Cormac does touch on an unfortunate weakness of mine -- I like that the Corsair solution is a little wilder.
Honestly, thats probably why I went with the Corsair over traditional air coolers. Well, that and the weight of the air cooler on my previous system (zeroTherm Nirvana) started to scare me.
Yeah I feel like there are a lot of choices when building a rig these days that are just kind of silly not to follow the herd on, so any flair I can add to my build is appreciated.
Of course, it sounds like I'm pretty much just biting your style at this point. Just remember what the sincerest form of flattery is.
Another random question: anyone have any experience with the fan controllers on modern MSI boards? I'm looking at the Z77A-GD65 and I'm pretty sold on it, but I wouldn't mind some smart fan controllers and it seems like Asus has a solid lock on that (and has for a while).
And to that point: case fans? Noctuas are ugly. There, I said it. Black with white blades would match the R3 so nicely.
Why do I care about things that are going inside a case with no window? What's happening to me?
Yeah I feel like there are a lot of choices when building a rig these days that are just kind of silly not to follow the herd on, so any flair I can add to my build is appreciated.
Of course, it sounds like I'm pretty much just biting your style at this point. Just remember what the sincerest form of flattery is.
Another random question: anyone have any experience with the fan controllers on modern MSI boards? I'm looking at the Z77A-GD65 and I'm pretty sold on it, but I wouldn't mind some smart fan controllers and it seems like Asus has a solid lock on that (and has for a while).
And to that point: case fans? Noctuas are ugly. There, I said it. Black with white blades would match the R3 so nicely.
Why do I care about things that are going inside a case with no window? What's happening to me?
I...I also matched a bunch of shit in my computer. RAM with black heat spreaders, even though I cant see inside. Black fans without lights, even though I cant see inside. Black cables, even though I cant see inside.... Its a sickness. Youve been infected.
For fan controllers, I grabbed this and while it is kind of gaudy, its flush so I didnt have to worry about it preventing my case door from closing. It has heat sensors and will adjust your fans according to temps if its set to auto, but you cant get the fans to go slower than 60% (I think, it may be 40%). Also, you cant turn off the beeping noise it makes when you touch it. Also also, if you put it in manual mode and then restart your computer when your computer reboots itll be in auto mode again.
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
My RAM is black and spikey (Corsair Dominator), my SATA cables are red, my fan lights are white, my motherboard's turbo indicator lights are blue, my video card is red and black, my motherboard is blue/silver. I have a clown case, and I am proud.
for fan controllers I have one of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811998077 and love it. it has temp probes, but no auto mode, but I never really like auto modes that much, they usually end up varying the rpm of the fans too often, and the constant revving up/down noise bothers me.
I have a fun game: buy all your parts and accessories without thought towards appearance and see how much of it turns out to be UV reactive. You'd be surprised! Damn you, innocent-looking SATA cables, you came down with a case of the 90s!
Hi, I finally got around to saving up enough money for a computer. This is my first time building a computer. I'd like to put a GTX 680 in it but I can't find a place to buy one I've looked on NewEgg and Amazon. I just wanted to double check that these parts would work with a GTX 680:
It's going to be a windows machine and I'd like it to be able to run the newest games at the highest settings on a 1920x1080 monitor. I've also got one other question. All of the guides I've seen recommend shopping from NewEgg. I live in a state where NewEgg has a distribution center so if I buy from them I have to pay tax. Are there any other good site to shop from? Thanks for the help.
You could buy a better case for less, and the 680 isn't really necessary for a single 1080p screen. It's a newer card in high demand with limited quantity released so far, so a lot of outlets (Newegg and Amazon included) are sold out entirely. Amazon, Tiger Direct, and NCIX are your other major online options. Microcenter is a good brick and mortar store than often has CPU/Motherboard deals.
What's your budget for this PC? Your build above is kind of mixed and matched, and there's a lot I'd do differently. If you give me an idea of how much you'd like to spend on it, I can give you a better recommendation on what to go with.
I've saved up about $1600.
Do you already have a TV/monitor? Do you need a mouse/keyboard?
