Building A Liquid-Cooled MicroATX Gaming Monster

[g-unit1111]

[citation][nom]mjmjpfaff[/nom]300$ for ram. man what a waste. get some 1866mhz ram and call it a day all any application needs if you wanted to get more preformance out of productivity get 16gb's. .[/citation]

I don't think that price for RAM is right - I've looked at that same RAM on Newegg before and it only runs like $65 for 8GB, maybe $120 for 16GB.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]g-unit1111[/nom]I don't think that price for RAM is right - I've looked at that same RAM on Newegg before and it only runs like $65 for 8GB, maybe $120 for 16GB.[/citation]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231437&Tpk=DDR3-2200

 

[ap90033]

Can this go to sleep? Can it play a game and record via media center at the same time without issue? Will this kill your power bill? What good is a bazillion GHZ Gaming rig if you cant afford to turn it on? What good is a rig like this if it can ONLY do one thing, gaming. I use my PC for Recording HD Shows Over the Air, Gaming, Movies, Internet, Work, Email, Music etc and it NEVER is turned off. I had it running 3.8 GHZ (its a I7 920) but decided to put it back down to stock and find out what I could overclock it to AND use POWER SAVING FEATURES without sacrificing stability....

 

[mjmjpfaff]

I don't think that price for RAM is right - I've looked at that same RAM on Newegg before and it only runs like $65 for 8GB, maybe $120 for 16GB.

its real and a little ridiculous to be sincere since 16gb's of 1600mhz cl9 ram should handle anything you throw at it

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231437&Tpk=DDR3-2200

Exactly what's the point of 2200 RAM in a gaming rig other than wasting the budget?

 

[mjmjpfaff]

Exactly what's the point of 2200 RAM in a gaming rig other than wasting the budget?

money to burn?

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]amk-aka-phantom[/nom]Exactly what's the point of 2200 RAM in a gaming rig other than wasting the budget?[/citation]It's in the article. It's in the thread. The memory was already here so why not use it?

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

It's in the article. It's in the thread. The memory was already here so why not use it?

Yes, I've seen that the RAM was already there. But why would you include such an expensive part in the budget? There's no point to that RAM other than artificially increasing the budget and the people who will use this build as an example might get confused. That extra $240 could have been used to maybe get more RAM in there (16?) or a Lian Li cabinet... unleash your imagination Any of these would be more useful than the 2200 RAM.

Not flaming the build - it's actually great. Just wondering why waste the budget.

 

[Crashman]

Yes, I've seen that the RAM was already there. But why would you include such an expensive part in the budget? There's no point to that RAM other than artificially increasing the budget and the people who will use this build as an example might get confused. That extra $240 could have been used to maybe get more RAM in there (16?) or a Lian Li cabinet... unleash your imagination Any of these would be more useful than the 2200 RAM.

Not flaming the build - it's actually great. Just wondering why waste the budget.

Just going for max O/C. Wanted to push all the other parts to the limit without having anyone question a memory limitation.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

Just going for max O/C. Wanted to push all the other parts to the limit without having anyone question a memory limitation.

Ah yes, OC enthusiasts Push the hardware to the limit... not my thing. Thanks for the explanation, though! Such RAM will indeed eliminate all OC doubts - it's the fastest there is, but as you see, it raised a lot of other questions

 

[mjmjpfaff]

Just going for max O/C. Wanted to push all the other parts to the limit without having anyone question a memory limitation.

with ddr3 memory pretty much all of those limitations were eliminated. stopping the need for oc'ing memory. and you didnt push the processor to 5ghz so im sure 1600mhz ddr3 ram would not bottleneck it

 

[Crashman]

with ddr3 memory pretty much all of those limitations were eliminated. stopping the need for oc'ing memory. and you didnt push the processor to 5ghz so im sure 1600mhz ddr3 ram would not bottleneck it

Please quit trying to make sense in a world of nonsense response posts I should have said "perceived limitations" because half of the article was about perception. The old PSU was used to disprove some negative comments, while the high-end RAM was used to remove the same.

 

[RedJaron]

895w power consumption. wow i thought the psu was 850w. that means that baby isnt running at silver or maybe even bronze.

No, you read it backwards. The system is drawing 895W from the wall. An 80 Silver rating means the PSU is at least 88% efficient at 50% load, 85% at 100% load. Even assuming the PSU is at 100% load, which this one isn't, that means that 85% of the 895W, or 760W, is actually delivered to the computer ( Crash said as much on page 2. ) PSU wattage ratings are for what they can deliver, not the limit of what they can pull.

wow a 256gb ssd. now why would you need a momentus if you have that much space on the ssd. the hdd would really be a storage drive and we all know they dont need to be fast.

256GB is only a storage drive if you're very selective of what files you put on it. After Win7 64, StarCraft II, LotRO, Mass Effect, and a few other system apps and utilities, my 128GB M4 only has 40GB left. Would you consider 170 GB enough to store everything? Perhaps it's enough for more casual users, but what casual user wants or needs an SSD? Sure, your average user's collection of Word and Excel docs rarely amounts to even a gig. But power users and gaming enthusiasts store content like massive music libraries, picture galleries, digital video archives, optical disc images, file downloads ( game patches, demos, utilities, etc, ) and much more. My photo RAW files alone account for over 200GB. At the very least, a HDD can be used as a full backup data dump for the SSD.

