A few years ago a friend of mine bought an overpriced unit which lacked driver support for it's weird unique Nvidia cards.
I told him I would build him a new rig when he wanted.
So now that he finally asked me I put together a new computer and was wondering what people here think of it.
My friend specified he didn't want it to be SLI/Crossfire and he didn't want it to sound like a vacuum cleaner was inside of it.
Also it had to have an HDMI port.
So using my opinion I put this together.
Specs.
Intel i5 2500k ( OCed 4.4ghz)
8 gigs of DDR3 1600mhz RAM (8-8-8-22 timings)
ASUS GTX 570 Direct CU ii (OCed to 900mhz core clock)
2x 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 hard drive (RAID 0)
Noctua NH-D14 CPU heatsink
Asrock P67 Pro3 B3 motherboard.
XIGMATEK ACXTNRP-PC702
Coolermaster Storm Enforcer.
I uploaded a Lost Planet 2 benchmark test B video on youtube with this build.
It ran fine on max 32xAA at 1920x1080.
probably would have received around 10 more fps average if I wasn't recording.
1080P recorded video of it here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyweG7wEDuI&hd=1
I chose an i5 2500k since the i7 2600k didn't seem worth the extra money for gaming.
I only OCed it to 4.4ghz because even that is overkill for just about any game out for now.
I was going to purchase 1333mhz RAM but there was a deal at newegg for ripjaws 1600mhz RAM which was just as cheap as most 1333mhz RAM.
I noticed the timings were quite high in the bios menu ( 11-11-11-28) so I changed them to 8-8-8-22.
I went with an Asus GTX 570 Direct CU ii because I heard it had great cooling and OCing capabilities.
I used a beta build of MSI Afterburner to OC the card to 900/1800/2000 clocks and upped the voltage to 1.050V.
I made sure it was stable. I did have a lower voltage and every game and even kombuster and furmark ran it fine but crysis would crash so I upped it to 1.050 then it was fully stable in Crysis.
I set my own fan profile and temps never went above 68C at full load.
Idle was around 38-41C.
For the hard drives I was told the Samsung Spinpoint F3s were still quite good for price and performance.
I purchased two for a Raid 0 setup.
Maybe one day when SSDs become cheaper I will get one.
To cool the CPU down with it's OC I went with a Noctua NH-D14 because I heard it's one of the best air cooling heatsinks on the market.
It's supposed to run quiet and cool.
My friend's room can get hot around summer and close to fall (around 82-86F) so I wanted a heatsink to compensate for that rise.
The heatsink does look odd for the color choice but I would take performance over looks any day.
For the motherboard I didn't need anything special.
It needed to be able to handle a 4.4ghz overclock for a sandybridge CPU and have some rep for being good quality.
I chose the Asrock P67 Pro3 B3 based on this info and because it was cheap.
Despite it beings a lesser known brand compared to companies like gigabyte and asus it was still getting fairly decent reviews by people given the price.
To power all the equipment I went with a Xigmatech 700W power supply.
It's not as well known but it has received great reviews.
I made sure to have some overhead in wattage in case of the overclocking and because it would run cooler.
To house the hardware I purchased a Coolermaster Storm Enforcer.
It was a newer case and it had a lot of room inside even though it was a mid tower.
The middle hard drive bay was removable to fit any length video card.
It did come with 2 front USB 3.0 ports but the motherboard did not support the plug which was no biggie.
I also purchased another 200mm fan for the top because the case did not include one.
Pictures are below of my computer build put together.
Wiring was hard because there was not a lot of room in the back.
It was the most time consuming part when putting together the computer.
I probably should have went for a modular PSU but it's not too much of a pain.
I just want to make sure that the wiring did not impede a lot on air flow.
Don't mind the fingerprints on the case.
I forgot to clean it off before taking the pics.
I told him I would build him a new rig when he wanted.
So now that he finally asked me I put together a new computer and was wondering what people here think of it.
My friend specified he didn't want it to be SLI/Crossfire and he didn't want it to sound like a vacuum cleaner was inside of it.
Also it had to have an HDMI port.
So using my opinion I put this together.
Specs.
Intel i5 2500k ( OCed 4.4ghz)
8 gigs of DDR3 1600mhz RAM (8-8-8-22 timings)
ASUS GTX 570 Direct CU ii (OCed to 900mhz core clock)
2x 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 hard drive (RAID 0)
Noctua NH-D14 CPU heatsink
Asrock P67 Pro3 B3 motherboard.
XIGMATEK ACXTNRP-PC702
Coolermaster Storm Enforcer.
I uploaded a Lost Planet 2 benchmark test B video on youtube with this build.
It ran fine on max 32xAA at 1920x1080.
probably would have received around 10 more fps average if I wasn't recording.
1080P recorded video of it here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyweG7wEDuI&hd=1
I chose an i5 2500k since the i7 2600k didn't seem worth the extra money for gaming.
I only OCed it to 4.4ghz because even that is overkill for just about any game out for now.
I was going to purchase 1333mhz RAM but there was a deal at newegg for ripjaws 1600mhz RAM which was just as cheap as most 1333mhz RAM.
I noticed the timings were quite high in the bios menu ( 11-11-11-28) so I changed them to 8-8-8-22.
I went with an Asus GTX 570 Direct CU ii because I heard it had great cooling and OCing capabilities.
I used a beta build of MSI Afterburner to OC the card to 900/1800/2000 clocks and upped the voltage to 1.050V.
I made sure it was stable. I did have a lower voltage and every game and even kombuster and furmark ran it fine but crysis would crash so I upped it to 1.050 then it was fully stable in Crysis.
I set my own fan profile and temps never went above 68C at full load.
Idle was around 38-41C.
For the hard drives I was told the Samsung Spinpoint F3s were still quite good for price and performance.
I purchased two for a Raid 0 setup.
Maybe one day when SSDs become cheaper I will get one.
To cool the CPU down with it's OC I went with a Noctua NH-D14 because I heard it's one of the best air cooling heatsinks on the market.
It's supposed to run quiet and cool.
My friend's room can get hot around summer and close to fall (around 82-86F) so I wanted a heatsink to compensate for that rise.
The heatsink does look odd for the color choice but I would take performance over looks any day.
For the motherboard I didn't need anything special.
It needed to be able to handle a 4.4ghz overclock for a sandybridge CPU and have some rep for being good quality.
I chose the Asrock P67 Pro3 B3 based on this info and because it was cheap.
Despite it beings a lesser known brand compared to companies like gigabyte and asus it was still getting fairly decent reviews by people given the price.
To power all the equipment I went with a Xigmatech 700W power supply.
It's not as well known but it has received great reviews.
I made sure to have some overhead in wattage in case of the overclocking and because it would run cooler.
To house the hardware I purchased a Coolermaster Storm Enforcer.
It was a newer case and it had a lot of room inside even though it was a mid tower.
The middle hard drive bay was removable to fit any length video card.
It did come with 2 front USB 3.0 ports but the motherboard did not support the plug which was no biggie.
I also purchased another 200mm fan for the top because the case did not include one.
Pictures are below of my computer build put together.
Wiring was hard because there was not a lot of room in the back.
It was the most time consuming part when putting together the computer.
I probably should have went for a modular PSU but it's not too much of a pain.
I just want to make sure that the wiring did not impede a lot on air flow.
Don't mind the fingerprints on the case.
I forgot to clean it off before taking the pics.
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