This ultra-powerful, all in one suitcase PC certainly has one up on my desktop PC. Designed by Matt from the DIY Perks Youtube channel, this build's rich sound system, immense spec, and oodles of portability has me drooling over the idea of nestling myself at the end of the garden to play The Witcher, like some lurking, tech-laden Leshy.
Not only does this thing include a full water loop, and a fold-out trio of 144Hz screens, it can even fit a full size keyboard and mouse inside the back panel for easy transportation. As such, I figured it deserved featuring—it's not often someone comes out with something as portable and powerful as this.
I mean, people have made triple-screen prototypes before, but that doesn't always end well. Just ask Razer...
Matt began this incredible build by prying apart an old monitor, and attaching some 3D printed brackets to the back. That made it possible to fit a light aluminium frame and backplate, complete with holes and cutouts for mounting this all in one PC's powerful components.
Mounting in a powerful and efficient 16-core, 32-thread AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, with its 4.9GHz boost clock, Matt opted for a mini-ITX motherboard to keep the footprint as small as possible. That's complemented by an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080, and both the CPU and GPU are fitted with a waterblock for incorporation into a full water cooling loop.
With the amount of heat expected to pour out, cooling was an important feature to get right.
The liquid loop, which was cleverly tested with a pressure gauge before being filled up, connects to four, low-profile, Alphacool NexXxoS UT60 X-Flow 40mm Hepta Radiators. Attached are six little Noctua fans, which, after being used in Matt's invisible PC build quite messily—as he himself admits—have now been given a gorgeous, tidy rewire.
To top off a potent PC like this one, Matt went for a 3,600MHz Crucial Ballistix 64GB RAM kit, and two 8TB Samsung SSDs for speedy storage aplenty. Don't worry though, all that data he'll be carrying around to do his video editing is only at risk for a hot sec. The moment he gets to his studio, he just transfers it into his new 100TB Synology NAS for backup.
As part of the goal was to build an all in one PC with a sound solution that surpassed any known all in one PC to date, Matt chose to add in a pair of self-contained Harman Kardon sound driver units, and a Tang Band T3 2190s subwoofer that can drop as low as 50Hz. This offers up a rich, rounded sound without too much work, aside from some smart mounting over a recess using 3D printed D couplers, to absorb vibrations.
Importantly for a portable build, all this helps circumvent the need to carry any bulky external speakers around.
Best microphone for gaming: make sure you're heard
Best webcams: be seen while you get your stream on
Best capture cards: lessen the load with a dedicated card
At full whack, the chosen components (monitors included) draw around 600W of power, so Matt opted for a pair of AC to DC power adapters rather than trying to jam in a full size PSU. These deliver up to 800W of power to a central block, which in turn regulates it down and disperses it throughout the system. Thanks to this solution, the thing weighs a heck of a lot less. The components also run off a single kettle lead, so there aren't a hundred wires cluttering up the desktop.
The whole build is a monumental portable powerhouse, and although there's room for improvement, it goes to show the kind of components you can fit into a portable frame, with a little ingenuity.
I'm not sure about taking it out in British weather though; that could end very badly.
