PSU needed!

[JarrettP]

I am building an new gaming rig and I need to know if I need two PSUs or one big one. I am going to be water cooling in a split loop configuration off of one pump and the specs are:

Armorsuit PC - P80 with 5 case fans included
2x i7 980x WC on a EVGA Classified SR - 2 MoBo
3/4 way SLi GTX 480 with WC
12 sticks Corsair CMGTX4 - DOMINATOR GTX with Fans on each cluster
WC pump is DD12V-D5 Pump
I am going to be running A radiator with two gentile typhoons
5 intel 64GB X25 e SSD with two in RAID 0

Should I get Two power supplies, one for GPUs and one for everything else, or one large one? What wattage for two smaller ones?

Also, 3 or 4 way SLi on GTX 480? If I am not going to get much more performance than 3-way I might get a sound card.

I was thinking About a SILVERSTONE ST1500 1500W ATX for everything but the WCing system. Is that enough? and if so, what PSU for the WCing system?

 

[Proximon]

I am going to be running A radiator with two gentile typhoons

You can't run 4 GTX 480s and one i7 980 on a single loop with a 2x120 rad. You might get by with a quad for the GPUs and a separate loop with a dual for the CPU.

My impression here is that you are throwing money around without doing research. The only reason to build the machine you are thinking about is to show off, and the people who really understand will just laugh or cringe at what you spent.

Water-cooling requires a lot of research and understanding. If you really must WC 4 GPUs and the CPU you'll need a budget of at least 12-1400 dollars for just that. Two pumps, two rads, two reservoirs, 4 GPU blocks, CPU block, hose, fittings, all add up.

You can probably get by at $600 with a single loop for two GPUs and a CPU, as long as you use a large radiator.

Two GTX 480s are more than enough for a top-end 30" gaming monitor.

As it is, you are spending thousands of dollars on a few extra frames per second that will only be visible to benchmarking programs.

 

[JarrettP]

I am going to be running A radiator with two gentile typhoons

You can't run 4 GTX 480s and one i7 980 on a single loop with a 2x120 rad. You might get by with a quad for the GPUs and a separate loop with a dual for the CPU.

My impression here is that you are throwing money around without doing research. The only reason to build the machine you are thinking about is to show off, and the people who really understand will just laugh or cringe at what you spent.

Water-cooling requires a lot of research and understanding. If you really must WC 4 GPUs and the CPU you'll need a budget of at least 12-1400 dollars for just that. Two pumps, two rads, two reservoirs, 4 GPU blocks, CPU block, hose, fittings, all add up.

You can probably get by at $600 with a single loop for two GPUs and a CPU, as long as you use a large radiator.

Two GTX 480s are more than enough for a top-end 30" gaming monitor.

As it is, you are spending thousands of dollars on a few extra frames per second that will only be visible to benchmarking programs.

I am very new to this kind of thing, I am going to play on Highest settings on all games including Crysis, so what would I need for that? I plan to run 3 30" screens.

 

[geofelt]

+1 proximon.

Once you get to 4 cores and two top end cards like the GTX480 you see very little gain, and perhaps a loss by going to 6 cores or three cards.
If you get a very well cooled case like the Antec 1200, you probably do not need liquid cooling.

Are the 30" monitors you will be using 1080P(1920 x 1080) monitors, or 2560 x 1600 monitors? It makes a huge difference. It is possible that a third GTX480 might be good if you have three 2560 x 1600 monitors.

A i7 930 with a modest overclock should be plenty.

Today's motherboards have good integrated sound; I would ditch the sound card.

My suggestion is to build a more modest rig for starters, planning to upgrade it later if necessary.

 

[JarrettP]

+1 proximon.

Once you get to 4 cores and two top end cards like the GTX480 you see very little gain, and perhaps a loss by going to 6 cores or three cards.
If you get a very well cooled case like the Antec 1200, you probably do not need liquid cooling.

Are the 30" monitors you will be using 1080P(1920 x 1080) monitors, or 2560 x 1600 monitors? It makes a huge difference. It is possible that a third GTX480 might be good if you have three 2560 x 1600 monitors.

A i7 930 with a modest overclock should be plenty.

Today's motherboards have good integrated sound; I would ditch the sound card.

My suggestion is to build a more modest rig for starters, planning to upgrade it later if necessary.

1920 x 1080 and I am only going to be using a headset, so no sound card then. Correct?

 

[Proximon]

My suggestion is to build a more modest rig for starters, planning to upgrade it later if necessary.

My thought exactly.

I have a little time now so let me see if I can shed some light on what you are up against. Just let me throw some thoughts out as a list.

