Where We Are Right Now: The OG gamer
This second machine is our primary desktop monster. It handles high-end gaming, online streaming, video upscale processing, and dedicated game hosting. And just like the media server, it runs 24/7.
It didn't always look like this, though. This computer used to be a jack-of-all-trades, single-handedly managing our Plex server, with on-the-fly transcoding, running our couch gaming/movie nights and being the daily drive for everything else. But trying to render video or host a game while someone else is trying to stream a 4K movie in the living room is a recipe for a bottleneck.
By splitting the workload and moving those media tasks onto our repurposed Mini-ITX rig, we completely liberated this machine.
The Shell: The Cube Form Factor
For this build, we went with a Micro-ATX form factor housed inside the Thermaltake Core V21.
If you’ve never built in a Core V21, it is an absolute joy for hardware enthusiasts. It’s a unique, cube-shaped chassis where literally every single panel—top, bottom, front, and sides—is completely removable. It essentially transforms into an open-air test bench, giving us total freedom to route cables and optimise airflow exactly how we want.
The Brains: Finding the Sweet Spot
At the core of the Z-series motherboard sits an Intel Core i7-9700K.
Because we paired it with a Z-chipset board, we had the freedom to really push the silicon. We originally had the chip past the 5.0GHz milestone just to see what it could do. However, the jump in power draw, and heat generation didn't justify the nudge in real-world performance.
Instead, we backed it down and locked in an overclock of 4.9GHz which we’ve found to be our sweet spot.
To keep those eight overclocked cores chilled around the clock, we installed the Arctic Freezer II 240 AIO liquid CPU cooler.
The GPU: The Unofficial Hybrid Frankenstein
Now for the centerpiece of the build: the graphics card. We are running an EVGA RTX 3080 Ti FTW3.
Anyone who knows hardware knows that EVGA made some of the absolute best-built, most resilient cards on the market before they exited the GPU business. We swapped the original air cooler out for an official EVGA AIO liquid cooling bracket, effectively turning it into an unofficial 3080 Ti Hybrid.
Because this card works hard for its living, maintenance is key. And the 30 series cards at the time they came out were going through an overheat fiasco. Since purchasing it, we have completely stripped it down repasted and padded it twice.
Power & Pressure-Optimised Airflow
A machine running a 4.9GHz CPU overclock and a power-hungry 3080 Ti needs a strong power foundation. We have our own tried and tested 750W EVGA power supply to handle things effortlessly.
Finally, inside the Core V21 cube, airflow is a precise science. We have a total of nine Arctic fans circulating air through the chassis. Using a deliberate mix of Arctic’s Pressure (P-series) and Flow (F-series) fans.
The Perfect Separation of Powers: Moving our Plex and HTPC duties off this machine and onto a dedicated shelf-hardware build was the best operational decision we could have made.
That wraps up the current state of our two core computer rigs!