The Official Computer Tech Support Thread

[innerspaceboy]

I’m hoping the MB community can provide me with some insight for a suitable mid tower upgrade for my needs based on our shared interest in noise isolation in our listening rooms.

I’m presently running Ubuntu 20.04.1 LTS on an SSD in an old Lenovo ThinkCentre-M78 SFF tower with an AMD A8-6500b apu with radeon hd graphics and 7GB of DDR3 RAM (as 1 chip is failing). Lossless audio capture and Gimp image editing are my most resource-intensive tasks, along with my daisy-chaining two DVIs while working from home. I also use my PC as a media server to access my content on my mobile devices. No HD viewing of any kind.

This old PC has only a single VGA input. Due to COVID I’m now working from home and needed a secondary display. I tried a low profile single slot graphics card but the SFF tower is just too small to insert the card. The solution I came up with was a Dell d6000 universal dock which provides DisplayPort over USB for the second monitor.

But the most critical element of my setup is that of minimizing fan noise. My office is also my record/listening room so I need it to be as quiet as possible. (MB members will understand.) As such I’ve run 25-foot long extensions on all of the PC’s cables to the tower in another part of the house to minimize fan noise.

Unfortunately this causes problems with DP over 25 feet of USB resulting in sluggish mouse movement, painfully unwatchable choppy video, and audio playback skips terribly. All of this is resolved by switching off the power to the universal dock and secondary display. I’m looking for a simpler solution.

My goal is to invest in a new tower with the following:

• Two DisplayPort inputs, or one DP and one HDMI (I have an HDMI-to-DP adapter handy)
  
• Two SATA and power inputs to support the SSD I use for the Ubuntu OS and the older HDD I use for my media
  
• Sufficient processor and RAM specs for the daisy-chained VDIs, audio capture, and image editing in Gimp. (Ubuntu is fortunately very light on resources so I expect any midrange tower should suffice for these tasks.)
  
• And as quiet a fan as possible (this is critical)

I apologize - I’ve not bought a PC in some time so standard mid towers may in fact be quiet enough for my needs, but I’ll defer to the group’s expertise. Can anyone suggest a solution which meets these criteria? Need I invest in higher-priced “silent” towers or these days will any small form factor PC run effectively silent?

Thanks for your input!



SUPPLEMENTAL NOTE

I wanted to be proactive so I performed an initial search of NewEgg and Tigerdirect for the following properties in the DESKTOP category:

Form Factor = desktop or mid tower or tower, SSD = none, HDD = none, memory = 8GB DDR4, Operating System = none

The best match: https://www.newegg.com/hp-z-series-z...quicklink=true

HP Z240 MT Workstation i5-6500 3.2GHz 4-Cores 8GB DDR4

Relevant Specs:

• Model - HP Z Series Z240
• 8GB DDR4
• No SSD
• No HDD
• Intel Core i5 6th Gen
• CPU Speed 6500 (3.20 GHz)
• HDD Interface - SATA
• Front USB - 2x USB 2.0, 2x USB 3.0
• Rear USB - 4x USB 3.0
• Video Ports - 1x DVI, 2x DisplayPort
• Internal Bays - 2
• RJ45 (ethernet port) - 1
• Date first available - September 03, 2019
• Price - $208.99 with free shipping

Unfortunately there’s no way to tell how loud the fan is on this, but it at least gives me an idea of what I can expect to spend on a full-size tower with the specs I’m after.

How does this option sound? Any red flags? Thanks again!

[Plankton]

That sounds like a good match, and HP is usually decent as far as components especially when you get up into the gaming PC's.

You can always replace any fan that may be preinstalled with something like this. Just match the spec'ed size.

[innerspaceboy]

Originally Posted by Plankton

That sounds like a good match, and HP is usually decent as far as components especially when you get up into the gaming PC's.

You can always replace any fan that may be preinstalled with something like this. Just match the spec'ed size.

Thanks so much for taking the time to read and respond. And I appreciate the fan upgrade suggestion. I hate ordering blind but the specs seem adequate, the price point is well within my budget, and I can return it if there are any major issues.

I'm planning to make my decision and place my order in advance of my November vacation so I can dedicate a weekend to setting up and configuring the system with the aforementioned SSD and HDD. Hopefully it will still be available then and will be a simple and straightforward plug-and-play setup.

If anyone else wants to chime in I'd love to hear additional insights.

Thanks again!

[innerspaceboy]

Originally Posted by Plankton

That sounds like a good match...

I’m curious, Plankton - my current setup is bothersome, with the sluggish mouse movement due to frame drop on the secondary display over the 25-ft cable, and my having to power off the docking station every time I want to do anything with video or audio playback. And with the dock I don’t have enough outlets in the room to connect my external disks so I can’t access any of my archived media.

