Help with a new gaming computer… Have many MANY questions

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[Faithh]

Well nvidia cards are easier nowadays to overclock because they limited the voltage on the GPU though.

I'd prefer the Asus whatever radeon V2 V2. The V2 is the one with a redesigned cooler.

Intel SSD's are reliable but not the fastest on the market. If you want a faster one for the same price look for the Samsung 840 basic (Non-pro).

Instead of a seagate buy a western digital. My seagate just occured a s.m.a.r.t. error.

About the Corsair H100i, indeed this unit doesn't grind but some units were grinding but this was fixable with a firmware update. Don't forget to update the firmware if you have the issue


The SP120's are meant for radiators and heatsinks, this one should be used for your H100i cooler.

The AF120/AF140 is meant for case cooling for airflow..

Btw, let me know if the H100i remains silent

[chaud]

I would go ASUS over ASRock if you are going to overclock to the limit of air cooling.

Intel 520 drive is overkill, get something else.

Seagate is cheaper for a reason, pay a little more for Western Digital if you can.

Gigabyte or MSI 7870 with the 3 or 2 fan coolers are the way to go.

[Milkshake86]

I would go ASUS over ASRock if you are going to overclock to the limit of air cooling.

Intel 520 drive is overkill, get something else.

Seagate is cheaper for a reason, pay a little more for Western Digital if you can.

Gigabyte or MSI 7870 with the 3 or 2 fan coolers are the way to go.

You'd be severely mistaken, ASRock has better $100-$200 bracket boards in general and the z77 E4 is an overclocking champ.

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[Kyokudai]

Most of your component choices look fine. I have a few suggestions and comments but ill get there in a bit. To preface, these are just my opinions and shouldn't be taken as standard nor will i claim to have facts and numbers to back them up.

First and foremost I have to ask a couple of questions.
What is your main goal with the overclocking?
While there are a lot of tools now to assist with overclocking these days, overclocking always comes with risks. Overclocking is expert friendly no matter how you look at it.
If your main goal is to get a little bit better performance, i have to ask, why not just get slightly better components that don't need to be overclocked to achieve the performance you are looking for?

Is the place that is building it going to do the overclocking for you?
I would make sure because many assembly places won't overclock for you.

What is your desired life span of the system?
If you are determined to overclock then keep in mind that overclocking will degrade the lifetime of the system.

Do you intend to upgrade this system through it's lifespan?
Overclocking will have to be re-tuned when you do upgrade. And if someone else does it for you the first time then you won't be as prepared necessarily.

To sum up the above. I would suggest you be cautious with the overclocking. It can be fun to play with and get you a decent boost to performance. But it does come with a cost. If you are doing it yourself, you can easily destroy components. Also at best it will get you around 1/2 generation more in terms of speed and performance. (once again my opinion)
-----

On to components:
Case seems fine to me, the fans that come with it are small so will be noisier. But you can upgrade those easily. Keep in mind you'll have approx 9 fans (give or take) in the case running. So these will generate noise but will be mostly necessary with overclocking. As an upgrade i would say a large side mount fan can go a long ways

Motherboard should be fine.
Processor is fine for just gaming.

Memory: Memory is one of the cheapest and most effective upgrades to a system. Windows 7 is capable of handling more memory. I would honestly recommend upping the amount of memory to 16Gb if you can swing it. And while matching memory isn't a huge deal these days, it's usually easier to do it initially.

Cooler: From what i can read via research, it should fit in that case. I think someone has already replied about the case so ill leave it there.
Optical Drive: Any will do, you won't need a disc in the drive to play those games.

SSD: an SSD won't boost in-game performance a huge amount, the only point it'll boost is the load times and perhaps transition points in MMO's. The main thing you want is reliability. Speed differences between models wont really help game performance. I don't know about current IBM performance, their initial entry into the SSD market wasn't too hot, but then again nobody's was. I will say this: consider that an SSD is just solid state memory, and IBM's specialty isn't necessarily solid state memory. Nor is it drive controllers. Samsung is highest rated at the moment, but I think Crucial and Corsair also have entries that are reliable. They've been doing solid state memory for a long time. All the same, back-up your SSD drive with an imager to be safe.

