My 10 year DS Journey & Why I Chose DS for 7th PC.

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   Very long story but this is my 10 year DS journey and my reasoning for my current configuration for my 7th PC from them.

I will relate here why I considered two other boutique PC builders and ultimately why I once again chose DS.

Between
 2010 and 2016, I got a total of 6 DS systems. I have gradually passed 
them down to family members as the years went by. Currently, the 1st is used by my mother-in-law, the 2nd is used by my dad, the 3rd is used by my wife, the 4th and 5th are in my office, and the 6th and latest one is for me at home.

I have never had an issue with any of them and they run perfectly to this day, even the 10 year old one.

I
 have not gotten a new system since 2016 though due to the lack of 
innovation & performance progression from Intel and them unable to 
move beyond their 14mm Skylake node.

Another 
reason why I have not gotten a new system is because I have been happily
 gaming on my 4 year old i7 6700k and 1080 TI at 1440p/60mhz.

This
 current system will most likely be quite adequate for the next couple 
of years with perhaps the only thing needed would be upgrading the video
 card for 1440p/120mhz and HDMI 2.1.

With the coming PCI-E 4.0, Zen 3 and the Nivida 3000 & AMD 6000 video cards though, I have gotten the upgrade itch.

 Also, I just recently bought a 48" LG CX OLED that can do 120mhz which 
has all 4 HDMI 2.1 ports (unlike the Samsungs which only have 1 HDMI 2.1
 port) and is both GSync, FreeSync & DolbyVision HDR compatible for 
my room at my dad's house and another 65" LG CX OLED for my room at my 
house.

I have been PC gaming on HMDI TVs from the comfort of my couch or bed 
for perhaps 15 years due to the immersiveness because of the size and I 
simply can no longer game on small monitors, other than the ultrawide 
49" ones which unfortunately do not yet have the vertical resolution I 
would want.

Although I love the brightness of 
QLED and have QLED in my living room, my wife's room, my mother-in-law's
 room, and my dad's house, I have an OLED in my own room in my house and
 in my room at my dad's house because nothing beats the colors and 
contrast of OLED in games. 

Yes, I am aware
 of OLED issues with burn-in and image retention which I am not too 
concerned about with modern TVs and I mitigate it by hiding the taskbar 
& icons and using dark mode and screensavers. I also end up using 
the OLEDs for gaming only and use the QLEDs for productivity and 
non-gaming tasks to limit brightness degradation of the OLEDs over time.

All
 this meant that on the one hand, I needed to upgrade to a new HDMI 2.1 
video card for my current gaming rig in my room to take advantage of 
120mhz and VRR and also get another gaming PC for my room at my dad's 
house now that I stay with him on the weekends since he's getting older.

I
 waited until PCI-E 4.0 NVME drives, Zen 3, Nivida 3000, & AMD 6000 
video cards had come out and read reviews before pulling the trigger.

I
 admit that I considered two other boutique PC builders besides DS that 
are just as well regarded. I will not mention who these other boutique PC builders that I considered are but I'm sure than PC connoisseurs will know the names.

The reasons why I considered these two other boutique PC builders were:

1) They have more choices when compared to DS in regards to custom paint jobs.

2) They had faster rated options in regards to RAM than DS.

Having said that, there were several reasons why I ended up returning to DS:

1) I have never had an issue with any of the 6 systems that I have gotten from DS.

2) DS is located 90 minutes from me so if there is a problem, I can drive to them and resolve it personally.

3)
 DS has these forums which are not only helpful in regards to getting 
support & answers but also I have noted that usually a simple post 
from a user on the forums ends up getting attention from DS and 
resolving the issue.

4) DS is willing to install air coolers and special order hardware if you ask for it.

5) The note section on the order/configuration screen is super convenient to express any special requirements.

6)
 I began doing my window shopping about 6 months ago & I noted that 
at that time, DS was more expensive for similar specs than those two 
other boutique builders that I considered but for some reason, in the 
last couple of months, I found DS to be less expensive than them.

