Ordered A New Computer...

[Tony]

My poor desktop computer is on it's last leg. I'm running a Q6600 cpu on a P5Q Pro mobo, and have been for quite a few years. This chip has been OC'd most of it's life and everything is just tired. Last night I decided to swap everything into a different mobo that i have (P5B-E) just to see if it will work. Well it was worse as I was afraid of. So I gave up on it last night and went to bed.

I woke up this morning and pulled the p5b mobo out and put the Pro back in. The computer would POST, but once it started to load the OS, BSOD! :dammit:

So fed up, I said screw it and stuffed my bloated HDD back into it, and it booted up. I said the hell with it and went into the BIOS to do a little "tweaking". The Q6600 stock is only 2.4GHz. With a little finesse, I now have the computer running stable at 3.48GHz

Yeah, that's right. I did a 1GHz overclock on this old chip. And, it's still running under 50c at full load hehe. But, it's days are numbered.

For that reason, I have just made the largest computer purchase I have ever made. It all revolves around the Intel Core i7 960! Yeah, the best of the best. AMD? AMD who?

Next, I needed to put that chip into something. How about an Asus Rampage III X58 mobo? Yeah, 6mbps sata III with USB3 connections, now we're talking.

Crap, I need a new video card, the 9800GTX+ is tired as well. Okay, lets go with teh EVGA GTX 560 2GB

We're going to need some memory to help all of this work together and all my stuff is DDR2 1066... Okay, how about 6 2GB sticks of Corsair PC3 12800 DDR3 memory?

Hm, now we have the power, how am I going to keep that chip cool? Well, with FLAMES! Yeah, I said flames, as in the Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme CPU cooler.

Okay, need a HDD that is just as fast as the rest of the stuff, so SSD is a no brainer here. So I decided on the OCZ Agility 3 120GB SSD.

Crap, my case looks like the ass end of a horse, so I'm going to need a new case... There just isn't enough room in a mid tower, so a Full Tower is definitely in order. The Antec DF-85 fits that bill quite nicely.

We still need to power all of this. And for that job, it's Thermaltake all the way with the Toughpower Grand TPG-850M PSU

Now I also had some help in the money department and didn't pay anywhere near retail for this stuff, so I think I got a good deal. I know I will not have to order anything else for a long time to come unless something dies on me. And it does happen from time to time. Sometimes, they just don't get the magic smoke sealed in there quite tight enough. Lets hope this time, they did lol.

Let me know what you think.

 

[Lee]

Was that English?? LOL No idea what you were talking about, but it sounds like a mean bit of kit.

 

[Tony]

Um, sorta lmao. If you click on the links, there are purdy pictures in them there links

Yeah, there are not many computers out there that are as powerful than this one will be. I didn't want to have to do this again in 3 years, so I went all out on it.

 

[Whirlybird]

Sounds like "Tony the Toolman" . . . Arrr . . . Arrr . . . Arrr

Seriously, you are going to rock Tony


This is the case for my main rig . . . http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2765147&CatId=1520

Tons of room . . . removable motherboard tray . . . a power bus that cleans up mess of wires . . . virtually complete toolless installation of hardware

 

[Tony]

I actually changed up the memory. Instead of 6 sticks of 2gb, I ordered 3 sticks of 4gb memory. Same amount of ram, only 3 slots, and I shouldn't have a problem with that massive cpu cooler lmao. I will be taking some video when I build this thing and will post it on the "tonynewlin" YouTube channel. Then, I will spam the forums with it hehe. It should be fun if it goes as smooth as my last build.

 

[murankar]

Well I am not a corsair fan but sounds like you got it under control. Trying to play games? If so it will handle. lol

 

[RCD]

Our family is starting to phase out of desktops and bring in tablets. We dont really do much on the computers, so tablets seemed practical.

 

[Tony]

Well I am not a corsair fan but sounds like you got it under control. Trying to play games? If so it will handle. lol

Nope, no gaming at all. I will be doing video rendering and photo manipulation. One video I need to work on has 7 or more videos going at one time, so I need the processing power. And after further checking, I'm almost positive my cooler will cover one of the memory slots so 3 sticks is the way I should have went to begin with. Last time I checked on memory, the 4gb sticks were so outrageous I didn't even bother looking. Now, they are cheaper than the 2gb sticks per gb lmao. go figure. Either way, everything will work.

Our family is starting to phase out of desktops and bring in tablets. We dont really do much on the computers, so tablets seemed practical.

Yeah, if you don't do much, a guess a tablet can work for you. But, I need HDD space, I need processing power, and I would make an ipad or whatever smoke with what I do. I won't even buy one to take with me to work because they are so under powered. But, if you just browse the interwebz and look at photos, then it's the way to go.

 

[murankar]

I get that. I have a laptop that can video really well. It is designed for gaming so it can do video just fine. If you can meet gaming standards the video should be no problem.

 

[Tony]

My current desktop with a quad core overclocked to 3.4GHz can't even run 7 videos at the same time. Some reason, I doubt I could find a lappy that would be able to do it. My lappy is only good for minor stuff, like SD rendering. When it comes to 7 HD videos being edited at the same time, I would blow this poor thing up lol.

