Please read everything I've written below. What you've bought (from what I can tell) is not going to work without some additional purchases!First and foremost: I almost certainly would not have gone with a Core i7 given that you're using 1U and you want a quieter system. The Core i7s tend to run hotter than the i5s (by sometimes up to 10-15C). It wouldn't be a problem assuming you're fine with the chassis fans running at full speed, but I'm pretty certain you're going to go into the system BIOS and drop the speed down due to the noise, which may cause heating/cooling problems for the CPU. I'm being paranoid here, absolutely. You'll see why this is more of a concern when I get to the HSF situation at the bottom...
Secondly: the CSE-512F-350B is one of those half-depth systems (I have one sitting in my garage -- in the video I linked, that system in the white box I mention? Half-depth Supermicro box). I love half-depth systems, but they are a serious PITA. Please don't let my comments depress you or bring you down though!
You need to be aware up front that the most painful part of the system is getting the hard disks in there and getting them wired up. Here's the user manual for the chassis:
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www.supermicro.com/manua ··· C512.pdfSee pages 5-3 and 5-4. Visually it looks like no problem, right? Yeah, trust me, it's a serious pain. Furthermore, with a 2.5" SSD, you might run into some issues mounting that in there, because the hard disks are assumed to be 3.5" and are screwed in/mounted via the bottom of the chassis (really). Maybe the 512F has mounting holes for 2.5" drives, but I strongly doubt it; they tend to focus on 3.5" drives. If it lacks 2.5" mounting holes, the easiest solution (since there's no 2.5-to-3.5 bracket that will work with underside-mounted screws) is to use some velcro tape. It's an SSD, no moving parts, yay.
The other complexity relating to the hard drives is the power connector. Now, the 512F series chassis is newer than what I've used, so this may be different, but: on the older half-depth models, all the power connectors positioned/intended for use with the hard disks were 4-pin Molex, not SATA. Given how little room there is in the case, I was only able to get 1 hard disk mounted because I had to use a Molex-to-SATA power adapter cable. See Figure A-2 in the chassis PDF (its near the bottom) for an example of the mess.
I can't find pictures of the chassis once opened up so I can't see what power connectors/etc. are in there.
I see with the 512F they changed the system cooling fan from a large circular blower to 2 or 3 square-shaped blowers, which is good (this is is what's used on all their higher-grade servers). Part of the power cable problem I mentioned on the half-depth I have pertained to how gigantic that circular blower was.
If you'd like me to make a short video showing you my half-depth Supermicro box and going over some of the annoyances mentioned above, I can do so. Just let me know.
Now, the other complexity -- this has to do with 1U boxes:
The model of chassis you bought
DOES NOT come with a heatsink for the CPU. Read the Standards Parts List at the bottom:
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www.supermicro.com/produ ··· -350.cfmYou cannot use the stock HSF that comes with the CPU becuase 1U is too short (height-wise) for it to fit. You're going to need to buy a Supermicro HSF. The reason you need one of their HSFs is so that you can guarantee compatibility with the air shroud used to route the air coming off the chassis fans across the CPU. See Figure 5-10 (page 5-9) in the documentation. A third-party one might be too high/too wide and not work.
All Supermicro HSFs are bolt-through and come with thermal paste pre-applied. You can see at the above page under Optional Parts List an item at the bottom called Heatsink / Retention which takes you to a link consisting of a zillion HSFs and you won't be able to quickly discern what to buy.
It seems pretty obvious at first though, right? You want one of the ones that lacks a fan, but mounts properly with your motherboard (which is socket LGA1155). Again, see Figure A-2 for an example of the kind of HSF you're going to need.
But here's the problem: because you're using an Asus motherboard, there's absolutely **zero** guarantee that the board has enough clearance around the CPU for a Supermicro HSF. There may be capacitors or VRMs or other parts around the CPU area which won't allow the HSF to mount correctly. If you had bought a Supermicro motherboard confirmed to work in that chassis, you wouldn't have that risk. So you're just going to have to hope for the best here.
So which Supermicro HSF do you need? I
think the one you want/need is the
SNK-P0046P.
The SNK-P0047PS+ is for a unique chassis/motherboard, and the SNK-P0046A4 is too tall to fit in 1U. They only make 3 LGA1155-compatible HSFs, so those are your choices. I think the SNK-P0046P is what you want, and it will be compatible with the air shroud, but like I said, I can't guarantee it'll work with an Asus motherboard.
Edit: there's one other aspect that just occurred to me: the CPU socket location on the Asus motherboard might not be positioned at the same location as on a Supermicro motherboard, which means the air shroud might not line up properly at all (it might be off by say half an inch, or maybe even an inch).
That's really bad. I don't know how to solve this problem other than modifying the shroud, but if you cut pieces off to make it work, you're going to lose airflow, which is bad (especially since you bought an i7). :/ This is why it's almost always best to go single-vendor (i.e. Supermicro chassis + Supermicro motherboard) when it comes to building a server system.
Welcome to all the "fun stuff" you get to deal with when it comes to 1U chassis. With 2U this isn't as big of a problem because you usually just use the stock HSF provided with the CPU, or if it won't fit, you get one that's similar to the classic Core 2 Duo / Core 2 Quad HSFs. I forget what my Core i7 came with (I always use third-party HSFs on my desktops), but if it's
like this one, then yeah, it works in a 2U but is too high to fit in a 1U.