- Ever since AMD released their massive many core
Threadripper processors, enthusiasts have been chomping
at the bit for an ITX small form factor solution
where they can pack as many cores as possible
into a tiny case like this one.
And guess what, ladies and gentlemen?
Today, we finally got it, sort of.
Technically, this motherboard comes
from ASRock's server division, ASRock Rack,
and is compatible with AMD EPYC CPUs.
But that doesn't change the fact that we are gonna build
a sick freaking gaming rig with it
with an RTX 3090 graphics card, 128 gigabytes of memory,
and 64 processing cores.
All in this tiny little thing right here.
It's gonna overheat.
Probably.
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- To start with, the main advantage
of Threadripper over EPYC, 'cause they're both available
in up to 64 core configurations,
is that aside from the lower price,
you'll actually tend to get better performance in desktop
or workstation applications because AMD was more willing
to go ham on the power consumption
of a desktop/enthusiast chip compared to, well,
something that's supposed to be super power efficient
for the data center.
It's also overclocking capable.
As for EPYC's advantages, well, they are several.
This puppy has 128 lanes of PCI Express Gen 4 connectivity,
up to octo channel instead of just quad channel memory,
and it's got support for up to four terabytes
of registered ECC memory.
None of which we will be taking advantage of today,
because this board only has four memory slots.
So we'll be running quad channel.
It only has a single PCI Express 16X slot,
so we won't be using all 128 lanes.
And, well, you can't buy one terabyte memory modules yet so,
or ever.
- [Jake] You could do 256.
You could do a terabyte total.
- You could do a terabyte total, but we're not doing that.
Of course, sometimes your choices are dictated
by a lack of better options.
And since there are no ITX motherboards for Threadripper,
we are going EPYC today.
Although it should be noted that this is not,
strictly speaking, quite an ITX motherboard.
See that?
It does only have one PCI Express slot,
like an ITX motherboard in a standard ATX-style I/O.
But it's actually a touch wider,
so this is a completely non-standard,
what do they call it, Deep ITX?
- [Jake] Yeah, proprietary Deep ITX.
- Proprietary Deep ITX.
The good news is that we did manage to find cases
that happened to be compatible with it, sort of,
after some modification.
Even with the extra width though, ASRock had to make a lot
of stars align in order to make this happen.
So first, one of the main reasons
that Threadripper mini-ITX boards don't exist
is that Threadripper requires an external chipset
on the motherboard for certain functionality,
like SATA RAID.
EPYC, by contrast, just doesn't support it at all.
So there's no need for an outside chipset.
Another compromise they made was having very little I/O.
So while we do have built-in dual 10 gigabit network ports,
and that's freaking awesome, 'cause we'd have nowhere
to put a network card on this thing.
Other than that, we get VGA out.
We get a, I believe this is a power button.
We get a management network port and two USB 3 ports.
We don't even have any additional USB 3 headers
on the board.
Here's another fun one.
The board uses ATX 12 volt power only.
Look at that.
There's no 24 pin connector.
There was no freaking space for it.
Which isn't to say that it doesn't still have
some cool connectivity.
All of these slimline ports over here,
these four are PCI Express Gen 4 8X.
If we were to plug them into like say, for example,
U.2 NVMe drives, although we can't use them for anything
that requires power from the board, 'cause we've only got
this single four pin power input for them.
And then these ones up here can actually run
either PCI Express Gen 4 by 8 or SATA
if you wanna hook up a bunch of SATA drives.
This thing is so freaking cool.
It's so dense too, even the back of the board
is as covered with components as the front
of a normal gaming board would be.
I guess another more indirect advantage of Threadripper
is that you can get much higher speed memory for it,
because you can run unbuffered DIMMs.
These 3200 megahertz CL 22 modules
are about as fast as you can really go with EPYC.
And CL 22, that really ain't that great.
For the best performance on Zen 2,
I would wanna be running more like 3200 CL 15.
But it's ECCs, so of course, you have error checking
and correction, so that's good for reliability.
That's funny, I went to install our eight terabyte,
'cause this video is all about massive numbers here.
Eight terabyte Sabrent M.2 drive,
and I realized this motherboard doesn't come with a screw
for it, but it does come with some screwy accessories.
So you got your standard I/O shield.
And then you got this trippy thing.
Look at this.
This is a four pin power connector to six SATA power.
