System Builder Marathon, June 2011: $2000 Performance PC

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]akinos242[/nom]I honestly only have one problem with this build, and I'm kind of surprised no one else has said anything. Why on a $2000 build would you use a non-modular, 80-plus Silver PSU, when you could have used a modular 80-plus Gold certified PSU?Even under full load this rig never hits even 700 watts, so putting in something like the Seasonic X750 Gold would have been a better choice and still kept you under budget.[/citation]Actually the system came out to $1999 when it was ordered, the prices were adjusted later and happily went down.

 

[cskelly]

Love the articles, Enter me to win!

 

[JamesSneed]

You know now that your $65 under budget you could swap the CPU cooler for a Prolimatech Megahalems from neweggg for 69.99. Also, if it were me I would take a dremel to the hard drive bay and cut off the top 3 bays just above the aluminum spacer so the top 120mm intake fan has unrestricted air flow.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]JamesSneed[/nom]You know now that your $65 under budget you could swap the CPU cooler for a Prolimatech Megahalems from neweggg for 69.99.[/citation]Why would we do that? The CPU was running cool.

 

[techguy911]

That case looks like any other standard cas the termaltake VJ400G1N2Z $99.
Fans: Side and Top 23cm and front 12cm,Rear fan 120mm would be a much better choice even has a mount for cpu rear mb fan mount.
It is amazing how cool a case with top 23cm fan is internal temps are quite low and looks much better.

 

[JamesSneed]

Why would we do that? The CPU was running cool.

We have a disparity between what we call cool. Having the OC'ed CPU run 53.7c over ambient room temp and assuming a low value for the room temp like 21c then the CPU is pushing 74.7c. Give it a little dust with use and a slightly higher ambient and this CPU would easily go over 80c. So for me a better cooler with more mass is what I would reach for if it was my own build.

 

[dark_lord69]

WOW!
Dual 6970s!

 

[Uni-duni-te]

Now that you have built pretty much the same system with the Scythe Mugen (previous build) and the Xigmatec Gaia coolers (current build), what is your opinion on both? is the Scythe much better?
On the case, I would choose the Silverstone RV02, that costs $159.90 on amazon (and even has an extra $20 rebate), has better cooling and noise.

 

[SavageNorseman]

The lower core voltage also aids the processor’s survival time, even though we estimated that the same CPU could survive 1.40 V for many months, likely exceeding a year. Perhaps 1.365 V will give us multiple years of operation?

You guys expect the system to last less than 1 year??? Does overclocking really reduce the life of a system THAT much? Someone please explain as I am thinking about overclocking my 4+1/2 year old system soon...

 

[Guest]

In your previous build you overclock the memory, but not in this one is that because it could not be OC'ed?

 

[deathmage85]

I won this computer. Its a very nice build. I've overclocked it to 4.8ghz easily. I've replaced the on-board sound with a Creative SB C-fi Titanium and as for the Intel Ethernet, I've replace that with a Bigfoot 2100. Now the computer is flying.

I've just recently built a Asus P8P67 Deluxe with Dual GTX 580's on a i5-2500k @ 4.4 ghz. 16's of ram and a OCZ Agility 3 single SSD.

This is a nice computer for my other 42 inch plasma display, that was sharing off my 580's on the 2nd card, now its got its own dedicated computer.

Love the computer so far, It arrived today.

 

[Guest]

deathmage85 did not deserve to win you should have helped someone out that actually needed a computer. idiots.

 

[longinthetooth]

I am confused about the use of 2xSSD and RAID 0. I expressed this conern on the forum/storage/general Storage rebuild RAID SSD and HDD, but am still confused but only received one reply.
Some earlier forum posts imply that SSD behave like RAID 0 anyway, so why have RAID? Others that SSD RAID only works with large file sizes, which seems to imply better performance with data rather than apps. Then there is the issue of how you get RAID, eg, mobo or separate card, do all cards and mobo have good RAID with TRIM, etc?
Gets equally complex when considering long term storage and RAID 1 as I explain in the forum, ie can you actually recover the data after a few years when the mobo, RAID card etc are no longer avialable or different versions?

 

[Guest]

I built this computer, but I'm having a motherboard problem that others have reported elsewhere: no sound. Not a peep. So far, asrock has done nothing to address it. It would be great if Tom's hardware could help us get their attention.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]jimss[/nom]I wonder how much they are paid to overclock the crap out of the boards ...[/citation]Check your other thread if you're interested, double posting is frowned upon by other readers.

 

[elduderino32]

Could anyone tell me if a OCZ 650W PSU could work for a bit? I am building this, but slowly and would like to use my previous case/PSU/Optical so I'm not dishing out all the cash at once.