The PUBG rig V2 x Strix x Thermalright

[ALXAndy]

So I have had an absolute ton to do over the past week. I had to completely empty a room, furniture and all, and then clean it and then completely revamp the layout. The window in here is broken, and doesn't close properly. So it was filthy in here, given we live on a road which kicks up dust. Glazier coming soon.....

Any way, my away rig was running too hot.

It was never a great idea putting a 3950x on a 120mm AIO, but due to AMDs really high idle temps it was struggling. It was also a heater, with the top of the rig constantly being very hot.

I didn't want to buy yet another case, so I grabbed my NZXT PUBG case out of storage. Bit odd to use a ITX board in it, but as you will see it matters none.

So I reused a lot of the hardware. This includes.

X570i Strix.

6700XT Strix.

And the EVGA Supernova PSU.

I already had two 1tb NVME in there and a 500gb SATA, so I added another 1tb SATA whilst I was at it.

I upgraded the RAM to 32gb, and it is a good thing I did as I will explain. It was £46.

I then focussed on cooling. I got this for £60.

I then got four of these for £8.50 each. They are made by the same OEM who make EK's Vardar fans.

Plan was to use three on the rad, one in the rear and the rad fans as intakes.

This is the case. NZXT 700.

I then foolishly assumed a PCIE 3 riser would work, as my Phanteks and Lian Li ones work with Radeon PCIE 4 cards. I got this.

I then got a keyboard. Already had a Strix mouse.

And a new mic for £30.

The only other thing really peeing me off was the monitor. It's a superb monitor (Raptor 144hz) but it is too low. It has no height adjustment. Why do monitors assume you are a kid now? Got this for about £12 IIRC.

I then spent 13 hours sat on the floor rebuilding the rig. And it would not post. Turns out that -

1. There was too much mounting pressure on the 3950x and this board is very fussy. Fixed that.
2. The gen 3 riser was having none of it.

I then got into a bit of a panic. After much f-ing around I found a Phanteks riser that worked, but not with the mount. So I had to spend another two hours modding the mount. After about 18 hours I got there, exhausted.

 

[ALXAndy]

Forgot. The RAM would have been too tall to clear the middle rad fan. The Crucial was about as low profile as it gets, and it barely fitted. Phew.

I managed to stick the IO shield Cenedd printed for me, as I warped it cutting it down a bit. Looks super now.

Edit. Don't post when you are exhausted...

I decided to sacrifice the front USB 3 for two more in the rear. I had the Akasa bracket to hand. Might seem daft, but the board was maxed out before with the printer, plotter and etc so yeah was deffo the best choice. It still has two USB2 in the front and all I use that for is charging and dumping photos from the phone.

 

[mickyflinn]

Very nice .

 

[ALXAndy]

Thanks dude. Not bad for a pile of parts I mostly had.

The 3950x actually boosts again, which is nice.

 

[Jay85]

So I have had an absolute ton to do over the past week. I had to completely empty a room, furniture and all, and then clean it and then completely revamp the layout. The window in here is broken, and doesn't close properly. So it was filthy in here, given we live on a road which kicks up dust. Glazier coming soon.....

Any way, my away rig was running too hot.

It was never a great idea putting a 3950x on a 120mm AIO, but due to AMDs really high idle temps it was struggling. It was also a heater, with the top of the rig constantly being very hot.

I didn't want to buy yet another case, so I grabbed my NZXT PUBG case out of storage. Bit odd to use a ITX board in it, but as you will see it matters none.

So I reused a lot of the hardware. This includes.

X570i Strix.

6700XT Strix.

And the EVGA Supernova PSU.

I already had two 1tb NVME in there and a 500gb SATA, so I added another 1tb SATA whilst I was at it.

I upgraded the RAM to 32gb, and it is a good thing I did as I will explain. It was £46.

I then focussed on cooling. I got this for £60.

I then got four of these for £8.50 each. They are made by the same OEM who make EK's Vardar fans.

