Can you construct a wholly AMD-powered gaming PC, utilizing all the highest Radeon and Ryzen parts, into the super-cute, small kind issue Cooler Master H100 chassis? Yes… after which additionally no. I imply, we managed to construct a useful PC utilizing an AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT and a 12-core, 24-thread Ryzen 9 3900X CPU utilizing the brand new mini-ITX case, however there are positively some compromises and caveats that we have to add in right here. Probably principally surrounding my use of the phrase: ‘functional.’
AMD’s resurgence has been effectively documented, with the advances it’s made in its processors, from the first-gen Ryzen chips to the mighty Zen 2 CPUs now beginning to be matched by the 7nm Navi silicon that’s being jammed into its RX 5700-series graphics playing cards. Because we get all gooey over how treatment mini-ITX motherboards are, and since ASRock has shipped us its spectacular X570 mini-ITX board, we determined to try to construct probably the most highly effective all-AMD mini gaming rig we may.
Then Cooler Master launched the H100 chassis, we obtained maintain of 1, thought it appeared like one thing ripped from Portal, one thing you’d get super-attached to earlier than having to brutally sacrifice it to GLaDOS, and determined that if we had been going to construct a teacup gaming PC it must be in that. Maybe that was our first mistake…
You see, the issue with the Radeon RX 5700 XT is that it’s a bit massive. Not in some bloated Zotac triple-slot kinda method, however extra in that it’s resolutely full-length and there’s no method that’s going to suit contained in the Cooler Master H100 case. We tried, we actually did, however nothing wanting Dremel-ing the hell out of its aluminium body would have it encapsulated contained in the dinky innards of our chosen chassis.
But wait, you say, you intro’d the piece by saying you managed to construct a useful PC utilizing an RX 5700 XT and a 3900X utilizing this case. What provides?
Well, that was arguably our second mistake… as you’ll be able to see from the picture beneath.
Yeah, it kinda needed to spill out the again. Which wouldn’t have been an issue if it had labored absolutely. Unfortunately, whereas it was useful in that we may boot into Windows, for some cause the prolapsed machine we had created refused to acknowledge that there was an AMD graphics card truly put in into the construct.
We’re not satisfied that the ASRock X570 Phantom Gaming ITX/TB3 is especially snug operating a power-hungry GPU throughout a ribbon riser cable. Especially not one contorted to squeeze by means of a PCIe bracket slot on a tiny PC case.
So yeah, whereas we may provide juice to the RX 5700 XT through the PSU, and it fortunately outputted our Windows desktop – and was clearly higher cooled than it could be had we been capable of cram it into the H100… rating one for Dave engineering – {hardware} acceleration, nevertheless, was sadly past us.
The Build
If you desire a actually highly effective mini gaming machine of this dimension powered by AMD then you definately’re going to should make one massive compromise… use an Nvidia graphics card.
I’m conscious that’s going to actually upset r/Amd – probably greater than being unable to have their subreddit written out in all caps – however sadly whereas AMD has now introduced its RX 5500-series graphics cards they’re solely catering to the OEM crowd proper now, ignoring DIY fanatics till some unspecified time later this yr.
And in the meanwhile it seems like they’re focusing on the GTX 1650 by way of gaming efficiency too. That doesn’t lower it for what we would like by way of body charges, and with the RTX-series playing cards additionally being too lengthy for the H100, that leaves the Nvidia GTX 1660 Ti, a GTX 1070-level card that may nail 1440p efficiency within the newest games.
But the remainder is all AMD. The base of the construct is the highly effective ASRock X570 Mini ITX board, the Phantom Gaming ITX TB3. It’s obtained all of the X570 good things, equivalent to PCIe 4.Zero and the right AGESA 1.0.0.three ABBA BIOS too, for all of your boosty frequency enjoyable time. Underneath the board is house for an M.2 PCIe SSD – we’ve dropped the bargainous Addlink S70 in there – and jammed 16GB of reminiscence into the board. Though we may in all probability do with some decrease profile RAM to be snug below the CPU cooler, one thing just like the Crucial Tactical LP could be excellent.
