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System Builder Marathon, Q1 2014: Our New Enthusiast PC
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1. Taking The SBM Down A Different Road

System Builder Marathon, Q1 2014: The Articles

Here are links to each of the four articles in this quarter’s System Builder Marathon (we’ll update them as each story is published). And remember, these systems are all being given away at the end of the marathon.

To enter the giveaway, please fill out this SurveyGizmo form, and be sure to read the complete rules before entering!

Day 1: The $2400 Reader's Choice PC
Day 2: Our New Enthusiast PC
Day 3: The $750 Gaming PC
Day 4: Performance And Value, Dissected

Introduction

We've been doing these System Builder Marathons on a quarterly basis for years. The premise is typically pretty similar, but we try to fold in variance whenever we can to keep the relationship spicy. This time around, we're switching things up a bit, largely based on your feedback, to hopefully improve our value analysis. We're focusing specifically on the prices of components that affect performance, leaving the parts that don't impact benchmark results out of the equation. In the final analysis, this means that the case, optical drive, and operating system have no bearing on price/performance (though we still list those prices for your reference).

In this way, we're freeing ourselves to experiment with more premium enclosures and include add-ons like Blu-ray drives without the negative impact on comparative value. You all know that it's possible to get by with a $40 case and $20 DVD writer, but now we can choose higher-end options more appropriate to our go-fast parts without hammering our critical analysis of the internals.

With that in mind, I went a different direction with this quarter's enthusiast-oriented build, opting for a Core i7-4770K processor (rather than a more budget-friendly Core i5) and single GeForce GTX 780 Ti (instead of dual GeForce GTX 770s in SLI).

Enthusiast System Components
MotherboardASRock Z87 Pro3, LGA 1150, Intel Z87 Express
$90
ProcessorIntel Core i7-4770K: 3.5 GHz Base Clock Rate, 3.9 GHz Maximum Turbo Boost, 8 MB Shared L3 Cache
$320
Heat Sink
Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO with 120 mm PWM Fan
$35
Memory8 GB Corsair Vengeance LP (2 x 4 GB) DDR3-1866 Model CML8GX3M2A1866C9B$103
GraphicsGalaxy GeForce GTX 780 Ti 3 GB GDDR5
$660
System Drive
Samsung 840 EVO MZ-7TE120BW 2.5" 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s SSD$90
Storage Drive
Western Digital Black WD5003AZEX 500 GB 7200 RPM, 64 MB Cache, SATA 6Gb/s
$71
PowerCorsair Enthusiast Series TX650 650 W 80 PLUS Bronze PSU
$90
Cost Of Components That Impact Performance
$1459
Case
NZXT Phantom 410 Series Orange Trim Computer Case$100
Optical
LG Black WH14NS40, 4 MB Cache SATA BDXL Blu-ray Burner, OEM$54
OS
Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-bit, OEM$100
Total Cost of System as Tested:
$1713

Armed with $1459 worth of parts that directly affect performance, the new build is surprisingly cheaper than last quarter's enthusiast-oriented configuration, which leveraged $1528 of gear to make it a gaming beast.

You could make it out the door for as little as $1519 if you purchased all of my platform parts, a $40 case, and a $20 DVD burner. I went with a more premium chassis and a Blu-ray writer, though, taking the total cost to $1713 (including a copy of Windows 8 for $100).

2. CPU, Motherboard, And Cooler

CPU: Intel Core i7-4770K

Again, one of the ways I'm mixing things up this quarter is tapping a higher-end Core i7-4770K instead of the field-proven Core i5-4670K.

While both processors sport four physical IA cores, the Core i7 benefits from Intel's Hyper-Threading technology, which allows it to schedule up to eight threads concurrently. In addition, it hosts 8 MB of shared L3 cache. That's 2 MB more than the Core i5.

Read Customer Reviews of Intel's Core i7-4770K


With similar clock rates compared to the Core i5-4670K (the i7 actually offers a 100 MHz-faster base and peak Turbo Boost frequency), our benchmark results should give us a clear picture of where the Core i7's strengths come into play, and where the extra cost goes to waste.

For the sake of my Day 4 judgement, I have to hope spending $320 on host processing pays off.

Motherboard: ASRock Z87 Pro3

Read Customer Reviews of ASRock's Z87 Pro3


This is one of the lowest-priced motherboards available with Intel's overclocking-friendly Z87 Express Platform Controller Hub, on sale at the time of writing for $90 on Newegg.