Plan was to use three on the rad, one in the rear and the rad fans as intakes.

This is the case. NZXT 700.

I then foolishly assumed a PCIE 3 riser would work, as my Phanteks and Lian Li ones work with Radeon PCIE 4 cards. I got this.

I then got a keyboard. Already had a Strix mouse.

And a new mic for £30.

The only other thing really peeing me off was the monitor. It's a superb monitor (Raptor 144hz) but it is too low. It has no height adjustment. Why do monitors assume you are a kid now? Got this for about £12 IIRC.

I then spent 13 hours sat on the floor rebuilding the rig. And it would not post. Turns out that -

1. There was too much mounting pressure on the 3950x and this board is very fussy. Fixed that.
2. The gen 3 riser was having none of it.

I then got into a bit of a panic. After much f-ing around I found a Phanteks riser that worked, but not with the mount. So I had to spend another two hours modding the mount. After about 18 hours I got there, exhausted.

That is mint! Love the colour scheme of that. Awesome job man!

 

[ALXAndy]

Thanks dude. Yeah, it needed to be done properly and not just chuck spare parts in it like the last time I built it.

Things I forgot to mention. I got the Phanteks Neons here on OCUK. They are superb. Also massive props to Thermalright. They are making a mockery of the industry tbh. £60, and they even managed to pull off a feat I haven't seen on coolers that cost 2x as much. I mean the name plate on the pump head. It is magnetic, so you can take it off and orient it in 90' increments meaning you can have it the correct way up no matter how you mount the pump.

But yeah overall a very cheap upgrade but a massive one at the same time.

Also forgot to mention I was sick of Windows having control of my fans, and them ramping to 100% as soon as you so much as started a game. For that I fitted my Aqua Computer PA3 and Splitty 9. It is running around 7v, IIRC, and that never changes. I also realised that no matter what I set the GPU to in AB it too ramped to 90% no matter what. Meaning it was maxing out at 54c but was making an ungodly noise. Eventually after many hours of fiddling I limited it in the AMD software. It goes to a max of 50% fans now (I mean it was so bad I could hear it through my open back headphones FGS) and yeah, temps are now brilliant and noise is far lower.

 

[ALXAndy]

OK so now that the dust has settled after the room refresh I will have a bit more time.

So it’s time to make it a brute like the two I have at home.

6700XT is fine and all but out of PUBG it ain’t world beating. It struggles in modern engine games at 1440p max. Which isn’t unsurprising.

So, it needs a bigger GPU. For this I chose a 6900XT Toxic from the MM here. Super price and will make a great upgrade.

There are but two problems.

The first will be the 650w PSU. This will be easy to rectify with the 850w Super Flower I bought a while back here for £30.

The second issue is much more of a problem. See, like nearly all modern cases if you fit two AIOs you can’t intake any air. You could fit the fans to bring air in, but it’s not ideal. Like, the rad fans. It would be pretty ugly too, with the full fins of the rads showing. And being not brand new they tend to look grotty.

What works best as Lian Li discovered a while back was having 3 extra fan holes as intakes, then pushing the hot air out of the case from the rads.

This case isn’t the best for airflow, and heat goes out through the limited vents far easier than air comes in.

So, I hatched a plan. I first looked at new cases but I have so many kicking around now I would have to smash them up and recycle them. Not ideal. It would also get expensive fast and I don’t want to go down that road either.

The plan? Replace the window with a 5mm cast acrylic one, then cut in either two 140mm fan holes or 3 120 (if they fit) and use them to intake fresh cooler air.

Looked at the acrylic and yeah, about £30 tops. Far cheaper than £200+ a case would cost. I also have a hardened hole saw I bought to cut the server with too, so it should eat through acrylic like it’s not even there.

I shall take a look at it next week and begin planning. I’ll likely machine my own grilles on the CNC.

 

[Cenedd]

Could you not just take out the existing window and stick it straight on the CNC to cut the fan holes in that? Save you £30

 

[ALXAndy]

Ever machined tempered glass bro?