I do think a LGA1155 based system is the best option for you. Do you plan to do more with the PC than just gaming/general use?
I'll put something together for you when I get home. It's tough to do recommendation type posts on my phone.
Yeah, I'm starting college in the fall and am going to major in digital animation, so it would have to be able to run those programs which I assume will be CPU intensive. That's the only reason I went with an i7 over an i5. I've already got a monitor and a keyboard/mouse. I'd like something that I wouldn't have to really worry about upgrading for the next couple of years.
Okay, seeing as the CPU horsepower will actually benefit you, here's what I'd look at (most links and prices from Newegg, just for reference, I know you need to shop elsewhere):
So that leaves you with a bit over $500 left in your budget. If CUDA is something you'd like (that is, if the applications you'll be working with for school can use CUDA/GPU acceleration of some sort) then you want to stick with NVIDIA cards. If MOAR POWAH is better for work purposes (leaving gaming aside) then you can wait for GTX 680s to get in stock and buy one, or pick up a GTX 580 now for about $100 less. If your applications can use GPU acceleration with AMD based GPUs, you can buy basically anything up to the Radeon 7970 and be happy.
If GPU acceleration for professional apps isn't on your radar, than the GTX 680 and anything priced similarly is unnecessary. I'm assuming you're running a single monitor at or near 1080p, and for gaming on something like that, you needn't spend more than $350 to get really fantastic performance, and you could easily spend less. The 7870, GTX 570, GTX 560 Ti w/ 448 Cores are the top-end of what you should be looking at.
As far as the build itself goes, I gave you a motherboard and PSU that can handle dual GTX 680s. You can always go lower wattage (and potentially higher quality) on the PSU for less/similar amounts, depending on if you step up to a nicer unit and what wattage you go with. If you spend less than $500 on a video card, my first buy would definitely be a CM Hyper 212 Evo (the 212+ is also very nice) so you can OC your 2600K. Aside from that, there isn't much I'd change.
The Corsair H series are evaporation water coolers. I am sure they do perform better than the 212+, but I am not sure how it's entirely relevant, since we are discussing air cooling.
As far as I know, they aren't evaporative coolers. If they were, closed-loop systems would run out of fluid fairly quickly.
Now I'm waffling between the Asus P8Z77-V and the MSI Z77A-GD65. Picking motherboards is stupid. The fan control in the P8Z77 sounds nuts (automatic voltage limit calibration? coooooool) but now I need to go over each featureset with a fine toothed comb.
Also, dear motherboard manufacturers: please make no more than 3 motherboard SKUs per chipset. THANKS.
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
I gave up so long ago with going over my boards with a fine tooth comb, because some of that stuff is just fluff. I look for: Good manufacturer, good reviews, and the three to five features I absolutely must have. Everything else tends to fall in line pretty nicely from there.
Should I even bother with pushing a crazy CPU overclock if the most intensive thing I do is games? How taxing on an i5 2500k are games these days, or is performance pretty much dependent upon the video card? I'm just wondering if I should go through the trouble if it's not going to get me extra frame rates or whatever (of which I'm capped at 60fps on this TV anyway, so that's easy enough to hit).
I gave up so long ago with going over my boards with a fine tooth comb, because some of that stuff is just fluff. I look for: Good manufacturer, good reviews, and the three to five features I absolutely must have. Everything else tends to fall in line pretty nicely from there.
This is sage advice. General consensus is Asus is still good, but overpriced?
So I hooked up my Netgear Powerline Networking gizmo and it added 15-50ms of ping to server that I'm used to getting decent response from. Did a back to back vs my goofy plug-ethernet-into-Airport-Express solution and the pings unmistakable skyrocketed. This is on what the Netgear considers is a "full" signal and the boxes are one room apart. Into the garbage chute with you!
This is making me lean towards the Asus since it has the WiFis built in.
Speaking of PC aesthetics, Asus really needs to start doing black edition rog boards again. Their damn blue or red boards just never match what i'm doing. If they had a RIVE black edition I'd be forced to get it I think.
