Black Ops Syndicate Review - pros and cons

After waiting almost a month for the 3930 mobo to re-stock, I finally received my DS machine.  I am very pleased about certain aspects of my rig, and disappointed about others.  This review will cover all issues, pros and cons, to date.

To start, here is my build:

Chassis Model: Black OPS Syndicate
Processor: Intel Core i7 3930K 3.2GHz (Six-Core)
Motherboard: ASUS Rampage IV Extreme X79 (Intel X79 Chipset)
System Memory: 16GB DDR3 1600MHz Digital Storm Certified Performance
Power Supply: 1200W Corsair Pro Gold Series (CMPSU-1200AX)
Hard Drive Set 1: (160GB Solid State (By: Intel) (Model: 320 Series)
Hard Drive Set 2: (1TB Western Digital Caviar (7200 RPM) (Model: Black Edition)
Optical Drive 1: Blu-Ray Player/DVD Writer (Play Blu-Ray and Burn DVDs)
Internet Access: High Speed Network Port
Video Card(s): 3x SLI Triple (NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 2.5GB)
Sound Card: Creative Labs X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional
Extreme Cooling: H20: Stage 4: Sub-Zero LCS Cooling System: CPU Only
H20 Tube Color: Red Tubing with High-Performance Fluid (UV Lighting Reactive)
Chassis Airflow: Upgrade Chassis With LED Performance Fans (Blue)
Internal Lighting: Internal Chassis Lighting System (Blue)
CPU Boost: Stage 2: Overclock CPU 4.5GHz to 4.8GHz

The overclock came to 4.5GHz with a V-core of 1.38.

Now on to the review
 

Once I hooked up the machine, there were, unfortunately, three major problems:

(1) the three fans on the top and two on the back were not the upgraded cooler master R4's with blue LED lighting.  They were the standard fans.  DS dropped the ball on this one, and will be shipping out to me 5 performance fans for replacement.

Here are some pics showing the incorrect fans:

The third problem is that there appeared to be bubbling along the inside right plexi glass panel and top panel.  Upon inspection, it was determined that the bubbling was actually water from the LC system.  The water was on both panels and there was water sitting on top of the water reservoir.  I wiped these down and tech support had me tighten the top of the reservoir which will hopefully resolve the issue.  Here are pics of the water on the panels:

DS is sending me a new hard drive for replacement which will hopefully resolve the data drive issue.  Other than these hiccups, I think the machine looks great.  I have run a few games on the SSD drive and they are smoking fast.  The 30" dell monitor is running at 2500x1600 resolution and looks gorgeous.  Here are some pics showing the wonderful configuration:

Do you have to contact the local electric power company to amp up their production before you turn that thing on?

Nice rig!

Originally posted by chasblock Do you have to contact the local electric power company to amp up their production before you turn that thing on?Nice rig!

This thing can run a small City :)

Looks like an amazing machine. Sorry about your issues that either shipping or packing caused, but glad they seem to be able to be resolved. I should be getting mine tomorrow if the tracking is correct. Your post has given me insight on what to look for. Again sorry got your issues. But thanks for posting them. Your machine is a beast good luck with it.

@josh134,

You're most welcome. Thank you as well for working with our team to address the issues.

Congrats! 

I'm glad you are getting all the bugs worked out (and getting the right fans), looks like Fedex did a number on it. Once its all said and done though, you're going to love your beast!

Update:

So after waiting another week, I finally received the cooler master replacement fans, ans a replacement hard drive.  However, DS forgot to include a new Sata 6 cable to replace the one which was broken and which had been previously discussed for hours with DS technical support.  Instead of overnighting me the cable, they "encouraged" me to go to Best Buy.  So my adventure continued into the evening last night going to two Best Buys and a CompUSA, none of whom had the correct cable.  Now I have to go to TigerDirect to look for the cable today.  Not really what I wanted to end up doing to get my 5k+ rig in working order.

As to the fans, the cooler master R4's arrived, but the connectors were not long enough (the connectors on the default fans were very long).  One would think DS would realize that I needed extenders for these fans.  The good thing is that I found these at CompUsa and was able to install the cooler masters. 


Edited by josh134 - 02 Mar 2012 at 8:05am

I hope DS is going to be compensating you in some form for the SATA cable? This is of course assuming they did not in fact end up shipping one out. 

Edited by Tidgxor - 02 Mar 2012 at 11:05am

@josh134,