SATA HDD: A seagate barracuda might be overkill if you are using an SSD for your primary load drive (if there's a price difference even). Western Digital has a better overall track record for their drive controllers. Just keep in mind that this is your secondary drive, so you don't need top of the line performance here.

Graphics Cards: Your choices really boil down to 2 chips: 7850, 7870. Something to think about is that alot of times the next step up in video cards in the same generation use the same physical chip with the "better" one being already overclocked. I can't say that this is the case for this, but it does happen alot. That means you might not be able to squeeze more out of the 7870 through an overclock. Since you're overclocking, go for the 2 fan configuration where one fan is over the GPU and the other is over the heat sink. And I, personally, would go with the 7850 over the 7870 unless the price difference is big. Other than that, you can choose whichever one matches those two things. As far as more enclosed or less enclosed, it's really hard to tell if the enclosure makes a big difference without using a smoke to watch the airflow.

OS: Definitely windows 7. Don't do 8 right now.

Desk: The L-shaped desks seem a little flimsy, and 'L' shaped desks are difficult to place in rooms especially if you move. (I use an L shape desk so i speak from experience). One thing to ask yourself, are you ever going to dual or multi screen? If so you will want more area and the larger desk, if not then the single will be fine. Also if you are planning on having your CPU on the desk make sure the single has enough physical room, especially if you have a (or may eventually get) a very large monitor.

I hope this is all helpful, and enjoy the new computer! (new toys are always fun!)

-Kyo

[Xuvial]

Sorry if I missed one or two questions, your post is really huge and it would've sorta helped if you had just bullet-pointed/numbered all your questions in one place so I could fire-off answers/opinions quickly.

> CPU cooler - H100i - stay away from this till Corsair fix their shit up. I'm an H100 owner, you could also call me ahuge Corsair fanboy, but even I will say that Corsair need to fix some shit with H100i. The benchmarks are awesome but they don't tell the story of reliability or quality assurance. E.g. the fans are way better now, but ironically the fan controller is screwy and can't regulate voltage properly, ending up with fans being too loud or grindy (back to square one Corsair!). Also yhe tubing isn't secure in 100% of cases and that can end up being nothing short of a disaster. No NCIX won't make sure the "tubes are tight" or whatever, that's not how it works. I dunno what NCIX's policies are but it'll ultimately be Corsair's responsibility if you're not happy with your pump once the build has been delivered.
I would either sit tight with stock cooler until Corsair do some fixes, or play it safer with an air cooler (a Noctua one maybe?), or buy an H80/H100 which have proved themselves to be mostly fine.

> SSD - Intel 520 series is solid, but not the best bang for the buck. Samsung 830 series is the hot thing right now, you get 128gb for $99.99 CAD on NCIX. Why would you pay $157 for a 120gb? Even if the specs are better on paper, in real-world performance the difference is jack-all. You won't even notice it because all SSD's more or less do the same thing, offer instant access times and ridiculous sequential reads.

> HDD - Western Digital HDD's could be considered a tad more reliable than Seagate HDD's. But the thing with HDD's is that it's still on a case-to-case basis when it comes to failures, it doesn't matter if you take Seagate or WD (though I personally prefer WD, a lot of people here also do :P) because both will have a reasonably small chance of failure.

> GPU - WoW is known to be somewhat friendlier with nVidia GPU's but whatever, when you're talking HD7850/HD7870 performance the differences don't matter because those cards aren't even close to being bottlenecks. I would stick with Asus DCII cards though, MSI Twin Frozr cards are known to be a tad on the louder side for no real performance benefit.

Can't answer anything about tables/desks/chairs because I haven't even heard of those companies, plus the fact that a solid computer desk can pretty much come from anywhere. I got mine for $50 when a company was clearing out their offices, a desk which just happened to be made of incredibly strong wood reinforced with steel framing+legs from below, could probably carry an elephant :P

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[Faithh]

@OP: Yep I meant the Asus 785x V2

All of you guys trying to say that the H100i is a bad one are wrong..

The H100i currently has a firmware bug. When the fans are at a low RPM, the pump is running at a much much higher RPM which is causing the grinding noise. Corsair fixed this yesterday with a firmware update.

With a large heatsink like NH-D14, you can't have the 200mm fans on the side panel. But depends on case to case though.