Honestly, I don't have any experience with this board. But considering ASRock's good reputation for enthusiast-oriented value, I'm willing to give it a shot for the money I'll be saving.

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO

Read Customer Reviews of Cooler Master's Hyper 212 EVO


Cooler Master's Hyper 212 EVO is one of the better air coolers for enthusiasts on a budget. I've used it before in the System Builder Marathon, and my results with it have always been respectable.

Currently on sale for $35, this seems like an inexpensive replacement for the heat sink and fan combo that Intel bundles with its Core i7 CPU, which I wouldn't expect to yield much overclocking headroom.

3. Video Card, Power Supply, And Case

Graphics Card: Galaxy GeForce GTX 780 Ti

Our last enthusiast build featured two GeForce GTX 770 cards in an SLI configuration. Interestingly, the lowest-priced GeForce GTX 780 Ti on Newegg as I write this sells for the exact same $660 as last quarter's dual-card setup.

When I originally wrote down the parts for this build, Galaxy's offering was the lowest-priced option on Newegg. It's now sold out, but you get the idea: we're looking for the most affordable 780 Ti available.

Read Customer Reviews of Galaxy's GeForce GTX 780 Ti


We expect Nvidia's flagship gaming card to demonstrate more more consistent performance, though I'm accepting of the fact that last quarter's SLI arrangement will probably be quite a bit faster, particularly in Surround resolutions. Then again, the GeForce GTX 780 Ti lets us get away with a less beefy power supply.

Power Supply: Corsair TX650 650 W PSU

Read Customer Reviews of Corsair's TX650


Using a single 250 W graphics card allows us to step down to Corsair's 650TX (from the 750TX we used last quarter). At $90, this is the reliable power supply that we usually favor for the mid-range enthusiast-focused machine.

Case: NZXT Phantom 410

Read Customer Reviews of NZXT's Phantom 410


The NZXT Phanom 410 was the only case to receive Tom's Hardware's Approved recognition in Thomas' Five Gaming Cases Between $80 And $120, Reviewed.

For that reason alone, I am giving the enclosure a nod in my System Builder Marathon box. It's an especially attractive option now that the $100 price tag doesn't directly take away from the price/performance calculation run on day four of the series.

4. Memory, Hard Drives, And Optical Storage

Memory: Corsair Vengeance LP DDR3-1866 Memory Kit 8 GB (2 x 4 GB)

This dual-channel kit boasts an XMP memory profile with 9-10-9-27 timings at 1866 MT/s, while sipping power at a mere 1.5 V. Selling for $103 on Newegg at the time of writing, it's priced as expected for high-performance memory in this RAM-hungry market.

Read Customer Reviews of Corsair's Vengeance LP 8 GB Memory Kit


System Drive: Samsung 840 EVO 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s SSD

Currently selling for $90, Samsung's 840 EVO 120 GB SSD offers respectable value for a system drive. Our own Christopher Ryan is particularly smitten with this repository, praising its performance and value-added features that keep data safe, despite triple-level-cell flash memory. 

Read Customer Reviews of Samsung's 840 EVO 128 GB SSD


Hard Drive: Western Digital Black 500 GB

When it comes to choosing the right hard drive given limited funds, you need to balance capacity and performance. This quarter, I chose to favor speed.

Assuming 500 GB is enough storage space for music, movies, and pictures, $71 gets you Western Digital's high-performance Black with an impressive five-year warranty. Of course, if you need to house terabytes of data, you'll want a larger drive. That might necessitate stepping back to a slower-spinning disk instead.


Read Customer Reviews of Western Digital's Black 500 GB Hard Drive


Optical Drive: LG Black OEM Blu-ray Burner

A standard DVD burner sells for around $20. But if you fancy using your PC as a media center, a Blu-ray writer gives you a little more flexibility. LG's WH14NS40 is going for $54 on Newegg after a temporary promotion, and I consider that to be a reasonable expense, given the options it opens up to enthusiasts.

