Popular Post bobfa Posted June 4, 2020 Popular Post Share Posted June 4, 2020 Welcome to EMS 0.9 a work in progress As some of you may know, I tinker a lot. With the changes in the world around me, I will not be inviting customers into my home to audition systems, etc. So my goals and my drive go back to experimenting and learning. I need an (EMS) Experimental Music Server. I need it to be able to support a lot of testing. I have to access the Motherboard, change PCIe cards, RAM; you name it. Or maybe there is this “perfect” new Motherboard that I am dying to test... Oh, and I have to keep the cats out of the system so it cannot spread across the living room. Here are some of the questions I want to answer for myself: Or hey, I wonder if a “silent fan” that is not PWM will cool the CPU fine? Can I hear the fan, or can I understand if the fan influences sound? Will that new cooler keep my system chill?? Can I hear the difference when the Boot Optane drive is on the CPU or the Chipset? What if I have a PCIe card with SSD internal storage vs. my NAS? Do I want to start building unique power supplies? Hey, what about that new Motherboard? OR that cool Apacer RAM? Or GHENT internal cables? Well that lovely LAN party case is too hard to work with so I actually listened top my son and got an https://openbenchtable.com mounting system: WOW I should have used this to start with! IMG_1611.mov It is really simple to setup, but it is easy to have to re-do the setup. The Cooler Master as shown below is now a new PC for ME! So it is time for the first EMS: a “LAN PARTY” case, also a test-bench case. It is a big black box with a lot of holes in it! Here is my $110 first experiment. I wonder if Goldilocks will approve of EMS 0.9?? I can fit everything inside for testing. Including my HDPLEX 400. (More on that later) So it is BIG and BLACK, It does not match the Victrola in my Living Room. I do not think It will fit. I took all of the drive bays out so I could put the HDPLEX inside. The first experiment is using an AMD 3700X processor in an Asus ROG Crossfire VIII Phantom Motherboard with 16GB of Apacer Hi-spec RAM and booting off of an M.2 Optane drive. I have removed the needed parts from my Xeon Server. CPU Cooling will start with a Noctua NH-D15 cooler. I will be using the HDPLEX 400 Power Supply. I am establishing a baseline here and taking my first look at AMD processors. I will do some more hardware upgrades such as USB cards, Network Cards. The first test will be picking an OS to run as baseline. Gentoo Player AudioLinux Vortexbox Euphony ??Windows?? (need a bigger Optane drive for this) With this motherboard the HDPLEX 400 is running a lot hotter than I like. I will be testing with another board the ASUS Crosshair VII Hero. I have several reports that it is really great sounding too. NanoSword, Gavin1977 and Exocer 2 1 My Audio Systems Link to comment
Popular Post bobfa Posted June 6, 2020 Author Popular Post Share Posted June 6, 2020 A short update, I will be editing the first post as I go forward. The machine is up and running playing music. The motherboard under test is a bit much for the HDPLEX400 and it gets too hot in the case. But I just had to listen. So the HDPLEX200 is running the Optical Module, the USB Card and the TXUSB Ultra. The HDPLEX400 is running the Motherboard. It does not go with the decor, but it makes music! The Victrola is over in the other room waiting till I get done. AnotherSpin and LTG2010 1 1 My Audio Systems Link to comment
bobfa Posted June 9, 2020 Author Share Posted June 9, 2020 A short status update. I have my second test system starting to come in right now. This one will be in homage to the Victrola. I will do the basic setup and assembly shortly and post some pictures, etc, soon. This time it is a different cooler that does not need a fan, a different "case" that has not arrived as of yet, and a bit more. I will also post a parts list but with the industry in a bit of flux it is hard to get some of these components. Getting closer to EMS 1.0! bob AnotherSpin 1 My Audio Systems Link to comment
bobfa Posted June 10, 2020 Author Share Posted June 10, 2020 Today I setup to start testing a different motherboard. Here is the basic setup of the board. FullSizeRender.mov I am still waiting for a special case to test with. I have run into a set of problems with coolers. The screws with a couple of them are the wrong thread pitch for the AM4 backplates. Both the NOFAN cooler and the AM4 mount screws from the HDPLEX case are a problem. I am testing with the NOCTUA cooler until I can figure the rest of this out. I do not want to do anything without that backplate on the motherboard. My Audio Systems Link to comment
bobfa Posted June 11, 2020 Author Share Posted June 11, 2020 In order to actually get some listening done I have resorted to a cooler with a FAN!!!! (ok ok). Only for a while. the NOCTUA cooler is almost inaudible. IMG_1599.mov My Audio Systems Link to comment
bobfa Posted June 11, 2020 Author Share Posted June 11, 2020 1 hour ago, Stephen_V said: That thing is massive! Stephen, There is a lot of energy do dissipate from a running CPU. Passive or semi-passive heatsinks need a lot of surface area to spread the heat around. In the time-lapse you can also see the NoFAN heatsink. Those copper lines are heat pipes. Once I get the right screws to install it properly I will test it! The Noctua has six heat pipes to each radiator. It comes with two fans if you need them. Oh and there are a couple of reasons we do not like fans. First is the fan makes mechanical noise and some vibration. Second, most fans are variable speed using Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM). PWM drivers for fans create electrical noise that is very detrimental. If my testing requires long term fan use I will go to a DC fan that is properly selected to move the needed airflow. bob My Audio Systems Link to comment
bobfa Posted June 11, 2020 Author Share Posted June 11, 2020 I am at 65 Watts TDP. Thanks My Audio Systems Link to comment
bobfa Posted June 18, 2020 Author Share Posted June 18, 2020 I have updated the main post a bit to talk about where I am. I discovered, with help, a better way to do this: https://openbenchtable.com The Open Benchtable makes this easy. First I put a test power supply on the system for setup. It is better to remove the motherboard for this. IMG_1617.mov IMG_1620.mov IMG_1623.mov My Audio Systems Link to comment
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