Reviews are pretty much irrelevant because they didn't use it in a case environment but once you compare a noctua nh-D14 with a H100 in pushpull you notice the difference clearly. The most being irrelevant is that they were running their CPU at a very low wattage while watercooling loves more wattage better than aircooling though. That's the main reason why they sometimes perform better than H2O with stock clock speeds..

In my Nzxt phantom I have 2x 200mm fan in the top as outtake, 140mm in the back as outtake, 200m and 2x 120mm as intake on the side panel and in the front a 140mm intake fan.

I couldn't mount the 200mm fan with my noctua. I had temperatures of 80° (noctua nh-d14) with a 2600k 4.7GHz @ 1.375V and with my H100 I have a max of 70° in prime95 small fft's ofc.

Most graphics cards are rather blowing their heat just in the case and the heatsink getting warmer.. Compared to a H100 with in pushpull configuration the cooler rather blows immediately the heat away from your case.

Graphics card such as the Asus are blowing the heat direct from the IO backplate (however you want to call this) away.

Just one question.. Why are people here still recommending that the 830 is the best for the bucks? The 840 (non-pro) performs clearly better than the 830 and costs the same as the 830 which makes 90$ -> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820147188

You'd be severely mistaken, ASRock has better $100-$200 bracket boards in general and the z77 E4 is an overclocking champ.

Doubt it. They don't use thermal pads between the heatsink and vrm >.<

Uhm the Z77 Extreme4 from Asrock is only making use of a 8 power vrm phase design while the Asus is making use of 12. The Asrock z77 extreme4 is very very unstable during EXTREME loads because of an overheating VRM. http://www.overclock.net/t/1271002/a...g-badly-needed

The overheating VRM is even causing a failed prime95 run.. -> Asrock failed?

I'm pretty certain that my Asus P8z68-v pro gen3 clocks better than any Asrock junk tbh.

Still for overclocking Asus > MSI > Asrock > Gigabyte

Gigabyte just makes the most reliable boards of them all. I had like a bunch of them without having problems but they were shit to overclock.

A lovely board to OC would have been the Asus p8z77-v pro or the MSI Mpower z77.

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[Xuvial]

I found that there was only 1 incident of a leaky H100i and it was on Newegg. Majority of the complaints were for the grinding noise I think but that has been fixed by the firmware update. When you told me about it, I got completely turned off from buying the H100i. But now, after I have read more reviews of it online, I find that the leaky H100i was just one case out of many good condition H100i's... So now, I am on the fence on buying it or not.

Corsair have indeed claimed they can fix the fan grinding/clicking with a firmware update. But that firmware update remains to be seen, they haven't released it yet. Until you can find some kind of confirmation that the update is out and it fixes the fan issues people have been having, stay on the fence :P

I can't seem to be able to decide on a SSD. I looked for more reviews online on SSDs and some say that the Samsung 840 Pro series is better. Some say that Samsung 830 series were better. I just want to find a good balance of cheaper price and performance. I can't decide on which one to get.
Also, I can't seem to find the 128GB Samsung 830 SSD for $99.99 on NCIX... Can you give me a link please?

That's why the Samsung 830 was recommended, it IS the ultimate combination of price/performance and the superb reliability rates are the icing on the cake.

Also I can't find that one for $99.99 CAD anymore o_O it's back up to $119.99...very strange.

I have decided on getting the Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 GV-R787OC-2GD that has 3 fans and is factory overclocked, meaning that its overclocked from the initial get-go. I will update OP with it.

Yup solid card

There was only 1 review from 1 guy whose H100i leaked and destroyed his computer parts, like his video card. I think all the other reviews were all 4-5 star reviews and the major complaint was the grinding noise, which, as you said, got fixed by the firmware update. I am much more leaning towards getting the H100i now then before... Probably will get it in push/pull but I don't how to make sure to see if my motherboard will allow enough clearance for it to work... Any way to measure that somehow before ordering the computer?

I just measured my own setup...it's H100, but I heard the radiator is more or less exactly the same. The rad is exactly 27mm thick, the fans 25mm thick (SP120s) for a total of 52mm. Now whether adding another two fans for push/pull will fit or not is heavily reliant on your case and your motherboard. In my case, my upper VRM heatsink is too tall and the RAM sticks are right there as well, the top of my case doesn't have enough clearance. In other cases the CPU pin comes in the way, etc.
From what I have read so far, a Carbide 500R won't be able to accommodate push/pull, you will need something like a 650D or a full tower like Phantom/HAF-X. Not to mention your ASRock Extreme4 seems to have it's top VRM heatsink right at the top, it could make even 650D not enough. A full tower is your safest bet for push/pull.

