AVADirect Deluxe Quiet Gaming Desktop PC Review
by Dustin Sklavos on February 23, 2014 12:01 AM ESTConclusion: Overall Strong, But Needs Refinement
AVADirect actually did a pretty solid job on this build. This is the third iteration of their quiet gaming PC that I've tested and the best of the three, and that's not just owing to the progress of the underlying hardware. The NZXT H630 is a night and day improvement over the old NZXT H2 and goes a long way towards doing justice to the efforts of the engineers behind the build.
What AVADirect needs now is to streamline it. The rubber fan mounts have to go, and with that, a serious re-evaluation of their shipping methods. I've long bemoaned their stuff as being overpacked: the case box, packed inside a larger box, surrounded by packing peanuts, because AVADirect is trying to kill my cats. The only SI that makes shipment more of a nuisance is Origin and their giant wooden crates. The fact that this overprotective shipping method still failed to keep the fans in their mounts (ignoring the general flimsiness of rubber fan mounts) suggests to me that the only thing stopping it from being overkill is that it's just not very good at its job.
The BitFenix Recon is also essentially unnecessary in this build. I suspect the fans are overkill, but I'm not going to complain since the system is so quiet anyhow and it's not like too much airflow ever killed a system. I'd revise the cooling system by replacing the Recon with in-line resistors and replacing the Zalman Cube with a 140mm closed loop liquid cooler, using two 140mm fans sandwiching the radiator and running at ~5V.
Finally, I think we're about ready to kill the mechanical storage entirely. The silencing enclosure for it is a nice touch if you must have mechanical storage, but it's not something I would go for in my primary system. That said, I do actually applaud AVADirect for opting not to include an optical drive. I barely use the one in my desktop, and it's easy enough to just get a USB one to plug in when you need it.
If it wasn't for the shipping snafus and slight overengineering of the interior, I'd say this is unequivocally the best quiet gaming machine AVADirect has sent us yet. They've done a fine job engineering it, now they just need to refine and streamline. I can't harp on the overabundance of part selection on their site; that's their business model and at this point unique to them. They just need to harness that abundance perfectly, and with this system, they're very close.
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Aslan7 - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
Were I interested in buying such a system the rubber fan mounts would appeal as would the fan controller. I'm willing replace fans or to pull fans out of a case to get a quieter build. The one thing I see wrong with the build is 8GB of memory. Current generation consoles have as much and Windows is heavier than a console. As for all SSD storage, that's laughable this year and the next. You could go all SSD if you didn't mind having a computer instead of a car. My Steam Library alone is 1.39TB I don't even have a lot of AAA games which run bigger and then there's Desura, GOG, and games not from a digital service, plus music, ebooks, photos and videos.I've got a 512GB SSD acting as a cache for a 4TB drive and I still find myself shuffling files to other drives.
Pbryanw - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
I think the specs sheet said it had 16GB of memory (4x4GB).As far as SSDs go, I'm sure a 512GB one would suffice for most people. I think those with big Steam & game libraries are in the minority. Also, with a quiet going on silent build (speaking from my own experience) a mechanical hard-drive can be the loudest component. It's why I now run two SSDs (for Windows + Steam Library) instead of an SSD + large hard-drive.
If you must have a 4TB storage drive (and this is a gaming PC), I think it's a bit pointless (as Dustin points out) to have two SSDs in RAID when SSDs are so much faster than mechanical hard-drives anyway. Better to have a 512GB SSD and 4TB hard-drive as per your setup then two smaller units in RAID.
Black Obsidian - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
Just because you *have* a 1.39TB Steam library doesn't mean you need every single game installed simultaneously, unless you're running on 56K or something. My library of Steam games is over 2TB and 100 titles, and yet my gaming PC's Steam folder is under 400GB.How? Because I only have games I am currently playing or am likely to play in the near future installed. One of the greatest advantages of Steam is the ability to download any game in your library, at any time, on any PC. Why negate that by trying to have ALL THE THINGS installed all the time?
Pbryanw - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
Totally agree with this. If you're like me, you only play one game at a time. I have more than 100 Steam games in my library and just have a fraction of these installed on a 256GB SSD (like you, the ones I'm most likely to play). The rest I can download anytime from the Steam servers.Papa - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
It's pretty easy to go into SteamApps folder, move the game onto a mechanical drive. That's all that Steam looks for. No need to delete if you don't have to.DominionSeraph - Tuesday, February 25, 2014 - link
I lived with an 80GB hard drive from'06 to '13, loading games from CD when I wanted them and downloading only high compression 720p rips. But that was a $350 Dell.This is a $2500 boutique gaming system. At $2500 you should not be so constrained for space. Since a SSD doesn't do much for games and is completely unnecessary for media files, it's stupid to trade space for needless expense.
Pbryanw - Tuesday, February 25, 2014 - link
Yes, it's $2500 but it's also been built for silence. If you've gone, like AVADirect, to the trouble of including a fanless CPU cooler, a PSU that is fanless up to 30% load and a fan controller, it seems a shame to include a mechanical hard-drive which could be the noisiest component in the build.Of course, this review includes no noise benchmarks, and the drive is in a silent enclosure, but going from my own experience, my WD Green was the noisiest component in my quiet build until I swapped it for an SSD. Including a 1TB SSD, as Dustin suggested, wouldn't be such a bad compromise between noise and space for a decent games library in my opinion. At the very least it should be offered as an option on their web-site.
I think it just comes down to that tricky balancing act between noise and performance. I can see why having a 4TB drive for games would be an advantage, but if you have a fast internet connection, it's easier (at least for me) to keep a decent list of favourite games and then download when I need to.
ironwing - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
A review of a quiet PC should include objective measurements of sound volume at idle and under load. One person's "very quiet" is another person's "too loud".shooty - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
Exactly, I don't need to see the benchmark results - I would like noise levels readings at various loads. I can look up a review of dozens of other similarly configured systems to get an idea of performance.twtech - Monday, February 24, 2014 - link
With my money, I'd probably get both the terabyte SSD, and keep the mechanical storage drive for mass storage.My SteamApps folder alone is approaching 1TB, and I have quite a few GBs of photos from my hiking trips. So I appreciate the inclusion of a mechanical storage drive - but I would suggest that if you are going to have one, why not go with 4TB?