PC Construction - Guru Tips & Comments Wanted!

[DreadStarX]

Alright Ladies & Gents, May I have your help please!

I'm looking for a beast of a computer.

Water Cooling
4 Way SLI
SSD
32GB+ of RAM
8x 27" Monitors
PSU NOT NEEDED (I won a 1300W PSU off of a raffle / Modular one to boot!)
Mobo is of your choice. (I Prefer intel CPUs)
CPU as state above, your choice, and I do prefer intel cpus
case; http://www.xs-pc.com/cases/h1-cube-case-10pci

Was hoping to work with that one. I do a LOT of gaming, I multibox EVE Online, and for any of you who read this, who are EVE Fans, I am BinaryData / DreadStarX. I run 5 - 22 clients depending on what I'm doing. Each client requires roughly 600MB Of RAM, and 750mb - 1GB of GFX Memory (I think). I do a lot of programming, HTML/CSS/PHP/SQL, the works. I've recently picked up 3D Modeling, and plan on rendering high res graphics, so my PC will need to be able to handle that as well.

Thanks in advance!

P.S. Sorry if this is the wrong section, school blocks 95% of Forums, and this one is on their hitlist, even though I keep telling them its a legitimate learning area. I learned quite a bit about WaterCooling today!

Edit:

I forgot to add that I prefer shopping with NewEgg due to some bad order history with TigerDirect.

 

[paulpicks21]

Hello Dreadstar,

When are you planning on building this beast of a PC? If it was me, I would wait a few months until IvyBridge-E is released. I think that is gonna be worth waiting for.

Paul.

 

[DreadStarX]

Hello Dreadstar,

When are you planning on building this beast of a PC? If it was me, I would wait a few months until IvyBridge-E is released. I think that is gonna be worth waiting for.

Paul.

Hey Paul,

Thanks for the response. I'm probably going to wait until the Thanksgiving/Christmas Sales start to build it. I'm currently in Job Corp, so it makes it rough to build a PC, and I don't trust my family with computer parts. History has shown that my family can't be trusted. Anyways, thanks for the response. I'm just wondering the specs I'll have will be.

Got a link to the new IvyBridge-E coming out?

Edit:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-4960x-ivy-bridge-e-benchmark,3557.html

 

[paulpicks21]

Hi mate,

I don't think a firm date has been given yet for the release, but I am pretty sure it will be well before the end of the year, hopefully in the next 2 months.

Here is a link to a preview of an engineering sample of the top of the line one, looking at what you want to buy then I figure budget is not an issue. It has some benchmarks on page 3 - Intel Core i7-4960X Preview: Ivy Bridge-E, Benchmarked - Ivy Bridge-E: Core i7-4960X Gets Tested
There will no doubt be some awesome motherboards available for it that will run 4 way SLI very nicely. Again no budget for the graphics? I really don't think you need 4, maybe consider a couple of GTX Titans if you want to go crazy.

Edit: Having said that, if you really want 8 monitors maybe 3 of them would be better lol.

Paul.

 

[DreadStarX]

Hi mate,

I don't think a firm date has been given yet for the release, but I am pretty sure it will be well before the end of the year, hopefully in the next 2 months.

Here is a link to a preview of an engineering sample of the top of the line one, looking at what you want to buy then I figure budget is not an issue. It has some benchmarks on page 3 - Intel Core i7-4960X Preview: Ivy Bridge-E, Benchmarked - Ivy Bridge-E: Core i7-4960X Gets Tested
There will no doubt be some awesome motherboards available for it that will run 4 way SLI very nicely. Again no budget for the graphics? I really don't think you need 4, maybe consider a couple of GTX Titans if you want to go crazy.

Edit: Having said that, if you really want 8 monitors maybe 3 of them would be better lol.

Paul.

Well, like I said previously, I multibox games a lot. I was known in WoW for multiboxing 5 man dungeons for farming capacities. But I no longer play WoW, upkeep vs payout wasn't worth it.

