My DS Review Order 15545

My original budget was around $1500.00 but once I got on the DS site I couldn't help myself. I felt like a kid in a candy shop. My total bill for this system was $2064.00 plus $65.00 for shipping. I keep second guessing myself on the build especially after seeing some of the monsters that are being built on the DS website. But... my only real regret is that I didn't put a 1000 watt psu in the box but the bucks simply ran out. If I want to sli the GTX 580 I'll just have to put in another Corsair later on.

So let's talk about the machine. From a subjective viewpoint, I've been playing Crysis to test it out. I've maxed out all the settings at a 1920x1080 resolution. The grass looks so real that I feel like I have to pull the ticks off of me when I stop crawling in it. The water is unbelievable. I've got a towel next to me to dry off when I reach land. The dust is so thick from that exploding mountain I wear a mask on my face when I'm playing. And of course the snow is so real I have to wear gloves to play. You get the point, the visuals are amazing. With the settings maxed out the highest temp I've reached so far is 71 degrees C with the fan running at 53% (GPU-Z told me that - thanks DST4ME). When I'm not playing she idles around 37 degrees C with the fan running at 40%.

When you buy an EVGA GPU you can get a free download of 3DMark 11 Advanced after you register your card. So I ran it after I downloaded the program just to see what I got. I ran it at the three levels they offer, E, P and X. E means Entry, P means Performance and X means Extreme.

So do I know what this means? No, I don't but I'm glad it beat their benchmark. They also said my computer is running good. But I knew that.

Now the bad news. I took the machine out of the box and hooked it up, turned it on and nada. The monitor wasn't receiving a signal. I thought oh $--t and kicked the dog. I called customer service and talked to Cassandra. She said she would have a tech rep get back to me right away. Within 15 minutes Robert returned my call and we spent the next two hours taking the thing apart trying to figure out what was wrong. It was past quitting time for Robert when we finally gave up. He gave me some instructions on what to continuing doing after he left but nothing worked. Robert said that it appeared to be either the mobo or the gpu but the only way to find out was to bring her back. Nuts!! The next morning Robert called and he set up an RMA over the phone. FedEx picked it up the next day on 4/1/11 and back she went.

The whole RMA process wasn't bad but a couple of things could be improved. First, I went on DS's site to see if I could find out anything about the process but all I found was the RMA form. I then searched the forums but I couldn't find out how the process worked or what to expect. I would recommend that DS put a little RMA section together on the site that explains what happens during this process. It would certainly ease some of the anxiety people feel when going thru this. If the site is already there I guess I missed it.

Next, it took a week to get it to DS and then it sat there for a week and I hadn't heard anything. I contacted Alex who got right on it and I got a stage 1 notice the next day saying they have it. A week goes by and nothing and then the next week I finally get stage 2 thru 5 notices. Now during this time I was communicating with Robert so it wasn't a total black hole regarding what was going on. The communications were mostly about upgrades I wanted to do to the system. Not much regarding the actual RMA.

Lastly, I was never given the official notice on what went wrong. My assumption was the mobo was bad not the gpu. Or am I wrong?

So that was the bad and the primary reason for the 8 rating. I know $--t happens I just don't want it to happen to me, LOL!! On the good side of the process, I pretty much rebuilt my whole computer. I guess that was better for DS than me because I totally blew my budget but as they say, you only live once. While in the shop for the RMA I changed the mobo from a P8P67 regular to a P8P67 Deluxe, I changed the psu to a Corsair TX 750, I changed the gpu from a GTX 750 to an EVGA GTX 580 and I added five sexy red fans to the box. My only regret that I mentioned in the first section above was that I didn't change the psu to a 1000 watts. Oh well.

Here you have the good folks at DS and all the people on the forums. First the DS crew. The primary source of communication with them was thru emails. I know I had well over 100 thru the whole process. In addition, I had numerous phone calls especially during the RMA event. Specifically, I was in contact with Alex, Cassandra, Chris, Craig and Robert. If I missed anyone my apologies. Alex, Cassandra and Robert were the ones I had most of the contact with, Robert especially. He's the one who worked with me thru the RMA process and my rebuild. I would like to say that they all worked with me to deal with my issues and leftfieldisms to get my system built and repaired. All of them were very professional, sympathetic when required and focused on getting me the right system. Thanks.

The DS forum is probably one of the best around. The information you can pick up on it is second to none. I certainly learned a lot from it and continue to do so. Guys like DST4ME, maxyme and Riceeater were particularily helpful to me as were a ton of others whose names I've spaced out. Thanks all.

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