I’m trying to determine how quickly I need to act on this particular potential investment. My current PC was released in October of 2012 and the refurbished HP Z240 I’m considering was released in mid-2016. It’s by no means new, but based on my Linux usage I don’t need anything more powerful than that.

I see that the offer is from a third-party seller on NewEgg so supplies are likely limited. Do you think I’ll be able to find a similar deal on a full-size tower with no SSD, HDD, or OS, 8GB of DDR4, 2 DP ports, and a 3.2GHz quad core or better processor any day of the week? I was planning on waiting to order until my vacation in November so I’d have time to troubleshoot the new setup before I have my next day working from home. But if you think this particular find warrants action, I might jump on it.

What are your thoughts? I really appreciate your input!

[Plankton]

Originally Posted by innerspaceboy

Do you think I’ll be able to find a similar deal on a full-size tower with no SSD, HDD, or OS, 8GB of DDR4, 2 DP ports, and a 3.2GHz quad core or better processor any day of the week?

Yes. That configuration can be put together pretty easily. One thing I'm not seeing is your graphics card. Is it one of the integrated ones?

[Mindfulness]

innerspaceboy, cool setup & nice computer background.

[innerspaceboy]

Originally Posted by Mindfulness

innerspaceboy, cool setup & nice computer background.

Thanks so much! I had a blast rendering the vector logo and putting the wallpaper together.

Originally Posted by Plankton

Yes. That configuration can be put together pretty easily. One thing I'm not seeing is your graphics card. Is it one of the integrated ones?

My current PC has integrated graphics. I tried ordering a SFF single-slot low-profile graphics card with multiple DP inputs but I couldn't get the card to fit in the PCI slot.

The new tower I linked from NewEgg states the following for graphics...

In the Specs section under Graphics it lists:
GPU/VGA Type: Intel HD Graphics

and under Video Ports: 1x DVI, 2x DisplayPort

Does that imply that it has integrated graphics like my current tower?

And you mentioned that you believe this configuration can be put together pretty easily. As this one-off deal is the only one matching my criteria on NewEgg and from a third-party seller, where else would you advise I look for one down the road if I don't jump on this offer?

Tigerdirect had nothing, nor did the HP website, and I imagine it's quite a lot of digging manually searching through eBay listings as you can't customize your eBay search criteria for a PC as simply as one can on NewEgg. Where would you suggest I look?

I'm loving all your insight!

[Plankton]

Originally Posted by innerspaceboy

Thanks so much! I had a blast rendering the vector logo and putting the wallpaper together.



My current PC has integrated graphics. I tried ordering a SFF single-slot low-profile graphics card with multiple DP inputs but I couldn't get the card to fit in the PCI slot.

The new tower I linked from NewEgg states the following for graphics...

In the Specs section under Graphics it lists:
GPU/VGA Type: Intel HD Graphics

and under Video Ports: 1x DVI, 2x DisplayPort

Does that imply that it has integrated graphics like my current tower?

And you mentioned that you believe this configuration can be put together pretty easily. As this one-off deal is the only one matching my criteria on NewEgg and from a third-party seller, where else would you advise I look for one down the road if I don't jump on this offer?

Tigerdirect had nothing, nor did the HP website, and I imagine it's quite a lot of digging manually searching through eBay listings as you can't customize your eBay search criteria for a PC as simply as one can on NewEgg. Where would you suggest I look?

I'm loving all your insight!

Yes, that's an integrated graphics setup.

After a little poking around it looks like the deal you have right now is a bit of a Unicorn of a find. I went to the Newegg PC build section and priced something out at just under $300 using the least expensive new components. I used Cybertron for my last build, but they're a bit pricey.

[innerspaceboy]

Originally Posted by Plankton

Yes, that's an integrated graphics setup.

After a little poking around it looks like the deal you have right now is a bit of a Unicorn of a find. I went to the Newegg PC build section and priced something out at just under $300 using the least expensive new components. I used Cybertron for my last build, but they're a bit pricey.

Outstanding. Your calling it a "Unicorn" is good enough for me to act on it. I've emailed the seller asking two critical questions:

1. Does the tower include two pairs of SATA data and power cables to connect an SSD and a HDD internally?

2. And will the included power supply be sufficient for both along with two DP monitors?

I noticed from some reviews of the model that the power supply is fairly weak so I want to make sure I won't need to upgrade it just to connect my two drives and displays and the occasional external device. And it will give me peace of mind confirming that the SATA power and data cables are connected and ready so that I can simply plug-and-play and be ready to go.

I'm waiting to hear back from the seller. Crossing my fingers that all goes well!

Thank you sincerely!

[Plankton]

No problem. Your monitors most likely have their own power supply, so no worries there.

Hope all goes smoothly!