Post your gaming setup!

[Ghâzh]

I know, right? I was pretty surprised too. But check it out - I spent a good ten minutes flipping between the green and the black before I decided I must be crazy and got the green.

Those are false specs. Western Digital doesn't officially report the speed of the Green drives but instead talk about their "smart speed adjusting technology" that sets the RPM according to the search / write function you are specifying. It is limited to 5400 RPM by hardware, though (which they don't mention in the technical specs). Greens are also made from cheaper parts hence the shorter warranty.

Nevertheless, if I was buying a storage drive right now I'd use the Green one instead of the Black I have at the moment. It's loud. Probably the loudest part in my pc while idling. :< Also the boot up sound is shattering. Like someone scratching nails against a blackboard.

[Marest]

I know, right? I was pretty surprised too. But check it out - I spent a good ten minutes flipping between the green and the black before I decided I must be crazy and got the green.

I would check Western Digital's website and specification sheets and not look on Amazon.

The Green drives use what WD calls "IntelliPower", which essentially means that the drive will use whatever speed it finds "necessary". According to tests, the max speed is 5400 RPM, but it can "boost", or ramp up to 5900 RPM if the drive feels the need.

According to WD themselves IntelliPower is:
A fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and caching algorithms designed to deliver both significant power savings and solid performance.

Basically, the drive will throttle itself when needed and run around 5400 RPM "normally" and in day-to-day use and only boost say at system startup or when the drive is used really intensely; like when installing large late, i.e. a game. It will still always be slower than a Black.

Whereas the Blacks run at 7200 RPM.

[Armond]

Well, that sucks. Thanks for the information, both of you.

That said, I'm using it for storage and I can't say as I've noticed any real issues with it (I primarily use it to hold my videos and such, and they play back fine). So, perhaps it wasn't such a bad deal after all.

[Gorack]

Case: Corsair 650D
CPU: Intel i7-3770k @ 3.9GHz
MoBo: Asus P8Z77-V
Heatsink: Coolermaster Hyper 212 EVO
RAM: Corsair Dominator Platinum 16GB @ 1866MHz
Video Card: MSI GTX 680 Lightning
PSU: Corsair AX750
SSD: Samsung 830 256GB
HDD: WD Caviar Black 2TB

http://i.imgur.com/RHKjN.jpg

[demonskies]

So my oh my got my first bad part from newegg. Got my parts on Friday and found my motherboard was bad womp womp. Now I get to wait til tomorrow to be able to send it out for RMA because its Columbus Day. So hopefully Ill have it back by next week but then I go on vacation so well see if I have time to get it setup before then.

[Synthaxx]

Many of the regulars who've been here for a year or 2 will remember my task to get the ultimate system back in early-mid 2011. 3 GTX580's, 16GB RAM, 2600K, 1200W PSU, and 4 SSD's in RAID0. Oh, and watercooling on the cards and CPU of course.

A few months ago, i sold one of my 580's as i had no need for that kind of power. Last week, almost a year since i finished my last job, i got a letter informing me that the government owed me £404 as Tax Refund ("404 - Tax Refund Not Found" heh). It only took a few days for me to set my heart on a GTX6 card. Just a single one, as i didn't even have need for 2 580's. At the same time, i decided i didn't need watercooling if i was going with a single card.

So, with the money, i bought myself the very pretty EVGA GTX670. Just the normal version. I say pretty as it's got a white strip down the side we can see with the brand and model "engraved" into it. This provides a nice contrast in my 800D with the white LED i've got running (yes, i swapped back to it from the Elysium -- best decision ever i might add). Along with the 670, i'd need a CPU cooler. I looked for a while, and almost as soon as i saw it, i knew the NZXT Havik 140 was the one. I looked at reviews. I wanted something quiet but where the cooler could really pull ahead when it needed to. Sure enough, reviews pitched this in a very favorable light, though i wasn't quite ready for just HOW good it'd be.

I had planned to install some Corsair Airflow fans, 5 to be specific (2x140 + 3x120), but settled on leaving those until later.

So, today, these 2 parts arrived. I gutted the waterloop out of my system in about 30 minutes and set about installing the new cooler first. I have to give a big shout out of NZXT for making this cooler so easy to fit. It is BY FAR the simplest cooler i've ever fitted, more than even my EK Supreme HF Waterblock with "easyfit" kit. It's a 15 minute job and very simple to do. Next up, i fitted the card. You all know how this goes, so no explanation needed. What i WAS surprised at is just how light it was. I've been used to cards that weigh over a kilogram for the past 18 months or so. To hold a card that seems to weigh less than 500G was great.

Now, i mentioned earlier i wasn't ready for how good the CPU cooler actually was. Let's put it this way - You know when you're about to yawn, and you start to hear that sound in your head as you actually start yawning? Well, i can't hear it over the "sound" of that. To put it another way, if you've ever had an old motherboard with a 40mm fan fitted on the chipset, the whole system is about 100% QUIETER than that and without the annoying high pitch noise or rattling. The loudest part is the GTX670 cooler, and even that's difficult to hear. I'm sat about 3ft away from the source of the noise and i can barely hear it. It's a damn-near silent system, and the temps are quite admirable.

