Post your Rig Specs Here!

[Keith Wallace]

Does nVidia still use bridges for SLI? I think AMD does CFX over PCI-e now, with their new cards.

 

[QwarkDreams]

Does nVidia still use bridges for SLI? I think AMD does CFX over PCI-e now, with their new cards.

Yup, SLI still needs bridges (besides the low-end cards). Afaik only the R9 290 & 290X don't need bridges anymore.

 

[cw1988]

What mobo do you have? Asus Evo R2.0, but which one? I'm sure you did your research but I just wanted to mention that the old M5A97 only supports CrossFireX.

This build will be pure overkill^^ Damn, FX8350, 16GB RAM, SLI GTX 770 4GB.....damn!

Its the Asus M5A99X, so it supports quad SLI which is pointless because after SLI it starts dropping to x4 and x1 speeds :S
Single GFX is x16, SLI drops to x8 but it wont make a different considering the gains.

Also:

 

[QwarkDreams]

Finally! Today came the rest of the parts for the new PC in the living room (PSU, RAM, OS).

Had my fair share of nerve-wrecking with the assembling (to be honest, it was 100% my fault as you will see in the picture).

The specs are now:

Case: Sharkoon VS3-S (I HATE that thing!!!)
APU: AMD A6-5400K 2x 3.6GHz
MoBo: MSI A78M-E45
RAM: Crucial Ballistix Tactical 1x 4GB DDR3-1866 (adding another 4GB stick next month)
PSU: Corsair VS350
ODD: some old LG DVD drive
HDD: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB

I do not recommend this case at all (only excuse for this case is if you need one right now and replace it with better one within short time). The cable management in there is terrible. With the PSU mounted in the top some cables are too short to be routed behind the MoBo tray, so I had to leave them hanging in the case (did my best to clear the path for the front intake fan). The 24pin cable almost doesn't fit behind the MoBo tray. The MoBo tray doesn't have a cutout for easy CPU cooler replacement (so you ahve to get everything out before you can replace the CPU cooler). The quality is really not worth the ~30€ (the steel feels too light and flexes a lot), you can only install 2x 2.5" or 2x 3.5" drives, the rear exhaust fan mount is only for 80/92mm fans. Never again Sharkoon.
I'm playing with the idea of replacing the case at the end of this year with a Corsair 200R which is about 20€ more expensive but at least it offers better quality and a more reasoned way of installing fans, drives and better cable management.

As you can see in the picture I connected the front panel stuff on the wrong spot.



What kinda puzzles me is that the MoBo (FM2+) was only ~38€ and supports CrossFire (has 2 PCIe slots) while my ASRock H87 Pro4 (LGA1150) only has one PCIe slot and was about 70€

 

[cw1988]

What kinda puzzles me is that the MoBo (FM2+) was only ~38? and supports CrossFire (has 2 PCIe slots) while my ASRock H87 Pro4 (LGA1150) only has one PCIe slot and was about 70?

The mobo above is a x16 PCI-E which reduces down to x4 it seems with SLI and the other PCI-E is a x1 speed. So even though SLI would be possible it could create a few issues with the speed reduction and differences. Just guessing, im not 100% clued up on how much speeds prevent gfx card bottlenecking etc.

 

[QwarkDreams]

The mobo above is a x16 PCI-E which reduces down to x4 it seems with SLI and the other PCI-E is a x1 speed. So even though SLI would be possible it could create a few issues with the speed reduction and differences. Just guessing, im not 100% clued up on how much speeds prevent gfx card bottlenecking etc.

To be honest, I've never really looked into SLI/CF(X) and PCI-e ports. That's probably why I never understood why most MoBos don't sipport both SLI and CrossFire.

 

[QwarkDreams]

I should really clean my PC more often....the amount of dust that has build up on the mesh on the front panel was...well, it was more than I would've expected in this short time since I last cleaned it.

But this way I did some more cable management and finally put all the unused cables behind the MoBo tray (damn...I need more zip ties). And yes, the grey shade on the top fans was dust before I cleaned them. Seems like on of the contacts of my fan splitter came loose and now I can only plug in two fans (not that I need more at the moment).





I also took the bottom intake fan (the Corsair SP120) and put it in the PC in the living room (the Sharkoon case only came with one front 120mm intake fan).

Btw, my next PSU will definately be at least semi-modular, but this could take a years until I buy a new one (being a Seasonic of excellent quality and more power than I could use even with a major upgrade in my rig).

Any thoughts on the cable management?

 

[gedzum]

Looking good. Just wondering though, how are you finding the stock intel cooler? Does it get particularly noisy after a while? The stock AMD one I had was obnoxious. Loud and high pitched. I'm considering the intel platform when upgrade time rolls. Might consider saving on an after market cooler since I don't really overclock much.