Read Customer Reviews of LG's WH14NS40 Blu-ray Burner

5. System Assembly And Overclocking

Although I've seen NZXT's Phantom featured here and elsewhere a number of times, I've never actually used one in a build until today. It's a very accommodating and spacious enclosure to work in, and easy on the eyes (particularly after the bargains I'm used to rooting out for this series). I'm not a fan of the overcomplicated hard drive mounting pegs. Also, the rubber grommets that hide cable routing are too loose, and are easily dislodged during the build process. Those are minor inconveniences, though.

My build process went smoothly, and I don't really have any solid complaints to register. Everything fit nicely, and I'm bereft of horror stories to tell about fitment, scraped knuckles, or mysterious boot issues. That makes for boring reading, but it's good in the end.

Overclocking

Like most Haswell-based CPUs, this one capped out in the 4.5 GHz range. My maximum stable overclock ended up being 4.4 GHz at 1.2 V before I started running into thermal throttling. Compared to last quarter's Core i5-4670K, that's an extra 100 MHz.

Despite my high-performance memory, the system defaulted to 1333 MT/s at 9-9-9-24 1T timings, which really hurt some of the stock benchmark results. As usual, I triggered the XMP setting to hit 1866 MT/s at 9-10-9-27 2T for my overclocked results, choosing not to pursue more aggressive data rates.

The budget-oriented ASRock board stepped up to deliver the functionality expected from pricier Z87-based options. It was perfectly stable, also.

Galaxy's GeForce GTX 780 Ti was limited by its power envelope, not by stability issues. Therefore, I maintained voltage at its stock setting and dialed back my memory overclock to yield as much headroom as possible to the GPU. This helped a little in the benchmark results. I set MSI's Afterburner tool to its maximum 106% power setting, and then dialed in 150 MHz core and 100 MHz (400 MT/s) memory overclocks. The fan speed was also ramped up just to be sure thermals were limiting the performance ceiling.

6. Test System And Benchmarks

The following tables include the stock and overclocked settings for this quarter's enthusiast build. You'll also find the PC we built for Q4 of last year, which is used as a comparison point.

Under that are our benchmarks and settings, for reference. At long last we updated our gaming suite to include Arma 3, Grid 2, and Battlefield 4.

Q1 2014 Enthusiast PC Test Settings: $1459 of Performance Hardware
 Default Configuration
Overclocked
MotherboardASRock Z87 Pro3 LGA 1150, Intel Z87 Express
Unchanged
ProcessorIntel Core i7-4770K: 3.5 GHz Base Clock Rate, 3.9 GHz Maximum Turbo Boost, 8 MB Shared L3 Cache4.40 GHz @ 1.2 V
Memory8 GB Corsair Vengeance LP (2 x 4 GB) DDR3-1866, Model CML8GX3M2A1866C9B, 1333 MT/s, CAS 9-9-9-24-1T1866 MT/s 9-10-9-27 2T @ 1.5 V
GraphicsGalaxy GeForce GTX 780 Ti 3 GB 256-bit GDDR5, 875/928 MHz Base/GPU Boost, GDDR5-7000
+150 MHz GPU, GDDR5-7400
System Drive
Samsung 840 EVO MZ-7TE120BW 2.5" 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s SSDUnchanged
Storage DriveWD Black 500 GB, 7200 RPM, 64 MB Cache, SATA 6Gb/sUnchanged
OpticalLG Black WH14NS40, 4 MB Cache SATA BDXL Blu-ray Burner, OEMUnchanged
CaseNZXT Phantom 410 Computer CaseUnchanged
PowerCorsair 650TX 650 W ATX12V v2.3 80 PLUS Bronze Modular PSUUnchanged
Q4 2013 $1600 Enthusiast PC Test Settings: $1528 of Performance Hardware
 Default Configuration
Overclocked
MotherboardAsus Z87-Plus, LGA 1150, Intel Z87 ExpressUnchanged
ProcessorIntel Core i5-4670K: 3.4 GHz Base Clock Rate, 3.8 GHz Turbo Boost, 6 MB Shared L3 Cache
4.3 GHz @ 1.285 V
Memory8 GB Patriot Viper 3 (2 x 4 GB), DDR3-1600, CAS 9-9-9-24-1T1866 MT/s 9-10-9-27-2T @ 1.5 V
Graphics2 x MSI Gaming N770 GeForce GTX 770, 2 GB 256-bit GDDR5, 1085/1137 MHz Base/GPU Boost, GDDR5-70121150/1202 MHz Base/GPU Boost, GDDR5-7460
System DriveSamsung 840 Pro MZ-7PD128PW 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s SSDUnchanged
Storage DriveSeagate Barracuda 2 TB, 7200 RPM, 64 MB Cache, SATA 6Gb/sUnchanged
OpticalLite-On iHAS124-04: DVD BurnerUnchanged
CaseNZXT Gamma Black ATX Mid-Tower Computer CaseUnchanged
PowerCorsair TX750 V2 750 W ATX12V v2.3 80 PLUS Bronze-Certified PSUUnchanged

