Finally, a decent passive NUC case (from HDPLEX)

Roon Software Discussion ROCK
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I just hounded HDPlex again.

This is what came back:

"I have developed a NUC kit for the next batch of H1 V3.

Here are some pictures.

The NUC kit is installed inside my H1 V3 case.

NUC kit supports the same six heatpipe heatsink system which is designed for Intel 65W TDP CPU. Therefore there should be a wide thermal margin for NUC which usually does not exceed 35W TDP.

Please note, the NUC board is installed upside down with CPU side facing top. The copper base in the NUC kit supports three point installation pattern for NUC 7th, it i also supports four point installation pattern first appear on the NUC 8th gen.

A NUC I/O shield is installed on the H1 Thin ITX backplate. Every new generation of NUC might require a new NUC I/O shield.

The NUC kit will include two I/O shield. See attached picture. One for I/O with TB3 and one HDMI, the other for two HDMI type.

There are also two USB 2.0 port on the I/O shield since NUC has two onboard USB 2.0 port. There are also two USB 3.0 side port on the H1 side plate. Those two USB 3.0 side port will be connected to NUC front USB 3.0 port.

Since H1 supports internal 80W ACDC, there is a 5.5/2.5 port on the I/O shield plate beside the NUC onboard DC input jack to support internal AC adapter for NUC board. This way, no external AC adapter is needed if customer choose to use HDPLEX 80W ACDC or 200W ACDC for their NUC.

The PCIE slot can support one PCIE1 or PCIE4 expansion card by using M.2-PCIE adapter. In this case, customer need to use SATA port for SSD since M.2 is occupied.

The new H1 V3 and NUC kit is in tooling phase. It might take a while for them to be released.

NUC kit does not work on current H1 V2."

NUC3
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NUC4
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NUC2
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NUC
NUC.png1348Ă—1049 73.1 KB

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This is great news…Larry is a great designer. I will put money down on his products for build quality and support too. My NUC is already using his 200W LPS

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I’m the happy owner of one of his bigger cases. The finish is good, and it does what it says on the box, which is great.

The tradeoff here is that it’s bigger than it could be, but that won’t necessarily be bad for the higher end of the spectrum: there’s space for both a built-in PSU and a larger drive (it’ll easily fit a 4TB 2,5" as is), possibly up to a 3,5" - 12TB if there’s a way to power it. It also means it’ll be easier to build in for those of us with butterfingers and/or diminishing eyesight (though HDPlex boxes are probably better off being treated as “nerdy neighbourhood kid” territory if you haven’t built a PC before).

According to Larry, and this matters for ROCK usage, one of the backplates it’ll ship with fits the NUC7 boards.

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I have been in contact with him myself and was going to create this very post. I was surprised to know he is aware of the Roon community so I guess hes popular on here.

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he has done roon custom logos on the big old component width chassis before but I dont think that are still available

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Would love a custom logo

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Larry had the Roon logo artwork last time I checked but not sure if the H5 is still available.

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very interesting indeed, does anyone know which NUC generation this is for, and when is this coming out?

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At least Nuc7 and Nuc8, so it’ll officially be ROCK (rather than MOCK) compatible. You need to double, triple and quadruple check, but Nuc6 might fit if you’re willing to dremel, custom make a backplate, or loose DisplayPort, Nuc5 if you’re willing to loose HDMI.

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Any update about when this will be available?

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Very interested in the HDPlex fanless case for a ROCK NUC. Checked at the website and nothing yet, but if anybody has a progress report on the development & availability of such a case, I would be in.

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Latest email update I received from Larry @ HDPlex:

"Yes. I will release H1.V3 next month and NUC kit in Sep."

Very much looking forward to it. I will definitely still run ROCK, but possibly also some other Linux distro or even a cut-down Windows on a different partition, if this case proves to be the thing I’m looking for. Think I’ve got ROCK on a 250Gb EVO NVMe M.2 SSD on my NUC7i7DNHE, so I’d have plenty of room to run another OS. Then, again, it may remain just a ROCK server.

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Just registered on here to say thanks. This thread was the catalyst for me finding out about the NUC kit.

Larry actually sold me one of the development kits which I retrofitted to a V1 H1. My use case is slightly different (portable gaming with eGPU) but thought you might be interested in my initial results.

I’m using a NUC8I7BEH and in desktop is around 30C, 45 min prime95 burn in settles around 60C. Initial boost will get to low 70’s.

I’m not sure on the rules here on linking to other forums, but I have a more comprehensive post out there on a couple of forums if anyone is interested.

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Yes, I’m very interested. I’m pretty new here too, so I don’t know all the rules either, but I bet you could identify the forum and thread and no one would have a conniption fit about it :wink:

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The Community Guidelines are covered in the terms of service here. Section 2 deals with posting links. Posting links to other forums is fine, providing they do not contravene the terms of section 2.

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Thats great.

Here is a link to SFF, I have a thread there where I am posting all the details.

SFF thread

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Nice Build, da_Goatee! Have you put a separate SSD in there; I imagine there is already an M.2 on the opposite side of the MB? Looks like thermal compound was used for the heatpipe to aluminum case coupling; does one use thermal compound for the copper to copper heatpipe-heatsink coupling? Looking forward to seeing some more pics of these after Larry releases the NUC kits (following the H1.v3 release). Prolly, hopefully, one from me, karma willing.

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Nice.

Did you monitor CPU temp for a full Roon library import and simultaneous background audio analysis running at full throttle (fast, all cores)? For a couple hours, if your local music library is big enough.

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Yep, thermal compound between cpu and block base, thermal compound between base and pipes, thermal compound between pipes and case walls. Lots of thermal compound.

I have a 1tb m.2 drive so don’t use a secondary, there is plenty of room if I wanted to. I might even be able to squeeze a 3.5 in. Will check later today.

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I didn’t do a full temperature run with increased settings, will set up a run later today an report back.

I’m not using it for Roon (it’s gaming for me) but I can run prime 95 for a couple of hours to 100% stress the CPU and see how the temps look? Would that be comparable?

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