 

[QwarkDreams]

Looking good. Just wondering though, how are you finding the stock intel cooler? Does it get particularly noisy after a while? The stock AMD one I had was obnoxious. Loud and high pitched. I'm considering the intel platform when upgrade time rolls. Might consider saving on an after market cooler since I don't really overclock much.

Of course aftermarket coolers are better than the stock solution but at least they are free and more than sufficient when the case offers good airflow and one doesn't intend to overclock. I get good temps (~28-34?C idle, 62?C max. on load (video encoding); depending on the weather) in my case with the stock cooler but it is louder than the other fans I have installed in the case but not really annoying. It does its job and came "free" with the CPU (I'm sure Intel and AMD include them somewhere in the price).

Finally, the package from Amazon with the 92mm fan (be quiet! Pure Wings 2) and CPU cooler (Cooler Master Hyper TX3 Evo) arrived :-D Already installed both and at least the noise level went down quite a bit. Can't say much about the temps since AMD's temp monitors are garbage.

 

[gedzum]

Thanks for the feedback mate!

Seeing your build progress gives me the urge to randomly tinker with my build

 

[QwarkDreams]

Thanks for the feedback mate!

Seeing your build progress gives me the urge to randomly tinker with my build

If this already gives you the urge to tinker with your build.....DON'T watch build guides on YouTube^^

Altough, that's the last progress for some time. Still figuring out if I wanna get an air cooler or AIO water cooling unit for my CPU, eventough it's completely unnecessary (i3, no OC).

 

[gedzum]

If this already gives you the urge to tinker with your build.....DON'T watch build guides on YouTube^^

Altough, that's the last progress for some time. Still figuring out if I wanna get an air cooler or AIO water cooling unit for my CPU, eventough it's completely unnecessary (i3, no OC).

Seeing builds in general makes me want to tinker. I definitely watch PC related videos on youtube, including build guides. Just wish I could get my hands on all the gear they get to work with

 

[Detectionable]

If this already gives you the urge to tinker with your build.....DON'T watch build guides on YouTube^^

Altough, that's the last progress for some time. Still figuring out if I wanna get an air cooler or AIO water cooling unit for my CPU, eventough it's completely unnecessary (i3, no OC).

Even if you don't need a water cooler, it definitely improves the overall look of your machine, I moved from a Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme Air Cooler, to an H100i water cooler, and immediately made the whole build look 10x better

I did need water though, the Tuniq was beginning to struggle with my FX / OC

 

[QwarkDreams]

Even if you don't need a water cooler, it definitely improves the overall look of your machine, I moved from a Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme Air Cooler, to an H100i water cooler, and immediately made the whole build look 10x better

I did need water though, the Tuniq was beginning to struggle with my FX / OC

Plus, you don't have to worry about the height of your RAM sticks. I find that very annoying.

 

[Detectionable]

Plus, you don't have to worry about the height of your RAM sticks. I find that very annoying.

Yea good point, I had to loosen the fan on my Tuniq to fit my RAM under it, everything's nice and clear now, much better airflow around the whole machine with that huge chunk of metal out the way

 

[Ashalinia]

Case: Rosewill Challenger ATX Mid Tower
CPU: AMD FX-6300 6-Core @ 4.62 GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3P
RAM: Crucial Ballistix Sport 2x4 GB DDR3 1600 MHz
GPU: Nvidia Geforce GTX 660 SuperClocked 2 GB
PSU: Corsair CX500 500W
HDD: WD Blue 1 TB

 

[QwarkDreams]

Case: Rosewill Challenger ATX Mid Tower
CPU: AMD FX-6300 6-Core @ 4.62 GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3P
RAM: Crucial Ballistix Sport 2x4 GB DDR3 1600 MHz
GPU: Nvidia Geforce GTX 660 SuperClocked 2 GB
PSU: Corsair CX500 500W
HDD: WD Blue 1 TB

Nice solid rig!

What CPU cooler do you have?

 

[Ashalinia]

Nice solid rig!

What CPU cooler do you have?

Thanks! And I'm actually still using the stock cooler haha. I was holding off on it because I didn't have enough money for one at the time, but now I'm considering a 212 EVO.

 

[QwarkDreams]

Thanks! And I'm actually still using the stock cooler haha. I was holding off on it because I didn't have enough money for one at the time, but now I'm considering a 212 EVO.

Really? You got the CPU overclocked pretty high. An aftermarket cooler will keep the temps lower and prolong the lifespan of your CPU. I would recommend you get it as soon as possible (and some nice thermal paste, like the Noctua NT-H1 or something from Arctic). Overclocking over 1GHz with the stock cooler can't be healthy for the CPU ;-)

 

[Ashalinia]

Yeah, I figured. At non-gaming usage (regular Internet browsing, watching videos and listening to music) I'm around 25C and my Vcore is about 1.41. A little on the high end but I read max safe voltage is 1.45 and threshold is 1.5.

Pretty happy with these speeds though. No clue why it hits 4.57 instead of 4.6-4.62.