Should I even bother with pushing a crazy CPU overclock if the most intensive thing I do is games? How taxing on an i5 2500k are games these days, or is performance pretty much dependent upon the video card? I'm just wondering if I should go through the trouble if it's not going to get me extra frame rates or whatever (of which I'm capped at 60fps on this TV anyway, so that's easy enough to hit).
This will depend somewhat on the games you're playing and your videocard, but you don't need insane overclocks on your CPU to feed most any single GPU setup. Dual cards is where CPU starts to matter more.
Now I'm waffling between the Asus P8Z77-V and the MSI Z77A-GD65. Picking motherboards is stupid. The fan control in the P8Z77 sounds nuts (automatic voltage limit calibration? coooooool) but now I need to go over each featureset with a fine toothed comb.
Also, dear motherboard manufacturers: please make no more than 3 motherboard SKUs per chipset. THANKS.
I have no idea how MSI's onboard fan control is these days, but damn if I don't love ASUS fan controls.
Also these days micro atx builds are really damn good unless you really really need two GPUs or a whole bunch of storage. I think it's a great route to go if keeping size/weight down is something that matters to you.
dammit that ft03 looks
incredibly sexy. Now I wanna use it for something myself
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AlectharAlan ShoreWe're not territorial about that sort of thing, are we?Registered Userregular
I gave up so long ago with going over my boards with a fine tooth comb, because some of that stuff is just fluff. I look for: Good manufacturer, good reviews, and the three to five features I absolutely must have. Everything else tends to fall in line pretty nicely from there.
This is sage advice. General consensus is Asus is still good, but overpriced?
So I hooked up my Netgear Powerline Networking gizmo and it added 15-50ms of ping to server that I'm used to getting decent response from. Did a back to back vs my goofy plug-ethernet-into-Airport-Express solution and the pings unmistakable skyrocketed. This is on what the Netgear considers is a "full" signal and the boxes are one room apart. Into the garbage chute with you!
This is making me lean towards the Asus since it has the WiFis built in.
What one considers "overpriced" comes down to what you consider to be a reasonable price for the included stuff. ASRock makes a Z77 motherboard with a virtually indistinguishable feature-set from the Z77-V board from ASUS that costs like $45 less, when it isn't on sale. The ASUS board does include Wi-Fi, though, and in my experience ASUS does a better UEFI experience, their documentation is better and more understandable, their support is pretty good, their boards are laid out just as well, and you get stuff like an Intel NIC. I'm willing to pay more (generally speaking) for an ASUS board because I'm confident that I'm getting something worth my money.
Sorry about the powerline stuff. I hope you don't feel misled, it has done well for me (though my expectations weren't exactly sky high to begin with).
Should I even bother with pushing a crazy CPU overclock if the most intensive thing I do is games? How taxing on an i5 2500k are games these days, or is performance pretty much dependent upon the video card? I'm just wondering if I should go through the trouble if it's not going to get me extra frame rates or whatever (of which I'm capped at 60fps on this TV anyway, so that's easy enough to hit).
I don't know if Skyrim would even notice the difference between an i3 and an OC'd i5, but Starcraft 2 or Civ 5 might. It really comes down to what you're playing. I notice it when I'm encoding/transcoding video, though.
Going to think long and hard about a Micro ATX build versus an ATX build. The FT03 is sexy enough to have on display in my space, where as even though I love the looks of the R3 it's something that I probably wouldn't want front and center still. That being said, even though I don't think I'll ever need to run a multi-GPU setup, for some reason the idea of building a system without that possibility seems like a poor idea. I'll look into it more, I think the FT03 would run the hard drive config I'm thinking (dual 128gb SSDs in RAID 0 and dual 500gb spindle disks in RAID 1). Can't decide if I want down the road flexibility or raw visual appeal. Some problem.
All my previous builds were budget-limited hodge-podges so I'm really getting a kick out of designing the system as a coherent, coordinated unit.
In my opinion the little extras that ASUS throws on to their boards all add up to be worth the extra cost, but if you're trying to trim fat from a build going with an asrock board is a very solid pick.