Just looked up the Titans, and my god, 1,000$ a pop is a bit more than what I originally thought they were. I was figuring 1,000$ - 1500$ for 4 cards. I was thinking 4x 770s would do the trick. 4GB of memory * 4 would give a potential 16GB of memory. If there was a way to dedicated Hard Drive capacity to GFX memory, I'd be dedicating a SSD to it, or one of my beloved raptor drives.

I was looking at 4x of these bad boys; Newegg.com - EVGA GeForce GTX 770 DUAL SuperClocked 4GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 SLI Support Video Card 04G-P4-3774-KR.

I've been out of the PC Building for nearly 3 years. The last major upgrade I did was moving from a 650Watt Power Supply to a 1300Watt Power Supply from the Cooler Master Rewards deal they did on Facebook several months back.

PSU: COOLER MASTER Silent Pro Hybrid (RS-D00-SPHA-D3) 1300W ATX 12V V2.3 / EPS 12V V2.92 80 PLUS GOLD Full Modular Individual Sleeve Cables Active PFC Power Supply w/Free Fan Controller and 10 Years Warran - Newegg.com

I currently have that PSU, my biggest concern is the cooling and space. That PSU is freaking huge, I could barely fit it in my current case. Anyways, not to beat a dying horse, thanks again Paul.

 

[kbrady1979]

Ivy Bridge-E comes out in September. That will be what you need to build off of. New motherboards will be released as well.

Also, 4-4GB cards won't net you 16GB of memory......you will only have 4GB of GDDR5

 

[paulpicks21]

Ivy Bridge-E comes out in September. That will be what you need to build off of. New motherboards will be released as well.

Also, 4-4GB cards won't net you 16GB of memory......you will only have 4GB of GDDR5

I was trying to find an article to better describe GPU memory use Kelly, as I was going to put what you did, but last time I put that someone disagreed with me, I know it only uses the Vram off 1 card but hey ho.
I couldn't find one then and I still can't find one lol.

 

[kbrady1979]

Well, that's how it is.......SLI/Crossfire doesn't add up the GDDR5 on all the cards, it uses the RAM of one card. If you use cards with say 2GB and 4GB you will only have 2GB usable RAM.

 

[paulpicks21]

Well, that's how it is.......SLI/Crossfire doesn't add up the GDDR5 on all the cards, it uses the RAM of one card. If you use cards with say 2GB and 4GB you will only have 2GB usable RAM.

I wish you had been around when I was trying to argue that point lol.

 

[DreadStarX]

Ivy Bridge-E comes out in September. That will be what you need to build off of. New motherboards will be released as well.

Also, 4-4GB cards won't net you 16GB of memory......you will only have 4GB of GDDR5

Well, that shot that theory to pieces. Not sure how these people roll 20 and 30 clients without having multiple computers.


Well I'll have to leave the building to the Gurus. I'm using the G19/G9 Mouse/Keyboard with a Sennhauser Headset. So you won't need to include those, either.

 

[DreadStarX]

Well, that's how it is.......SLI/Crossfire doesn't add up the GDDR5 on all the cards, it uses the RAM of one card. If you use cards with say 2GB and 4GB you will only have 2GB usable RAM.

Forgive the double post

I was informed by a friend, that you can have 4 Cards and run the individually, the SLI was an option. EVE Online can be insane, 2,000 vs 2,000 man fights where you graphics card is running full bore, and you're trying to coax more out of it.


My goal is to get as much bang for my bucks. If I spent 7500$ on a PC (USD), then I want to maximize the potential for that 7500$.

 

[paulpicks21]

Well, that's how it is.......SLI/Crossfire doesn't add up the GDDR5 on all the cards, it uses the RAM of one card. If you use cards with say 2GB and 4GB you will only have 2GB usable RAM.

