[wysiwyg]

My ITX case maxes out at 160W power and I'm wondering what the power requirement is for the Z68-ITX-B-E. I'm looking for just the requirement before other hardware and the CPU are included.

I'm planning on a 65W cpu, SSD, 750GB 2.5" drive, and slot-load blu-ray. I'd be disabling the onboard video of the CPU to save wattage as well.

The problem as I see it is that everything on this motherboard except the CPU is mobile platform based. If this motherboard had a G2 socket and included a heatsink then I could get a 55W i7 mobile or something with even lower wattage. The second generation I-series cpus generally use more power than the first generation especially with the I5 series switching from 2 cores + hyperthreading to 4 cores + no hyperthreading.

I really wish this motherboard had a socket G2 (with a heatsink included!). If it did then I would have a much easier time getting a CPU to fit the power requirements and I could give the Nvidia video a try instead of the Intel HD 2000/3000 video.

[supaahiro]

The motherboard (with typical memory installed, excluding the CPU) takes up to 90W.

[wysiwyg]

supaahiro, on 03 February 2012 - 11:49 AM, said:

The motherboard (with typical memory installed, excluding the CPU) takes up to 90W.

Thanks for the info. I'd probably be limited to a 35W i3-2120T in my case since the next the second gen i-series are mostly 65 watts or over.

Edit: Checking Intel's specs I see a line of 35W i5 cpu's that aren't sold at Newegg. The i5-2390t might be interesting to try with the Z68ITX-B-E. I'd certainly like to try an alternative to my current build of a Zotac H67-ITX-C-E and 65W i5 cpu with integrated graphics to see what the GT 430 can do.

This post has been edited by wysiwyg: 03 February 2012 - 04:46 PM

[ForceFedFlesh]

wysiwyg, on 03 February 2012 - 04:30 PM, said:

Thanks for the info. I'd probably be limited to a 35W i3-2120T in my case since the next the second gen i-series are mostly 65 watts or over.

Edit: Checking Intel's specs I see a line of 35W i5 cpu's that aren't sold at Newegg. The i5-2390t might be interesting to try with the Z68ITX-B-E. I'd certainly like to try an alternative to my current build of a Zotac H67-ITX-C-E and 65W i5 cpu with integrated graphics to see what the GT 430 can do.

Why not just upgrade ur ITX Case PSU with a 300+Watt for a small form factor case if thats what it is? Not too expensive and with all the extras I can still see you breaking over 120 watt prolly.

[wysiwyg]

ForceFedFlesh, on 03 February 2012 - 10:57 PM, said:

Why not just upgrade ur ITX Case PSU with a 300+Watt for a small form factor case if thats what it is? Not too expensive and with all the extras I can still see you breaking over 120 watt prolly.

I use a modded ISK300-65 which uses an external 160W laptop (brick) PSU. Even the ISK300-150 uses a 150W psu which is made for the case. I wanted a very small case and not one of the cube types or micro-atx cases. The current build has a Zotac H67-ITX-C-E with an i5-2405S cpu, blu-ray slot load drive, 128GB SSD, and 750GB HDD.

A GT 520 card is only 29W max which might make it a better upgrade to my existing build than the Z68ITX-B-E with a GT 430 since this isn't exactly a game box. The ATI HD 5450 is only 20W and worked fine with the first generation i5-660 and the H55-ITX-C-E with an i5-660.

[ForceFedFlesh]

Well, j/w Have you thought about also undervolting ur Memory, also if anything you can also underclock ur Cpu a bit, if you run into complications.

Might have to pop out a Hard drive, so you may choose from SSD/HDD


Just trying to throw a few ideas

[wysiwyg]

Basically I was trying to get the most power I could out of a really small 160W system. The cpu power I have is good, I'm not sure how the i5-2390T and a GT 430 would stack up vs the i5-2405S and its onboard HD3000 video on the H68ITX's displayport. So far 160W is the most I can put in an external brick power supply so that's my limit ATM.

I do kind of wonder what the Z68ITX-B-E's target audience was. The second generation socket 1155 cpus are more power hungry than the first generation and anyone wanting 200-300W would probably be fine getting a micro-atx form factor and case. I suppose this would be good for something like a Silverstone SUGO cube case with a larger PSU bay on it but I'm aiming smaller than that. The 29W GT 520 wasn't out when the Z68ITX was designed and that would probably make more sense than the 55W GT430.

Still, I wonder why Zotac didn't just go with a mobile GPU and socket G2 if they wanted to make a more powerful mini-itx and are using mobile memory anyway. I'd go for that since I don't want a laptop but I do want lower power use in a small case. I'd think this would be much more attractive for a small HDPC with lots of power in a (typically) insufficiently ventilated silently running build. Those VIA and ATOM cpu motherboards really have horrible performance.

When it comes down to it I don't want to hear that it runs for crap if I build a PC for someone so I'm always looking for something that can do more than play DVDs and stream video but can live in a really small case.

This post has been edited by wysiwyg: 04 February 2012 - 05:04 PM

[ForceFedFlesh]

Well I think ur fine with 160w someone on newegg said they used a 200w with a i5 65w cpu, and 200 watts was good and said probably around 140 to have everything installed work with a ssd+HDD+ram+onboard 430+wifi+usb

I mean I think ull be fine, but ur gonna be breaking it close haha.

[wysiwyg]

Looks like the H67ITX-D-E solves the power issue with a GT 520 GPU instead of the GT 430. This makes more sense to me since while the GT 430 was somewhat more powerful it still wasn't really up to real gaming. The GT 520 is < 30W for a discrete card so perhaps the board will require about 65W instead of 90W. I'll ask in a new thread. :-)

[wysiwyg]

Wait a sec...

It looks like Zotac put one of these motherboards and a 35W i3-2100T in their Zbox ID70 Plus.

It only as 4GB of memory and a 320GB hard drive though. I'd like more info on the brick; i.e is it 150W?

I wouldn't mind getting this case as a DIY project. I might like it better than the Antec ISK300.

I'm going to contact Zotac and see if I can get one of these cases.

[ForceFedFlesh]

wysiwyg, on 09 February 2012 - 07:19 AM, said:

Wait a sec...

It looks like Zotac put one of these motherboards and a 35W i3-2100T in their Zbox ID70 Plus.

It only as 4GB of memory and a 320GB hard drive though. I'd like more info on the brick; i.e is it 150W?

I wouldn't mind getting this case as a DIY project. I might like it better than the Antec ISK300.

I'm going to contact Zotac and see if I can get one of these cases.

hehe gl man!