Stuff like intel NIC, 4 pins on every fan header(and they throw in a lot of them in smart places), their robust onboard fan control even if your fans aren't PWM enabled, the best UEFI in the business, BIOS flashback and what have you are all enough for me to go with them despite the price premium.
This isn't to say that MSI/Asrock/Gigabyte don't make nice boards, because they do. I'm just partial to ASUS offerings
Now if they'd just get back to sticking a ps2 port on most of their boards again
Out of curiosity what does the MSI board offer you that you really want? Is it just price/feature set? Because if it's enough cheaper than the asus board you can always just grab a fan controler and it'll still do the trick.
Out of curiosity what does the MSI board offer you that you really want? Is it just price/feature set? Because if it's enough cheaper than the asus board you can always just grab a fan controler and it'll still do the trick.
It just seemed to be a well made, well laid out board that was a fantastic performer for under $200 -- and it still seems that way, but you're right I think the little things on the Asus make it seem like the best choice.
Well, the record should show that I am kinda an ASUS fanboy, in that I have a tendency to just get their stuff. So take me advising an ASUS board as me advising you only on what I have direct experience with.
ASUS does have their AI suite II which lets you change a lot of clocks and such from within windows, although I'd always advise bios based stuff for actually setting stuff for permanent usage. I did use the AI suite while getting started on the overclock on my x79 board and it worked well enough for that, voltage control from within windows wasn't spectacular.
Is the Coolermaster thermal paste that comes with Hyper 212 Plus good enough or do I need to get some Artic Silver 5?
Still need to figure what the best way to combo it up on Newegg for the best price and then manage to justify to myself that I really need all this. Lol.
It's hard to justify any of it other than the fact I want it to play with. I possibly could use the power with VMware, Visual Studio and SQL Server. Whether I actually will is another story.
Well then, in that case definitely get the i7 because it's fun.
e: unless you're planning on upgrading to 32 gigs of ram I'd get a 4x4gig ram kit instead. It's cheaper and asus has some secret sauce in their z77 bios that lets the IMC address the sticks in parallel so their boards are actually slightly faster with 4 sticks in instead of 2.
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AlectharAlan ShoreWe're not territorial about that sort of thing, are we?Registered Userregular
No one who has no reason to own a 2600K (myself included) has any need for 32GB of RAM (once again, myself included). Both are money I have a hard time encouraging people to blow. You'd get as much nerd cred, and probably more use, out of spending that money on a fancier GPU, if you just had to spend it on that PC. Personally, I'd probably use it to buy a 2TB HDD. God I hate Thailand so much right now.
Also, consider buying a different PSU. The HX650 is pretty old at this point, Corsair didn't include it in the refresh of the HX line. The Hale82 from NZXT is built on a newer platform, so performance in terms of voltage regulation, ripple, and noise is better, efficiency is roughly the same (if not better) and it's only marginally more expensive after shipping. And don't buy any AS5. The Cooler Master stuff is probably just fine, and AS5 is (much like Antec's cases were until recently) cruising on its past success without actually being particularly great relative to new competition.
General Statement Unrelated to Anything Else I Just Said: People sling the 212+ around a lot, and it's a nice cooler for $25 (possibly the nicest, though Xigmatek makes a good one too, iirc) but it's definitely not the best air cooler around. The performance is solid for the price, but not world-beating, and the mounting system makes my brain hurt just looking at it. One doesn't have to buy a Noctua DH-14 to get a better air cooler than the 212+. The new 212 EVO looks good, Xigmatek's Baldur/Dark Knight has always been solid, NZXT has newer 120mm and 140mm compatible offerings, Prolimatech is always great (and the mounting system is top notch). Scythe's Mugen 2/3 is a favorite of many. Let's not get caught up in the 212+ as a catch-all recommendation.
For what it's worth, I mostly just suggest the 212+ because I don't have personal experience with any other coolers in it's price range and I know that it works and will cover most people's needs without being too expensive.
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AlectharAlan ShoreWe're not territorial about that sort of thing, are we?Registered Userregular
For what it's worth, I mostly just suggest the 212+ because I don't have personal experience with any other coolers in it's price range and I know that it works and will cover most people's needs without being too expensive.