For all the reasons above, I pulled the trigger for my 7th DS system on 11/19/20. 

The
 following is my configuration and my reasoning behind it. Please note 
that this is only my personal reasoning for choosing this particular 
build and that it is subjective and works for me and it is not 
necessarily good/bad or right/wrong for someone else:

Chassis Model: Digital Storm Velox
I decided against 
the Lumos case because I prefer air cooling and the front glass limits 
air intake. Also, I saw videos on YouTube in regards to the danger of 
receiving broken glass panels damaged in transit.

I
 was very temped by the smaller size of the Lynx case which fits 
perfectly in the space I planned for it in my room at my dad's house but
 I found its looks only adequate.

I was very 
tempted to special order the Lian Li Lancool II Mesh RGB White which is 
my speed for both airflow and looks but I ultimately decided to stick 
with the Velox because I prefer its looks and I can get it in white.

Having
 said that, I wish that DS would update the pictures of the Velox on its
 website to reflect the new glass panels on both sides which they have 
been promising that they would update for a long time now and they still
 haven't done it.

Personally, I prefer the old look shown in the current pictures rather than the current all glass panels. 

The
 Velox though is too big for the space in my room at my dad's house so I
 will have to move my current gaming rig from my house to his and have 
the Velox in my room in my house instead.

Exterior Finish: Exotic Paint Finish - Blanco White
Of course I chose the white option for aesthetic reasons but I remember when DS offered more color choices years ago. 

I would love to get it in blue like you can for the Bolt case which would look perfectly in my room. The wider color choices when compared to DS is one of the reasons why I considered those other two boutique builders.

Having
 said that, I discovered that you can enter the Velox configuration 
screen, change the case from the Velox to the Lynx and keep the Blanco 
White color option.

I wonder what would have happened if I had done that and if DS would actually paint the Lynx in white.

Processor: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X (12-Core) 4.8 GHz Turbo
Of course I went with AMD rather than Intel now that Zen 3 is competitive in games to the best that Intel has to offer. 

Even
 if Rocket Lake in March regains the performance crown which remains to 
be seen, Intel will not be power efficient until Alder Lake due to 
Rocket Lake being a back port and by than time Zen 4 will not be far 
behind.

I'm strictly a gamer and I do not do any real productivity work or multi-tasking so I know that the 12-core 5900X is overkill.

At
 first I considered the 6-core 5600X which is good for current games but
 I think that as times goes by, more games will take advantage of more 
cores, specially console ports since the new PS5 and Xbox Series X use 
8-cores.

I was going to then choose the 8-core 
5800X which is more than great for current and future games but all 
things being equal, I think that game optimization for console hardware 
is overcome by PCs via brute force alone. 

From
 what I have read, because developers optimize for consoles, these have 
an advantage when similar specs are compared between consoles and PCs. 
Which is one of the reasons why we always heard of bad console to PC 
ports but when do we ever hear about bad PC to console ports?

Therefore,
 superior PC hardware when compared to console hardware must be chosen 
so that PC can overcome these console optimization via brute force 
alone.

Also, my thinking is that sure a 5800X 
can in the future, use all 8-cores in a game optimize for it but what 
about all those background tasks that Windows run? Wouldn't I want a few
 more cores for those tasks too?

After all, it is too much of a hassle to quit every background task and system tray icon every time I play a game.

But
 the main reason why I chose the 5900X is because considering that I 
keep my PCs around in some form or another for at least a decade, I do 
not want to regret not having 12-cores later in the future. 

Yes,
 I know that I can upgrade the CPU later but not in this case because 
AMD's AM4 socket has reached end of life with the Zen 3 so there is no 
upgrade path for me. 

Even if there was an 
upgrade path though with the upcoming AM5 socket, I have never and I 
will never upgrade a CPU as I do not have the skill set to do so nor the
 time to be without a PC and have some else do it for me. 

Motherboard: ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi) (AMD X570 Chipset) (Up to 3x PCI-E Devices)
Frankly,
 the only reason why I chose this particular motherboard is because 
Tom's Hardware recommended it as their choice for Best High-End X570 
board.