I am probably not going to do any extreme overclocking whatsoever. I just want to do some mild overclocking like up to 4.3 or 4.4 but nothing higher than that, hopefully. With the games I will be playing, I won't be needing that much overclocking... And I want my computer to last me 3 years from now so then I can upgrade my parts if needed.

I think I will stay with the asrock motherboard since I will only do mild overclocking as I mentioned... What you think?

Of course, the Extreme4 is great and will handle mild/moderate (even heavy) overclocks for a long time.

[Faithh]

There was only 1 review from 1 guy whose H100i leaked and destroyed his computer parts, like his video card. I think all the other reviews were all 4-5 star reviews and the major complaint was the grinding noise, which, as you said, got fixed by the firmware update. I am much more leaning towards getting the H100i now then before... Probably will get it in push/pull but I don't how to make sure to see if my motherboard will allow enough clearance for it to work... Any way to measure that somehow before ordering the computer?



I am probably not going to do any extreme overclocking whatsoever. I just want to do some mild overclocking like up to 4.3 or 4.4 but nothing higher than that, hopefully. With the games I will be playing, I won't be needing that much overclocking... And I want my computer to last me 3 years from now so then I can upgrade my parts if needed.

I think I will stay with the asrock motherboard since I will only do mild overclocking as I mentioned... What you think?

EDIT:

I will update my OP in the beginning of it with my finalized build very soon... Hopefully, people can give input on it so I can get it ordered soon

The Asrock would suit for your use tbh. But still I won't recommend them over Asus. Been hearing a lot of rumours their rma service is crap etc.

Well about your 500r with an H100i in push pull configuration.

As far as I can see on this forum -> http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=101182

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y19...4/P1000344.jpg
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y19...4/P1000348.jpg
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y19...4/P1000343.jpg

As far as I can see, the room between the radiator/fans and motherboard is too small to do pushpull. But if you do it like he did you can have a push configuration. One more option you still have is, mounting 2 fans on the radiator (top) but you can't close it with the panel I think so you have your push pull configuration.

If you plan to pay an additional 60eur, try the case nzxt switch 810 which is a lovely case with a huge sidewindow/fan filters. The case is very huge but it's almost complety customizable and supports up to 480mm rads though and a lot of space between the motherboard and the top (like 90mm). You can press a button to switch the colour though.

There might be other cases which will do push pull configurations without taking the toppanel off, but I'm only familiar with a few cases :/

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[Faithh]

Yeah I just looked online regarding that just now. I found that people are finding other issues with the new firmware update... So I am going to wait a bit.

I was actually thinking of getting the Corsair SP120 High Static Pressure Fans x2 and get the NCIX peeps to put them as exhaust out on the top, basically sidelining the whole issue with the original H100i fans' grinding/clicking noise...

I am a bit confused still on something though. Should I get the 2 fans exhausting underneath the radiator or above the radiator? I can have either the fans exhausting out on top of the case and under the lid with the radiator under and inside the case... OR... I can have the fans exhausting underneath the radiator inside the case while the radiator is out on the top of the case but under the lid? Which setup is better? I heard something about the radiator needing to have the fans facing it or away from it... I don't know... I can't seem to figure it out... :/



I found it even more strange that I find TWO prices listed for the Samsung 840 (non-pro) on NCIX... o.O

Here:

http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=77...e&promoid=1030 - $104.99
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=77...e&promoid=1209 - $99.99

So weird... I have been refreshing all those parts' pages and searching for them for the past week and I have seen prices fluctuate like crazy... For the same parts even... Very strange.

Here's the price for the Samsung 830:

http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=74...0%26%20Storage - $119.99

I will probably wait and see which one is cheaper out of them in the next day or two and choose that one... I am leaning more on the Samsung 840 at the moment so hopefully it turns out that way. I can always do the Price Matching for NCIX and get the cheaper price from another Canadian store... which I am going to be doing anyway for every price I am going to order and save some dollars from there :P.



