New System Build
I am creating this thread as a sort of worklog for the new system I am building. I am building myself a new system as a sort of celebration for finishing my Master's degree.
Hopefully, I will be able to attach pictures (not sure since I have not tried since the site was redesigned).
Here are the specs:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6400
Zalman CNPS9500 LED Cooling Fan with Heatsink
Asus P5B Deluxe motherboard
Corsiar XMS2 DDR2 800 (2 x 1GB)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 160GB (x2 in RAID 0)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 320GB (backup drive)
HIS X1950PRO 512MB IceQ Turbo
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer
NEC 18X DVD±R DVD Burner
NEC Black Floppy
Saitek Eclipse II Keyboard
Logitech G5 Laser Mouse
Thermaltake Matrix Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower
Antec NeoHE 500 ATX12V 500W Power Supply
I will add some product shots below, as it seems we can only add one image per post.
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Image Upload
Hmm...it seems we can only add one image to the original post that starts the thread, and no images in the comments.
Okay, JRKy, what would be the best way to create a thread, or blog, or whatever where I can add a couple of pictures to the post to document my progress as I build the system?
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Hrm, I would think you could
Hrm, I would think you could upload pics to an image category (Roach's Pics) or whatever and link to them.
-----
"Irish I had another drink"
"Lord, please save me from your followers"
Yeah, but...
I thought about that, but I don't want to flood the front page with a bunch of pics from my work log.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
There's a setting to have it
There's a setting to have it not be on the front page when you post the image.
-----
"Irish I had another drink"
"Lord, please save me from your followers"
Case
Okay, I finally have some time to post some pictures. Here is a shot of the case with the side panel off.
This is my first aluminum case. It is very light, but also seems a bit flimsy in places. Most of the edges are rounded, but there are a few sharp places. I had a little difficulty, which I will explain later with the pictures that show the trouble.
There are 2 120mm case fans. The lower drive bay for hard drive is sideways from the top drive bay. This is the first time I have had a case with the hard drive bay in that orientation. I like it, though it gets a bit cramped.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Case Front
Here is a shot of the front of the case.
One of the main reasons I got this case is that the ports are at the top of the case. I got tired of reaching down to plug things in.
In addition, the front of the case is mesh (with a filter backing), so the case will have good airflow.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Unfortunately
Unfortunately, the case has a few problems. The first one I noticed is that the punch-outs for the power supply back-stop were too short (or, you could say my power supply was too long).
In this picture, you can see where I marked the punch-out where my power supply sits. I decided to cut the case to allow the power supply to fit.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Modified
Okay, so things didn't fit quite right. Nothing a Dremel couldn't fix. It ain't pretty, but it works just fine.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Motherboard
Here is a shot of the motherboard with CPU and fan mounted. I decided to go with after market cooling so I could get a little overclock out of it while still being quiet. This Zalman cooler has received some good ratings, and I helped a friend put a system together last year with one. They are very quite and cool extremely well compared to stock cooling.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Motherboard (top)
Here is a shot of the mother board from above.
From this angle, you can see a few of the reasons that I chose this board over others that would have been less expensive.
Other than getting good reviews and being a capable overclocker, the floppy and IDE ports are on the right edge of the board (as you would see it in the case - but bottom on this shot). The floppy is a black port on the right, then the white power connection, then the red port is the for the IDE (the reflection of the camera flash makes it hard to see).
A lot of the Core 2 Duo boards have the IDE at the bottom edge of the board (left side in this shot), so hooking up a DVD drive would mean a cable stretched across the board. Some put the floppy at the lower right edge (bottom left in this shot, about where the IDE port is located on this board). I didn't think the placement of these ports in other boards were all that good. This is one of the few boards that seemed to put the ports in a good location for avoiding a rats-nets of cabling.
Also, this board has a heat-pipe system too cool the Northbridge and some of the power circuitry. You can see the Northbridge cooler and the pipe in this shot; behind the Zalman cooler is a radiator looking heat sink that the Northbridge pipe leads to, that also sits on the power circuitry. The way I have the Zalman set up, it will blow air over this heat sink, and out the back of the case (by way of the rear case fan). The Zalman also pulls in air in a way that will draw some over the memory. This presents an excellent flow of air across several of the warmest components of the system.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Motherboard installed
Here you can see the board mounted in the case. Memory has also been installed at this point. The Corsair modules have a black heat spreader, so they are hard to see.
You can see the motherboard's heat sink in this shot, right behind the CPU cooler. The placement of the rear fan could not be better. I didn't know it would line up so well with the CPU cooler when I made the order.
You can also see some of the beginnings of my cable routing efforts. The front panel ports for the case were split up. One side was run down the back of the motherboard tray (you can see them come out between the upper drive cage and the lower drive cage. The other set of cables were run down the upper drive cage and tied in place. I also routed the wires for the power button, light, and drive light along the edge and under the lower drive cage.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Putting it together
This show shows the all the drives installed (floppy, DVD, and hard drives). I bought round cables for the DVD and floppy, and went with the shortest that I thought would work so I would not have a lot of extra cable to tie up. I also bought additional SATA cables. Though the motherboard comes with several, I wanted the ones with latches and that were black.
