Build me a PC "Mac Mini"

[mshan]

Hi Bangraman:

I've got an idea for a simple, completely reversible mod to your Antec Aria that I think may reduce the perceptibility of your psu fan spinning up:

Just remove the wire fan grill from the psu.

I'd also appreciate your impressions of how noisy / intrusive the DVD-ROM / CDRW of your Mac Mini is while spinning 1) dvds, and 2) cds.

 

[Edwood]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bangraman I'll also re-iterate the thread rule... Complete specs only.

OK, I won't waste your time posting about single items anymore.....

-Ed

 

[AlanY]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mshan I'd also appreciate your impressions of how noisy / intrusive the DVD-ROM / CDRW of your Mac Mini is while spinning 1) dvds, and 2) cds.

I have the ordinary DVD/CD-RW drive (not the writeable DVD "SuperDrive") in my Mac Mini. While playing CDs and DVDs it's pretty quiet, on par or slightly quieter than the CD drives in my various PC machines. You can hear the spindle motor spinning, humming softly, but that's because the Mac Mini by itself is so quiet. My desktop PCs are loud enough that the CD spindle noise gets largely drowned out by the ambient noise. When accessing data CDs, however, my Mac Mini's CD drive is slightly above average in noise. The motor that moves the lens armature back and forth for random access is not as quiet as the spindle motor. Again, this is only an issue when accessing data CDs, not music CDs.

I've built a bunch of homebrew PCs in my life, and I just don't think it's possible to build as quiet a machine as the Mac Mini for around the same price. If you swap in and out enough components, you might eventually arrive at the sweet spot where you get quieter than the Mini and end up under budget, but getting it right the first time is much, much more of a crapshoot than people make it out to be. (And even then you wouldn't have the intangibles, the clean look, the small size, etc.) The Mac Mini doesn't meet every need, but it does meet a set of needs extremely well that aren't being effectively addressed currently by other vendors.

 

[bangraman]

I have the standard drive, and it's quite noisy when in data / ripping access. I haven't compared it side by side with a regular DVD-ROM/CD-ROM yet but pehaps it's a quiet one and it's just incredibly noisy compared to the 'at rest' noise of the Mac Mini. I haven't spun any audio CD's and haven't watched any DVD's on it so far so can't tell you about those.


I've ordered more Minis for experimenting at a client's apartment. These'll have the DVD-RW drive.


My question now is: Can anybody tell me where I can order a Nexus 80mm fan in the UK?

 

[bangraman]

On a related note...


This is not an audio question, but a video one. I didn't realise how utterly crap the KM400A Unichrome implementation was. Even the basic Direct3D requirements of some of the simple software I'm using, it gives up on. This was not going to be a huge problem given that I would add an AGP card and the IGP was going to be an absolute last-ditch option... but of course, I forgot that the AGP card would have another fan on it.


Swapping the KM400A board for an Nforce board wouldn't solve the DVI requirement so I am being forced to go AGP. I have a Geforce 3 Ti 500 which I can fit. I have a couple of 4Ti's and 6600GT's as well but I think those are overkill. The issue is that the 3Ti has a fan on it, and will obviously be a culprit for extra heat generation and noise. How could I cool the 3Ti for fanless operation?


[size=xx-small]
And incidentally... a hundred there, fifty there, two hunded there... it really adds up. I could have bought a couple more Mac Minis in place of this experiment!

[/size]

 

[mshan]

Unfamiliar with the Nvidia graphics card, but an 128 MB ATI or Sapphire Radeon 9600 video card is passively cooled and would fit nicely in the Antec Aria case (a lot of aftermarket passive heat sinks like the Zalman heatpipe will interfere with the power supply).

Again, you would be specifically looking for the standard, passively cooled version (i.e. not the Pro, XT, or SE versions).

If you are going to use an ATI HDTV Wonder, you probably want the ATI built video card; otherwise the Sapphire Radeon 9600 is probably just as good and may be easier to find.

 

[Damage]

Have you looked into some of the aftermarket cooling kit offered by Zalman? This particular link leads to Zalman's USA website with all of their GPU/Videocard coolers, so I'm not sure how much of this applies in UK.

Outside of such cooling solutions, the other obvious, quiet solution is to use some sort of water cooling mechanism.

 

[bangraman]

Further thoughts come up with one word vis-a-vis the Mac vs PC for audiocentric HTPC comparison, especially if it's going to be DACed:


kmixer.


It is possible to get around this on Windows of course, but you're limited to... what, two jukebox apps? And iTunes doesn't do it. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know Macs don't have this issue.

 

[breez]

Buy a sound card which bypasses Kmixer even with WDM drivers. I believe RME cards do this and there has been some talk about EMU cards too.

 

[morphie]

any card supporting asio does

 

[mshan]

Apple Airport Express is capable of bit perfect output (got to keep volume at max and keep all digital signal processing such as cross fade, etc. off) and I do believe that there is no equivalent of Kmixer in Apple's operating system. It has a mini optical output or regular mini output that can plug into an external dac or av receiver and sounds pretty damn good. (I read that there may be a new Apple Airport Express with a regular optical output in the works). Plus you get a wireless access point and usb printer server port.

I own an RME Digi96/8 PAD and enjoy it immensely (all outputs active simultaneously, drivers bypass Kmixer automatically, simple interface), but it is rather expensive. I think Chaintech AV-710 can also bypass Kmixer (ASIO?), but requires some tweaking.


P. S. - Scott Nixon (http://www.scott-nixon.com/dac.htm) has a USB interface TubeDac in the works that should sound awesome and not cost too much.

 

[breez]

Yes, but the point is that not all applications support ASIO while everything supports waveout/WDM.

 

[dknightd]

Bang, you are correct macs don't have the kmixer issue. But then again they do not have the wide variety of player software that PCs have. I like my Mac(s) but haven't found software that provides gapless playback - have you? (crossfade in itunes does not count)

One problem with using a minimac for a music/video server is the disk capacity is too small. You pretty much have to use external firewire drives for storage. My experience has been that the external drives make as much noise as a reasonably quiet cpu. I think a good solution might be to put the cpu/disk in a seperate space, and just run wires for the display and input devices to the listening area. Then within reason you don't have to worry too much about the noise the computer makes. Of course this is not always practical.

Life is full of comprimises...

 

[bangraman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by breez Buy a sound card which bypasses Kmixer even with WDM drivers. I believe RME cards do this and there has been some talk about EMU cards too.

This is important information in that case. What cards do for sure?


dknightd, a small standalone NAS plus either a Wifi-G or a cabled connection will take care of that problem. It may be able to talk as is to the Mac, or use Dave.

 

[J@ck]

The IBM S-series used in many offices are quite "silent" and performs pretty good. They are not pretty but looks ok.
You might want to have a look.