How bad is my cable management?

[Sturmgewehr_44]

Hi. I've been doing stuff in my PC recently. I installed a new graphics card a month ago (GTX 980) and reseated my cooler a bit over a week ago. I took some pictures of my setup, and what the cabling inside looks like.

Here: http://i.imgur.com/mBSyVeP.jpg

I know it is nothing fantastic. In fact, I quite dislike it. How bad is the management?

A lot of it comes from my Harddrives, which were mounted backwards, and as a result it caused a huge mess in the front (look at the drive cages, and you'll see).

This came to my attention because I want(ed) to better the temperatures of my CPU, during load. This reason is sort of obsolete to me now, but I think I might get another SSD soon. How bad is my overall condition, and how can I attempt to fix it?

I know of PCIE SSDs. They are more expensive and lower capacity from what I searched. How effective are these as opposed to traditional Sata3 (6Gb) SSDs? Are they slower/faster, or more reliable?

I have an i7-2700k so am on PCIE 2.0. Would this be a bottleneck problem? I know PCIE SSDs take up a lot more bandwidth allegedly than Graphics Cards do. My 2700k has 16 supported PCIE lanes. Could this be a problem? I currently have my 980 in 16x, and a wireless network adapter in I think a 4x lane.

My case is a CM Storm Enforcer. My specs are listed in my signature if anyone is curious.

 

[i7Baby]

Most of your cables should be run behind the mobo tray. That'll help.

 

[smackers_12]

As i7 said you run the cables behind the tray (not directly behind the board). WHy are your hard drives mounted that way in most cases you can mount them the other way also. Don't run your 8pin power cable across the mobo it looks bad and that case has a window. Pcie ssds are really expensive but they are faster than sata ones but probably not worth it for a consumer. lots of current pcie ssds are m.2 ssds in adaptors. What cooler are you running, there isnt one in that picture

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

Most of your cables should be run behind the mobo tray. That'll help.

A good amount of them are. A lot are tied behind the motherboard. How could I route more of them through? Is it overly difficult? I would prefer not to disconnect any PSU cables whilst doing so. Is that even possible?

If I were to get another Sata SSD, would finding a good place to mount it with velcro be okay?

 

[someguynamedmatt]

If your 4/8-pin CPU power cable isn't quite long enough to reach behind the motherboard tray, definitely buy a sleeved extension cable for it... that will help immensely. And cable ties are your friend.

Concerning SSD performance, I'll leave that up for someone else to answer - a PCIe SSD has the capability to be much faster than a SATA drive since it's interfaced directly with the PCIe bus, but aside from that I have no experience with them.

 

[i7Baby]

You re-route cables with the power not connected. Do one at a time.

Take the one from the top of your mobo (ATX 12V) and route it behind the mobo tray.

Turn all your HDDs around 180 degrees.

Look at photos of other PC interiors eg http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/off-topic/computers-science-technology/486355-is-this-a-good-700-pc

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

As i7 said you run the cables behind the tray (not directly behind the board). WHy are your hard drives mounted that way in most cases you can mount them the other way also. Don't run your 8pin power cable across the mobo it looks bad and that case has a window. Pcie ssds are really expensive but they are faster than sata ones but probably not worth it for a consumer. lots of current pcie ssds are m.2 ssds in adaptors. What cooler are you running, there isnt one in that picture

I was reapplying thermal paste when I took the picture, so the heatsink isn't present. If you look in the backround, you can see it lying around. It is a Hyper 212 Evo.

 

[smackers_12]

You will have to remove the power cables to reroute them but if you do it one by one you shouldn't have any trouble remembering where they go. Mounting an ssd with velcro is ok but its better to put it in a hard drive bay, they are not fussy on their orientation though so it should be ok. What cpu cooler do you use

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

You re-route cables with the power not connected. Do one at a time.

Take the one from the top of your mobo (ATX 12V) and route it behind the mobo tray.

Turn all your HDDs around 180 degrees.

Look at photos of other PC interiors eg http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/off-topic/computers-science-technology/486355-is-this-a-good-700-pc

How do I reroute all the cables though? I have to completely disconnect them?? What about the cables that are already tied on the back of the board? Those as well? How can I prevent forgetting where what cables go where?

I've been through worse, but still...

I hope it isn't as bad of an experience as reinstalling a clumsy 3lb heatsink.

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

You will have to remove the power cables to reroute them but if you do it one by one you shouldn't have any trouble remembering where they go. Mounting an ssd with velcro is ok but its better to put it in a hard drive bay, they are not fussy on their orientation though so it should be ok. What cpu cooler do you use

Do I remove each cable completely, or do I simply remove one end and reroute it?

Could I pay Microcentre or something to do it for me? I could do it, but idk. I've been through some pretty stressful stuff with my PC lately and I've had enough.

