- Joined
- Feb 2, 2017
- Messages
- 80
- Motherboard
- GIGABYTE GA-H270N-WIFI
- CPU
- Intel i5-6500t
- Graphics
- Nvidia GTX 1050-TI
- Mac
- Classic Mac
- Mobile Phone
Hi everyone, long time lurker
Recently got my hands on a FLAWLESS Cube (almost all in original packaging). Part of me hates to take it apart, but there's really no way I'll ever use it as a G4 machine (already got an old iMac for that purpose)
So, add me to the ranks of people wanting to put a more modern machine inside. Admittedly, I'm not hellbent on getting OS X to run on the thing, but it'd be a nice plus. Not super concerned about it at the moment though.
My main question has to do with power- I've looked through a good many of the other threads here and gotten a feel for how the majority of the builds go. I'm mostly trying to determine what the best way to power it, given the specs I'm hoping to achieve:
All in all, I think it's a bit aggressive, but doable. My concern lies in being able to power everything with a PicoPSU (largest one they sell these days seems to be the 160W model). I'd prefer to get a full-speed CPU and not the T variant, but will I have enough power to run the normal one @ 65W + GPU at 75W + everything else? As far as I can tell, it would be close to the maximums, but then I see other people here with similarly configured specs in terms of power, so maybe it would work?
I'd ultimately like to be able to run it pretty normally, though I do want to play Overwatch as well. I don't *think* that will be too much, but I could be completely crazy. I'm thinking of trying to put a fan on the bottom and top to push air along, though that will require some extra cutting obviously. The quieter the better, but let's not kid ourselves, I don't expect this thing to be dead silent. So long it's not too much louder than my 08 Mac Pro, I think I can live with it.
Hopefully this is enough information to go on. It'll still be a little while before I can start building (gotta get the cash scraped together first), but I definitely want to be able to have my parts all decided and a gameplan before I start spending.
Thanks!
EDIT: 5/18/17
I think I'm content with it for now. I still don't have a touch button enabled, as I can't find a way to squeeze the original in and haven't felt like doing all the wiring for a different touch pad. Here's some pictures!
And here's an iCloud gallery of all the photos I've taken of the project to date.
https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0oG6XBubhja8A
Final system specs are as follows:
Overall, I'm pretty happy with the final build. There's very little excess cabling with the m.2 SSD, though I did leave a SATA cable snaked down to around the GPU just in case I want to put an optical drive in place at a later date.
I have not installed OS X yet- I may do that in the future, but as of right now it's just on Windows 10 (gasp) and I'm actually reasonably happy with that as an OS (double gasp)
Speeds and temperatures are good- it's remarkable how powerful these little tiny low power chips can get. Maybe in a year or so I'll up the processor to an i7 T variant, but it's pretty unnecessary right now. On average, I think I pull right around 100-120W under load, and if it's just being used for web browsing it's much, much lower.
Temperatures under load tend to be around 70° for the GPU and upper 60s for the CPU. I did scale back the power draw on the GPU via Afterburner to 85% of what it's allowed to pull, but that's more for noise than for temperatures. I haven't noticed any real performance hits and that keeps the whole package quieter.
Let me know if you have any questions! Overall I've really enjoyed this project and hope to do another build inside a quicksilver- but that'll probably be at least a year or two, hah.
Recently got my hands on a FLAWLESS Cube (almost all in original packaging). Part of me hates to take it apart, but there's really no way I'll ever use it as a G4 machine (already got an old iMac for that purpose)
So, add me to the ranks of people wanting to put a more modern machine inside. Admittedly, I'm not hellbent on getting OS X to run on the thing, but it'd be a nice plus. Not super concerned about it at the moment though.
My main question has to do with power- I've looked through a good many of the other threads here and gotten a feel for how the majority of the builds go. I'm mostly trying to determine what the best way to power it, given the specs I'm hoping to achieve:
- Mini ITX LGA-1151 mobo (either H270 or H170 chipset, not entirely sure yet)
- Intel i5 6500 or 6500T. Maybe a Kaby Lake model, but it'd probably be better to switch to Coffee Lake in a few years for the power savings.
- Nvidia 1050 TI (
Zotac "mini" model, should fit just fine though a bit tight perhapsWent with an EVGA model instead which debuted just recently at the same price. General consensus is it's a better card. It is dual slot with the plate, but the top half is exhaust, which I think is a net win for heat.) - Optical drive (don't care if it's bluray or not, I'll probably just end up pulling one from a MacBook)
- + memory, fans, SSD, etc...
All in all, I think it's a bit aggressive, but doable. My concern lies in being able to power everything with a PicoPSU (largest one they sell these days seems to be the 160W model). I'd prefer to get a full-speed CPU and not the T variant, but will I have enough power to run the normal one @ 65W + GPU at 75W + everything else? As far as I can tell, it would be close to the maximums, but then I see other people here with similarly configured specs in terms of power, so maybe it would work?
I'd ultimately like to be able to run it pretty normally, though I do want to play Overwatch as well. I don't *think* that will be too much, but I could be completely crazy. I'm thinking of trying to put a fan on the bottom and top to push air along, though that will require some extra cutting obviously. The quieter the better, but let's not kid ourselves, I don't expect this thing to be dead silent. So long it's not too much louder than my 08 Mac Pro, I think I can live with it.
Hopefully this is enough information to go on. It'll still be a little while before I can start building (gotta get the cash scraped together first), but I definitely want to be able to have my parts all decided and a gameplan before I start spending.
Thanks!
EDIT: 5/18/17
I think I'm content with it for now. I still don't have a touch button enabled, as I can't find a way to squeeze the original in and haven't felt like doing all the wiring for a different touch pad. Here's some pictures!
And here's an iCloud gallery of all the photos I've taken of the project to date.
https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0oG6XBubhja8A
Final system specs are as follows:
- Intel Core i5-6500T 2.5GHz Quad-Core OEM/Tray Processor (35W)
- Gigabyte GA-H270N-WIFI Mini ITX LGA1151 Motherboard
- EVGA Nvidia GTX 1050 Ti 4GB
- Samsung 850 EVO 500GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive
- Crucial Ballistix Sport LT 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory
- PicoPSU 160W
- Noctua NH-L9i 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler
Overall, I'm pretty happy with the final build. There's very little excess cabling with the m.2 SSD, though I did leave a SATA cable snaked down to around the GPU just in case I want to put an optical drive in place at a later date.
I have not installed OS X yet- I may do that in the future, but as of right now it's just on Windows 10 (gasp) and I'm actually reasonably happy with that as an OS (double gasp)
Speeds and temperatures are good- it's remarkable how powerful these little tiny low power chips can get. Maybe in a year or so I'll up the processor to an i7 T variant, but it's pretty unnecessary right now. On average, I think I pull right around 100-120W under load, and if it's just being used for web browsing it's much, much lower.
Temperatures under load tend to be around 70° for the GPU and upper 60s for the CPU. I did scale back the power draw on the GPU via Afterburner to 85% of what it's allowed to pull, but that's more for noise than for temperatures. I haven't noticed any real performance hits and that keeps the whole package quieter.
Let me know if you have any questions! Overall I've really enjoyed this project and hope to do another build inside a quicksilver- but that'll probably be at least a year or two, hah.
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