Forgive the double post

I was informed by a friend, that you can have 4 Cards and run the individually, the SLI was an option. EVE Online can be insane, 2,000 vs 2,000 man fights where you graphics card is running full bore, and you're trying to coax more out of it.


My goal is to get as much bang for my bucks. If I spent 7500$ on a PC (USD), then I want to maximize the potential for that 7500$.

That makes sense I guess, to be honest I don't play games like that and have only ever had SLI once to get a bit more grunt for regular games and benchmarks etc.

 

[paulpicks21]

Another thing I would say, (although it would be awesome to have some nice 2560X1440 Monitors) if you are gonna have 8 screens then I would stick with 1920X1080 otherwise it will hammer the VRAM badly.

 

[DreadStarX]

Well, that's how it is.......SLI/Crossfire doesn't add up the GDDR5 on all the cards, it uses the RAM of one card. If you use cards with say 2GB and 4GB you will only have 2GB usable RAM.

Forgive the double post

I was informed by a friend, that you can have 4 Cards and run the individually, the SLI was an option. EVE Online can be insane, 2,000 vs 2,000 man fights where you graphics card is running full bore, and you're trying to coax more out of it.


My goal is to get as much bang for my bucks. If I spent 7500$ on a PC (USD), then I want to maximize the potential for that 7500$.

That makes sense I guess, to be honest I don't play games like that and have only ever had SLI once to get a bit more grunt for regular games and benchmarks etc.

CCP Games has bumped their requirements up with the latest expansion "Odyssey". Since I am still in class, and will be heading back to dorm after class, I'll not be able to grab the current hardware specs they suggest, but roughly want;

CPU: 2.8Ghz+
RAM: 2GB Min, Suggested 4GB+
HDD: At least 15GB - 20GB of Free Space (Increases every expansion by 1 - 3GB)
GFX: 200s Series minimum; suggested 560GTX or higher. My current computer at home is rocking a 560GTX, its a boss of a card for the price I paid.

There is that information; If you want the specs, just Google for it.

 

[paulpicks21]

Forgive the double post

I was informed by a friend, that you can have 4 Cards and run the individually, the SLI was an option. EVE Online can be insane, 2,000 vs 2,000 man fights where you graphics card is running full bore, and you're trying to coax more out of it.


My goal is to get as much bang for my bucks. If I spent 7500$ on a PC (USD), then I want to maximize the potential for that 7500$.

That makes sense I guess, to be honest I don't play games like that and have only ever had SLI once to get a bit more grunt for regular games and benchmarks etc.

CCP Games has bumped their requirements up with the latest expansion "Odyssey". Since I am still in class, and will be heading back to dorm after class, I'll not be able to grab the current hardware specs they suggest, but roughly want;

CPU: 2.8Ghz+
RAM: 2GB Min, Suggested 4GB+
HDD: At least 15GB - 20GB of Free Space (Increases every expansion by 1 - 3GB)
GFX: 200s Series minimum; suggested 560GTX or higher. My current computer at home is rocking a 560GTX, its a boss of a card for the price I paid.

There is that information; If you want the specs, just Google for it.

Funny you mention that as I actually had 2 x 560ti in SLI, that is how I found out it only uses the Vram from one card lol. I was hoping to double the 1GB and was quickly disappointed

 

[DreadStarX]

Yeah, but back to the topic. I'll hold off on the motherboard/processor. But is there anything else I should be looking at purchasing? What style of ram should I buy 4x 8 GB?

I currently run 2x 2GB sticks at home for 4GB. G.Skill is what I have. The ram is a few years old, around 3 to 5. DDR3. I'm so out of date on my PC Building.

My final project after I get this computer built is to roll down to my high school, and work with the kids there on custom building a computer case. I haven't decided what Logos to put on it, but for sure is a SevenForums "SF" with the proper colors. Include an EVE online logo, as well as the companies parts I'm using. But I'm still working out the threading needed for screws, and proper airflow.