Not directed at you, and it's certainly an appropriate cooler for the niche it's in. I just don't want people to fall into the habit of only recommending one cooler.
Also i'm trying to advise someone on a laptop for some light gaming and general use in the 600-800 dollar range and I really haven't kept up in this area lately. Ideally I'd like something with a decent display and a solid GPU, figure probably an i5 2450m or so for the CPU is plenty for that kinda need. Not sure if there's anything out there that combines this feature set in this price range though.
Now if they'd just get back to sticking a ps2 port on most of their boards again
Tell me about it! The one thing that I really got screwed on with this new build (and I didn't even consider it when looking at boards) is that my wireless Logitech mouse is PS/2. Oddly, the receiver thing has a USB plug for the keyboard, but the mouse is PS/2. Weird looking thing.
Now I'm eying the newer models where the receiver is a microscopic little USB dongle that doesn't even have to be set up for line of sight. Looks like a mighty good upgrade, I don't like this damn puck with lights anyway.
is it worth dropping the money for an ivy bridge CPU if i'm looking to build from the ground up (previous plans to do so got derailed) or should i stick with sandy bridge
it would just be for gaming at high+ settings, i'm not looking to do video rendering or anything and i don't know if ivy bridge is overkill
is it worth dropping the money for an ivy bridge CPU if i'm looking to build from the ground up (previous plans to do so got derailed) or should i stick with sandy bridge
it would just be for gaming at high+ settings, i'm not looking to do video rendering or anything and i don't know if ivy bridge is overkill
General consensus is actually that the overclocking potential of Sandy Bridge seems a little more... fruitful with air so it's probably a better value for gaming. Not much performance difference between Ivy and Sandy, just significantly lower power draw from Ivy. If you don't care about power draw so much, and you'd like to overclock, Sandy is a fine choice.
That being said -- you may find that Ivy is as cheap or cheaper than Sandy. Or are you talking about motherboard chipset? I think the Z77 is probably a good choice to keep things as futureproof as possible.
Wait, does the P8Z68-v Pro have a built in fan controller? Could I have saved $20?
Also, order a book on Amazon with free 2 day shipping on Sunday? Should get to me by Wednesday. Order 3 fans from Newegg on Monday with free 5 day shipping? Should get here Tuesday. What?
Cooler Master R4s, hard to beat $5/fan. Do I have to oil these? Apparently you have to oil the Slipstreams which I didnt know. Should I oil my GentleTyphoons?
Pretty sure the GTs are fine without, but if I had a guess those cooler masters are gonna want oiling.
really unless you're talking like noctua fans where the bearing is sealed up there's no real harm in adding a drop of lubricant before putting the fan into service though.
is it worth dropping the money for an ivy bridge CPU if i'm looking to build from the ground up (previous plans to do so got derailed) or should i stick with sandy bridge
it would just be for gaming at high+ settings, i'm not looking to do video rendering or anything and i don't know if ivy bridge is overkill
General consensus is actually that the overclocking potential of Sandy Bridge seems a little more... fruitful with air so it's probably a better value for gaming. Not much performance difference between Ivy and Sandy, just significantly lower power draw from Ivy. If you don't care about power draw so much, and you'd like to overclock, Sandy is a fine choice.
That being said -- you may find that Ivy is as cheap or cheaper than Sandy. Or are you talking about motherboard chipset? I think the Z77 is probably a good choice to keep things as futureproof as possible.
yeah, a little googling agreed with you re: sandy vs ivy bridge
the last time i did this song and dance was january, so... looking to cut corners here. i'm thinking i could swap the 2500k for an i3 2120 and just OC it a bit, and i'm not very attached to that motherboard or PSU either
Pretty sure the GTs are fine without, but if I had a guess those cooler masters are gonna want oiling.
really unless you're talking like noctua fans where the bearing is sealed up there's no real harm in adding a drop of lubricant before putting the fan into service though.
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Cormac does touch on an unfortunate weakness of mine -- I like that the Corsair solution is a little wilder.