I almost went with the new version, the 
Asus ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero and I have had DS special order 
motherboards for my builds before, but this new version is currently out
 of stock and it would have meant waiting a couple of months and it 
offers little practical difference from the current version other than 
passive cooling.

System Memory: G- Skill Trident Z Neo DDR4-3600 C16 2x16GB (F4-3600C16D-32GTZN)
I
 had DS special order this kit for me. It it not only very well reviewed
 but the main reason is that the Ryzen architecture is quite receptive 
to faster and better RAM which is one of the reasons why some reviews 
comparing AMD's Zen 3 to Intel's 10th Gen show Zen only faster by only 
2% when testing with lower rated RAM while other reviewers show Zen 
being faster than that when tested with higher rated RAM. The Intel 
systems on the other hand do not seem to show quiet as much difference 
performance wise as AMD when tested with different rated RAM.

Having
 said that, I do wish that DS had the option of RAM faster than 3200Mhz 
as 3600Mhz CL16 is the sweet spot for Ryzen systems. This is one of the 
reasons why I considered the other two boutique PC builders because they
 do offer faster RAM without special ordering it. 

I
 almost considered waiting for PCIE 5.0 and DD5 RAM but it would not be 
until 2022 when it gets down to the desktop market and it will be 
expensive at the beginning and at first, the performance of the first 
batch will not be any faster than the performance of DD4's fastest batch
 and lastly because it it will take a couple of years to iron out all 
the kinks and by then, AMD's Zen 5 and Intel's Meteor Lake will have 
come out. 

Power Supply: 1200W Silverstone / EVGA / Thermaltake (Modular) (80 Plus Gold)
Yes,
 I know. Total overkill. Honestly, the only reason why I went with the 
1200W option is because it is modular while the 1000W option is listed 
as being semi-modular and while the 850W option is also modular, its 
MTBF is rated as 100,000 hours and 80 Plus Gold certified while the 
1200W has an MTBF of >100,000 hours and although the title lists it 
as being 80 Plus Gold certified, when you click on its spec tab, it says
 that it is 80 Plus Platinum certified. Peace of mind to me is worth the
 $195 difference spread over 10 years between the 850W and the 1200W.

Storage Set 1: 1x SSD M.2 (1TB Samsung 980 PRO) (NVM Express)
Boot
 driver of course. It is the fastest option right now and surprisingly 
affordable. I just wish that Samsung had already released the 2TB 
version.

Of course I don't need that much space for the OS drive but I choose the
 1TB Samsung 980 Pro because it has almost twice the Peak Random Read 
& Write and Sequential Write speed than the 250GB version. 

Storage Set 2: 1x SSD M.2 (4TB Sabrent Rocket Q4) (NVM Express)
This
 will be my drive for games. My current game drive contains my entire 
Steam/Epic/Origin/GoG library and it is enormous at over 2TB so yes, I 
do need the space. I realize that games do not need nor benefit much 
from NVME and a SATA SSD for games would suffice but...is there so why 
not use it.

Yes, I do realize that having two 
M.2 drives might limit bandwidth on both under certain conditions but 
the ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi) (AMD X570) motherboard has one 
M.2 slot drawing PCI-E 4.0 lanes from the Chipset side of the fence 
while the other M.2 slot draws PCI-E 4.0 lanes from the CPU side of the 
fence so no worries.

Yes, I do realize that I 
could get it much cheaper on my own but for reasons regarding the air 
cooler that I chose and that I will get to later in that section, I 
needed this drive to be installed by DS.

Storage Set 3: 1x SSD (4TB Samsung 860 EVO)
 This will be for my personal data of which I have almost 3TB worth of pictures, comics, music, videos, & docs. 
Yes,
 I do realize that I could have gotten this drive much cheaper on my own
 but I had already not only made a couple of special order requests but 
had also changed my initial build after I pulled the trigger and got to 
Stage One so I felt guilty about giving DS so much hassle with my 
ambivalence and buying this from DS was my way to thank them for their 
patience with me.