 

[paulpicks21]

Ok, so hold off on the CPU and Mobo, the Ram well I would expect the Ivy-E boards to have 8 x Ram slots like Sandy-E, so you have the option to either get 8 x 4GB or 4 x 8GB, the later will allow for expansion should you require 64GB lol.
I love G.Skill and my last 4 sets of Ram have all been G.Skill. I expect you can run with at least 2400MHz on the new Ivy-E, but again it's best waiting until the time to see the full specs of the new chipset.

What cooling do you have planned? Realistically if you want 4 x GPU's then heat is gonna be a big issue, have you considered a full custom loop to cool the beasts?

SSD, what capacity did you have in mind? The new Samsung 840 Evo's come in 1TB size and look very promising.

Paul.

 

[DreadStarX]

Ok, so hold off on the CPU and Mobo, the Ram well I would expect the Ivy-E boards to have 8 x Ram slots like Sandy-E, so you have the option to either get 8 x 4GB or 4 x 8GB, the later will allow for expansion should you require 64GB lol.
I love G.Skill and my last 4 sets of Ram have all been G.Skill. I expect you can run with at least 2400MHz on the new Ivy-E, but again it's best waiting until the time to see the full specs of the new chipset.

What cooling do you have planned? Realistically if you want 4 x GPU's then heat is gonna be a big issue, have you considered a full custom loop to cool the beasts?

SSD, what capacity did you have in mind? The new Samsung 840 Evo's come in 1TB size and look very promising.

Paul.

Well, I was going to look at the SXCP or XSCP Cases, according to the article here on SForums, they make some very insanely good Water Cooling kits. I was going to go a full loop, and watch the cooling. I planned on overclocking it when I need too, but I'm still a novice in that section.

As for the SSD, i was going to keep it below 250GB. Because I've heard a lot of negative comments about anything above 250GB. But I've never owned one.

 

[kbrady1979]

256GB SSD's are the sweet spot for price/performance these days, but there is certainly nothing wrong with bigger capacities if you buy a quality SSD. You buy junk, that's when you start having problems. I'm very picky about what SSD I use, and recommend. As for the case, read reviews and watch videos on the ones that can suit your needs and you will find out everything you need to know about them, good and bad. You don't have to settle on one right now, but do your homework, find the one that you want and keep an eye on it and catch it on sale. You don't have to order all of this at one time, especially something like a case.

 

[paulpicks21]

Ok, so hold off on the CPU and Mobo, the Ram well I would expect the Ivy-E boards to have 8 x Ram slots like Sandy-E, so you have the option to either get 8 x 4GB or 4 x 8GB, the later will allow for expansion should you require 64GB lol.
I love G.Skill and my last 4 sets of Ram have all been G.Skill. I expect you can run with at least 2400MHz on the new Ivy-E, but again it's best waiting until the time to see the full specs of the new chipset.

What cooling do you have planned? Realistically if you want 4 x GPU's then heat is gonna be a big issue, have you considered a full custom loop to cool the beasts?

SSD, what capacity did you have in mind? The new Samsung 840 Evo's come in 1TB size and look very promising.

Paul.

Well, I was going to look at the SXCP or XSCP Cases, according to the article here on SForums, they make some very insanely good Water Cooling kits. I was going to go a full loop, and watch the cooling. I planned on overclocking it when I need too, but I'm still a novice in that section.

As for the SSD, i was going to keep it below 250GB. Because I've heard a lot of negative comments about anything above 250GB. But I've never owned one.

As Kelly says 250/256 is a good place right now, but if you can afford bigger then there is certainly no issues with the decent brands like Samsung. The new range of 840 Evo's look good, but the older 840s and 840 Pros are excellent drives.
Just depends what space you need and how quick you want to access it. Most of us have the OS on the SSD and then a regular HDD or 2 for storage etc, I only have a 128GB SSD and my Steam games come to a few 100GB so I chucked them all on a HDD, but I have the one I play the most on my SSD for quicker load times.