Finally, My Build thread. 980x, Rampage III Extreme, Revo SSD

Amit

Amit

Amit

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20 Oct 2010
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Some of you may remember my thread some time ago where I asked your advice on building my super machine.

Well I have finally finished the build part of the project, so here it is.

First the Spec

Asus Rampage III Extreme Mobo
Intel i7 980x CPU
Corsair H70 Corsair Water-Cooler
2x AKASA Viper 120mm Fan
OCZ Platinum 12GB (3x4Gb) DDR3 PC3-12800C7 1600MHz Memory
XFX ATI Radeon HD 6870 Black Edition 1024MB Graphics Card
OCZ 240GB Revo SSD
Western Digital Caviar Black 2TB HD
Sony AD-7261S-0B SATA Writer
Corsair 850AX PSU
Corsair graphite 600t
Apple 27" LED Monitor

So onto the pics.

All the boxes
pc (1).jpg


Asus Mobo installed.

pc (2).jpg


Then Powersupply

pc (3).jpg


The poo bit. The USB 3 socket on the case has to be plugged into a socket on the back of the mobo. Not very clean, but i routed the cable the best I could to keep it clean

pc (4).jpg


pc (5).jpg


Power cables routed through the lower case bracket, then brought back around close to where they are needed

pc (6).jpg


plugged in both power connectors, just because they were there. You only really need 1 unless going for extreme overclocking (from what I have read)

pc (7).jpg


pc (8).jpg


Installed the optional chipset cooler. This is advised when you arent using a conventional CPU heatsink with fan as there will be no airflow across it.

pc (9).jpg


H70 cooler fitted. After running the comp for the first time, I found the stock fans to be far too noisy so I replaced them with AKASA PWM Vipers which are much better. (not shown in pic)

pc (10).jpg


Graphics card and my Revo SSD, and 12GB Ram installed. Hopefully in the correct slots. I couldnt figure out which mem slots were bank 1 so I googled pics of other builds and copied :)

pc (11).jpg


Cable routing around the back of the mobo

pc (12).jpg


and the final shot showing all components in place inc HD and DVDR

pc (13).jpg


This is the first PC I have built in over 7 years.

I have to say things have come a long way since then. In my day, the latest innovation in computer building was ide cables that had been bundled into a single round cable.

I was amazed at how much easier it was to build this pc with the modular power supply and the amazingly well designed and laid out case. Love the no screws quick install drive bays.

The machine is up and running beautifully now.
Only 1 issue left to resolve which is, for some reason I cant work out, the mobo reports CPU fan failure even though the AKASA fans are plugged into the PWM CPUFAN header, and the bios has full control of the speed and even correctly displays the fan speed and adjusts the speed based on temps.

My next big hurdle is overclocking. I am a SERIOUS noob when it comes to overclocking. Last time I did that, I had to solder a resistor to the CPU cartridge or something lol. There are like 11 million settings on this board which I have no clue about. At the moment, I have used to boards eazy oc feature and clocked it to 4.2ghz and the machine runs perfectly with an idle temp of 36 degree going up to around 46 under use. I am sure I can go a lot further. I just selected the safe option in the bios

I could do with some serious help getting the best out of the machine. Particularly around the memory clocking and bus speeds. Any gurus wannna pop round for a play? Especially if you understand this mobo and its features :P

What I do know is.. this thing is snappy! apps all open instantly.

look forward to your comments.
 
Thanks

On the front of the case, there is a USB 3 header. But unlike normal USB headers on cases, it has a regular USB plug on the end. Additionaly, there is no USB 3 pin header on the mobo.

So it means you have to plug it into the socket in the back panel. This must be fairly normal if strange as the little hole in the blank plate was there specifically for that purpose :S

Odd design but there you go.

Also annoying was the fact that the case also has 4 normal USB port on the top panel, but the board only has 1 double USB header, so I can only use two of the ports on the case.

Amit
 
That's unusual Amit, the boards I've had have all had tons of USB headers inside. Perhaps as they move to USB3 they're cutting down on port numbers to cut costs.
 
The case was designed before the USB3 header was standardised. Therefore, rather than risk individual pins, the case manufacturer would give it a USB connection so people can connect to the I/O plate USB3 connection.
 
With the H70 do you have it pulling air into the case or out? I read that if you have a fan at the top of the case for extraction you will get better temps using the H70 as an intake as it gets cooler air from outside the case going through it then this hot air is taken out of the case by the fan at the top.

Looks great and clean :)
 
The vipers arent in the pics as they were added later.

I think from memory they are configured pulling air from the outside the case in as recommend in the H70 manual
 
ashatron said:
out of interest, why the 980x and not the i7-2600k?
Click to expand...

Went over it in my previous thread, but essentially I had to build a pc that would last me atleast 5years to a budget I had to spend.

Choose the 6 cores as I figured the future of software dev is to make better use of multiple cores. OCd 6 cores is better than 4 OCd cores a few years done the line when I will be counting on the CPU for use with modern apps.

Machine is primarily used for home office and media streaming, but will also be used for web dev, and maybe the odd game.

Amit
 
How u finding the Apple 27" thats the screen im thinking of getting cba waiting on Harzo 27" without the antiglare coating just some general feed back and what its like for a gaming moniter would be nice.
 
I love the monitor. It's my fav bit. I use a 27" iMac at work and fell in love with the high res screen.

Not sure how good it would be for gaming though with the gloss coating. You have to get your lighting correct to get the best from it.

Have a look at the dell 27" for gaming.

Also be aware you will be limited to new ati cards as they are the only ones that have mini display port.
 
I did suprise myself to be honest but in reality I think the credit should go to corsair for their power supply and smart case.

So glad I returned the cooler master cosmos
 
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