Unfortunately, the hard drive cage is a bit cramped and close to the bottom of the case. The cables I bought (the black ones) have the latch, so the ends were heavier than the ones that came with the motherboard. I could not get the black ones to fit on the bottom drive. The 90 degree connector ran into the bottom of the case and did not leave enough room for the cable to bend. I used one that came with the motherboard (red). Since the end was not as heavy, there was barely enough room to for the cable to bend, but it fit. The bend is really sharp, so I am a bit concerned about damaging the cable. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of choice. A straight connector would not have fit either, since the cable would then run into the side of the case and I would not be able to close it.
The other difficulty I had was the IDE cable for the DVD drive. The port on the motherboard is at a 90 degree angle to the board. This can be good in some cases, and does seem to help cable routing in my case. Unfortunately, there is not much space between the connector and the lower drive cage. This makes connecting the cable a bit difficult.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Another shot
Just another shot of the build at a different angle.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Almost all there
Now almost everything is installed. The only thing missing is the fan controller. I was not thinking about this when I ordered the parts, but there was no way to control the speed of the case fans.
My other systems all have Antec power supplies that have a circuit specifically for controlling fans based on the temperature in the case. It makes the systems very quiet when not being run hard. With this system, the modular power supply does not have this function, so I ordered a fan controller after I started putting the system together.
One of the things I like about this case is the bar that holds up the power supply is removable. If you look at the pictures, you will see this is the first time the bar is in place. This makes installing the components much easier, and if I ever have to replace the power supply, it is much easier to remove. My other cases have a bar in a similar location that cannot be removed, making it difficult to work inside the case.
I took my time when installing the power cables. Considering this is the first time I have given any thought to cable routing, I don't think it is too bad. Looking at the pictures now, I could have improved a few things. However, most of the power cables are out of the way, so you can barely see the hard drive or video card power cables. The floppy drive power cable is hanging in front of the CPU cooler, so that could probably be done better.
What do you folks think? Any ideas on cleaning this up more?
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
A closer look
Here is a closer shot of the video card. I bought this HIS card because of it's high factory overclock and the cooling solution. It moves a lot of air, but can be quieter than some other cooling solutions. It also pushes air out of the case, as apposed to simply recirculating the warm air already in the case (as most other cards do).
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Up and running
The system is up and running. I took this some time while Windows was installing.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Going downhill from here
Some time after this, things started going down hill. After installing the video card drivers, the card stopped working. It would work in Safe Mode, and without drivers installed, but not with the drivers installed from the disk or the latest two revisions from ATI. I was considering returning the card and getting something different when another problem cropped up.
The fan controller arrived the next day. I installed it, and the fans would not work. I had already had problems with the outlet that the fans were on - it would not power the DVD or floppy drive either. I switched the DVD and floppy to a different modular cable, and things were fine (though now the case was just as cluttered as a not modular power supply). When that particular plug was used for the fans alone it was fine. Apparently, the lights on the fan controller, plus the fans was just too much for that circuit. I switched the fan controller over to the circuit that the DVD and floppy were on, and everything was fine. I tested that outlet with the hard drives, and they would not spin up. Obviously something was wrong with the power supply, and I began to think that it was the source of the video card problem as well.
At this point, I started doing some stress testing on the CPU, memory, and hard drives. The memory has a mail-in rebate, so I wanted to make sure the modules were good before mailing it in. Everything was fine, and I started playing with the fan settings. I had added the included fan controller for the Zalman fan, after finding out that the motherboard would not control 3-pin CPU fans (only 4-pin fans). I could have bought a 4-pin version of the Zalman, if I had known (though without the blue LED). For those of you looking for after market cooling for a new Core 2 Duo CPU, make sure you get one that has the small 4-pin connector (not a 4 pin molex connector).
I started to play around with overclocking, but the temperatures for the CPU were getting into the mid 50's C. I decided to stop and RMA the power supply and video card (the fan had started clicking). I had disconnected the video card fan because of the clicking, and figured that some of the temperature increase was due to poor video cooling. I got the front-side buss up to 325 before temps got higher than I wanted, then backed it down to 310 (default is 266). I'll have to try again when the power supply and video card come back. I want to get the highest overclock possible while maintaining a CPU temp no more than 50 C. I think that is possible, but I need the video card cooling to work correctly first.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Working now
Well, the replacement parts came in on Thursday and Friday. I put the machine together Friday evening, and started stress testing it. It seemed stable so I started pushing the buss speed up a bit. My goal was to get a bit of an over clock while keeping noise and heat down. I was able to over clock it from 2.13 GHz to 2.46 GHz (about a 15% over clock) before the tempurature got above 55C (under Prime95 stress testing at 100% on both cores). The fan noise at this level is not too bad when it is under the desk. I may end up turning the fans down a little since it is unlikely that the system will encounter 100% on both cores very long under normal use.