So that's that hard drive plug thing
that I showed you guys before.
And then it also has a 24 pin to four pin adapter
for the 12 volt only power that goes into the motherboard.
Crazy.
Now that that's built up, we can turn our attention
to our case, this is the SUGO 15 from SilverStone.
It ain't cheap, but it's really cool,
it's highly configurable, so you can either set it up
for tons of storage or for tons of air cooling
or for tons of water cooling, it all comes down
to your personal preference.
For us, we're going with a mixture.
We don't really need any storage,
but we need both a big air cooler on our CPU
and a water cooling radiator for our GPU.
One thing you might have noticed
is that Jake did a little drill out rivet thing here.
So this used to be in here as a support or something
and a two and a half inch drive mount, yeah.
We don't have room for that, 'cause we gotta put a big old,
what is it, Deep, Deep ITX board in this thing.
It's really nice that we're able
to put a full-sized ATX power supply in here,
because otherwise, I don't know how we would handle
the power spikes that come from, well, RTX 3090 graphics.
Here we go.
Question for you, Jake.
- [Jake] There it goes.
There's a thing you have to remove.
- Oh, yeah, I was gonna ask about that.
- [Jake] There's a screw on the bottom.
- How does it come out?
- [Jake] There's a screw on the bottom.
- Well, how do you get the screw on the, oh, wow,
there's a removable bottom panel on this case,
that is so cool.
- [Jake] Just once screw and then it slides out.
- There's our GPU support out of the way,
this thing can handle up to a triple slot graphics card,
which is pretty sweet.
Where's the mounting hardware for this?
Now for our power supply.
It's standard ATX in terms of how it screws into the case.
But what's special about it is its depth
or rather lack thereof.
It's a 1200 watt power supply, 80 Plus Platinum efficiency.
But this thing is only as deep
as a 120 millimeter fan, pretty much.
So that is what allows it to fit in here.
Hold on.
Hangs down from the top, you know what I'm saying?
Actually, oh, you know what?
There's pretty easy access to everything,
I love this punch out on the bottom.
- [Jake] I just realized that too, wow.
- So you can reach your modular power supply interface-
- [Jake] I was worried about it, but-
- Super easy.
Now we gotta make a small configuration change
to our case here.
This rear 120 millimeter fan would be fine
if we were doing something slightly less power hungry.
But we wanna turn it around to act
as an intake so that our CPU is getting fresh air
rather than the preheated air that's gonna come
from our radiator for the graphics card.
So we're using a slim dual 120 millimeter radiator
from XSPC, we just grabbed whatever was on the shelf,
and it happened to be super mondo slim.
And then, because we know that we don't have a ton
of surface area, we're going with some pretty balling fans,
Noctua industrialPPC 3000 RPM fans.
To be clear, I'm not expecting to run these
at maximum speed all the time.
It's just, hey, they have the potential
to ramp up if we really need to.
So we want it right about...
- [Jake] Just put it on loosely and it just-
- Right there.
Man, this is a really tight fit, wait.
- [Jake] Not a very well-designed bracket.
I think it's not meant to have the fans
on that side, but whatever.
- Yeah.
We're bringing sexy back.
You know, Jake, I do wish we had shorter cables for this.
- [Jake] Yeah.
That's all you're getting.
- In fairness to him, I think I assigned this project
to him yesterday.
So let's plug in the wonko adapter now.
That goes there.
It feels unnatural to me that this is it.
These four wires are motherboard power.
- [Jake] It's also ugly.
- Jake. - [Jake] Hi.
- Did you check if the 24 pin fits?
I'm up against one of those mini PCIes.
Okay, I'm gonna flex it.
- [Jake] Is it in?
- It's in.
- [Jake] Doesn't get much closer than that.
- It's tight.
It is right against the motherboard,
it is putting pressure on the motherboard.
- [Jake] Just don't screw the motherboard in,
we don't even need it now.
- What the?
- [Jake] Is there enough space to bend it though?
These cables are pretty flexible.
- I think we're good.
- [Jake] I mean, there's only like two things left
to put in, so.
- You'll have to pardon the construction noises.
They basically told me, look, do you want it done fast
or do you want it done quiet?
And I was like, fast.
So that's what we're dealing with.
What the heck is going on here?
No problem, this is not the best cable management
that I have ever done.
