Question Desktop design / purchase discussion

[Kristi2k]

Hi, I'm coming from a loud, large custom build tower. I want to build or buy a _small_ desktop that is energy efficient, near silent but powerful enough to do what I need.
Here's what I primarily use the desktop for:

• Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom
• Very light video editing
• ffmpeg
• Web design

I've been considering the following:

• iMac
• Mac Mini
• ASUS ExpertCenter PN64-E1
• Custom Build

The ASUS device looks perfect for silence and power consumption, the draw back with this and with the Apple desktops is that I can't install a 8TB HDD, I'd need to use a StarTech USB external drive shell- they do have a nice one. I should note that the 8TB internal drive currently stores all of my photos and videos.

Custom build specs:

• ASRock Z790M PG LIGHTNING/D4 LGA 1700 Intel Z790 SATA 6Gb/s DDR4 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard
• Lian LI PC-O11 Air
• Intel Core i7-12700 - Core i7 12th Gen Alder Lake 12-Core (8P+4E) 2.1 GHz LGA 1700 65W Intel UHD Graphics 770 Desktop Processor - BX8071512700
• be quiet! - SILENT WINGS 3 x2
• Arctic Silver 5 High-Density Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound AS5-3.5G
• Antec Earthwatts Gold Pro Series EA650G Pro 650W Semi-Modular, 80 PLUS GOLD

With this case I could install the 8TB drive but am wondering how quiet this will be.

The prices will all be around the same range with the exception of the iMac being a bit more.

 

[Tech Junky]

Well the HDD is an easy solution with an enclosure.

Then it comes down to being tied to apple or not.

The key to silence is airflow. More fans means they run slower to move the same amount of air to keep it cool.

 

[Kristi2k]

I am not against using an Apple product.

 

[Tech Junky]

Just keep in mind that apple increases the costs beyond just the hardware. Sometimes they make things difficult to upgrade whereas a PC is simple to add to if you find you need to add something. For instance if you want to upgrade the wifi card when wifi 7 comes out it's pretty simple whereas an apple might require getting a new machine years later when they finally update the hardware. Apple tends to use their own connector for most things making it near impossible to do much with them other than replace the whole system.

ADL for Intel will get the job done and leave money for other things you might want without the apple tax. I added thunderbolt 4 to my setup for $60 where it would be significantly higher otherwise.

The one thing you might consider is a GPU to handle the heavy lifting for the graphics stuff. The built-in graphics is enough for routine surfing or light graphics but, if you're doing rendering it will speed things up considerably.

 

[Kristi2k]

A GPU will add a lot more power usage which is what I'm trying to lower. I am borrowing a Mac Mini M1 right now and it runs everything I need to do - I'm just not sure I want to switch over to MacOS yet. The only thing I'd need to buy software wise is a utility that's free on Windows but paid on MacOS.

I think that the biggest thing holding me back on a tiny device is having to use an external drive for storage of my files. I've considered a NAS but that is too much for what I do.

 

[Tech Junky]

GPU only boosts power use when it's in use as the primary source. When idle thru don't use much energy. I get the idea of lowering energy use though.

I'm running a 12700k as a headless server 24/7 and my typical idle power is fairly low at maybe 100w but, I have the power when I need it for something. The system is rated up to 450w at full tilt but, the only time it gets up there is if I'm testing it. The CPU is capped at 125w at full power so it won't be a hog.

Take all of the components and put them into PCPartPicker.com to get an idea of the power needs. Adding a GPU won't affect the idle power all that much but, it's nice to have if you want to speed a project up. The PCP power is going to show you the max it would need. The biggest draw is the CPU and GPU though if you're putting the system under load.

A NAS is a waste of money if you can just put the drive inside the case. You could get a second drive and use raid 1 to keep a spare copy for when the older drive dies. Nothing special would be needed to do that other than setting it up through the os. If you went with Linux you could even skip the raid and just setup a cron to run daily to backup any changed files.

There's a bunch of different ways to get to where you want to be.