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An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch)An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch)Posted Apr 21, 2012 9:09 UTC (Sat) by epa (subscriber, #39769)In reply to: An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch) by leoc Parent article: An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch)
Fifteen years ago I could see the value in tower cases for PCs but I don't understand why people still use them. Your motherboard has almost everything built in, the only expansion card you need is for video and perhaps not even that. The hard disk will be an SSD (unless you are really strapped for cash - in which case why are you building a system from scratch instead of buying secondhand?). There's no need for a floppy drive so all you need is a single drive bay for a DVD player. Why have all that empty air inside your computer?
I know that mini-ITX motherboards and cases are available but why not have a smaller case for an ATX motherboard?
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An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch) Posted Apr 21, 2012 12:03 UTC (Sat) by leoc (subscriber, #39773) [Link] It depends on what you need the computer for. In this particular case it needs a lot of CPU horsepower and a lot of disk space. This system has a ~240GB boot SSD drive plus 4 2TB drives for data, and will probably need more over time. The P280 holds a lot of drives and they will probably all get used eventually. I don't bother with DVD drives at all any more, but the extra PCI slots are handy for holding the necessary SATA controllers for all those drives.
An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch) Posted Apr 21, 2012 17:00 UTC (Sat) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link] The hard disk will be an SSD (unless you are really strapped for cash - in which case why are you building a system from scratch instead of buying secondhand?). What makes you think there's going to be just one hard disk? The largest available SSDs are still under 1TB, and that's just plain not enough space for a lot of users. You can fill 1TB with digital photographs and video very quickly. Not to mention that people who are keeping things that are precious to them are likely to want some kind of redundancy in the event of a drive failure, which means having multiple drives. That may not call for a full tower case, but it certainly justifies something with some expansion room.
An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch) Posted Apr 23, 2012 8:45 UTC (Mon) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link]
Yes, some people have specialized requirements for lots of storage but I was thinking more of the 95% of users who do not need more than a few hundred gigabytes of disk space. Still, I guess most of that 95% do not build their own PCs anyway.
Tower cases for quiet PCs Posted Apr 22, 2012 7:43 UTC (Sun) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
Mostly a tower case is useful for larger graphics cards, essential still for gaming, more than one hard disk, and general upgradability while still staying near silent. Instead of a floppy I have one of those "8 in 1" memory card readers - more convenient than having a separate one. Large cases give you more space for large, quiet 120mm fans.
I have a Core 2 Duo E8200 with NVidia GTX260 in an Antec P180 case, with a good (large) CPU cooler and a good quality quiet PSU - all this would not fit in a minitower case while still retaining good airflow for quiet cooling. I can only just hear a soft fan sound while gaming, and the setup could be upgraded in various ways and still stay quiet.
The problem is that quiet PCs are treated as a black art, with magazine/web reviews barely mentioning noise levels (and never quantifying them), consumers not knowing what to look for, and PC makers generally not building quiet PCs. Once you know the sort of parts to use, it's not hard, but quiet PCs will cost more than a typical one.
Tower cases for quiet PCs Posted Apr 22, 2012 11:52 UTC (Sun) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] The problem is that quiet PCs are treated as a black art, with magazine/web reviews barely mentioning noise levels (and never quantifying them) Never say never. For example: cooler review and diagram from it, videocard review and diagram from it, here is review of PSUs without fans and when regular PSUs are reviewed there are diagrams too. It depends on who does the review, really.
Tower cases for quiet PCs Posted Apr 23, 2012 8:48 UTC (Mon) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link]
You're right, a big graphics card would not fit in a smaller case. I was assuming that most users would be happy with onboard graphics, but then those who are techie enough to build their own PC are more likely to be heavy gamers or otherwise have special requirements.
A tower case doesn't guarantee that the card will fit - my HP x8400 'workstation' at work doesn't physically fit a Nvidia 4500 x2 double-width card, which is a bit shocking really.
Tower cases for quiet PCs Posted Apr 23, 2012 16:44 UTC (Mon) by jedidiah (guest, #20319) [Link]
It's not so much about being a "heavy gamer" as much as it is having something that's not total crap. If you can upgrade your GPU, then you can cheaply fix an old mistake or just keep up with current tech.
Tower cases for quiet PCs Posted Apr 23, 2012 19:02 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
or that you are trying to run a 'modern Linux Desktop Environment' (at least according to some DE developers who assume that everyone is using what was a 'gamer' quality card a year or so ago)
Tower cases for quiet PCs Posted Apr 24, 2012 9:25 UTC (Tue) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link]
I thought that even basic onboard 3D acceleration was sufficient to run a compositing window manager. I've run GNOME 3 on such systems without trouble.
An Interview With Linus Torvalds (TechCrunch) Posted Apr 23, 2012 11:15 UTC (Mon) by nim-nim (subscriber, #34454) [Link]
If you want a silent setup a big case helps a lot
A big 120 mm fan spinning slowly will move as much air as a small fan spinning fast, except the first one will be nearly noiseless and the second one — not at all. The only part that can be difficult to silence is the gpu as there is no room for a big fan on a PCI card, so either you go totally fanless for the GPU or it will drown the other parts in noise.
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