New build using XPS 730x case 2600k

[hugabone]

What do you think of this build, I bought a new Dell XPS 730x case over a year ago but never done anything with it. I had a factory built XPS 730x and liked the case so that's why I decided to go with it again. I will be using it for modest gaming and a little heavy video rendering and other things.

I already ordered an I7 2600k, Corsair H80 water cooler, MSI P67A-GD80 motherboard, G.skill F3-12800CL8D 16gb of ram. I will be ordering the Crucial M4 256gb SSD, Asus GTX560TI video card, Seagate Barracuda XT 2TB Sata 3 HDD. I will be using the 730x stock power supply. This will be overclocked to about 4.5ghz.

I do have a few questions, I chose to get the Crucial M4 over the Ocz vertex 3 because of reliability problems. My question is is it necessary to get a 256gb over 128gb for bootups and programs if I have a 2gb storage? Is the Ocz vertex 3 that bad for being reliable? I know 16gb of ram might be overkill because I don't run that much photo editing but Newegg has them for $59 a piece for 2x4gb. What do you guys thing of this build?

 

[hugabone]

The responses are rolling in now.

 

[flyboy86]

I wouldn't think any photo or video editing will use 16GB of ram. I have 8GB and the most i have seen being used is almost 6GB, that was when i was gaming + skype + firefox with about 10+ tabs open. Ram prices keep on dropping so I would just stick with 8GB for now. You can always get more later on.

 

[hugabone]

I wouldn't think any photo or video editing will use 16GB of ram. I have 8GB and the most i have seen being used is almost 6GB, that was when i was gaming + skype + firefox with about 10+ tabs open. Ram prices keep on dropping so I would just stick with 8GB for now. You can always get more later on.

Thanks for the reply, I already order 16gb of ram since they were $118. I will probably order the 128gb Crucial M4 SSD instead of the 256gb.

 

[neograndizer]

OCZ and other manufacturers are hit and miss with the newer SATA III SSDs. Sandforce controllers seem to be buggy at best with this 'newer' technology. I have an OCZ Agility 3 and it hiccups once in a blue moon. It does make me feel like a guinea pig testing out a new product. >sigh<

Just be prepared for some heavy troubleshooting when the time arises. Check out Crucial and OCZ forums. I'm sure you'll find quite a bit of info from many users.

Question is why 'downgrade' from the current system? I think it should still be good especially for gaming and heavy rendering. Especially with triple SLI capability with no penalty to bandwidth? Maybe I'm wrong, didn't follow closely to the previous i7 version.

Will you actually get that much more of a performance boost? Than say getting a better gfx card? I'm too new in this field and maybe my thinking is flawed.

 

[hugabone]

OCZ and other manufacturers are hit and miss with the newer SATA III SSDs. Sandforce controllers seem to be buggy at best with this 'newer' technology. I have an OCZ Agility 3 and it hiccups once in a blue moon. It does make me feel like a guinea pig testing out a new product. >sigh<

Just be prepared for some heavy troubleshooting when the time arises. Check out Crucial and OCZ forums. I'm sure you'll find quite a bit of info from many users.

Question is why 'downgrade' from the current system? I think it should still be good especially for gaming and heavy rendering. Especially with triple SLI capability with no penalty to bandwidth? Maybe I'm wrong, didn't follow closely to the previous i7 version.

Will you actually get that much more of a performance boost? Than say getting a better gfx card? I'm too new in this field and maybe my thinking is flawed.

I no longer have my 730x I7 920. I sold it a few months after I got it, that was a couple of years ago. I'm just building a new platform off the case that it had. Right now I'm using a 4 year old core 2 2.13 ghz 6400 processor. So this will not be a downgrade

 

[neograndizer]

I no longer have my 730x I7 920. I sold it a few months after I got it, that was a couple of years ago. I'm just building a new platform off the case that it had. Right now I'm using a 4 year old core 2 2.13 ghz 6400 processor. So this will not be a downgrade

[:lorbat:6] [:tapko:4]

Thought it was still in 'one piece'...

I know my brother has an older model xps case and I hate it (sorry, just my opinion-maybe they improved the design). It seems more geared towards a custom water cooling solution than air cooling. It's also a dust magnet with all those open holes. Also find a lot of hot air emitting from the hdds on the top rack. Only fan I was able to put in was an outtake on the bottom. I actually found screw holes that allowed it. There are no screw holes at the front to allow any air intake fans to be placed without modding. Also have to mod it if I want to put in some dust filters. But again, my opinions are based on an older case design that I stripped and cleaned for my brother. It's still got a lot of dusty gunk in there, even after using a vacuum + compressed air.

I have a 60GB Agility 3 SSD mounted as my boot drive. Only other main program in it is M$ Office and device drivers. Nothing else resides in it. I use a WD Caviar Blue 1TB drive for gaming. All my other drives are for storage (1x 750GB, 2x 250GB and 1x 1TB-all old drives stripped and used from previous systems). Again, in terms of reliability and stability, it does hiccup once in a blue moon and I do lose some data when this happens. Not critical data, but still data none the less.

I've seen many users say a Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB is a good fast HDD. Though I'm not sure about it. I don't own one and it isn't available where I'm at.

 

[hugabone]

Best answer selected by hugabone.