Paired with all that we’ve obtained the Ryzen 9 3900X, the 12-core, 24-thread behemoth, that fortunately runs at 4.2GHz all-core below load. And how are we retaining such a robust factor cool in such a tiny case? The lovely Noctua L12S cooler simply matches the cramped confines of the ASRock board, although apparently it does require the Intel becoming bracket not the AMD one.
With the potential of cooling a 95W TDP CPU, it’s an awesome match. Though, clearly it does get tremendous toasty in there, it doesn’t throttle or crash even below critical load. So I’m counting that as totes secure.
Even if it did peak at 101°C throughout heavy CPU benchmarking…
The Performance
Despite being trapped in a cramped chassis with an excellent small CPU cooler, and on a small kind issue X570 motherboard, the 12-core Ryzen 9 3900X nonetheless shines. It’s a contact slower in benchmarking than on one thing just like the MSI MEG ACE X570, however not by a lot.
And nonetheless completely hoses any equivalently priced Intel processor you wish to put close to it.
Even although we’ve needed to swap down from the RX 5700 XT to the GTX 1660 Ti we’re nonetheless getting nice gaming efficiency out of this mini monster.
At the best graphical settings at 1440p we’re seeing each Far Cry New Dawn and F1 2019 prime the 60fps mark simply. And look nice doing it.
The extra demanding Assassin’s Creed Odyssey on Ultra settings proves a harder job, with our machine solely hitting 42fps at 1440p, however flippantly tweak a couple of settings and also you’ll be powering although at far greater body charges.
The similar will be stated for Metro Exodus. On Ultra at 1440p we’re solely simply above 30fps, however it is going to solely take some small settings tweakery to push above the 60fps mark.
The Cost
The drawback with this construct is it ain’t low cost. But that’s the mixed drawback of attempting to create a mini gaming rig and attempting to do it on the frustratingly costly X570 motherboard platform.
The X570 and 12-core Ryzen combo are what take this micro gaming pig as much as across the $1,500 mark. And if you happen to had been seeking to jury rig an RX 5700 XT into the construct like I used to be then you definately’re taking a look at method above that time, as much as virtually $2k.
| Product | Price | |
| Chassis | Cooler Master H100 | $70 |
| Motherboard | ASRock X570 Phantom Gaming ITX/TB3 | $230 |
| CPU | AMD Ryzen 9 3900X | $565 |
| Cooler | Noctua NH-L12S | $50 |
| RAM | TeamGroup Vulcan 16GB | $68 |
| GPU | Asus Phoenix GTX 1660 Ti | $285 |
| Storage | Addlink S70 1TB | $114 |
| Power | Corsair 650W | $80 |
| Total | $1,462 |
But solely a mad man or a complete idiot would do such a factor. And, truthfully, we wouldn’t actually advocate you drop the X570 or 3900X into such a construct both.
Going with a extra price-sensitive Asus B450I and a six-core, 12-thread AMD Ryzen 5 3600 CPU, will web you virtually the identical gaming efficiency and nonetheless offer you a hell of a variety of processing energy ought to you really want it. And that brings the fee to a way more cheap $1,000.
The different factor is, having constructed a machine into this Cooler Master H100, we wouldn’t advocate it for a mini gaming rig both. It’s simply too cramped in there and the place the PSU sits does the system no favours.
And not having the ability to match a full dimension GPU inside it leaves you open to idiots doing idiotic issues. Something just like the Phanteks Enthoo Evolv or the nonetheless attractive Bitfenix Prodigy will serve you much better and are far more enjoyable to construct into.
So, whereas we could have didn’t construct a wholly AMD-based gaming machine into this Cooler Master chassis, we’ve nonetheless managed to create a critically highly effective gaming PC with a palty footprint. And one which is able to ship each nice gaming body charges and offer you all of the processing energy you may want for these non-gamey workloads you may need.
But then you may additionally do one thing very comparable, and nearly as highly effective, for a full $500 much less.
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