Now I wish that the GPU was a bit longer, actually, so we-
- [Jake] No, that's where the pump's gonna go.
- Oh yeah, that's right, oh, yeah, that's right.
Oh, crap, how are we gonna get that in there?
- [Jake] I didn't really wanna get the drill out,
but maybe we could get the drill out, maybe.
- We're just gonna ram it in like this,
drill four holes on the bottom.
And boom, it's attached.
Oh man.
This window thing in the bottom here so you can access
the bottom of the power supply is amazing.
- [Jake] Looks pretty dope.
- Next up, we're gonna put in one of my favorite coolers.
This is the NH-U12S TR4-SP3, and it's one
of the only coolers on the market
that was specifically engineered for Threadripper
and by extension, EPYC, just anything with a lot
of CCXs spread out over an incredibly large area.
And what's so cool about this one is it's got this feature
that allows you to offset the mount.
So you can see we've moved it, what is it,
like six millimeters or something like that?
Just a little bit.
Now, it's intended to help with PCI Express slot clearance.
What we're using it to help with is clearance
for our tubing to run over here to the graphics card.
So you can see, all right, like that.
That is how our tubes are gonna come through.
Now it's time for some EPYC thermal paste application here.
- [Jake] I just do dots all over.
- There we go.
Oh, so tidy.
Good job, Linus.
Wait, no, I don't want this in just yet,
I wanna run my tubing first.
Yeah.
Oh, dang it, now I've got thermal goop all in the way.
Looks like we're gonna have just enough clearance
to tighten these collars down.
That is really close.
So this'll just chill here, ah, there we go.
Aw, no problem.
- [Jake] Everything is so tight.
- It's a good thing we're using a nice robust tubing,
because otherwise, sharp fins on it over time,
I wouldn't be too happy about literally touching
the fins once I have this screwed in.
Oh man.
Oh, let's throw the GPU in from, oh,
I didn't run power for the GPU.
This is a sweet RTX 3090.
So it's actually using not the Founder's board,
but the reference board.
So it's freaking tiny.
It's water cooled by EK Water Blocks,
this is a product ASUS actually sells.
pre water cooled with an EK block on it.
And you only need two standard eight pin power connectors.
And it's single slot at the back, which is sick,
'cause a lot of the time, even if you get
a single slot water block on your graphics card,
you're still stuck taking up two slots
at the back because the I/O is on the other side.
So here, you got three DisplayPorts,
single HDMI, back plate.
There's thermal paste on the back of it.
I'll use my shirt to clean it, lttstore.com.
So this puppy is gonna go, oh man.
There's a plate in my way.
- [Jake] Look at the I/O shield.
- I know, there's nothing on it.
Wait.
That's where the thermal paste is coming from,
it's coming from my hand, it's on everything.
Okay, RGB, just get, just get there.
Yeah, you remember what I said?
Now I wish that the GPU was a bit longer.
Yeah, not a problem.
There we go.
Yeah. - [Jake] Why?
- Tubing time, so this goes right there.
It's gonna be a little tough to screw in,
but actually not that bad, the loop itself
is pretty well thought out, good work, Jake.
Yeah, I can't even get you a view of this,
Andy, and this is just too tight.
- [Jake] That's what she said.
- [Linus] Oh yeah.
- [Jake] Did you get it in?
- [Linus] Ho ho.
Yeah, it's in.
Look at that.
That is, does this fan spin?
Oh yes.
Oh good.
Okay.
- [Jake] Does it fit? - [Linus] Oh yeah.
- [Jake] Isn't this a great layout?
- Easy, easy.
Last run.
I mean, that's the thing
about only water cooling one component in this system,
is you're only running four tubes.
Now, what I could have-
- [Jake] Wait, why did you make that tube so-
- I was about to explain why I made this so long.
Well, hold on, there's a reason for it, Jake.
It leaves room if we wanted to do that whole cool idea
with the expansion of the slimline things
for us to have lots of room to work
to add PCI Express cards and stuff like that.
- [Jake] But we're not gonna do that.
- Well, but now we could.
So let's fill it.
Holy crap balls, that is freaking tight.
Look at this thing.
This funnel's worked here longer than you, Jake.
Well, okay, the pump works.
Neat.
Wow, it didn't take a lot of water.
- [Jake] Slim rad.
Put the cap on and do the tilt.
- Yeah, for sure.