 

[mjmjpfaff]

Please quit trying to make sense in a world of nonsense response posts I should have said "perceived limitations" because half of the article was about perception. The old PSU was used to disprove some negative comments, while the high-end RAM was used to remove the same.

i dont know how to respond. sorry?

 

[mjmjpfaff]

No, you read it backwards. The system is drawing 895W from the wall. An 80 Silver rating means the PSU is at least 88% efficient at 50% load, 85% at 100% load. Even assuming the PSU is at 100% load, which this one isn't, that means that 85% of the 895W, or 760W, is actually delivered to the computer ( Crash said as much on page 2. ) PSU wattage ratings are for what they can deliver, not the limit of what they can pull.

256GB is only a storage drive if you're very selective of what files you put on it. After Win7 64, StarCraft II, LotRO, Mass Effect, and a few other system apps and utilities, my 128GB M4 only has 40GB left. Would you consider 170 GB enough to store everything? Perhaps it's enough for more casual users, but what casual user wants or needs an SSD? Sure, your average user's collection of Word and Excel docs rarely amounts to even a gig. But power users and gaming enthusiasts store content like massive music libraries, picture galleries, digital video archives, optical disc images, file downloads ( game patches, demos, utilities, etc, ) and much more. My photo RAW files alone account for over 200GB. At the very least, a HDD can be used as a full backup data dump for the SSD.

i understand that the psu can go over 850w but past 100% load it's efficieny drops. i was saying it is probably running at bronze efficiency not silver.

looked over the build again i thought it was the momentus xt. nevermind that comment

 

[RedJaron]

i understand that the psu can go over 850w but past 100% load it's efficieny drops. i was saying it is probably running at bronze efficiency not silver.

First, this PSU wasn't past 100% load. It was only at 89% load. Second, the 80 Plus ratings aren't completely flat. While an 80 Plus rating means the PSU will be at least 80% efficient on any load, everything higher has a curve to it. A Bronze must be at least 85% efficient at 50% load, but only 82% efficient at 100% load. A Silver will be at least 88% and 85% efficient, respectively. ( Full table here. ) So a Bronze will always be at Bronze efficiency and etc for the rest of the ratings.

In this case, the PSU was at 89% load and 86% efficient, which is a higher rating than required anywhere for a Bronze.

 

[Crashman]

i dont know how to respond. sorry?

I was just trying to say that some of the hardware was picked to negate nonsense responses (RAM), other hardware was picked to disprove nonsense responses (PSU).

What you said about memory cost makes sense, but the use of lower-cost memory would have left this article open to nonsense responses about overclocking limits and performance caps.

 

[Crashman]

i understand that the psu can go over 850w but past 100% load it's efficieny drops. i was saying it is probably running at bronze efficiency not silver.

looked over the build again i thought it was the momentus xt. nevermind that comment

You're looking at input power. Power supplies are rated at output power. If you look at the two power tests (the original and the one at the bottom of the conclusion) you'll find that the rest of the system is actually drawing around 768W from each power supply.

Input power - loss to conversion = output power. Efficiency is calculated as output power / input power. Therefore, Input power x efficiency = output power.

 

[mjmjpfaff]

You're looking at input power. Power supplies are rated at output power. If you look at the two power tests (the original and the one at the bottom of the conclusion) you'll find that the rest of the system is actually drawing around 768W from each power supply.

Input power - loss to conversion = output power. Efficiency is calculated as output power / input power. Therefore, Input power x efficiency = output power.

alright i get it now. thanks for the info

 

[mjmjpfaff]

what about two of those just gpu cooled 580's and a regular air cooler maybe something like the scythe mugen 3. it should save some money and go with 55$ ram a single 1tb samsung f3, a dvd burner (20$). a new asrock z68 extreme3 gen3 mobo. and a 128gb crucial m4. that should be close to 2k

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]mjmjpfaff[/nom]what about two of those just gpu cooled 580's and a regular air cooler maybe something like the scythe mugen 3. it should save some money and go with 55$ ram a single 1tb samsung f3, a dvd burner (20$). a new asrock z68 extreme3 gen3 mobo. and a 128gb crucial m4. that should be close to 2k[/citation]That sounds interesting for a full-sized build.

 

[nukemaster]

Assuming the same amount of current per PWM phase, the Maximus IV Gene-Z’s twelve-phase regulator would surely outpace that of the seven-phase product we had problems with in the SBM. As an advanced overclocking model, we’re actually counting on the Maximus IV Gene to have better-quality parts on each of its twelve phases.

I assume you mean the boards 8 phase power system(well at least for the cpu it self).
Extreme Engine Digi+ :
- 8 -phase CPU power design + 4 -phase iGPU power design
- 2 -phase Memory power design

Either way it is a good board

 

[RedJaron]

what about two of those just gpu cooled 580's and a regular air cooler maybe something like the scythe mugen 3. it should save some money and go with 55$ ram a single 1tb samsung f3, a dvd burner (20$). a new asrock z68 extreme3 gen3 mobo. and a 128gb crucial m4. that should be close to 2k

Very similar to my last build, granted I didn't put near as much $$$ into the GPU and went with a Hitachi instead of the Samsung.

 

[youssef 2010]

there's a typo in almost every chart, as this is a $2625 PC and not $2000 PC. These $625 can be more than some gamers pay for their whole system.

 

[mjmjpfaff]

That sounds interesting for a full-sized build.

oops i forgot about the motherboard. in that case keep with the asus motherboard. and by the way the scythe mugen 3 should fit into that case.