Sorry to bombard you all with questions, I get excited when I find a good resource.
Honestly, thats probably why I went with the Corsair over traditional air coolers. Well, that and the weight of the air cooler on my previous system (zeroTherm Nirvana) started to scare me.
Of course, it sounds like I'm pretty much just biting your style at this point. Just remember what the sincerest form of flattery is.
Another random question: anyone have any experience with the fan controllers on modern MSI boards? I'm looking at the Z77A-GD65 and I'm pretty sold on it, but I wouldn't mind some smart fan controllers and it seems like Asus has a solid lock on that (and has for a while).
And to that point: case fans? Noctuas are ugly. There, I said it. Black with white blades would match the R3 so nicely.
Why do I care about things that are going inside a case with no window? What's happening to me?
I...I also matched a bunch of shit in my computer. RAM with black heat spreaders, even though I cant see inside. Black fans without lights, even though I cant see inside. Black cables, even though I cant see inside.... Its a sickness. Youve been infected.
For fan controllers, I grabbed this and while it is kind of gaudy, its flush so I didnt have to worry about it preventing my case door from closing. It has heat sensors and will adjust your fans according to temps if its set to auto, but you cant get the fans to go slower than 60% (I think, it may be 40%). Also, you cant turn off the beeping noise it makes when you touch it. Also also, if you put it in manual mode and then restart your computer when your computer reboots itll be in auto mode again.
All this case talk also reminded me that I'm a bit overdue for cleaning out the fan filters and a general spraying out of dust in my case. One of these days I'm going to stop thinking about it and actually order one of these http://www.amazon.com/Metro-Vacuum-ED500-500-Watt-Electric/dp/B001J4ZOAW/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS?ie=UTF8&coliid=I3PVUM2ZXX7LT0&colid=2W4VDJ9LFQHH4 because canned air is expensive and the can gets cold too quickly.
Okay, seeing as the CPU horsepower will actually benefit you, here's what I'd look at (most links and prices from Newegg, just for reference, I know you need to shop elsewhere):
CPU - Intel Core i7 2600K
Motherboard - ASRock Z77 Extreme4
RAM - 16GB (4x4GB) G.SKILL DDR3
GPU - See Below
SSD - 128GB Crucial M4
HDD - 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3
ODD - Lite-On CD/DVD Burner
PSU - NZXT Hale82 750W
Case - CM 690 II Advanced
OS - Windows Home Premium 64-Bit
All together it's about $1090.00
So that leaves you with a bit over $500 left in your budget. If CUDA is something you'd like (that is, if the applications you'll be working with for school can use CUDA/GPU acceleration of some sort) then you want to stick with NVIDIA cards. If MOAR POWAH is better for work purposes (leaving gaming aside) then you can wait for GTX 680s to get in stock and buy one, or pick up a GTX 580 now for about $100 less. If your applications can use GPU acceleration with AMD based GPUs, you can buy basically anything up to the Radeon 7970 and be happy.
If GPU acceleration for professional apps isn't on your radar, than the GTX 680 and anything priced similarly is unnecessary. I'm assuming you're running a single monitor at or near 1080p, and for gaming on something like that, you needn't spend more than $350 to get really fantastic performance, and you could easily spend less. The 7870, GTX 570, GTX 560 Ti w/ 448 Cores are the top-end of what you should be looking at.
As far as the build itself goes, I gave you a motherboard and PSU that can handle dual GTX 680s. You can always go lower wattage (and potentially higher quality) on the PSU for less/similar amounts, depending on if you step up to a nicer unit and what wattage you go with. If you spend less than $500 on a video card, my first buy would definitely be a CM Hyper 212 Evo (the 212+ is also very nice) so you can OC your 2600K. Aside from that, there isn't much I'd change.
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As far as I know, they aren't evaporative coolers. If they were, closed-loop systems would run out of fluid fairly quickly.
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Also, dear motherboard manufacturers: please make no more than 3 motherboard SKUs per chipset. THANKS.