And here are the benchmark details:

Benchmark Configuration
3D Games
Battlefield 4
Version 1.0.0.0, DirectX 11, 100-Second Fraps "Tashgar"
Test Set 1: Medium Quality Preset, No AA, 4X AF, SSAO
Test Set 2: Ultra Quality Preset, 4X MSAA, 16X AF, HBAO
Arma 3
Version 1.6.89.06, Version 1.5.26.05 (June), 25-Second Fraps
Test Set 1: High Preset, FSAA Enabled
Test Set 2: Ultra Preset, 8x FSAA Enabled
Far Cry 3
Version 1.04, 50-Second Fraps "Ananaki Village"
Test Set 1: High Quality Preset, No AA, Standard Alpha, SSAO
Test Set 2: Ultra Quality Preset,  4X MSAA, Enhanced Alpha, HDAO
Grid 2
Version 1.2, Direct X 11, Built-in Benchmark
Test Set 1: High Quality, No AA
Test Set 2: Ultra Quality, 8x MSAA
Audio/Video Encoding
HandBrake CLIVersion: 0.98, Video: Video from Canon EOS 7D (1920x1080, 25 frames) 1 Minutes 22 Seconds, Audio: PCM-S16, 48,000 Hz, Two-Channel, to Video: AVC1 Audio: AAC (High Profile)
iTunesVersion 10.4.1.10 x64: Audio CD (Terminator II SE), 53 minutes, default AAC format 
LAME MP3Version 3.98.3: Audio CD "Terminator II SE", 53 min, convert WAV to MP3 audio format, Command: -b 160 --nores (160 Kb/s)
TotalCode Studio 2.5Version: 2.5.0.10677, MPEG-2 to H.264, MainConcept H.264/AVC Codec, 28 sec HDTV 1920x1080 (MPEG-2), Audio: MPEG-2 (44.1 kHz, Two-Channel, 16-Bit, 224 Kb/s) Codec: H.264 Pro, Mode: PAL 50i (25 FPS), Profile: H.264 BD HDMV
Productivity
ABBYY FineReaderVersion 10.0.102.82: Read PDF save to Doc, Source: Political Economy (J. Broadhurst 1842) 111 Pages
Adobe Photoshop CS6Version 13 x64: Filter 15.7 MB TIF Image: Radial Blur, Shape Blur, Median, Polar Coordinates
Autodesk 3ds Max 2012Version 14.0 x64: Space Flyby Mentalray, 248 Frames, 1440x1080
7-ZipVersion 9.28, LZMA2, Syntax "a -t7z -r -m0=LZMA2 -mx=5"
Benchmark: THG-Workload-2012
WinRARVersion 4.2, RAR, Syntax "winrar a -r -m3"
Benchmark: THG-Workload-2012
WinZipVersion 17.0 Pro, Best Method, ZIPX
Benchmark: THG-Workload-2012
Synthetic Benchmarks and Settings
3DMark 11Version: 1.0.1, Entry, Performance, Extreme Suite
PCMark 7Version: 1.0.4, System, Productivity, Hard Disk Drive benchmarks
SiSoftware Sandra 2013Version: 2013 SP5c-1872, CPU Test = CPU Arithmetic / MultiMedia, Memory Test = Bandwidth Benchmark
7. Results: Synthetics

We begin our benchmark analysis with the synthetics, which should pinpoint the biggest differences between this quarter's and last quarter's System Builder Marathon setups. There's the Core i7 against the Core i5, and the GeForce GTX 780 Ti against the 770s in SLI.

Processor-oriented tests able to exploit Hyper-Threading should demonstrate gains on the new system. Meanwhile, games designed to tax GPUs could go either way, depending on optimizations for Nvidia's multi-GPU technology.