Video is very strong. I was playing Quake 4 at 1025x768 with high quality settings and no AA on my previous system. I got about 1/2 hour playing on the new system Saturday night to see if it was stable. I can now play Quake 4 at 1280x1024 with ultra high quality and 4x AA. That's quite a bit of improvement, and I might be able to go higher.
I spend most of the time transfering files and settings between the three computers so I can get rid of the oldest one. That has not given me much time to actually play on the new system. Now that I have a good power supply and video card, it looks like this will be a very fast system.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
How much for the whole
How much for the whole thing?
RevT
Altogether
Including software (OS & antivirus), ~$1,900.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Whats the dB rating on that
Whats the dB rating on that heatsink? It's giving me a headache just looking at it.
-----
"Irish I had another drink"
"Lord, please save me from your followers"
Not too bad...
Their site says:
Silent Mode 1,350RPM ± 10 % : 18.0dB ± 10%
Low-noise Mode 2,600RPM ± 10 % : 27.5dB ± 10%
This site Acoustic Samples @ FrostyTech, however shows it at 36 dB and 53 dB.
It looks like it is loud, but it is quieter than stock cooling (and better at keeping it cool).
I have mine set in the middle, so it is only a little louder than my previous build. There is a vent hole on the side of my case, right over the fan, so I hear it more than a solid-side case would. I am going to try to put a filter over the vent holes, to cut down on dust, so that should also quite it a bit.
I am also messing around with the clock speed and voltage (more on that later), so I may actually be able to turn the fan down some more.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Bah, my next rig is gonna be
Bah, my next rig is gonna be a liquid-cooled beast.
-----
"Irish I had another drink"
"Lord, please save me from your followers"
That would be nice.
That would be nice. I thought about doing that, but I did have a budget to work with. I went over a little as it is, and water cooling would not have been possible.
Maybe when super-fast quad-core processors are affordable I might upgrade to a water cooled rig.
A buddy of mine at work put together a water cooled rig with the same motherboard and processor. He put a worklog up on Hard|OCP. Here's the link: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1091320&highlight=mesh
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Very pleased
I am very please, impressed even, with this motherboard and CPU. I have been messing around with the clock speeds and voltage settings.
Right now, my clock speed is 2.6 GHz (stock is 2.13 - that's a 22% overclock), and my voltage is at 1.3 (stock is 1.3525). The system idles around 32C motherboard and 38C core, and goes up to 47C mb and 52C core under load with Prime95.
(The new Intel processors have an on-die digital temperature sensor on each core. This gives a higher, but more accurate, reading than the motherboard. Most other CPUs don't have this, so motherboard temps are often used for comparing with other systems.)
That's right, I under-volted my CPU. Most of the time when you overclock a system, you have to turn the voltage up to get stability. Well, to begin with, I had the CPU voltage at auto, but my temps seemed really high. I decided to try to play with the voltage to get the temps down, and set it to stock to start with. My temps dropped 10C right away, even overclocked. That says a lot about the stability of this board and the CPU.
At auto, obviously the BIOS was increasing voltage to maintain stability. It is apparent after almost 24 hours of stress testing with Prime95, that my lower voltage settings are stable, and that the auto setting pumps up the voltage too much.
I wanted to get a balance of power and noise. Right now, the system is very quiet (quieter than the workstations at work), and the overclock provides good performance. I probably won't try to push the overclock any further, as the last time I did that, it was unstable. I did just turn my fan down a little more, so temps will probably go up a some - a couple of degrees - but as long as they stay under 55C I am doing well. If I can keep the noise down, the temps below 55C, and the overclock at 22% I will be very happy with this setup. Right now, it looks like I can do exactly that.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Filter Mod
One of the nice things about the case I bought was that the front was mostly mesh, with a foam filter material behind the mess. This allowed good airflow while cutting down on dust. Unfortunately, they completely forgot this concept when they made the vents on the side panel.
Notice that the holes are larger than the mesh on the front of the case. Makes for good airflow, but a lot of dust could get in there. In addition, these vents sit right over the CPU and video cooling fans, allowing the fan noise to be heard.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Filter Mod
I decided that I wanted to cut down on dust and noise, so I would rig up some kind of filter. I headed out to my local home improvement store and picked up some materials; aluminum channel, a filter for a shop-vac, and some hex bolts and nuts.
I took this picture after cutting the channel, and drilling the holes in the channel and the side panel.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Filter Mod
Shot of the channels in place.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Filter Mod
Filter in place. I had to cut the filter down a bit, but that was a given.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Filter Mod - done
Shot of what it looks like on the outside. The flash is reflecting off the filter material a bit, it is not that bright when looking at it under normal light.
It seems to have cut down on the noise a little, but I will have to wait to see what it does as far as dust is concerned.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
Dead memory
Well, after about 2 months, I started having some short lockups during games, and freezes when coming back from a sleep state. Turns out my memory is bad.
Thankfully, it is still eligable for RMA, so I sent it back to New Egg. Now I have a single 512 DDR2 667 module on the way to get the system up and running while I wait for the RMA.
What a drag...no gaming for me for a couple of weeks.
Roachman
A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.