Now, when i turn up the CPU fan, obviously i can hear it, and when i turn up the GPU fan curve, obviously i can hear that too. However, it is still quieter than my watercooling ever was, and what's more, with each component handling it's own temperature and cooling, i can actually play games like WoW with the CPU fan at minimum and not worry about heat from the GPU pushing it up to 65-70C. Yes, i can game with the CPU fan at minimum and i don't have to worry about temps. It is literally that good. If i need to use the CPU, just up the fan speed and we're good. This is on a 2600K overclocked to 4.6Ghz at 1.4V, and temps peaked at 62C in WoW earlier. I don't run intensive software that often, so i can run silent mode with confidence most of the time.

One thing i'm not so impressed with is the 670's idle temps. It's noise is great, but at default settings, it idles at 55C. Temperature peaks at 80C in WoW (out in the barrens which pushes usage to 99%). Obviously, with MSI afterburner, i can create my own fan curve, so this is a small point not worth worrying about. One thing to keep in mind is that i'm running this in an 800D with only 1 exhaust fan at the back. The 800D is infamous for it's rather poor airflow (as it's only got 1 intake, and that's not a great design), so it's not a problem. Main point is that these temps are fine by me as i can always fix them very easily.

So, i solved all the problems with these upgrades;
- No more heat issues
- MUCH less noise in every situation
- Less maintenance
- Less power usage
- Support for 4 screens on one card - Something that comes in very handy as a developer at times
- Less crashes and bugs due to the very frustrating issues with the 580's when in SLI

I used to only be able to run 2 screens per GPU, and since i occasionally used a third, i had to disable SLI when on 2 cards.

Now, pictures. I must apologize for the quality. The iPad camera doesn't deal well in low light shots, but it also doesn't like light pointed in it's general direction. Click on any picture for a larger size one.

The CPU cooler up close with the 670 hiding underneath. You can see that it blocks off the first RAM slot if you're using RAM with tall heatsinks due to the fan, but that's not an issue for most people.


A general overview of the system. I've since removed the bottom 140MM fan you can see there. The overall tidyness of it is impressive as i'm traditionally known for not caring about tidying cables. With only 1 card, this is not a problem.

Now, perhaps the most stunning pic (in real life, it looks better);

A night shot with the lights at full. I've tweaked the position slightly since this shot was taken, but you can see i've run it from the PCIE slot (where it connects to the controller), up and behind the fan, to the top, down between the RAM modules, and then wedged it between the top of the GPU and the bottom of the CPU cooler. Since the change, you can now also see the model to the right of "EVGA" as well. It looks much more stunning in real life than in the picture.

[CheezusCrust]

Synthaxx, that is so cool. I really like the colour matching of your GPU + CPU cooler

[at05gt]

I'd honestly recommend buying a pound of cable ties and going to town. I don't have the time right now to take a pic of my box, but it looks something like a roller coaster - there's a path the general bunch of cables follows, and it obviously splits from time to time, but everything is as bunched up as I could get it.

Ya they really are a computer geeks best friend, I'll get some from the garage and spend a few hours this week organizing the mess. I spent a few hours Sunday "sealing" my case, intake fans are filtered, side panels and any case "gaps" where sealed with 1/4" thick foam insulation tape (for weather striping doors, works well). When my GPU fan isn't roaring like a jet engine my case is damn near whisper quiet now, put a load on it however all my fans kick into overdrive and its just a wall of noise.

[Zeara]

@ Synthax and the gpu temps.

Thats what you get when buying a reference cooler. I do admit it looks cool in the case. But (imo) you should have gone with a custom cooler (asus/gigabyte). And with adding extra case fans, airflow should get better. (So you dont have to get a blower fan for that )

[Drunkenvalley]

@ Synthax and the gpu temps.

Thats what you get when buying a reference cooler. I do admit it looks cool in the case. But (imo) you should have gone with a custom cooler (asus/gigabyte). And with adding extra case fans, airflow should get better. (So you dont have to get a blower fan for that )

Little to do with that, really. The 800D in general has pretty terrible aircooling, so temps in that case are universally pretty high.

[Marest]

Bought a sleeving-kit just for fun and tested sleeving the cable on an old case fan today. Didn't turn out great but for a first attempt I'm fairly happy.

[Xuvial]

@Marest if that's your first attempt at sleeving then you did a damn fine job.

@Synthaxx well I'll be darned, you're probably the only person I know who went back to air from water and is finding it an improved experience :O

Little to do with that, really. The 800D in general has pretty terrible aircooling, so temps in that case are universally pretty high.

That's a bit sad considering how much that thing costs, and the overall looks are pretty sleek too. Oh well.

[MMKing]

Bought a sleeving-kit just for fun and tested sleeving the cable on an old case fan today. Didn't turn out great but for a first attempt I'm fairly happy.

Could you provide a link to where you bought the set?

Searching ''sleeve kit'', ''sleeve''. Or any other word of relevance i could think of did not bring me to the product i was searching for.

[Drunkenvalley]

MDPC-X.com will have pretty much everything, as well as some of the best quality. Just know that sleeving can be a PITA to get right.