The Cloud Gate test result (in red) favors the single GeForce GTX 780 Ti over our previous SLI setup. This could be considered surprising, given how much higher those 770s score in the Graphics component. But because our Core i7-4770K features Hyper-Threading, allowing it to excel in the Physics test, Futuremark appears to weigh that functionality more heavily.


In PCMark, the Core i7 clearly enjoys a huge advantage in the Home and Creative benchmark tests, while the work result barely changes between systems. As far as storage is concerned, the fast SSDs achieve almost identical scores.

The Core i7-4770K shows up the previous build's Core i5-4670K when it comes to Sandra's Arithmetic module, which obviously takes advantage of as many logical cores as it can.

With the new build defaulting to 1333 MT/s memory settings, bandwidth appears disappointingly low until the XMP memory profile is instantiated. This will likely have a detrimental impact on any memory-dependent benchmarks in our test suite.

8. Results: Media Transcoding

The following audio- and video-oriented transcoding benchmarks are tied to processor performance. There are definitely differences in how they utilize CPUs with multiple cores, though. Our iTunes and LAME tests employ a single thread, giving us a good look at the per-core performance of each CPU. Meanwhile, TotalCode Studio and HandBrake leverage as many cores as they can get.

Running on a single core, the first two benchmarks fare worse on the new build, despite its higher Turbo Boost clock rate. It's possible that more conservative memory settings are limiting performance in stock form. That hypothesis is backed up by the Q1 machine's slight win in overclocked trim once XMP is enabling, bringing throughput back up to where we want it.


In sharp contrast, HandBrake and TotalCode Studio are highly responsive to Hyper-Threading, giving the new build a significant advantage over the Core i5-4670K we used last time around.

9. Results: Rendering And Productivity

All of the tests on this page are fully optimized to utilize multi-core (and even multi-processor) configurations.

Blender stands out as the biggest beneficiary of the Core i7-4770K's Hyper-Threading technology, though FineReader and Visual Studio 2010 also demonstrate the Core i7's significant advantage, too. If you use a lot of higher-end professional apps, many of which are sped up substantially by parallelism, the premium on Intel's flagship CPU family might be money well-spent.

10. Results: Adobe Creative Suite

We run two scripted Photoshop benchmarks: one that is threaded and fully taxes our CPUs, and another that leverages OpenCL acceleration to offload work to our graphics cards.

Since previous tests have shown us that OpenCL-accelerated filters don't leverage multiple GeForce cards in SLI, the single-GPU GeForce GTX 780 Ti takes a clear win. The CPU-dependent results are much closer, however. Four physical cores appear to be a sweet spot, and Hyper-Threading has no impact whatsoever.

CPU and memory performance are the critical variables in the rest of these tests, which do not leverage the heterogeneous nature of OpenCL. The Acrobat benchmark is single-threaded, and like iTunes and LAME, is affected by memory bandwidth. Meanwhile, Premiere Pro sees benefit from the Core i7's Hyper-Threading technology.

11. Results: Compression Tools

The chart below represents three separate benchmarks. WinZip's -EZ switch forces the app to use maximum compression. That's a processor-bound test, and its more taxing workload translates to longer completion times. The OpenCL-accelerated version leverages graphics resources to help compress files larger than 8 MB.

Our OpenCL-enabled benchmark clearly favors the new build's GeForce GTX 780 Ti. The WinZip CPU test favors the current build, too, but for the Core i7-4770K's multi-threading prowess. The WinZip EZ results appear limited by memory bandwidth more than anything else, pulling the results closer together.

12. Results: Battlefield 4 And Arma 3

Battlefield 4

Replacing its predecessor in our bench suite, Battlefield 4 also tends to be limited by the graphics subsystem. CPU performance can be a factor at high detail levels though, so it should be interesting to see how these benchmarks play out. For those of you who're long since done with this game's single-player campaign, it's also worth noting that big multi-player maps also tend to be quite processor-bound. In the real-world, you'll get even more benefit from a faster CPU than these tests would indicate.

At the Medium preset, our SLI-enabled build from last quarter enjoys an advantage over the newer machine and its single graphics card as we test Surround modes on three monitors. At the Ultra preset, however, the two GeForce GTX 770s only manage a slight win at 1920x1080 and below, as other limitations kick in at 4800x900 and up.

