my build and questionsPost Date: 2010-07-06 |
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dswany777 
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Joined: 06 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 51 |
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 Topic: my build and questionsPosted: 06 Jul 2010 at 12:52pm |
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Hi All,
Been viewing posts and researching...may finally bite the bullet and upgrade- blah blah same story. My build below but here are my comments and questions.
I currently dont have a monitor to support, but intend to game at 1920x1080. In general my budget limit is $2,500 but am flexible...I dont mind paying for something that lasts and I can build on/upgrade....I hate paying for stuff I dont need.
I think I'm sold on SSD...I understand you get some speed on booting up the OS? I like that...
probably will run i7 at 2.8...
Leaning towards one big vid card (480?) that I could add a second later. I suppose I should go heavy on the power supply now...
I really need help on cooling: I want a quiet system...but those liquid cooling options are pretty expensive. If I did go with it (I'll admit I like the look and wow factor), what components do I want cooled? Just CPU, GPU also? chipset? I'm lost. If no liquid than what combo of fans do I need and do I need any additional case mods over the standard hailstorm? I guess I'm asking which stage is best in your opinions.
Thanks for the comments!
Build I'm considering (w/out the 480)
Chassis Model: Special Deal Hot Seller - Black OPS HailStorm Edition
Exterior Finish: - Standard Factory Finish Trim Accents: - Standard Factory Finish Processor: Intel Core i7 930 2.8GHz (Quad Core) Motherboard: EVGA X58 LE Edition SLI (Intel X58 Chipset) (Supports SLI or CrossFire) System Memory: 6GB DDR3 1600MHz Digital Storm Certified Performance Series (Highly Recommended) (Hand Tested) Power Supply: 750W Digital Storm Certified (Dual SLI Compatible) (Silent Edition Recommended) Expansion Bay: - No Thanks Hard Drive Set 1: Operating System: 1x (64GB Solid State (By: Corsair Nova Series) (Model: CSSD-V64GB2-BRKT) Set 1 Raid Options: - No Thanks Hard Drive Set 2: Multimedia\Data: 1x (500GB Western Digital (16MB Cache) (7200 RPM) (SATA) Hard Drive Set 3: Backup\Misc.: - No Thanks Optical Drive 1: DVD-R/RW/CD-R/RW (DVD Writer 24x / CD-Writer 48x) Optical Drive 2: - No Thanks Internet Access: High Speed Network Port (Supports High-Speed Cable / DSL / Network Connections) Video Card: 1x ATI Radeon HD 5750 1GB Add-on Card: - No Thanks Sound Card: Integrated Motherboard Audio Extreme Cooling: H20: Stage 3: FrostChill Cooling System: CPU Only H20 Tube Color:White Tubing with High-Performance Fluid (UV Lighting Reactive) Chassis Airflow: Upgrade Chassis With LED Performance Fans (Blue) (Up to 6 Fans) Internal Lighting: Internal Chassis Lighting System (Blue) Enhancements: - No Thanks Chassis Mods: - No Thanks Noise Reduction: - No Thanks Boost Processor: FREE: Stage 1: Overclock the processor between 3.3GHz to 3.9GHz (Cooling Upgrade Recommended) Boost Video Card: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my video card(s) Boost Memory: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my memory Boost OS: - No Thanks, Please do not tweak the services on the operating system Windows OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium (64-Bit Edition) Restore Kit: Digital Storm Specialized Recovery System (DVD Image Based) Virus Protection: McAfee Internet Security (Includes: AntiVirus, FireWall and AntiSpyware) Office: - No Thanks Benchmarking: - No Thanks Install/Test Game: - No Thanks Display: - No Thanks Surge Shield: - No Thanks Speakers: - No Thanks Keyboard: - No Thanks Mouse: - No Thanks External Storage: - No Thanks Exclusive T-Shirt: - No Thanks Priority Build: - No Thanks, Ship Within 5-15 Business Days After Order Is Successfully Processed Warranty: Life-time Expert Customer Care with 1 Year Hassle-free Hardware Service |
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Dragoonseal
DS Veteran 
Joined: 03 Apr 2009 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2247 |
Quote Reply
Posted: 06 Jul 2010 at 1:52pm |
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I hope you meant you would probably run a 930 at 3.8GHz and not 2.8GHz.
A 3.8GHz is actually a pretty mild overclock for a Core i7, and with
even a decent air cooler will run plenty cool.