Graphics Card(s): 1x Radeon RX 6800 XT 16GB (VR Ready)
It
 was either this one or the Nvidia 3080. The 3080 is 6%-7% faster but I 
really can't tell the difference between 141fps and 150fps.

Yes,
 Nvidia's Ray Tracking is currently superior to AMD's but it still 
limits performance too much for my taste, is only in a couple of games 
that I am interested in and even then, I really can't see much 
difference with it on. 

Personally, I think
 that we need two more generations for Ray Tracing to be prevalent 
enough with little performance loss and noticeable enough difference for
 it to be worth it.

DLSS was the biggest draw 
though. I see this as the main reason to choose Nvidia. Having said 
that, I want to game at 1440p/120 not 4K so DLSS is not of much benefit 
to me in that scenario while DLSS is only an option in only a few games 
that I am interested in.

Also, because AMD's 
Super Resolution version of DLSS is open source and in the PS5 and 
current Xbox and Microsoft is going to push it, it will have better 
support in the long run from game developers who gravitate to the most 
common denominator rather than something more proprietary like DLSS. 
Look what happened between GSync and FreeSync for example.

AMD does have Smart Access Memory but Nvidia will have its version of it soon too.

Ultimately
 though, it was the 6800XT's 16GB of VRAM that sealed it for me. I use 
an obscene amount of graphical mods in many of my games and those 16GB 
of VRAM makes my mouth water.

Having said that,
 since I'm in no hurry, I'm halfway hoping that DS will not get stock of
 the CPU and GPU to fulfill my order until January when the Nvidia 3080 
TI with 20GB of VRAM is released so I can ask DS for that one instead.

That card will be the killer choice until Hopper and RDNA3 come out in a couple of years.

Extreme Cooling: Noctua NH-U14S Premium CPU Cooler with NF-A15 140mm Fan (Brown)
This
 was the biggest hurdle. I simply do not care about any and all possible
 argument in favor of an AIO. Comparing the two, GamersNexus, 
HardwareUnboxed or LunusTechTips conceded that a great air cooler is 
competitive temperature wise to a good AIO. It can also run quieter than
 an AIO by lowering the fan speed, good luck with lowering the fan speed
 of an AIO.

I do not plan to overclock (Ryzen 
seems to loose single-thread performance if you overclock it) and I will
 use the rig in an air conditioned room so temperatures are not a 
concern for me.

The biggest reason for me to 
choose an air cooler over an AIO though is reliability, longevity and 
maintenance. Steve at GamersNexus said that AIO manufacturers had told 
him privately that a good AIO would last an average of 5-6 years. I 
still have 10 year old PCs around so that's not reassuring to me. 

Sure,
 I can replace the AIO when the pump fails if and when I eventually 
notice that it has failed and yes, it will fail eventually but I should 
rather say that I could pay someone else to do it for me since I do not 
have the technical expertise to do it on my own but then, why would I go
 to all that hassle when I can simple have an air cooler and never have 
to worry about it as at most, the only point of failure to an air cooler
 is the fan which on the other hand, I can replace on my own.

Since
 I pass along my computers down to family members whenever I get a new 
one, I need my PCs to last at least 10 years without any maintenance or 
hassle other than upgrading the video card or SSD down the road.

 If an AIO can 100% promise me that it will not fail nor need any 
maintenance for 10 years then I would be willing to consider it but 
otherwise, I'm sticking to air coolers.

So an 
air cooler is a deal breaker for me and DS willingness to accommodate me
 in regards to my requirement for an air cooler was another reason why I
 chose DS rather than the other two boutique PC builders.

Of
 course DS, like most if not all PC builders discourages air coolers but
 the real reason is not because of throttling, as a good air cooler like
 the Noctuas will not throttle even Threadrippers but because of damage 
in transit which cause RMAs and customer dissatisfaction.

When
 I expressed my desire for a quality air cooler, DS recommended me the 
Be Quite! Dark Rock Pro 4 or the Noctua NH-U14S. I chose the Noctua 
because of the brand of course and because it is a single tower and fan 
cooler as opposed to a double tower and fan cooler.