Part of me wants to ditch the idea of a full ATX board, go Micro ATX and just get one of these: http://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=291&area=en
This is sage advice. General consensus is Asus is still good, but overpriced?
So I hooked up my Netgear Powerline Networking gizmo and it added 15-50ms of ping to server that I'm used to getting decent response from. Did a back to back vs my goofy plug-ethernet-into-Airport-Express solution and the pings unmistakable skyrocketed. This is on what the Netgear considers is a "full" signal and the boxes are one room apart. Into the garbage chute with you!
This is making me lean towards the Asus since it has the WiFis built in.
This will depend somewhat on the games you're playing and your videocard, but you don't need insane overclocks on your CPU to feed most any single GPU setup. Dual cards is where CPU starts to matter more.
I have no idea how MSI's onboard fan control is these days, but damn if I don't love ASUS fan controls.
Also these days micro atx builds are really damn good unless you really really need two GPUs or a whole bunch of storage. I think it's a great route to go if keeping size/weight down is something that matters to you.
dammit that ft03 looks
incredibly sexy. Now I wanna use it for something myself
What one considers "overpriced" comes down to what you consider to be a reasonable price for the included stuff. ASRock makes a Z77 motherboard with a virtually indistinguishable feature-set from the Z77-V board from ASUS that costs like $45 less, when it isn't on sale. The ASUS board does include Wi-Fi, though, and in my experience ASUS does a better UEFI experience, their documentation is better and more understandable, their support is pretty good, their boards are laid out just as well, and you get stuff like an Intel NIC. I'm willing to pay more (generally speaking) for an ASUS board because I'm confident that I'm getting something worth my money.
Sorry about the powerline stuff. I hope you don't feel misled, it has done well for me (though my expectations weren't exactly sky high to begin with).
I don't know if Skyrim would even notice the difference between an i3 and an OC'd i5, but Starcraft 2 or Civ 5 might. It really comes down to what you're playing. I notice it when I'm encoding/transcoding video, though.
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So this may seem dumb but this FanExpert2 demo is quickly selling me on Asus:
Going to think long and hard about a Micro ATX build versus an ATX build. The FT03 is sexy enough to have on display in my space, where as even though I love the looks of the R3 it's something that I probably wouldn't want front and center still. That being said, even though I don't think I'll ever need to run a multi-GPU setup, for some reason the idea of building a system without that possibility seems like a poor idea. I'll look into it more, I think the FT03 would run the hard drive config I'm thinking (dual 128gb SSDs in RAID 0 and dual 500gb spindle disks in RAID 1). Can't decide if I want down the road flexibility or raw visual appeal. Some problem.
All my previous builds were budget-limited hodge-podges so I'm really getting a kick out of designing the system as a coherent, coordinated unit.
Stuff like intel NIC, 4 pins on every fan header(and they throw in a lot of them in smart places), their robust onboard fan control even if your fans aren't PWM enabled, the best UEFI in the business, BIOS flashback and what have you are all enough for me to go with them despite the price premium.
This isn't to say that MSI/Asrock/Gigabyte don't make nice boards, because they do. I'm just partial to ASUS offerings
Now if they'd just get back to sticking a ps2 port on most of their boards again
Well, I like the idea of the UEFI being editable from Windows (maybe this is a thing Asus does too). Mostly this article made me feel good about the MSI: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/z77-extreme6-z77a-gd65-z77h2-a2x,3187.html
It just seemed to be a well made, well laid out board that was a fantastic performer for under $200 -- and it still seems that way, but you're right I think the little things on the Asus make it seem like the best choice.
ASUS does have their AI suite II which lets you change a lot of clocks and such from within windows, although I'd always advise bios based stuff for actually setting stuff for permanent usage. I did use the AI suite while getting started on the overclock on my x79 board and it worked well enough for that, voltage control from within windows wasn't spectacular.