Arma 3

Arma 3 is limited by both the processor and graphics cards, depending on the situation. At the Medium-detail preset, our CPUs appear to be the critical component, handing the new build a win up through 5760x1080, where SLI yields notable gains. Under the influences of the Ultra setting, two GeForce GTX 770s in last quarter's configuration score meaningful victories in both triple-monitor tests.

13. Results: Grid 2 And Far Cry 3

Grid 2

Like most of Codemasters' racing titles, Grid 2 is platform-limited at all but the highest resolutions and detail levels. In fact, it's so sensitive to memory bandwidth that the new build suffers a significant loss at default settings when the High-quality preset is used. Stepping up to the Ultra setting with 8x MSAA enabled transfers the limitation to the graphics subsystem, where two GeForce GTX 770s on last quarter's box serve up superior performance above 1920x1080.

Far Cry 3

More than any other game in our benchmark suite, Far Cry 3 leans heavily on graphics cards and is far less dependent on the host processor. Last quarter's dual-GPU configuration scores wins almost across the board against one GeForce GTX 780 Ti.


14. Power And Temperature

With a single 250 W graphics card instead of two 195 W models, this quarter's effort is guaranteed to use less power under a graphics load. The CPU shouldn't reflect much of a change, either, since both PCs employ quad-core Haswell-based processors.

Indeed, the Q1 2014 build remains under 475 W, even when I overclock it. A quick look at the CPU under load shows both platforms faring similarly, though the previous build's Core i5-4670K manages to idle at a significantly lower wattage. That could be a platform issue, where the board I'm using today isn't dropping to the same idle states.

The thermals are comparable between both machines, except for the GeForce GTX 780 Ti's higher temperature under load. We're not entirely surprised. After all, the 780 Ti leans on a big GK110 that uses more power than the smaller GK104 on Nvidia's GeForce GTX 770. Our overclocked 780 Ti's temperature drops quite a bit, which makes sense in light of our manual fan speed increase to prevent throttling. 

15. A Core i7 And Flagship GPU Impress, Naturally

Despite an upgrade to Intel's Core i7-4770K and a $660 GeForce GTX 780 Ti graphics card, this quarter's enthusiast-oriented build is actually a little cheaper than my last effort, which included a Core i5 and two GeForce GTX 770s in SLI. Most of that comes from a lower-priced motherboard, less expensive storage, and a lower-output power supply.

The stock performance of this build suffered a bit because my memory kit defaulted to 1333 MT/s (Ed.: Which is by design; most enthusiasts know to enable XMP right out of the gate to correct this fail-safe of sorts). That bottleneck was mitigated by the overclocked configuration, which is where I triggered the XMP profile.

Here's the performance breakdown.

I'm a little surprised to see the Core i7-4770K merely matching the performance of my Core i5 at stock clocks in the A/V transcoding suite. But when you look at the individual benchmarks, it's clear that half were penalized for my memory setting. The other half actually did run faster. And the issue was obliterated after a bit of tweaking, giving this quarter's machine a notable advantage in processor-limited metrics.

We also see that one GeForce GTX 780 Ti isn't as fast as two 770s in SLI. Again, no shock there. Let's dig a little deeper into the gaming numbers to see how the match-up shakes out at 1920x1080 and Surround resolutions:


At 1920x1080, the GeForce GTX 780 Ti does a much better job of keeping up with the two GeForce GTX 770s in SLI. When the resolution increases to 4800x900, the dual-GPU configuration walks away with a clear win. Not that I needed it, but this is more evidence to support my opinion that SLI makes the most sense in multi-display arrangements. Still, the GeForce GTX 780 Ti makes a good case for using a single-GPU flagship (so long as it's priced competitively) with just one screen. After all, it uses for less power and delivers almost identical performance.

As for the rest of the build, I'm pleased with the choices I made. Right now, I'm thinking it'd be interesting to see how a Core i5 with a couple of GeForce GTX 760s would compare, while saving a boatload of cash. I'm also pretty happy with the few components that I bought that don't affect the benchmark results, but still add appropriate pizazz to this mid-range machine without scraping the bottom of the barrel to keep it affordable. NZXT's Phantom 410 and LG's Blu-ray writer complement the rest of the go-fast gear nicely. More so now than ever before, the lucky reader who wins my machine is going to enjoy those premium add-ons. 

All that's left now is seeing how my machine compares to Paul's budget build and Thomas' high-end setup in our Day 4 analysis. Bring it on, gentlemen!