The Corsair Nova SSD has craptastic speed for its price, an Intel SSD has literately 8-10 times better small file read/write performance, which is where SSDs really shine and is the only area that they perform exceptionally better than normal HDDs at anyway, so hands down you want an Intel SSD over the Nova. They come in 40GB, 80GB, and 160GB flavors. You'll want primarily OS/apps on one, which even the 40GB has plenty of room for, but if you want room for games on it get the bigger 80GB or 160GB. Games do not benefit nearly as much from SSD speeds though so feel free to just install them on the conventional HDD, you won't be missing much. Why do you have such tiny underpowered video card selected? That poor little thing would choke itself to death trying to play games at a 1920x1080 resolution. A $2500 budget is plenty to get everything you need and then some, but you have to steer clear of the overpriced and waste of money case and water cooling selections. Water cooling is never a requirement, you don't need it unless you are trying to push extreme over the top overclocks. You'll want something more like this: Ticket #420378, Price: $2230 Chassis Model: Special Deal Hot Seller - Cooler Master HAF 932 Exterior Finish: - Standard Factory Finish Trim Accents: - Standard Factory Finish Processor: Intel Core i7 930 2.8GHz (Quad Core) Motherboard: EVGA X58 LE Edition SLI (Intel X58 Chipset) (Supports SLI or CrossFire) System Memory: 6GB DDR3 1600MHz Digital Storm Certified Performance Series (Highly Recommended) (Hand Tested) Power Supply: 750W Digital Storm Certified (Dual SLI Compatible) (Silent Edition Recommended) Expansion Bay: - No Thanks Hard Drive Set 1: Operating System: 1x (80GB Solid State (By: Intel) (Extreme Performance) (Model: X25-M MLC Edition) Set 1 Raid Options: - No Thanks Hard Drive Set 2: Multimedia\Data: 1x (1TB Seagate/Hitachi (7200 RPM) (32MB Cache) (SATA) (Extreme Speed) Hard Drive Set 3: Backup\Misc.: - No Thanks Optical Drive 1: DVD-R/RW/CD-R/RW (DVD Writer 24x / CD-Writer 48x) Optical Drive 2: - No Thanks Internet Access: High Speed Network Port (Supports High-Speed Cable / DSL / Network Connections) Video Card: 1x NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480 1.5GB (Includes PhysX Technology) Add-on Card: - No Thanks Sound Card: Integrated Motherboard Audio Extreme Cooling: AIR: Stage 2: Noctua NH-D14 Extreme Performance (Does NOT fit on the regular EVGA X58 3X SLI) H20 Tube Color:- Not Applicable, I do not have a FrostChill or Sub-Zero LCS Cooling System Selected Chassis Airflow: Standard Factory Chassis Fans Internal Lighting: Internal Chassis Lighting System (Red) Enhancements: - No Thanks Chassis Mods: - No Thanks Noise Reduction: - No Thanks Boost Processor: FREE: Stage 1: Overclock the processor between 3.3GHz to 3.9GHz (Cooling Upgrade Recommended) Boost Video Card: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my video card(s) Boost Memory: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my memory Boost OS: - No Thanks, Please do not tweak the services on the operating system Windows OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium (64-Bit Edition) Restore Kit: Digital Storm Specialized Recovery System (DVD Image Based) Virus Protection: - No Thanks Office: - No Thanks Benchmarking: - No Thanks Install/Test Game: FREE: Hot-selling game with a NVIDIA GeForce GTS 250 or above graphics card Display: - No Thanks Surge Shield: - No Thanks Speakers: - No Thanks Keyboard: - No Thanks Mouse: - No Thanks External Storage: - No Thanks Exclusive T-Shirt: FREE: Digital Storm T-Shirt - Black (Large) Priority Build: - No Thanks, Ship Within 5-15 Business Days After Order Is Successfully Processed Warranty: Life-time Expert Customer Care with 1 Year Hassle-free Hardware Service OS/apps on the SSD, room for a few games too. Then games/music/movies/pictures on the HDD. If you want future expandability for dual SLI 480s then select the larger 1200w or 1250w power supply. This will cost an additional +$170 or +$219. Also highly consider the 2 years or 3 years part warranties for +$99 or +$199, great deals for the money. |
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Lilim
Intel Core i7 920 @4.2GHz HAF 932 - Dual SLI Nvidia GTX 480s 3x Intel X25-M G2 (80GB) SSD RAID0 |
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dswany777
Newbie
Joined: 06 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 51 |
Quote Reply
Posted: 06 Jul 2010 at 2:06pm |
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Hey,
Thanks for the quick reply...
- yes I meant 3.8GHz
- Noted on the Intel SSD...I didn't know the Corsair was so bad. thanks for that.
