New build, opinions please.

[mixup]

Hi there, friends building a computer (no doubt he'll show up in this thread heh). Wanted your opinions on it as I know you guys know what your talking about. I've done quite alot of reading and come up with the following specs:

AMD Opteron UP 146 San Diego 2.0GHz
DFI LanParty NF4 SLI-DR EXPERT
G.Skill 2GB DDR HZ PC4000
BFG GeForce 7900 GTX OC 512MB GDDR3
Western Digital Raptor 74GB WD740GD 10,000RPM SATA 8MB

The rest of the stuff is pretty standard. What we want here is something to play with, a good overclocker. Thats the main reason for CPU, Mobo and Ram choices. I know the ram timings on the G.Skill aren't the tightest, but it overclocks really well.

One of the main questions is regarding the CPU. Never worked with an Opteron before so I don't know what they test like with games. Most reviews on the net seem to concentrate on benchmarking the CPU with applications rather than games, understandable I know.

So then...Good combination? Anything you'd change/add/replace etc?

All input appreciated.

[ferrari_freak]

Hi, let me be the first to welcome you to XS :woot: :banana: :welcome: :YIPPIE:

Anyway, Opterons are fine for gaming and do very well with overclocking. I think that everything that you have there is fine except I have a few concerns with your HDD and graphics card choices. The Raptor is pretty old now and there are drives that have a lot more storage and cost a lot less with competitive performance. I'm not sure on this one, but from what I've heard, the WD I have in my rig and the SATA2 Hitachi Deskstars are almost as fast as the Raptor and are very cheap. Regarding your graphics card, the card itself is fine, the problem is with your vendor. I don't know where you will be ordering your parts, but all the sites that I have seen has the BFG as being a lot more expensive than the other vendors of the same card but that's a minor issue. Other than that it looks fine to me, good luck. Btw, what PSU and case will you be using?

Usama aka Ferrari Freak

[mixup]

Hi there, thanks for the warm welcome.

Storage is not a problem, the computer only needs a minimal amount of space. All its going to be used for is playing a couple of games. The graphics card is very reasonably priced where he's getting it from, other GTX cards of the same model being more expensive.

The PSU is a Hiper HPU-4K580-MK Type R 580W, full spec can be found here http://www.hipergroup.com/English/products/hpu-4b580.html

The case is a Thermaltake VA3000SWA Tsunami Dream, full specs can be found here http://www.thermaltake.com/XaserCase/tsunami/swa/swa.htm

[Serra]

First: :welcome:


AMD Opteron UP 146 San Diego 2.0GHz
DFI LanParty NF4 SLI-DR EXPERT
G.Skill 2GB DDR HZ PC4000
BFG GeForce 7900 GTX OC 512MB GDDR3
Western Digital Raptor 74GB WD740GD 10,000RPM SATA 8MB


Keeping in mind I use CAN dollars instead of US dollars (I'll assume you're from the US) anywhere I refer to prices...

My comments:
1. While the Expert board is a good overclocker, it has also been known to fry CPUs more often than some other DFI boards (whether it's the boards fault or users I won't comment on). I might suggest saving some money and going for an SLI-D or SLI-DR (if you need those 4 extra SATA II connectors). You should get about the same overclockability, with less chance of frying your CPU, and you'll pay less for it. If you really want to save some serious $$, but still use DFI and get SLI & RAID, get an Ultra-D and go over to techpowerup.com, where you can find a quick and painless guide to enabling SLI & RAID with only a few pencil strokes.

2. Instead of spending ~$230 on a 74GB Raptor, get 2x $100 drives instead. I'll currently recommend the Samsung SP2004C (a 200GB SATA II drive) because it is the fastest ranked 7200rpm SATA II currently... or any Seagate product (just marginally slower). 2 SATA II hard drives in RAID 0 have been shown again and again to be overall faster than 1 raptor... and cheaper too. One nice benefit is then you also get a LOT more space... in the area of 160 - 200GB PER HARD DRIVE instead of just 74.

3. Spend saved money (~$10-$30 on Mobo if you went for SLI-DR or SLI-D respectively [~$100 if you went for Ultra-D and just enabled RAID and SLI yourself..], plus ~$30 on the hard drive) towards a larger case, like the Stacker STC-01 or a ThermalTake Armor (if you prefer), which are each about $40 more than the case you have there. You'll get better airflow, enjoy putting the components in that much more (because they're so roomy), and you'll have enough space that you can easily go to water cooling or other projects without a care about space.

Question: What are you going to use as cooling for the CPU?

My 2 cents

Serra

[mixup]

First: :welcome:



Keeping in mind I use CAN dollars instead of US dollars (I'll assume you're from the US) anywhere I refer to prices...

My comments:
1. While the Expert board is a good overclocker, it has also been known to fry CPUs more often than some other DFI boards (whether it's the boards fault or users I won't comment on). I might suggest saving some money and going for an SLI-D or SLI-DR (if you need those 4 extra SATA II connectors). You should get about the same overclockability, with less chance of frying your CPU, and you'll pay less for it. If you really want to save some serious $$, but still use DFI and get SLI & RAID, get an Ultra-D and go over to techpowerup.com, where you can find a quick and painless guide to enabling SLI & RAID with only a few pencil strokes.