- When you are spending money on a computer you need to be aware of diminishing returns. Beyond a certain point, processing power does nothing for you. Yes, in the future that overpowered processor might be useful... but because you spent so much on it you NEVER get your money's worth.

- Here's a very unofficial Proximon rule: If you can buy two computers for what you spend on one, put them side-by-side and see no difference in performance, you spent too much.
In your case you are spending about three times what a good rig would cost.

- About three years ago an old friend, without consulting me, had an 8K rig built for himself. He could have spent 2K then, and 2K today, and today's rig would be faster than the 8K rig. And he could have taken a trip to Fiji on the savings.

- Water. Inside a computer surrounded by electricity. You need some mechanical ability to pull it off, and for a first-timer you need 48 hours to assemble, pressure test, and install a water loop.

- Large projects have a way of discouraging a novice or make them impatient so that they make errors.

- If you are really sure you want to go with some serious water-cooling, you may need to spend some extra on a serious custom case from Mountain Mods up front... but I would say you probably just need a Corsair 800D for now.

- Build a conservative computer and air cool it to start. Once that is up, running, and right, add a simple CPU water loop. Keep the projects single-day sized as much as you can. Several small projects, not one big one.

 

[geofelt]

At 1920 x 1080 sli GTX480 is very good.

Try the integrated sound. It is very good, regardless of speakers or headphones. Several generations ago, a discrete sound card saved some cpu cycles. With today's multicore cpu's and hyperthreading cpu savings is negligible.
If you later feel that one is needed, you can always add one later. first.

In the next year, we will see the launch of sandy bridge 32nm quads. You should still be good.

We will see faster SSD's and much better price/capacity. You might want to save some budget for that.

No doubt there will be faster graphics cards within the year. You may not need them, but the top of the line cards like the GTX480 will keep their resale value if you ever want to upgrade.

I do not like more complicated water cooling when a simpler, cheaper, and maintenance free solution is available. The Prolimatech megahalems is as good as it gets:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835242001

The things to go top dollar on are the monitors, psu and case. We tend to keep them for several generations.

 

[JarrettP]

At 1920 x 1080 sli GTX480 is very good.

Try the integrated sound. It is very good, regardless of speakers or headphones. Several generations ago, a discrete sound card saved some cpu cycles. With today's multicore cpu's and hyperthreading cpu savings is negligible.
If you later feel that one is needed, you can always add one later. first.

In the next year, we will see the launch of sandy bridge 32nm quads. You should still be good.

We will see faster SSD's and much better price/capacity. You might want to save some budget for that.

No doubt there will be faster graphics cards within the year. You may not need them, but the top of the line cards like the GTX480 will keep their resale value if you ever want to upgrade.

I do not like more complicated water cooling when a simpler, cheaper, and maintenance free solution is available. The Prolimatech megahalems is as good as it gets:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835242001

The things to go top dollar on are the monitors, psu and case. We tend to keep them for several generations.

I Decided to go watercooling because I wanted to overclock and I inherited Quite a bit of money from a relative, <1m, so I decided I would build a nice rig that was future proof.

 

[Proximon]

Just start out with a strong foundation, and don't try to do it all at once.

And on the subject of headsets, high-end ones do indeed require a soundcard, because of impedance. Onboard sound just doesn't put out enough power to drive a good headset.

I own these Sennheisers
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826106219&cm_re=sennheiser_headset-_-26-106-219-_-Product

And this soundcard is barely enough
http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Blaster-XtremeGamer-Fatal1ty-70SB046A00000/dp/B000IZAN4K

 

[WR2]

so I decided I would build a nice rig that was future proof.

There is no such thing as a 'future proof' PC.
If you want the best available 'future proofing' advice invest more money than you spend.
Good air cooling will allow nearly as much overclocking as water cooling, and it's a lot easier to do.

 

[geofelt]

Today's best parts will be old hat in a year. The most "future proof" parts I can think of are monitors, cases, and psu's. Maybe keyboards and mice. Get the best there.

Invest/save the difference, and next year you will be able to get the next best thing again.

As to overclocking, Air will do you just as well for any sort of useful overclock. If you want to try for record setting overclocks, then that is a different ball game.

 

[DaveWesh]

Not to resurrect a dead thread but the SR-2 is Xeon ONLY Mobo, the i7-Desktop Line dont have dual QPI(i think thats the right Acronym) links, And therefore cant be used in the SR-2. Get the E5650, its a 6/12 CPU only clocked at 2.6, so just do a tad bit of OCing and you'll be fine.