- I wasn't going to acutally buy that card...I got impatient waiting for the email of the build i was working on, so i pulled that one down from last week. I'd probably get the 480, as mentioned.
- I also didn't have a 1200W power supply in that build, which i might get given i want a platform to add another GPU later.
so then i guess the last question remains on water cooling...am I really getting that much more quiet and wow factor vs. some good fans? What did you mean by waste of money case?
Thanks again all... |
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Dragoonseal
DS Veteran
Joined: 03 Apr 2009 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2247 |
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Posted: 06 Jul 2010 at 2:46pm |
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No problem, most don't. It's certainly not something they like to advertise. 
Not at all, the water cooling setups from DS are not actually very quite at all. They cool very well but to get a quiet setup you have to make a number of custom pump and fan selections which ramps up the price significantly over the already high cost. Air cooling is not loud by any means, I personally find it amazingly quiet but I guess that's a more subjective thing. I can tell you that the HAF 932 case fans and the Noctua NH-D14 CPU cooler fans are particularly quiet, even my conventional 7200RPM HDD is more annoyingly loud than the two of them put together.
The HailStorm (Corsair 800D) is ridiculously expensive. It's one of the larger cases and can accommodate LCing setups a bit better than some cases but it only has a pathetic 3x 140mm fans for air flow for the entire large case, along with that huge price tag. A HAF 932 is literately a third of the cost at a whooping $269 (!) less than the HailStorm from DS. It is fairly huge itself, almost the same size as the HailStorm, and has 3x 230mm and 1x 140mm fans for air flow. The air flow from those massive 230mm fans is not only unmatched but is amazingly quiet because they don't have to run at high RPMs to still move a ton of air, where as smaller fans have to all run at very high RPMs to do the same which gets loud fast. So the HailStorm is a waste of money. Sacrificing all that air flow and extra $269 is not at all worth the extra 15% or so space when a HAF is already unnecessarily large for most any setup. |
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Lilim
Intel Core i7 920 @4.2GHz HAF 932 - Dual SLI Nvidia GTX 480s 3x Intel X25-M G2 (80GB) SSD RAID0 |
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dswany777
Newbie
Joined: 06 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 51 |
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Posted: 06 Jul 2010 at 2:58pm |
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wow, great intel...thanks again. I guess I got some thinking to do. More of an internal struggle at the moment as to whether I want to fork over the cash for the coolness factor (what my gut and ego want) of liquid cool, or what my brain and wallet want for a nice basic air cool system.
Anyway, great feedback...so thanks.
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DST4ME
DS ELITE 
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 36758 |
Quote Reply
Posted: 06 Jul 2010 at 6:32pm |
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the build Dragoonseal has is great but I would change the psu to brand name for better quality and reliability.
there is also another issue, if you are going to want the ability to go sli then you gonna want the 1250w enermax. if you don't want go go sli in the future then you can drop the psu to corsair 750w and you can also go with the micro mobo, with one gpu, it still gives you 2 more pci lanes, and since in this senario, you are not going to go sli, then the micro mobo is best. as Dragoonseal mentioned, for air cooled system, the haf is much better choice, I have the 800D myself but that is only because I got LC on cpu/gpu, originally I was gonna go with haf myself, I love that case for its price vs performance/quality. |
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dswany777
Newbie
Joined: 06 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 51 |
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Posted: 07 Jul 2010 at 1:19pm |
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thanks again guys....
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DST4ME
DS ELITE
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 36758 |
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Posted: 07 Jul 2010 at 7:13pm |
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Our pleasure and good luck
 but Dragoonseal did all the work Edited by DST4ME - 07 Jul 2010 at 7:14pm |
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dswany777
Newbie
Joined: 06 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 51 |
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Posted: 08 Jul 2010 at 9:28am |
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Actually I did think of another question: Lets say I do go for the blowout system- start with one 480 and then add another later in SLI....
- if i chose liquid cooling what case and combo should i use? I assume CPU, GPU cooling?
- same question if air cool....what would your recommendations be- costs aside.
I really wavering, I feel like I should just bit the bullet and go full bore now, that way I shouldn't have to worry for years...I'd hate to want to upgrade in 2 years and find out my cooling is appropriate for a second card, etc.
Thanks again guys. |
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dswany777
Newbie
Joined: 06 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 51 |
Quote Reply
Posted: 08 Jul 2010 at 2:11pm |
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by the way, here is my most current build thinking...note I'd proably change the power supply to 1250 to accomodate an additional card, but otherwise i think this is it.....