2. Instead of spending ~$230 on a 74GB Raptor, get 2x $100 drives instead. I'll currently recommend the Samsung SP2004C (a 200GB SATA II drive) because it is the fastest ranked 7200rpm SATA II currently... or any Seagate product (just marginally slower). 2 SATA II hard drives in RAID 0 have been shown again and again to be overall faster than 1 raptor... and cheaper too. One nice benefit is then you also get a LOT more space... in the area of 160 - 200GB PER HARD DRIVE instead of just 74.

3. Spend saved money (~$10-$30 on Mobo if you went for SLI-DR or SLI-D respectively [~$100 if you went for Ultra-D and just enabled RAID and SLI yourself..], plus ~$30 on the hard drive) towards a larger case, like the Stacker STC-01 or a ThermalTake Armor (if you prefer), which are each about $40 more than the case you have there. You'll get better airflow, enjoy putting the components in that much more (because they're so roomy), and you'll have enough space that you can easily go to water cooling or other projects without a care about space.

Question: What are you going to use as cooling for the CPU?

My 2 cents

Serra

Hi, thanks for the reply.

Regarding the HDD situation...You make a very good point. I totally overlooked using a raid 0 setup and do agree it's the way to go. I've read alot about that particular motherboard and not heard of it frying chips, but to be on the safe side (and to shave the all important cost down) I'll downgrade to the sli-d. As you said, it will still yeild the same overclocking ability.

Right, I've actually chosen a different case. I've gone with the Thermaltake shark which is bigger than the previous one and performs really well in the reviews I've read (cooling specific). Can't go with the amour, it's out of stock where were buying from.

You mentioned water cooling, which is a subject that has cropped up when talking about this build. Anything you'd sudgest as reading material? or personal opinions, of course, would be a great help.

Nearly forgot, at the moment the HSF is just the stock version. Nothing has been decided on this yet.

Again, thanks for your time!

JJ

[Serra]

As far as water cooling goes, the best thing on the web I can point you at is MaxxxRacer's sticky in the water cooling section... you should learn a lot from there. Like everyone else, you'll probably still end up with a few questions after reading... but the questions are generally much more specific to your exact chosen design instead of general questions that apply to everything. At the very least, you'll get a great place to start searching from.

In looking for a decent air cooler, I might recommend a Big Typhoon for your setup. Now before someone jumps up and argues that better stuff does exist, let me explain my reasoning. The BT may not be the bleeding edge anymore, but it is still a very good air cooler and will also provide cooling for memory and your capacitors... and as I get the feeling (if I'm wrong here let me know) that since this is one of your earlier full-builds, you might prefer to give it pretty good cooling and get some good OCing in before jumping to the more intensive stuff. As an example, if you're interested in cooling your CPU great, you can get a Ninja or a Tuniq Tower... but then you should probably look into finding a way to cool your memory and PWM's after, and it's just easier IMO to get a BT in the beginning, then upgrade as you see fit later. The BT is a proven, good air cooler that works very well in a closed case (something not all competitors can claim) and you shouldn't worry about your selection if you pick it.

I like the Shark as a case, but if you're looking to go into water cooling, I'll warn you that it will probably require modifying depending on how effective you want your liquid cooling system to be. With only 1x 12mm intake and 1x 12mm output on it, there's just not a lot of places you could put a radiator. If you do end up going liquid, you will almost undoubtedly end up getting a dual 12mm radiator (most people do... or even a triple, which is more rare), which you'll find you either have to mount externally, or... probably cutting a hole for it on the top of the case (which can look really nice when done properly). As always, I will plug for the case that I have in my sig. Depending on where you are they can be hard to come by, but it was worth it.

Serra

[mcvigo]

i have a 36 gig raptor and performance isnt so great, yes windows does load faster but i dont think its much difference, my friend loads bf2 maps almost as me with a ide 7200 rpm although he has 2 gigs of cheap ram and i have 1 gb corsair xmx

[Major_A]

Most Opterons, minus the 1XX series, need ECC RAM and use a different socket. Historically that's why no one even looked at them. With the introduction of the 1XX series it was the same socket, 939, had 1MB of L2 cache, and didn't need ECC RAM. For the price, almost guaranteed O/C, and L2 cache that's why you see them all over the place now. I assume that you know that, but thought I'd share if you didn't.

With the stock HSF I don't know how far you will get with your O/C. Generally to get those "uber" clocks you need something that can handle the added heat and voltage.

I guess I'm not exactly clear here. Is this a 50/50 investment? It's hard to recommend anything to someone when I'm not sure what the situation is.

As far as a RAID configuration, if you are using this for computer for school/work/system critical situation I'd recommend you reconsider running RAID 0.

[updawg]

I disagree about the advice on the raptors!
read this article
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=445800

You can purchase these Hardrives for $150 each including shipping on online vendors!

Just my .02c

[Serra]

The issue with Raptors is that 2 regular SATAII hard drives are almost always better, and (within about $2) half as expensive. Even if you feel you could buy 2 raptors and have the best of both worlds, I could just as easily buy 4 SATA II drives and RAID 0 them (or provide redundancy & speed... RAID 0 + 1, or RAID 5). I'll consitantly have notably more hard drive space AND faster reads/writes.

Serra