Have you ever wondered what would happen if you combined your PC with some of your other unconventional household items? This time-honored structure’s primary function is straightforward: it houses a fully formed Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Ti Inside a specially designed Picket Case that doubles up as both a desk lamp and a fully powered gaming PC.
This DIY PC, featuring an AMD Ryzen CPU, boasts a trendy design that rivals even the most advanced gaming PCs, such as the Corsair One i500, whose wooden casing adds to its sleek appeal. With its powerful Nvidia GPU, this PC boasts ample processing power to handle demanding video games at 1440p, especially when leveraging Nvidia’s DLSS technology to boost frame rates.
The PC’s origins are attributed to Matthew Chew, a creator popularized by his YouTube channel mxc_builds, where he showcased the project through a video and shared it on Reddit. We’ve spoken with Matthew so far, exploring an extraordinary custom-built walnut gaming PC that he designed and assembled last year.
Chew reveals in his latest YouTube video that the initial spark for his innovative project stemmed from an Instagram post featuring a woodcraft expert who built towering lamp structures. The designer’s closing gesture pays tribute to those iconic lamps.
While Chew’s showcase piece is undeniably impressive, its hefty price tag of over $3,000 means it would be out of reach for most gamers, making it an unlikely candidate for a budget-conscious gaming PC lineup. The video meticulously outlines his comprehensive design and creation course, each detail carefully crafted by him personally. Underneath a recent Reddit post about a PC build, Chew notes that his entire project took roughly two months to complete.
While the design of this PC case is aesthetically pleasing, its internal components are also impressively well-crafted. The build is powered by an Asus ROG Strix B650E-I mini-ITX motherboard, paired with an AMD Ryzen 7 7700 CPU, an Asus ProArt RTX 4070 Ti graphics card, 32GB of Corsair Vengeance DDR5 RAM, and a 2TB Corsair P5 NVMe M.2 SSD. The system is completed with an 850W Cooler Grasp SFX Gold power supply and an ID-Cooling IS55 ARGB CPU cooler.
The Arctic P14 ARGB cooling fan has a designated space on the Prime, accompanied by a picketed cowl that enables unobstructed airflow. The PC is encased in a removable blend of metal and breathable mesh, serving as a durable mud guard, while power for the lamp is generated by a discreet LED strip positioned along the rear of the casing. The intricate details of the design are nestled within a protective outer layer, situated atop a richly hued walnut base. The facility button resides within its designated compartment, resembling a lamp switch, and is connected via a barrel plug to the computer.
Chew provides a series of benchmarks and cooling evaluations that warrant careful examination, yielding intriguing results. During rigorous testing, both the CPU and GPU temperatures peaked at a scorching 183.2°F (84°C) and 186.8°F (86°C), respectively, accompanied by the fans’ earsplitting whine, as recounted by Chew. The temperatures seem alarmingly high, hinting that the casing may not be optimally designed for heat dissipation.
Despite these concerns, Chew suggests that as the system reaches an advanced “real-world” gaming benchmark, CPU temperatures plummet to 158°F (70°C) and GPU temperatures drop to 140°F (60°C), accompanied by significantly reduced fan noise. Although not a prime example of a specific construction type, even so, this setup is not ideal for optimal performance due to significant thermal issues, as acknowledged by Chew himself, suggesting that it would not be a wise decision to utilize such a configuration with more complex components.
As a devoted enthusiast of Picket PC builds, I have been thoroughly impressed by Matthew’s latest creations, which clearly demonstrate his mastery of this craft. This design aesthetic is exactly the kind of thing that would appeal to me for my own personalized projects. It seems unlikely that this specific $3,000 device will be widely available in retail stores anytime soon.
While you’re not required to invest two months building a custom PC, creating an impressive-looking system still demands careful planning and selection of top-quality components. If you’re preparing for your next build, we recommend consulting our comprehensive guide to the best PC cases on the market. Here’s the improved text:
With options similar to the Fractal Design Torrent on the market, you’ll get sleek designs and cooling for a significantly lower cost than this build, unless you’re keen on wood, in which case the wooden-framed Fractal Design Node 2 case is an alternative worth considering.
