(A not so) Extreme Makeover: Computer Edition

Fire_fly

Fire_fly

Fire_fly

Soldato
Joined
18 Jan 2012
Posts
3,898
Location
Derbyshire
After having my current computer for nearly 4 years I have decided that it is time for a something new. What initially started out as a plan just to update my graphics card to a 560Ti for BF3 has instead evolved into a full upgrade.

My rig as it stands was pre built by OcUk back in 2008 and has served me well

Q6600 @ 3GHz
Nividia nForce 790i ultra SLI
2 GTX 260s in SLI
4GBs of OCZ RAM
500GB HDD
Arctic Freezer Pro 7
Corsair TX750 SLI
Antec 900 case

img0270yw.jpg


and the insides

img0275qb.jpg



I will be upgrading to

i5 3570K @ around 4.5Ghz (hopefully)
Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H
Gigabyte Windforce X3 GTX 680
8GBs of Samsung Green Ram
Phanteks PH-TC14PE CPU Cooler, in Blue.
From my old build I will keep the PSU, HDD and the case, but I will be changing out the fans for some that are a bit quieter, some Akasa Apaches.

Most of my order was delivered by OcUK yesterday and is sitting in the box awaiting the arrival of the CPU cooler, which should arrive sometime next week.

img0269h.jpg



I will post some more pics when I start building, this will be most likely sometime next week.
 
It was due a good clean out last week, but I didn't really see the point as I’m going to be changing everything and I will clean out the case as well. I think I will be getting some fan filters for it as well so stop it getting so bad in the future.
 
My cooler arrived Friday afternoon and me and my house mate started building that evening.

First I striped out all of the old stuff from the case and was left with this,
img0277j.jpg

and a lot of dust on the floor.

The next thing we did was to strip out the fans and their cages in the front of the case to replace them with the Apaches, this is what we ended up with.
img0280bp.jpg

All nice and clean.

Next came giving the case a good clean out and replacing the rear fan.
img0279pl.jpg


Now onto the Motherboard, we installed the coolers brackets and fitted the processor.
img0283zk.jpg


Moving on we then installed the RAM and CPU cooler.
img0289h.jpg

The Intel stock cooler is there for scale, the Phanteks one is huge, and we were not sure if it would in the case.

Now to get it all back in the case, after a bit of a hastle getting the screw holes to line up it finally went in.
img0290zj.jpg


The side of the case just fits on but we had to remove part of the side window so it would fit.
img0292q.jpg


At this point we got a bit carried away with the build and neglected to take many more photos. But we installed the front fans and HDD cages along with the PSU and Graphics card. Once we had it all installed and wired up this is what we ended up with.
img0296or.jpg

The cables could do with a bit more of a tidy up and I would like some orange zip ties to match in with the cooler, but overall i'm quite happy with it.
 
After deciding that I did not like having a hole in the side of my computer I though that it may be better if i got the side window fixed so that it would fit back into the side panel of the case. After going out and buying a nice new hacksaw from B&Q I cut of the internal fan clip that was in the way of the CPU cooler and ended up with it looking like this.
img0301bl.jpg

The side of the case with the window installed now fits onto the side of the computer with about a 1-2mm gap between it and the cooler.

I will run it at stock for the next week or so to ensure everthing works and then will spend a weekend trying to overclock the nuts off it :D.
 
Last edited:
nice build, done pretty much the same transition myself though I'm still running my Q6600 machine alongside my updated rig. Haven't had chance to start OCing it yet but let us know what kind of temps you get with the Phanteks and the 3570K
 
Nice to see someone re-using the Antec 900 series case. I've got one sat here which I'm putting off building into my media centre as It'll need modding and I just don't have the drive to do it at the moment.
 
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