I
 currently have the double tower and fan Noctua NH-D15 in two of my PCs 
blocking the RAM slots and I cannot bother going to the hassle of having
 someone remove it for me so I can upgrade the RAM. Single tower and fan
 coolers from Noctua cool quite well and I can still upgrade the RAM in 
the future.

So I went with the Noctua NH-U14S 
but then a few days later, I noticed that its width would most likely 
block easy access to the M.2 slot situated between the primary PCI-E 
slot and the CPU socket in the Asus motherboard.

I
 contacted DS and requested the smaller Noctua NH-U12S instead, 
specially the Chroma.Black version of it that looks badass which would 
allow me easier access to the M.2 slot in question but the Noctua 
NH-U14S had already shipped and couldn't be returned.

I
 didn't care and was willing to pay for both since I want what I want 
but unfortunately, both the regular ugly Noctua NH-U12S brown and its 
better looking Chroma.Black version sibling were either out of stock or 
being sold by third-party vendors at both Amazon and Newegg.

DS
 told me that they only special order from first party Amazon or Newegg 
but that I could order the Noctua NH-U12S on my own and have it shipped 
to DS and they would install it for me.

The 
Noctua NH-U12S was coming from overseas with an ETA of middle to late 
December and since I'm still waiting for both the CPU and GPU to fulfill
 my order and I'm in no hurry, I was tempted to wait but by this point, I
 actually felt sorry for all the changes that I had made to my build and
 how I had made DS go back and forth so I decided to stick to my 
original option of the Noctua NH-U14S.

This did
 require me to have DS install the 4TB Sabrent Rocket Q4 NVME for me 
though rather than me getting it on my own for a lesser price because 
the Noctua NH-U14S would most likely end up blocking that M.2 slot.

Cable Management: Exotic Cable Management - Red - (Cable Combs with Custom Color Sleeved Extension Cables)
Pretty cables.

Chassis Fans: Corsair LL Series (RGB Fans) (Software Controlled Effects)
Pretty lights.

Internal Lighting: Remote Controlled Advanced LED Lighting System (Multiple RGB Color Modes)
More pretty lights.

Airflow Control: Corsair Commander PRO Management Control Board & Software (1x Board)
I think the Corsair is better than the default DS one and I'm curious to see how DS will route all those damn cables.

OS Boost: - No Thanks, Please do not tweak the services on the operating system
DS should really specify which services they disable.

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Professional (64-Bit Edition)
Honestly,
 the other reason why I choose the Pro version is because you can delay 
updates and I know that someday when I get a new PC again years from 
now, I will pass this PC to my office so I will need Remote 
Desktop/Group Policy.

Recovery Tools: USB Drive - Windows 10 Installation (Format and Clean Install)
I like the peace of mind that if something goes wrong, I can always nuke everything and start from scratch.

Priority Build: - No Thanks, Ship Within 15-20 Business Days After Order Is Successfully Processed
Why in the world would I want to rush this? Is like having a baby. It needs time to cook properly.

Warranty: Life-time Expert Care with 3 Year Limited Warranty (3 Year Labor & 1 Year Part Replacement) 
I
 very much considered extending the warranty two more years just for the
 peace of mind but like I said, six DS PCs and never had an issue so I 
stuck with the regular warranty.

Freight:
As
 I had mentioned before, I live about 90 minutes from where DS is 
located. I actually drove to their old place in Fremont to pick up my 
first PC from them back in 2010. Their new location in Gilroy is further
 away from me but still doable. My plan was to drive to them again this 
time but there was no option for doing so during check out, probably 
because of COVID. 

On the other hand, I'm 
glad that they have a freight option for security in transit purposes, 
specially considering that I chose the air cooler option.

---

Well
 that's it, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. If you have read 
this far, thank you for your attention. Thank you to the community and 
to DS for 10 years of great service. Here's hoping for another 10 years.

Everyone be safe out there. 

My 10 year DS Journey & Why I Chose DS for 7th PC.

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