First gaming build

hugobosslives · 29 Nov 2014 at 17:47

I have loved reading about some of these epic builds over the past year. So that now I've actually got around to moving away from laptops and building my own rig I thought i'd share it here.

First thing to say is that this isn't a fancy expensive rig. Trying to get maximum performance for around £600 quid. The things that I wanted were:

Overclocked i5
Nvidia GTX 970
SSD boot drive

So I've bought all the parts I need except the graphics card. I'm going to hopefully buythat on Monday but I can get building without due to the Intel graphics that come with the i5.

So the components that I have/bought are (and the prices they cost me) mostly from overclockers:

CPU i5-2500k [£110.00]
CPU cooler: Corsair H75 [£59.99]
Mobo: MSI Z77-G43 [Free with CPU] plan to updgrade to SLI Z97 board soon
RAM: Avexir Core White Series 8GB [£59.99]
SSD: 120 GB Sandisk Ultra II [£39.99]
HDD: 500GB from old laptop [free]
PSU: SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" [£49.99]
Case: BitFenix Neos ATX Tower WhiteBlue [£29.99]
Cables: Random selection of cables e.g. sata III [free]

And hopefully a 970 ACX 2.0 Superclocked EVGA for £260ish

So total is £350+ the 970 so just cresting £600

So far I have some of the fans and the SSD. The rest should arrive Monday when I put it together. And I will update this thread.

hugobosslives · 29 Nov 2014 at 21:18

ALXAndy said:
Hey man just some advice...

wow. interesting. does the 4x lane not bottleneck though? i realise 16x is overkill but i thought 4x would be too low?

hugobosslives · 29 Nov 2014 at 21:49

ALXAndy said:
It does ...

haha well you lost me there. I know nothing about these VT-X/D things... :/

so basically i'd just need a bigger PSU and keep the board?

pretty sure even gold rated 550 wouldn't handle sli?

hugobosslives · 29 Nov 2014 at 22:11

thanks for the info mate. i'll bare it in mind when i want the extra card

hugobosslives · 1 Dec 2014 at 22:41

So lots of exciting things appeared in the post today

The case came first and I love it:

Then came the Ram, PSU, and H75 cooler:

hugobosslives · 1 Dec 2014 at 22:46

Next up: Fit the parts I can

Fans went in first, then PSU and SSD. I'm all ready for the motherboard and CPU which should arrive tomorrow (tues) or the day after:

IMG-20141201-WA0009_zps4becde27.jpg.html

and all put together it currently looks rubbish. but its progress

:

hugobosslives · 4 Dec 2014 at 10:17

cliffo88 said:
The NEOS looks quite small actually, what's the build quality like?

Seems pretty good actually. Only problem I had was one mobo screw thread was poorly tapped and thus wouldn't screw in.

Rightttt. Update so all the parts arrived and I went with a MSI GTX 770 in the end. Got a bit excited so forgot to take many pictures haha:

Getting an adapter for these power pins as the panel won't go on haha

Played at bit of Crysis 3 and Fifa and getting some crazy low temps on High 1080p. Really happy

Got to do some cable management and play around in the BIOS with OCing and Fan control but it works! Feels gooood

Total cost came to just around £480 as I went with the 770 not the 970 in the end. Seems alright for 1080p gaming. I plan to get either another 770 or the x70 of the next generation

I will update when I've done all the tidying up

hugobosslives · 4 Dec 2014 at 12:43

ED209 said:
not bad at all, what temps are you getting on the processor with the all in 1 water block?

I have a after market fan one and been looking at upgrading this to a water cooling block.

Depends on fan speed.

set to 30% its 22C idle and about 28C when browsing tabs, videos, music etc. Ramps upto about 60-70% in gaming but never breaks 50C.

Really impressed with this cooler:

eg. right now:

hugobosslives · 5 Dec 2014 at 19:01

Damo667 said:
I've just upgraded...

