{Success} Abe's Steam Box: Core i7-2700K - Zotac Z77ITX-A-E - Sapphire R9 280X

Components:
Zotac Z77ITX-A-E motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813500077

Sapphire Vapor-X R9 280X graphics card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202137

Silverstone RVZ01 case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163252

Silverstone SX600-G 600W power supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817256109

Noctua NH-L9x65 CPU cooler
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00VB3Y89E

Noctua NF-S12A 120mm case fan
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835608038


Already Owned:
Intel i7-2700K CPU
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115095

Kingston HyperX 240GB SSD (x2)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820239046

Crucial Ballistix 16GB DDR3-1600 low profile RAM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148657

Apple A1278 DVD-RW slot-loading drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA7BJ35V0955


Comments:
First of all; this build would not be possible without the immensely detailed Zotac Z77 mini-ITX builds by Giacomoleopardo and Minihack. Thank you!

The main purpose of this build was to have a system that could accommodate just about any video card and one where I could reuse my CPU. It would also have to fit in my entertainment cabinet. This system is mainly used for media consumption and (Steam/GOG) gaming.


My previous build was constrained by the fact that my case was limited to low-profile graphics cards. Not this one! The Silverstone RVZ01 is a great compact case capable of fitting up to 13" graphics cards.

Since I decided to reuse my CPU I needed to find a slightly older motherboard. Intel's 7-series boards were the last to support Sandy Bridge processors. Try as I might, I was unable to find any of the Gigabyte boards listed in the Buyer's Guide (2013) at a reasonable price. After searching these forums I found some had had success with the Zotac Z77ITX-A-E. I found one (new, sealed in the box) on Ebay and decided to pull the trigger. To couple with the Zotac board; I went with the Sapphire Vapor-X R9 280X due to the fact that the 280X works out of box and this specific one supports DirectX 12.

Installation:
As previously mentioned; Giacomoleopardo's guide was immensely helpful so I mostly followed it. Clover install config was the same:


After Clover installation I dropped FakeSMC.kext and RealtekRTL8111.kext in EFI/CLOVER/kexts/10.10 set my SMBIOS to Macmini6,2. I then began to create my DSDT. Unlike Giacomoleopardo, I was unable to get Pjalm's specific Zotac patch working. After applying my system would kernel panic. Instead I decided to just use Pjalm's generic 7-series patches.


After generating a stable DSDT I then proceeded to install the graphics card. As others have experienced; the 280X mostly works OOB. The Sapphire Vapor-X immediately worked and provided full QE/CI acceleration without edits. Using the Hamachi framebuffer allowed OS X to properly recognized it.


Audio configuration went without a hitch using Toleda's CloverALC patch.

That's pretty much it. Other than tweaking my Clover config.plist (attached) a bit to get things just right everything appears to be stable and working as expected. Thanks to this great community for helping me get this puppy up and running!


Note: These Noctua fans are pretty damn great. Whisper quiet and keep things noticeably cooler than stock fans. Plus they look like I crammed a chocolate eclair in my box! I'll be using Noctua fans for all my builds from now on.

Looking nice have you tried 3 monitors with your Shapphire R9 280x Graphics Card?

This is a single monitor setup but I can test dual monitor support later today. I know both DVI ports work and the HDMI port sort of works (have to remap that one). I have no way to test DisplayPort at this time.

That is one mega Steam Box The spec sheet at Newegg says the R9 280X requires a
750 watt PSU are you finding the 600w Silverstone is able to handle that when you are
running maxed out games on this system ? Does it get too hot with the fan getting loud
as well ? How does the Noctua CPU cooler perform under load. Do the temps go well over
70 degrees C ? Good job on all the research you did to put this build together.

I was worried about that too when I was shopping for a power supply. I did plenty of research and found that many with this card were using power supplies in the 600W range without issue. Silverstone is coming out with a 700W SFX power supply. Maybe I'll upgrade to that once it comes out but so far it's been stable during extended gaming sessions.

The CPU does get pretty warm but the 280X stays fairly cool. I did have a Cougar case fan in this during early builds but switching to Noctua made a noticeable temperature and audible difference.

oh i see did you do a DSDT edit for your Graphics?

I can confirm that dual monitors work. I can't test 3 monitors right now, however.

I tried some DSDT edits for graphics but found my system to be less stable. This card didn't really need any edits to make it functional.

That's great I'm thinking of getting card as a upgrade from my 760 but I want to make sure that 3 monitors work. Did you inject from EFI?

jbamford said:

That's great I'm thinking of getting card as a upgrade from my 760 but I want to make sure that 3 monitors work. Did you inject from EFI?

Click to expand...

I'd hang onto the 760 a while longer, if I was you. The R9 series is an experiment for more than two monitors. Maybe Apple will update 10.11 to support the R9 series by the time El Capitan is ready for release this Fall.

Stork said:

I'd hang onto the 760 a while longer, if I was you.

Click to expand...

I second that of Stork's advice. I built a video rig for a buddy with two R9s with 3GB a piece and I can say that ATI is still not there yet. So we returned the R9s and got two 780s. Nvidia and CUDA supported apps just rock period, given that the GPUs are set up right. I would always stick with what works rather than whats new.