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

As i7 said you run the cables behind the tray (not directly behind the board). WHy are your hard drives mounted that way in most cases you can mount them the other way also. Don't run your 8pin power cable across the mobo it looks bad and that case has a window. Pcie ssds are really expensive but they are faster than sata ones but probably not worth it for a consumer. lots of current pcie ssds are m.2 ssds in adaptors. What cooler are you running, there isnt one in that picture

Wait. What tray? Don't I route through the cable cutouts that I located throughout the case?

Sorry if I'm illiterate in this matter. I had someone assist me greatly when I first built my PC (around three years ago) and he did all the cable management for me.

Is the management completely awful?

 

[smackers_12]

the motherboard tray is the part of the case with the cutouts in it that the motherboard attaches to. You just have to remove one end of the cable and reroute it. Its not worth paying someone to do it its not hard

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

the motherboard tray is the part of the case with the cutouts in it that the motherboard attaches to. You just have to remove one end of the cable and reroute it. Its not worth paying someone to do it its not hard

Yeah, you're probably right. I just had a bad experience with reseating my cooler so I'm kind of out of it. Is it easier than that?

What if a mass of cables are blocking all the cutouts?

Can the cables be taken out just like that? Would I need to reconfigure anything when I'm done?

 

[smackers_12]

Well its really not much different to plugging any power cable in, it goes in one socket one way.

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

Well its really not much different to plugging any power cable in, it goes in one socket one way.

Ok, I'll see if I can give it a try.

Kind of a bad question, but would reseating a awful and bulky cooler like the Hyper 212 Evo be more moderately hard than rerouting cables?

What is of a higher knowledge level?

 

[i7Baby]

Do one cable at a time.

Don't re-seat your cooler unless you have to.

 

[smackers_12]

Its definaltey easier than reseating a 212 evo its basically plugging things in

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

Ok, so I did some stuff today.

I managed to pretty much move all the HDD cables into the back. The rest of the cables I didn't move.

Also, I did notice one of the PSU cables seems to be used for nothing. It is connected into the PSU but the other connecting side is connected to nothing at all.

I can post some pictures of it (might be hard to see).

I tried to play around with the CPU connector. The thing here, is that I put a little bit of force on the connector (on the motherboard) and it doesn't budge. I'm afraid of damaging it if I pull too hard.

However, that is curently the least of my concerns. Apparently, part of the connector of my Seagate Barracuda (the part that secures the power into it's connector) fell off and I can't get it to work now.

I had around 200Gb on it. Is there anyway that I can fix it?

Pictures: http://i.imgur.com/qUoCuaG.jpg (after cleaning up a bit)

http://i.imgur.com/qcwt3os.jpg (the connector problem, notice how the squared section that holds it in is missing, it broke off).

If I can't fix this, should I just get a WD Black 2tb drive? Stuff like this is why many see Seagate as a poor company.

This is what the PSU harddrive power connector looks (not the other connector I was talking about). It fits well enough into the Barracuda, but nothing is securely holding it in place because of the broken piece I mentioned above: http://i.imgur.com/edtH5Fz.jpg

 

[i7Baby]

You'll probably have to replace the drive. Tape the connector in place to transfer the data to a new drive.

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

You'll probably have to replace the drive. Tape the connector in place to transfer the data to a new drive.

I don't think that will even work. Either way, I'm going with WD next time around, maybe a 3TB Black drive.

Anyway, I have worked on three of the really invasive cables. They are out of the way now. However, the CPU 8-Pin cable is too short to route effectively. I measured a bit, and it seems I need at least six more inches at the least. How big are some extensions? To be safe I would want a good quality, foot long one.

I noticed that there is a cable (could be two) that is hovering beside my USB 3.0 header. It seems to be attached to nothing. It is placed in the Sata/IDE marked section of my PSU, but as I said, both sides of it (it seems to be a split cable) are connected to nothing at all. Could this be an oversight, and I might not need it? I wish I knew more about it.

Is it possible it is used for Harddrive LED indicator (which I assume is optional because this cable has been attached to nothing for a very long time and I've had no issues).

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

Here are the final results:

http://i.imgur.com/naqiDAs.jpg

They are far from perfect, but I do notice a difference.

 

[Sturmgewehr_44]

looks much better, you can hide that fan's wire by the fan's frame/shroud.

I could but I think I'm done for now. Next time I do something internal, I'll try, but thanks for the suggestion.

Anyway, I added a new Caviar Black 3TB because of the death (sort of) of my Barracuda. I am noticing slower boot times from my SSD (main boot drive) almost coincidentally after formatting the drive. Could this be because of the drive's larger capacity slowing things down a tad? Is that normal??