Yeh I only have 2 eight (6+2) pin PCI connectors on this Superflower PSU but two 770s would definitely go over a modest 550W so I would have to either by a 650+W GPU and a second 770 or get more efficient gpus such as the 970s.

I have just played far cry 4 and got 50-70 fps (av 60) on ulta/very high settings at 1080p which I'm more than happy with

so don't see the need for SLI just yet haha.

hugobosslives · 12 Dec 2014 at 14:03

tonschk said:
Hi there, where have you found the black/orange fans ?

In the first post?

They are just cheap ones of a auction site. Had a free £10 to spend and as I run them off the motherboard headers and not the PSU I can make them ultra quiet when not gaming

hugobosslives · 4 Mar 2015 at 10:09

Thought i'd update this post with a few changes I've made. First the boring...I added a new 1TB WD Blue disk for all my steam games

Had a bit of a fan clicking problem devlop on the 770 which wouldn't disappear despite taking off the msi cooler and re oiling and seating the fans.

So i've installed the H75 directly to the GPU using a NZXT G10 bracket and some extra heatsinks. I've then put a massive noctua heatsink on the 2500k.

temps on the gpu in fc4 have gone from 78C to around mid 60s (card is on about a 5% overclock on top of boost clock)

Main problem was the pathetic options on my case for mounting fans/rads. I've basically ghetto modded it up with the last fan actually on the outside of the case. Anyway enjoy the pictures haha:

cooler off

add some vodka:

much better. so sexy naked. (oh and added some extra hink sinks i had lying around to aid surface area. they are placed above where the hottest chips are underneath the black plate)

then add one of these bad boys:

here's it in the case with the new cpu setup. doesn't look pretty but the temps are great:

i only put one fan on the noctua as one on the back would screw up the noctua airflow

any questions or advice?

hugobosslives · 6 Mar 2015 at 10:27

SuperG said:
that is was beast of a first gaming pc!

thanks. just wish this case had more fan mounts that are accesible. There's only one on the back. And then two on the front but they are behind the hdd mesh/grill so cant be used for the radiator as you cant detach the pipes on an AIO.

maybe I should just buy a Phanteks Luxe

hugobosslives · 14 Mar 2015 at 09:53

Techno-Geek said:
Lovely colour of case, nice build. What else you gotta do?

well.....

Ideally i need a new case. I love this case. looks really good, build quality is actually spot on. and its nice and compact. However... I really need a bit more space. Ideally it would be 3cm taller with roof intakes. But we'll see....

performance wise. i'm not really sure what i can do. the psu (550w superflower gold) wouldn't take another 770. so can't go sli. i guess i'll pick up the next generation after the 970 (i.e. 1070 or whatever they do with the naming).

i'm still fairly confident with the 2500k. my chip clocks really well. Its on stock voltages and is rock stable @4.5 in prime95 and games. I have it at 4.3 currently as the extra heat at isn't worth it when i'm gaming. sometimes when running my engineering modeling i clock it higher but its still fine

any suggestions from yourself?

hugobosslives · 14 Mar 2015 at 13:24

Aston998 said:
wow!!! Really nice build! i have the same SSD The Sandisk Ultra 2

thanks mate. its a great drive. just be sure to not completely fill it. i've run some benchmarks on mine and its super quick until its about 95GB full and then the write speeds crash. but i think this is the same for all ssds haha.

while i'm here i might as well show my full setup. my screens are both 1080p. Got an LG-IPS234 on the left. And a Iiyama E2409HDS on the right. The IPS has fantastic colours whilst the TN as a 1ms reponse for fps games. I love them.

Oh and i've just 3d printed a new mascot for my case. (its a griffin for those wondering

) you can also just about see my 3d printed phone charger on the desk between the screens. it has one of those Qi charging pads inside and wireless charges my nexus

Edit: yes i know there's some issues with the 3d printing to work out haha