 One of the unforeseen consequences of self-isolation has been that my kids can't go to school and they can't go to their friends' houses. So, ever since it started, my dining room table has been covered in kids' school assignments and virtual playdates over Discord in Minecraft. So, in my usual fashion, I'm gonna be solving both of these problems with technology. We're gonna finally put a work desk into my kids' room, and in order to make it as compact as possible, we are actually going to build the Minecraft gaming machine right into the desk. So, this Malm desk from IKEA was selected for its actually very similar to a computer case pricing, and the rest of the components were actually chosen, well, half by us and half by MSI, who sponsored this video. Unfortunately, with all the time people have been missing at work, this one is not in such an organized state. So, wish me luck here, ladies and gentlemen, because this is what I've got to work with. (*crashing sound*) (*music*) Got some instructions for the desk, got a partially built-up test bench, so we've got an MSI 5700XT graphics card, dual fan, four heat pipe cooler with backplate, three display port outputs, factory overclock, and lots of performance for Minecraft. Got a test bench with a black NHD 15, some CPU, I actually don't know what's in there, and an MSI Extreme Gaming X570 Ace. So, the main features of this one are that you've got four Gen 4 M.2 slots, active cooling on the chipset, an Infinity Mirror here, lots and lots of RGB lighting, and of course, very robust VRMs for overclocking. TX850 80-plus titanium power supply, gaming keyboard mouse and headset from MSI, some white Delrin. Oh, this is good, labels, front, back, mid, vertical GPU mounting kit, some 3600 megahertz CL12 Trident Z RGB, cooling fans, power cables, Commander Pro for RGB, RGB strips for Commander Pro, Wi-Fi antenna, Velcro strips, and then a variety of fan filters, power cables, USB splitters, and... Oh, I guess I'll go get the desk now, we'll just start throwing it all in and see what happens. Do you need help? Uh, no, it's better this way, because at least there's a camera rolling if I fall down the stairs and die. I swear, it's genius. Yes! Please tell me there are no obstacles on the stairs. Oh, my legs are gonna get trapped. It smells like cat pee on the carpet here. One of the objectives for this project was for it to be something that could be easily reproduced at home with minimal tools and know-how. So the modifications to the desk are actually pretty minor. We've got an RGB strip that's already in place here on the back, so we're gonna hook that up a little bit later. And then basically on the bottom cabinet here, where there's gonna be a... Oh, here you go. There's gonna be a door on the front. We've basically just got a couple of 120mm intakes, so that's just a hole saw and then a regular drill bit. We've got a square hole that was cut with a jigsaw and this little, uh, like, comb-style cable management piece. And then around back, a single hole for a power cable to go to one of our power bars, as well as a 120mm exhaust. Other than that, it's just a matter of a few holes in here and some computer hardware in there, and we should be pretty much good to go. There's no manual, but power supply first is as good a bet as any. We're gonna go ahead and leave hybrid mode on. I do want this to be as quiet as possible, because this is a room where people sleep. So I think it goes there. I think this one goes right here. And this one goes here. Another way to mount the motherboard, if we don't care about getting it lifted up off the bottom of the table, is to actually just put little 632, um, like, inset things into the wood itself. We actually showed this when I did a build on the bottom of a desk way back in the day. But what's nice about this is it lifts up the motherboard so that we can cable manage underneath it and all of that good stuff. I will say this about cases that are intended to be cases. They're a little more ergonomic to work in. Now you guys might decide to do yours slightly differently, but we will put the plans for any pieces that we created for this build in the video description. This is one of the last times we're gonna have access to the motherboard, so actually the M.2 boot drive is already installed in the top slot over here, but now is a good time for me to throw in my memory as well. This is a 16 gig kit. Is that lined up now? Oh, shoot, I missed. Figured it out. The tolerances are a little, eh, um, but if we loosen the screws going into the desk, we can screw the motherboard into the mounts and then put the mounts into the desk after the fact. Wow, we got that one at the back. That motherboard is down. So now we're just going to tighten this back down, but not too much. Have you used the drill before? Okay, perfect. You're gonna use it again. So here's what you're gonna do. These bolts need to go through this fan filter through this hole, and then I'm gonna hold the fan on the other side. This is gonna be our exhaust fan. Yep, just press it just a little bit and then it'll grab onto the right spot. If I were to go back and have this care package redesigned, I would probably ask for a slightly different power supply mount. I'm a little bit fussy about my power supply mounts just because they are so heavy, but the way that this one's intended to be used is we've got a hook and loop fastener pair here, and then it's kind of friction mounted against the motherboard. I had my mic turned off, but putting in the front power button was a bit of a chore, so