Specifications:
Chassis Model: Special Deal Hot Seller - Cooler Master HAF 932 Exterior Finish: - Standard Factory Finish Trim Accents: - Standard Factory Finish Processor: Intel Core i7 930 2.8GHz (Quad Core) Motherboard: EVGA X58 LE Edition SLI (Intel X58 Chipset) (Supports SLI or CrossFire) System Memory: 6GB DDR3 1600MHz Digital Storm Certified Performance Series (Highly Recommended) (Hand Tested) Power Supply: 750W Digital Storm Certified (Dual SLI Compatible) (Silent Edition Recommended) Expansion Bay: - No Thanks Hard Drive Set 1: Operating System: 1x (40GB Solid State (By: Intel) (Extreme Performance) (Model: X-25V Edition) Set 1 Raid Options: - No Thanks Hard Drive Set 2: Multimedia\Data: 1x (500GB Western Digital (16MB Cache) (7200 RPM) (SATA) Hard Drive Set 3: Backup\Misc.: - No Thanks Optical Drive 1: DVD-R/RW/CD-R/RW (DVD Writer 24x / CD-Writer 48x) Optical Drive 2: - No Thanks Internet Access: High Speed Network Port (Supports High-Speed Cable / DSL / Network Connections) Video Card: 1x NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480 1.5GB (Includes PhysX Technology) Add-on Card: - No Thanks Sound Card: Integrated Motherboard Audio Extreme Cooling: AIR: Stage 2: Noctua NH-D14 Extreme Performance (Does NOT fit on the regular EVGA X58 3X SLI) H20 Tube Color:- Not Applicable, I do not have a FrostChill or Sub-Zero LCS Cooling System Selected Chassis Airflow: Upgrade Chassis With LED Performance Fans (Blue) (Up to 6 Fans) Internal Lighting: Internal Chassis Lighting System (Blue) Enhancements: - No Thanks Chassis Mods: - No Thanks Noise Reduction: - No Thanks Boost Processor: FREE: Stage 1: Overclock the processor between 3.3GHz to 3.9GHz (Cooling Upgrade Recommended) |
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Section9
Newbie
Joined: 03 Jul 2010 Online Status: Offline Posts: 33 |
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Posted: 08 Jul 2010 at 7:57pm |
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You said you were concerned about cooling, and wanted a quiet system. It looks like you've moved away from LC to the Noctua DH14 (I ordered the same thing), but you've selected to change out the case fans for performance fans with blue LEDs.
Consensus on the board seems to be that performance fans are generally not worth the upgrade on the HAF cases, and are louder. The 932 already comes with a big front 240mm fan with a red LED. There's supposed to be a 240mm blue one, but that may be a special order. As for the rest of the fans, the 932 has great air flow with huge fans that are quiet because they can run at lower RPMs. You may be better off leaving the case fans alone and just going with the blue case lighting. As always, YMMV.  |
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DST4ME
DS ELITE
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 36758 |
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Posted: 09 Jul 2010 at 9:26am |
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it all dependes. first you need to decide if you want to LC just the cpu or gpu also. second if you lc the gpu then you have to know what you are doing everytime you want to change or add another gpu, to change or add, you just get the gpu with the waterblock on it and then install it in the loop. if one wanted to LC cpu/gpu then a good case would be the hailstorm, mobo can be evga LE, ftw, 3x classified, for sli 480 psu should be the 1250w enermax. for air cooled, I would stay with haf, no fan upgrades cause they are loud, like I said before Dragoonseal's build is good if you change the psu to a brand name. |
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DST4ME
DS ELITE
Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 36758 |
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Posted: 09 Jul 2010 at 9:28am |
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for HDD1 you gonna want a bigger drive then 40GB. change psu to brand name, you said you were gonna do this anyways. drop upgraded fans. rest looks good |
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Dragoonseal
DS Veteran
Joined: 03 Apr 2009 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2247 |
Quote Reply
Posted: 09 Jul 2010 at 4:17pm |
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The 40GB Intel SSD is more than enough for just OS/apps. At 12GB for Win7 and 1-6GB for the page file you're looking at a good 20GB free for apps. But apps are usually tiny, every one of them together will rarely take up more than a few GB, and you are always free to install any abnormally large ones on the HDD anyway. Games/media are what take up massive space, so store those on the HDD.
Alex from the Digital Storm team says good things about DS's brand of PSUs (TechNPS), in that they are manufactured by the same companies that make PSUs for all the top PSU brands. So this is largely a matter of preference. |
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Lilim
Intel Core i7 920 @4.2GHz HAF 932 - Dual SLI Nvidia GTX 480s 3x Intel X25-M G2 (80GB) SSD RAID0 |
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