- [Jake] No, the other way.
- It's, I don't think it's gonna make a difference, Jake.
That water's moving, look.
- [Jake] All right.
Should we plug a monitor in and?
- Yeah, we should find out if it actually works.
- [Andy] Did we swap the SSD?
- [Jake] Did you swap the SSD?
(bleep) - No.
Putting bottom panel on, here's hoping
we haven't accidentally interfered
with any of these little nubbins that need to go into the,
oh my god, do they still do this?
- What?
- Freaking SilverStone.
I've seen this, I've seen $700 cases from them
that are sharpied from the factory.
'Cause they scratched it.
- Ew.
- SilverStone.
- [Jake] I mean, it's the inside of the bottom.
- Yeah.
It doesn't technically matter, but like...
SilverStone.
Should we fire it up with no side panels first?
- Yeah.
Also, it might boot VGA first, so who knows?
- I don't know, I've got no Num Lock, Jake.
Not a good sign.
- While we were troubleshooting trying to get the system on,
which turns out it is fine, I booted up the IPMI,
and on some server boards,
you have these really weird interfaces
with these weird graphs and crap that,
even with dicking around with it for 10 minutes,
I wasn't really able to understand.
On this one, you can just put it in manual mode
and set the fan duty cycle to a static 0 to 100%.
So I figured out which one is our radiator fans.
I think maybe we'll try 50% duty cycle.
- [Linus] Yeah, that would probably be, hey, that's better.
- It's still a good amount of air, it's really quiet.
- Okay, here we go.
Holy bananas, that is a lot of cores in hardware info.
33.4 degrees.
And 50 degrees on the die.
Let's fire up that Task Manager.
There it is, boom.
Also, memory ran at 3200 megahertz right out of the gate.
Here we go.
Cinebench R23.
We're sitting at about 92 degrees on the CPU.
- [Jake] Did you put thermal paste on?
- [Linus] I did. - [Jake] Okay.
- 52,000 freaking points.
See you later, Threadripper 32 core.
Now we need to know if this thing can actually hold up
in terms of thermals.
So I have gone ahead and started a 30 minute stress test,
and we're gonna see where it ends up.
Should I also hit it with FurMark?
Oh, I heard the fans ramp a little bit there.
After about 15 minutes, we've settled in with GPU temps
of about 70 degrees Celsius.
That's with the fans running at half speed.
And CPU temps that are 66 degrees
in the traditional way of measuring them.
And 91.7 in the on-die way of measuring them.
So that is well within tolerance for both of those.
It's a lot of heat though.
I can feel it from way out here, it's crazy.
But it's stable, crazy stable.
So let's go ahead and shut down our stress tests.
And I mean, we went and put a 3090 in it,
we're gonna play some video games, right?
I'm going for do DOOM Eternal.
- [Jake] DOOM is so easy to run, sop using DOOM.
- I don't want to, I like it.
- [Jake] It's so easy to run, stop.
- Okay, I better not be in the middle
of a stupid unskippable mission cutscene again.
This is an epic gamer moment if I've ever had one,
we're running at 55-60 FPS.
I actually have no idea what settings we're even at though.
- [Jake] Turn that RTX on.
- It's basically cranked.
It's cranked, we got ray tracing on,
we're all high, practically everything.
- [Jake] Ray tracing on ultra, turn motion blur off, eww.
Follow the objective, dude.
- Oh.
Okay, are these bad guys?
They seem bad.
- [Jake] Get in the limo.
Press X, press X, press X.
- Oh, so I'm not supposed to fight them.
- [Jake] Press X.
- X to what, to not die?
- [Jake] It heals, it heals.
This would be a sick video editing machine.
- This is a sick anything machine.
I mean, I don't know what anyone would actually build
or use something like this for, but it really does seem like
the kind of thing that somebody would want, right?
- [Jake] Maybe with a Quadro?
- Someone, yeah, yeah, you throw a Quadro in here,
this thing's freaking incredible.
It's so quiet too.
And it's only mostly expensive.
- [Jake] It's only got a $10,000 CPU.
- Yeah, yeah, don't worry about that.
Just like don't worry that I wouldn't tell you
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Thanks for watching, guys, if you enjoyed this video,
then maybe you'll also enjoy, hey, why don't we throw them
to the 18 core with the dual radiators?
That one was fully water cooled and actually even smaller.