because the desk is so thick, I couldn't really get access to the ring at the back. But basically with a screwdriver, I was able to kind of hold it in place, and now that it's screwed in, this is a good time for us to go ahead and route the power switch, because the more stuff we install in the bottom here, like, you know, graphics card and all that, the less access we're gonna have to the motherboard. Modding a PC power button is pretty simple. You can just salvage these from any broken case and then just extend them using wires. So all we need is a power switch and then power LED that's built into our power switch up here. MSI actually has not only 12 volt RGB, they have 5 volt addressable RGB, and then they even have one of Corsair's stupid proprietary connector ones built right into their motherboard. That's pretty sick. We're still gonna need a Commander Pro because I'm gonna have separate zones for the strips and the fans, but that's still sick. Now's as good a time as any to put in our RGB and fan controller, so the one trick is we need to make sure it's below this shelf. The idea is that this shelf and this drawer are both still completely accessible and the computer is just built into the bottom here. So we're gonna go ahead and put it there with a little hook and loop fastener. The USB plug goes into the bottom of the motherboard down here, and the only other plug that needs is a SATA power connector that I'm gonna go ahead and run all the way under the motherboard. Now we just run another one of these short cable-wired cables and plug that in. I haven't spent this much time on my back since I was in college. Just kidding, we all know I didn't get laid in college. I'm not sure if it's your intent, but it makes that kind of thing more awkward when you don't reply. My kids are all downstairs watching Wild Kratts now, so I guess I'll have to put this in myself. But here's a tech tip for you guys free of charge, it is really really important for these fans to have filters on them because they are intakes and they are gonna be right next to this carpeted floor right here. Carpet can be just an absolutely nasty dust trap, and if we have an intake next to carpet, it pretty much must be filtered or your computer is gonna be disgusting. Just full of cat hair, dead skin cells, all that kind of nasty stuff. Another nice side effect of these is that it makes these holes look so much better. These are from Silverstone. They're actually magnetic. Now we're at the point where it's time to wire up our RGB strips, but unfortunately there's no hole at the back so I'm gonna have to put a new one. I don't want sawdust all over the motherboard. Can you grab a vacuum? You suck, I'll drill, okay? Did you catch it all? I didn't suck it all. No? Wait, what, really? Oh yeah, I can see it from through here. That's pretty bad. Oops. There we go. And I've got the RGB and the front power switch through that. Now I can bring those down real nice and tidy. Good job. Now I've got all the LED strips on the bottom of this shelf. There you go. Oh, I almost forgot the most important part, the graphics card. So we're using this aluminum rod. See, it's threaded on this end. We've got a washer here. So I'm just gonna run this through the entire desk. It's gotta be nice and strong. There it is. Then I'm gonna tip the whole thing. Then we throw a washer and a nut down here. Tighten that up. And that's it. That's the graphics card mount. Nice. Door's on. It's got power. Ready? Fans are all spinning. And we've got a post. For the keyboard, MSI sent over the Vigor GK50 with low profile mechanical switches and as you can see, full individual key RGB backlighting. So if I want to plug in the Wi-Fi or what have you, you just throw that in there. On the underside, there's actually a little cable management shelf. So I can chuck my Wi-Fi junk up there. For the mouse, they sent over their Clutch GM50 mouse. This has a PMW3330 optical sensor. It's super lightweight. It's got RGB lighting and it's got 20 million click rated Omron switches. The Immers 50 headphones are provided for their durable metal construction, 40 millimeter neodymium drivers, detachable microphone, and of course, RGB lighting. And there's inline volume and mute controls and all that good stuff. And finally, the cherry on top is their Optix Mag 272CQR. So this is a curved gaming display with a 165 hertz refresh rate. It's 2560 by 1440 resolution. It's rated at one millisecond response times. It's got FreeSync. And what else do you want? Oh, yeah, it's got RGB lighting, of course. Now that we've been in game for a while, we're ready to take a look at our thermals. It's running super quiet. Even with the door closed, I've got my mic right on me and you can barely hear this thing in the quiet profile. We are boosted up to 4.35 gigahertz. 60 degrees! No, 53. As for our GPU, with all that fresh air coming in right next to its intake, it actually hasn't gone over 60. Minecraft is, mind you, a pretty light game, but that's all this machine was designed to do, and it looks like it's gonna do it just nicely. Well, hey, it's running, so mission accomplished, right? So thank you to MSI for sponsoring this video. Thank you to you guys for coming along for the journey. I think it actually worked out, like, shockingly well. This is clean. And speaking of clean, well, MSI sponsored this video, so I don't have, like, another sponsor to talk to you about, but maybe you could check out one of my previous desk PC builds where I strapped the whole computer to the underside. That was pretty cool, too.