CPU - Trying to decide i5-3570K or i5-2500k or i7-3770K or i7-2600k
CPU Cooler- COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus
Motherboard - ASUS P8Z77-V PRO
RAM - Crucial Ballistix sport 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
GPU - EVGA 01G-P3-1561-AR GeForce GTX 560 Ti FPB
SSD - SAMSUNG 830 Series MZ-7PC256B/WW 2.5" 256GB
ODD - LITE-ON 24X DVD Writer
PSU - CORSAIR Professional Series HX650 (CMPSU-650HX) 650W
Case - Fractal Design Arc Midi Black
Is the Coolermaster thermal paste that comes with Hyper 212 Plus good enough or do I need to get some Artic Silver 5?
Still need to figure what the best way to combo it up on Newegg for the best price and then manage to justify to myself that I really need all this. Lol.
Nintendo ID: Incindium
PSN: IncindiumX
It's tough to recommend an i7 if you're only going to play games on it.
Nintendo ID: Incindium
PSN: IncindiumX
e: unless you're planning on upgrading to 32 gigs of ram I'd get a 4x4gig ram kit instead. It's cheaper and asus has some secret sauce in their z77 bios that lets the IMC address the sticks in parallel so their boards are actually slightly faster with 4 sticks in instead of 2.
Also, consider buying a different PSU. The HX650 is pretty old at this point, Corsair didn't include it in the refresh of the HX line. The Hale82 from NZXT is built on a newer platform, so performance in terms of voltage regulation, ripple, and noise is better, efficiency is roughly the same (if not better) and it's only marginally more expensive after shipping. And don't buy any AS5. The Cooler Master stuff is probably just fine, and AS5 is (much like Antec's cases were until recently) cruising on its past success without actually being particularly great relative to new competition.
General Statement Unrelated to Anything Else I Just Said: People sling the 212+ around a lot, and it's a nice cooler for $25 (possibly the nicest, though Xigmatek makes a good one too, iirc) but it's definitely not the best air cooler around. The performance is solid for the price, but not world-beating, and the mounting system makes my brain hurt just looking at it. One doesn't have to buy a Noctua DH-14 to get a better air cooler than the 212+. The new 212 EVO looks good, Xigmatek's Baldur/Dark Knight has always been solid, NZXT has newer 120mm and 140mm compatible offerings, Prolimatech is always great (and the mounting system is top notch). Scythe's Mugen 2/3 is a favorite of many. Let's not get caught up in the 212+ as a catch-all recommendation.
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Not directed at you, and it's certainly an appropriate cooler for the niche it's in. I just don't want people to fall into the habit of only recommending one cooler.
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Tell me about it! The one thing that I really got screwed on with this new build (and I didn't even consider it when looking at boards) is that my wireless Logitech mouse is PS/2. Oddly, the receiver thing has a USB plug for the keyboard, but the mouse is PS/2. Weird looking thing.
Now I'm eying the newer models where the receiver is a microscopic little USB dongle that doesn't even have to be set up for line of sight. Looks like a mighty good upgrade, I don't like this damn puck with lights anyway.
it would just be for gaming at high+ settings, i'm not looking to do video rendering or anything and i don't know if ivy bridge is overkill
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General consensus is actually that the overclocking potential of Sandy Bridge seems a little more... fruitful with air so it's probably a better value for gaming. Not much performance difference between Ivy and Sandy, just significantly lower power draw from Ivy. If you don't care about power draw so much, and you'd like to overclock, Sandy is a fine choice.
That being said -- you may find that Ivy is as cheap or cheaper than Sandy. Or are you talking about motherboard chipset? I think the Z77 is probably a good choice to keep things as futureproof as possible.
Also, order a book on Amazon with free 2 day shipping on Sunday? Should get to me by Wednesday. Order 3 fans from Newegg on Monday with free 5 day shipping? Should get here Tuesday. What?
really unless you're talking like noctua fans where the bearing is sealed up there's no real harm in adding a drop of lubricant before putting the fan into service though.
yeah, a little googling agreed with you re: sandy vs ivy bridge
https://secure.newegg.com/WishList/MySavedWishDetail.aspx?ID=19237952
the last time i did this song and dance was january, so... looking to cut corners here. i'm thinking i could swap the 2500k for an i3 2120 and just OC it a bit, and i'm not very attached to that motherboard or PSU either
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Now I have to find some lube