 

[Cenedd]

Fair point...but yes, did you not read my last project?!

 

[ALXAndy]

Yeah but you’re crazy so it doesn’t count

 

[ALXAndy]

Right. I got the server out two days ago (it is half finished) and realised it would be a severe ball ache to take the PSU out. Like, beyond a pain. Had a look around, and snagged this for £109 delivered.

It isn't from the range that explode. TPU gave it a favourable review, and at that price it was unbeatable.

I bought these for it. Cheap as chips, but very nice.

I also realised after hours of looking at it that the NZXT case is not going to work. You can't fit a 360 rad top and front. As such I have decided to spend a disgusting amount of money on a case (more info when I 100% decide which) that will have 9 fan mounts and thus, 3 intakes and a rad both top and front exhausting. The PUBG case cost very little, and I really don't want to mod it. Well, maybe I would like, if it would work but it will not. I can't order the case until tomorrow, as it will be enormous and extremely heavy whichever one I decide on.

Moving on. I won't replace the fans on the 6900XT Toxic. I was going to, but it just means I have to keep them around. Instead I have ordered 6 of these.

Which cost me £25. Figured if I was going to dump that sort of money into a HEDT case I may as well go with full RGB. I also bought one of these.

For three reasons.

1. It is the only memory come board cooler I have ever seen that does not have a janky mount.
2. The board will not have any airflow over it.
3. The RAM I bought was cheap rubbish and looks like it.

Right, back tomorrow.

 

[Cenedd]

As such I have decided to spend a disgusting amount of money on a case

Ahh, the old spend more on a case than you want to admit to anyone routine....I've NEVER done THAT! *sidles off out the room hoping nobody notices*

 

[pepp77]

Ahh, the old spend more on a case than you want to admit to anyone routine....I've NEVER done THAT! *sidles off out the room hoping nobody notices*

Hell I bought a case for my recent PC build, then went and bought a second case cause I liked it more when I saw it! I still have the first case in its box sitting on the side.

 

[Cenedd]

s'alright, I drilled holes in mine and then flooded it Gotta respect your investment!

 

[ALXAndy]

Hell I bought a case for my recent PC build, then went and bought a second case cause I liked it more when I saw it! I still have the first case in its box sitting on the side.

I have a problem.... I now have three ITX cases in the loft and three Alienware chassis in the spare room. And there will be another one soon /facepalm.

It's annoying, but unless you spend stupid money you just can't get one that can hold two AIOs and intake air. Which is super annoying. I mean, I found this thing for £85.

But amazingly they decided to save exactly 50p in metal and make sure you can't.

I did consider getting it, and literally raising the roof but as I get older I realise I simply can't be arsed.

 

[Cenedd]

but as I get older I realise I simply can't be arsed.

A-men to that!

 

[ALXAndy]

OK the deed is done. £331 later...

Three 140mm intakes, one 140mm exhaust, and able to take a 360 AIO in the roof and front, whilst still having three intakes in the side. Of course about half of that goes on this.

It does everything. Fan control, RGB control, a clock, a temp meter and even the weather. I loathe RGB software, and I loathe fan control through Windows.

So some stuffs arrived.

Just waiting on the PSU, case will be here Friday. Unfortunately I had no rig. I gave the 6700XT Strix to my mate who collects me and brings me back from holiday, so that was his payment for next year. As such.

Still it is better than no PC at all.

 

[Cenedd]

As such. Still it is better than no PC at all.

But think of all that power you'll be saving. You'll pay off the new case in no time!
The "MEG"...I can't help but think of that bad terrible-looking shark film that's been plastered all over the billboards.

 

[ALXAndy]

Could be worse. Could be like my kettle and toaster !

Bit cheesy.....

TBH what pushed me over the edge was that screen. I mean, the ability to control all of your fans and RGB without a virus on your computer made it worth it. The other option was a black Odyssey X, but that was £400.