paint the fan and cooler if I really want to. I find black helps to give a heads-up when cleaning is necessary.

I am aware that my drawer idea is not ideal for cooling, but I had considered minor modifications to the cabinet's rear to improve air flow, say, twin 120s drawing in and twin 120s pulling out. I'd have to figure out some sort of dust filtration system, though. I can also mesh over the drawer top and leave it cracked slightly to improve air intake.

I did have another idea tonight... I found this wall mount, which looks trick.

View attachment 300215

I wonder about the possibility of piggybacking this from my TV stand VESA mount. It would put the system out of the way and hidden just as well without sacrificing cooling. However, the stand's weight capacity is 110 lbs, and the TV is listed at 88 lbs, a 22-lb differential, so I'll have to figure out my collective component weight and the wall mount itself to see if overload is possible. This approach, however, would mean modifications to keep dust out, or a lot more work in cleaning.

Honestly, I like the idea of a rack mount-type case for the display to stand on, but I'll have to pull the display down again to adjust stand mounts for a max of 8" to play with (currently around 3" ceiling clearance). And even at that, a 4U is on the edge of what will fit. Further complicating things, I'm considering dual systems, using a 2nd-gen Intel I have lying around as a media NAS. I'll have to get pretty creative on that one.

name of this wall mount?

 

[An0maly_76]

name of this wall mount?

It's on Etsy.com. They carry at least two sizes, maybe more. Here's a link with a built-in search that should take you right to them.