Built my new PC today

N

Neo

New member
Okay so I've got all the parts for my PC upgrade during the week and I've spent some time trying to get everything up and running properly.

My new systems specs are:

Intel 980X CPU (stock speeds at the moment until I get everything stable)
Asus Rampge 3 Extreme Motherboard
6GB Kingston HyperX DDR3 2000MHz RAM
2x GTX280 in SLi
1x 9800GT dedicated PhysX
Soundblaster X-Fi Fatal1ty platinum edition
2x 320GB Western Digital Raptors in Raid0
1x 500GB storage drive and another 1.5TB storage drive
2x LG DVD writers
CoolerMaster Cosmos ATX case
Antec 1000Watt TruePower Quatro (Audi??) PSU
Microsoft Reclusa Keyboard
Razer Mamba Mouse
Logitech Z5500 Digital 5.1 speakers
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit
....
And my pretty monitor: Dell U2711 27" LCD :)

I'll post screenies as soon as I'm happy with everything. At the moment it's a bit of a mission to get this thing stable. 6Core CPU territory is a bit new for me and the power requirements of this machine is rather insane.

I can say with 100% honesty that this was the most stressfull PC build I've ever had. The components are FLIPPEN expensive and knowing that one mistake can kill any of them was really nerve-wrecking.
 
Strategist01 said:
Very Nice! BTW, why do you need 6 cores?
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Hehe, I was waiting for someone to say that. Remember when everyone had dual core CPU's and early adopters of Quad-Core CPU's were being ripped off by others saying that it's totally wasted and it will never be needed? Well, those people had a point, for 6 months. So this time I'm future proofing myself for at least a year.

So yeah, 6 cores are overkill for now. But I can promise you now that it will change very quickly :)

Anyways...I'm going to run a 24 hour burn-in now and leave the machine on to see if it remains stable. I cannot seem to run 3DMark Vantage without the machine going into some sort of hang-state. I've downloaded the latest update for it as well but it doesn't help. I did run a few benchmark runs of Batman: Arkham Asylum and it worked fine showing a 35% increase over what I had with my dual core E8500 @ 4.11GHz. I'd like to see what happens when I start pushing this CPU to 4GHz hehehe.

When I could run a Vantage test I managed to score P25,000 with a CPU score of almost 50,000 - obviously that's with PhysX enabled.

So far this is a monster of a PC and even my ageing GTX280s have somehow found new life in them :D
 
Neo said:
Hehe, I was waiting for someone to say that. Remember when everyone had dual core CPU's and early adopters of Quad-Core CPU's were being ripped off by others saying that it's totally wasted and it will never be needed? Well, those people had a point, for 6 months. So this time I'm future proofing myself for at least a year.

So yeah, 6 cores are overkill for now. But I can promise you now that it will change very quickly :)

Anyways...I'm going to run a 24 hour burn-in now and leave the machine on to see if it remains stable. I cannot seem to run 3DMark Vantage without the machine going into some sort of hang-state. I've downloaded the latest update for it as well but it doesn't help. I did run a few benchmark runs of Batman: Arkham Asylum and it worked fine showing a 35% increase over what I had with my dual core E8500 @ 4.11GHz. I'd like to see what happens when I start pushing this CPU to 4GHz hehehe.

When I could run a Vantage test I managed to score P25,000 with a CPU score of almost 50,000 - obviously that's with PhysX enabled.

So far this is a monster of a PC and even my ageing GTX280s have somehow found new life in them :D
Click to expand...

Ah. Ok. I imagine your PC must get very toasty and warm, LOL.
 
Strategist01 said:
Ah. Ok. I imagine your PC must get very toasty and warm, LOL.
Click to expand...

No it's running very nicely. The CoolerMaster case is the best case I'v ever seen in terms of cooling. My CPU is running at a normal temp of 40 Degrees Celcius which is fine for the CPU and our current weather conditions :)

The only thing that I don't like about this motherboard is the PCI-E slot spacing. Due to the fact that I have a PCI soundcard I am forced to pair my 2 GTX280's RIGHT next to each other, making for very poor airflow between the cards. Luckily they seem to cope as that's they way they'd be sitting in a Tri-SLI config anyways. Still - I'd like SOME space between them *sigh*

It's true what they say - no motherboard is perfect - but this one is pretty close :D
 
So here is what went OUT of my PC:

IMAG0009.jpg


And this is what went IN:

IMAG0007.jpg
 
Very nice Nigel.

But why the need to overclock? That thing is already so freaking powerful, why bother? When do they gfx cards get replaced?
 
DenSweeP said:
Very nice Nigel.

But why the need to overclock? That thing is already so freaking powerful, why bother? When do they gfx cards get replaced?
Click to expand...

Graphics cards will be replaced when there is a successor to the current GTX 480. I don't like the fact that the GTX 480's are so insanely power hungry and run so freaking hot. My GTX 280's already hit 70 - 80 degrees Celcius during gaming, so I don't want hot-plates (GTX 480's) just yet lol

The reason for overclocking is: My motherboard is THE motherboard for overclocking - it's what it was made to do. The 980X can handle an overclock easily up to 4.0GHz and at those speeds it's unstoppable.
 
DenSweeP said:
Very nice Nigel.

But why the need to overclock? That thing is already so freaking powerful, why bother? When do they gfx cards get replaced?
Click to expand...

It is just stupid to have something that is capable of 4ghz on stock volts and leave it and stock speeds. So either bump up the speed or drop the volts. People who just leave hardware running stock don't deserve their hardware :P
 
I overclocked the CPU to 3.6GHz last night. It's a very small overclock and the Intel Speedstep technology actually pushes CPU harder than that. Either way, I'll be installed a new CPU cooler on the CPU soon and hopefully that will help with the temps and give me some courage to push the 4.0GHz barrier.
 
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