I am confused on what exactly is the VRM heatsink. I know the RAM sticks have heatspreaders which are the RAM heatsinks I think... I could be wrong though. I also cannot figure out where or what the CPU heatsink is... I am confused on which is which.

I want to try out a different case but I really like Corsair 500R... It has a variety of things that I like that make it a great case for me.
I have looked and researched for other cases... I have looked at the 650D and other Corsair cases and even other brand of cases, also full tower cases, but I always come back to the 500R. I guess I will not have push and pull but I will have good quality fans at ALL the fan mounts of the 500R.
I will make a new separate post attached to this post or a new post entirely, regarding fans... But that will be after I have finalized the main components for my CPU .

Also, is it possible to get a different motherboard but with similar performance as the ASRock Extreme 4, which has bigger clearance at the top of the 500R case for a P/P setup with the H100i? How would I figure this out? I think I can look at zoomed in pictures of motherboards and correlate from that... maybe... What would you suggest?

http://imgur.com/HMKJe

The Red & yellow circles are the VRM heatsinks. Sometimes you have situations that the radiator is not fitting because it's interfering with the Red circle I painted on that picture.

Try this case: Nzxt phantom OR Nzxt switch 810 (which can do much fatter radiators in PP)

Nzxt phantom -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0b-pZmSv6A
Nzxt switch 810 -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfu_1GWDraI

With the nzxt phantom you get a bracket so you can do PP. I can't promise if the VRM of the asrock won't interfer the radiator though with the nzxt phantom. But with Any Asus p8z77 or p8z68 it will work. The motherboard being used on that video was an Asus p8z68-v or pro, just like I have now.

For the Nzxt switch 810, there's no need for a bracket. There is 90mm space for radiators + fans which is more than enough for H100 with any kind of motherboard. Also you can add 3 fans in the top while having the toppanel on it, so you don't see the fans at all so it's fully covered. This case will guarantee you 100% pushpull.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfu_1GWDraI This dummy guy didn't mount 3 fans on the top :P

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[Xuvial]

Lol most good cases have pretty much everything you listed there. What's your max budget for the case?

[Faithh]

Hmm... Thanks. Now I know what they are lol.

I am still researching so that's why it took me a while to respond. Umm... There are few things I am looking for in a Computer Case. Well, actually, let me tell you the reasons why I like the Corsair Carbide 500R series.

- I love that it is completely black finish
- I love that it can hold up to 10 fans (even though I only count 9 but it says 10, whatever.... I still like the number of fans I can mount)
- I love the removable hard drive cages... Helps in giving more air flow into the case to the graphic card when it's removed
- I love the cable management grommets that are available in it
- I like the dust filters
- I like that the external inputs (USB 3.0, USB 2.0, audio jacks, etc.) are on the front of the case and not the top of the case (if its on top of the case, then it's easy to catch dust in the holes of those ports)

If I can find all of the above in a case and it looks good from the outside, as well as the inside, then I will definitely consider it... I am looking into the NZXT cases right now, and looking at reviews and videos on it... So far I like them, but I need to research some more.

Let me count.. 1 fan in the back, 3 fans in the top, 2 fans on the hdd bays, 2 fans on the front, 1 fan at bottom which makes 9. Also you can add another 1 or 2 or 3 for the radiator.

The 2 fans on the hdd bays can be positioned like you want. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tTwXq0MaNY for the case nzxt switch 810

About the watercooling options, you can mount upto a 420mm in the top though and also you can remove the hdd bays and place there another 240m radiator or 120mm radiator. So you have 2 radiators in total and both radiators are can be in pushpull.

There is also a black mat version btw.

The switch is the hardcore of hardcore cases though.

Just a suggestion: A case with a big window is rather going to get more attention of you than a case without one if the case is at a desk.

[Lychee3000]

/10charsss

[inux94]

Remember to get a 3rd party HDD bracket for the Switch 810, the stock ones are absolutely HORRIBLE & it gives heavy, heavy vibrations on my 7200RPM HDD.

[Xuvial]

edit: You know what, forget it. The number of cases which accommodate push/pull with zero modding almost don't exist. Maybe Xigmatek Elysium if you enjoy fridge-sized cases.

See this thread: http://www.overclock.net/t/1144409/h...-full-listings