Vanquish 3: One Year Later

Well, ever since my Vanquish 3 arrived last May, my consoles have mostly been collecting dust save for Netflix and Halo 5.

I will now finally concede to Digital Storm's choice of the fugly PNY GTX 970; the mini-DisplayPorts have allowed me to create a wonderful triple-screen setup, although I'm not gaming in surround, it's made multitasking a breeze.

And now, at the 11-month mark, I finally decided to be brave, and attempt some simple upgrades myself, something which I initially shied away from, which is what ultimately pushed me towards a DS purchase. The pure and simple fact that attempting upgrades yourself not voiding the warranty gave me the greatest comfort.

And now, the results:



I replaced the rear black exhaust fan, replaced the 8GB Adata RAM with 16GB of blue LED Crucial Ballistix, and added an 140mm intake directly below the 970, and two 140mm exhausts on top, thanks to advice from DS Technical Support and friends who are more tech savvy than I.



Adding these fans has decreased the 970's idle temp by six degrees, and what truly blew me away was under full load, it doesn't even come close to the 80* ceiling, averaging 72 degrees with Witcher 3 and Battlefront.

As I was researching the Vanquish 3's components to make sure I knew was I was doing, I unfortunately stumbled upon Newegg reviews for the Gigabyte Z97x, the Vanquish 3's motherboard, and saw that most of the 1-star reviews had something alarmingly in common; unexplained failure after one year. So as I head into month 12, I'm nervous as can be, but am confident that should the worst happen, Digital Storm's support that all their customers cannot stop raving about will come to the rescue.

DS, this is still a beautiful, amazing budget machine, even more so now that I've added just a bit of my own flare. Can't wait until I get enough saved up for the Velox (or Velox 2, perhaps?).

Edited by milesprower06 - 13 Apr 2016 at 1:22am

Congratulations on your system. Looks awesome.