 

[RCD]

My current desktop with a quad core overclocked to 3.4GHz can't even run 7 videos at the same time. Some reason, I doubt I could find a lappy that would be able to do it. My lappy is only good for minor stuff, like SD rendering. When it comes to 7 HD videos being edited at the same time, I would blow this poor thing up lol.

Why would you be watching 7 videos at once? lol

 

[Tony]

I'm not watching them. I'm using 7+ videos at the same time in one video I'm editing. think of it as picture in picture.

 

[murankar]

This lappy I have is about as powerful as the one you are building. Just do a search for for the MSI GT660R. Got a lot of good reviews.

 

[Tony]

well, I had to make yet another order today. My wife told me when she got her lappy that she loves using her lappy, and hardly ever used the desktop. So, I gave her monitor to my grandma for her surveillance system I installed. Right after I gave that away, my 24" monitor caught on fire because of a bad regulator on the board. So, I ordered two more 23" LED monitors and have been running them on my computer since. She told me once I get my computer built, she is stealing my old computer and one of my monitors. Um, NOOO! lmao. So today I ordered yet another 23" LED monitor for her computer. I wonder what she is going to ask for next lol.

 

[Tony]

Well today I have received all of the parts I needed for the Bitchin' i7 Build except the memory I'm going to use for it. Since I ordered it late, it should be here tomorrow I hope. If not, I'm tearing the package open and using the memory I have even if I do have to pay a restocking fee lmao.

The case is awesome. There are only a few things I don't like about it, but I knew about before I ordered. The first is on the doors for the drive bays (optical). They have a latch that you have to push in order to open the dvd drive tray. Yeah, I just took the one off on the bay I put that in. Speaking of the DVD drive, I had to put it in the second bay because it was hitting one of the top fans before being pushed in all the way. Oh well, I will just stick a card reader in there . The second issue was the front USB 3.0 plug. You have to run a wire all the way to the back of the mobo in order to hook it up. Since my mobo doesn't have any 3.0 ports on the mobo it's self, this really isn't an issue. In fact, I don't have anything that could utilize that port anyway.

Those are the bad points of the Antec case. The goods are yet to come when I fire it up and make sure everything works.

The i7 chip is much bigger in the 1366 socket than the lga775. The chip is also much more heavy. But, the cooler I purchased screwed right on. yes, I said screwed, and not those cheap push pins that I hate so much.

The video card is smaller than my last one, but should put out about 6x more power. We will see.

The SSD drive is friggin small. lmao. I was wondering where in the world I was going to mount it, then when I took the case out of the box, there were rubber bushings mounted on the bottom of the case just for an SSD. How wonderful

The PSU had to be installed upside down since it sits in the bottom of the case. the fan will be sucking in air from the top of the psu and blowing it out. I love the psu being down there because it keeps the CoG really low, and with a case this size, it matters. The modular design is great. But, I wish there were more wiring options. All of the extra wires come in their own bag to keep them together. I was impressed with the way it looked. Now, just have to wait to see how it works.

This is pretty much where I stand at the moment. I don't want to waste $90 and use that memory I purchased even if I do build another DDR3 computer. I can still get it cheaper. The cooler has a blue LED fan that doesn't match anything in the case so I will more than likely pull it out and replace the LED's with red. Since it is blue now though, I decided to go ahead and install a blue led fan in the side door to blow onto the GPU to keep it cool. After all, everything I'm doing will be using the crap out of the GPU.

Here's hoping I get my memory tomorrow.

 

[Whirlybird]

"I love the psu being down there because it keeps the CoG really low" . . . only an RCer would worry about CoG on a computer

"Not those cheap push pins that I hate so much" . . . don't we all . . . I cracked an AMD chip once to the tune of another $180

Let's hear it for modular power supplies

 

[Tony]

It's a sickness I tell ya hahahaha

 

[murankar]

modular power is so awesome. It give the ability to keep the inside looking clean, for the ocd types and allows for better airflow. When I get home I will need to replace a few things on my tower so it will work. That maybe my new server since the wife and I both have lappies. I think I might self host my videos and pictures.

 

[Tony]

I have thought about putting a server in this house. I just found a great Dell server with 32GB of memory, a badass cpu and so on for $2500. IT's more server than I could ever need. Over 10TB of storage. But, no money lmao. I will probably just setup this old dell with the P4HT 3.0GHz and put windows server on it. It will do what I need it to do.

As for this one and the modular power supply, there could be things that are done better. There are still a lot of wired hanging out that I had to tuck under the mobo tray, but it looks pretty clean. Now that it's running (Im' on it now), I will break it all down here after a while and redo every aspect of it and make it the cleanest install you have ever seen. Including custom plates and brackets to hide wires, cover ugly things, and whatnot. But, I will have to get tired of the way the case looks now before I do that.

Anyone have some red CCFL's laying around? 12" preferably? lol

 

[nitro208ca]

Hey Tony. one thing you should not do is overclock your cpu.It puts to mucxh stress on the processor and you can burn it out by shortening its life