20090131

MythTV hardware setup


The Shuttle K45 assembly instructions were usable. They say to apply thermal paste to the heatsink, but Intel supply the heatsink with thermal paste already applied.

It was a bit of a fiddle to get my DVB tuner card in the case, as the aerial socket near the top got in the way.

The Celeron comes with a CPU fan with a 3 pin connector, but the K45 motherboard has 4 pins.
The 4th pin is used to control the fan speed. A 3 pin fan can be connected to a 4 pin motherboard, but the fan runs at full speed all the time.

At full speed, this fan is very noisy, so I had to replace the heatsink and fan,
There isn't much room in the K45, so most heatsinks designed for low noise don't fit.
I selected an "Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Low Profile", which has reduced the noise to bearable levels.
The heatsink is bigger than the supplied Intel heatsink, so the mount holes on the motherboard are too close, and small plastic extensions have to be fitted.
The motherboard has some SMD components near the mount holes, so the extensions do not fit flat, but they do still work.

I think the power supply fan is currently the loudest noise source, but I don't feel like replacing it at the moment.

The K45 has a clear face plate so that you can customise the case with your own images. I've used the MythTV logo for mine.

2 comments:

magicduncan said...

So was it quiet?

Malcolm Parsons said...

It could be quieter, but my wife is happy.