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Building a PC under my kitchen cabinets....

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ragtag

New Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2016
I have an idea for a build, that I'm not sure if is viable, or more importantly safe, so I would love your opinion on it.

I have a wall mounted desk, next to my kitchen cabinets. Basically it looks something like this.

Code:
      	      	  +---------+
                  |         |
 +------------+   |         |
 |            |   |         |
 |   Screen   |   |         |
 |            |   |         |
 +------------+   |         |
                  |         |   Sink
     Desk     	  | Fridge  |=============================
==================|         |	      |         |        |
             +---+|         |	      |         |        |
             | O ||         | Cabinet | Drawers |  Oven  |
             | L ||         |	      |         |        |
             | D ||         |	      |         |        |
             | P ||         |	      |         |        |
             | C |+---------+---------+---------+--------+
             +---+|	Crawl space   	      	      	 |

The idea is to throw out my old PC, and build a new computer into the base of the kitchen cabinets. Giving me more leg space, and a cleaner look. The space under the cabinets is 21cm tall, more than wide enough and 3+ meters long.

I'm thinking I can build it on a long MDF or plexiglass board, similar to a wall mounted build, so that I can easily pull the whole computer out through the end facing the desk, like a long drawer when I need to do any maintenance. I would then make went holes on the right side of the crawl space for air intake, and exhaust on the left side under the desk. Possibly using extenders for the GPU's, so that I can fit more of them on there, without having them all next to each other.

Since I need the computer to do CG mainly in Blender, which utilizes either the CPU or GPU at 100% for hours/days on end while rendering, the system will likely generate quite a bit of heat. To start with I'll likely take the two GTX680 cards in my current system and use for some extra CUDA performance, and then add something like a GTX1070 to drive the screen. I haven't really decided if I'm going to go for water cooling and overclocking yet, or just leave it as an air-cooled machine.

I do have some concerns with this though. :)

Firstly, there is a sink there, which will likely be above some of the computer. The pipes to and from the sink go down and then along the wall to the right, for about a meter in the crawl space, before they vanish into the back wall. I'm thinking I can put in some plastic protection there, that leads any leaks away from the computer, and out, but it likely would never be 100% safe.

Secondly, the computer is under the fridge, and the fridge's pump would be more or less straight above it. Could the heat from the computer mess with or mess up my fridge?

And finally, and most importantly, is this a serious fire hazard? The cabinets are made of particle board, and the floor is cheap click together parquet.

Is this just a stupid idea, or is it something that could actually work?
 
Hi,
Don't worry about fire, I know about lots of computers mounted into particle board cabinets, and never heard about a problem. I think the risk here is water and humidity. Make sure you can mount the computer at least 1cm above the floor, to avoid risks... and try to check the humidity of the space, if it's too high consider other options.

Good luck!
 
I would also worry about leaky pipes/sink/garbage disposal? Putting it under the sink in general in my mind isn't a great idea. Any number if issues could pop up that could fry your pc. Humidity would be one as illusion said, another being heat in general (run a lot of hot water through your sink and likely that cabinet space heats up 10-15 degrees pretty quick).

Perhaps looking at a way to get a small form factor case and suspending it from underneath the desk is more appropriate?
 
I would not mount computer under the sink.

Access to the hardware will be difficult. Cleaning it out will be a nightmare.

The potential for vermin inside the rig is great. I am not implying that your home has vermin, but a computer is just another place for them to hide, especially when the computer is not easily accessed.
 
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