[MMKing]

MDPC-X.com will have pretty much everything, as well as some of the best quality. Just know that sleeving can be a PITA to get right.

Well i enjoy doing new things on my hobby, time consumption is not a problem. On the contrary, i enjoy spending time. As long as it yields results that is.

[Drunkenvalley]

Well i enjoy doing new things on my hobby, time consumption is not a problem. On the contrary, i enjoy spending time. As long as it yields results that is.

What I mean is, remember that the pictures of sleeving is almost always about 10 times the actual scale, so millimeter precision is required for the good results, and then you have to repeat this success. :P

[MrPaladinGuy]

CPU i5-2500k @ 4.5
RAM 2x4GB 1333 G.SKILL Ripjaw X
OS Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
Keyboard Logitech G510
Mouse Logitech M310
Speakers/Headphones Sennheiser HD 419
Motherboard BIOSTAR TP67XE (B3)
Hard Drive 1 Samsung 830 256GB SSD - OS/Software Drive
Hard Drive 2 1TB Western Digital Caviar Black - Game Drive
Hard Drive 3 1TB Western Digital Caviar Black - Fraps Drive
Optical Drive Liteon 24x DVD-R
Display 1 Asus VE245H 24" 1080p LCD
Display 2 Samsung 42" 720p Plasma
PSU Corsair Professional Series Gold AX850
Mouse Pad XTracPads Ripper XL - Customized
GPU EVGA GTX 570
CPU Cooling Cooler Master V6 GT
Case Cooler Master HAF X RC 942
Sound Card X-Fi Fatality Champion

[MMKing]

Picked up some parts for my build earlier today.

---------- Post added 2012-10-10 at 02:08 PM ----------
Old build:
i5-2500k - Stock cooler
Asus GTX 470 - Coolit Omni closed loop watercooling
4GB x 2 Corsair Dominator 1600MHZ Tall
1 x WD Caviar Black 1TB
2 x Seasonic 400GB 7200RPM - Unknown name
Highres image - http://i.imgur.com/Mgm43.jpg


3200x2400 http://i.imgur.com/5YIx1.jpg

The MSI 7970 Lightning FYI, so you don't confuse it with the GTX 680. And you won't believe what came in the box. Intel / Nvidia documents from 1998/1999 regarding warranty. It also makes references to DX5 and DX6 :P


3200x2400 http://i.imgur.com/DEsmB.jpg

Yeah i know, the H80 is superior to the H70 in every way. But the fans in picture bellow was included in a package deal at a discount. The price of the package minus the price of buying two separate fans would save me 15USD. So i basically got the pump, radiator etc for 15 Dollars.


3200x2400 http://i.imgur.com/3DgI0.jpg

I will post a picture of the new setup when my camera is recharged. And sorry about the double post thing, needed 10 posts to attach images.

[Marest]

@Marest if that's your first attempt at sleeving then you did a damn fine job.

Indeed first time ever. Mistakes were:
- Shrink that came with the kit was either way too big for that particular sleeve or just too small. I had to do a "custom" solution with a cable tie at the other end - not looking great but it won't show if I ever decide to use this fan.
- The sleeve itself wasn't stretched perfectly, mainly due to me measuring wrong. It could've been stretched another 4-6 mm probably which would mean a tighter fit. Still, you can't see the cables underneath at glance so I'm happy.
- As I used a regular lighter I managed to burn a small portion of the shrink-tubing at the end. The pictures don't show this, but it looks a bit nasty close-up.

Could you provide a link to where you bought the set?

https://www.inet.se/produkt/5321536/...ving-kit-svart

Not perhaps the cheapest kit ever, but it does come with sleeve in different sizes, heatshrink tubing, some cable ties and other miscellaneous items that could or could not be of use. If you just want to try out sleeving (and do a more "general" job, say sleeve a bunch of cables together just for fun) it's a decent kit, but I'd probably recommend to actually buy a tool-kit and some 3 mm sleeve instead of the above. The cost would be less most likely.

MDPC-X.com will have pretty much everything, as well as some of the best quality. Just know that sleeving can be a PITA to get right.

Indeed, for any serious sleeving you should go to MDPC. http://en.mdpc-x.com/mdpc-sleeve.htm

And, it's only a PITA if you want it to be exactly right. Expect to redo cables a few times if you want the sleeve to be stretched properly, be the right size and for the heatshrink to align perfectly. For more "general" sleeving (say, like the sleeves on extension cables) it's just time consuming I reckon.

Well i enjoy doing new things on my hobby, time consumption is not a problem. On the contrary, i enjoy spending time. As long as it yields results that is.

Well, each cable on, for example, a GPU power cable can take around 10-15 minutes to complete. Factor in redoing it when it's not perfect and you can count around 20 min per cable. For a novice/first time this is probably ~30+ min per cable. Once you start doing a few you get the hang of it though and it speeds up the process somewhat.

[noteworthynerd]

@Synthaxx well I'll be darned, you're probably the only person I know who went back to air from water and is finding it an improved experience :O

I went from my water loop to a NH-D14 and my temps are lower as well, but I'm partly contributing that to proper TIM application this time.