My Corsair Build

[OtherSyde]

So this whole ordeal started when I decided to get a new EVGA GTX 960 SSC, and when it didn't give me the performance I really wanted, I finally stopped lurking on TPU and actually made a post. The advice of the guys in this thread brought me to several conclusions and led me to basically said screw it and go nuts, and ultimately basically buy an entirely new system piece by piece due to the inherent inferiority of only having 2GB of VRAM, and the extremely crappy cooling capabilities of my old RAIDMax Scorpio mid-tower, which was also just kind of embarrassing to look at because it looked like the iTunes visualizer had a seizure. I built it (the case and lights, I mean) over a decade ago; see the lunacy here.

Now, as stated at the end of that thread, I've acquired more components today and installed them, so I figured it was time to start a proper build thread rather than piggybacking onto a previously-resolved question thread.

The new toys are:

-Corsair Hydro H105 liquid cooler to replace my long-suffered craptacular stock Intel CPU cooler
-Antec Nano Diamond thermal paste to augment said cooler
-16GB of Corsair Vengeance Silver 1600MHz RAM to replace my slower, smaller quantity of 8GB of 1333MHz G.Skill Ripjaws (which was also red and contributed to my blue-themed build looking like an uncoordinated circus)
-Black MassCool 90mm fan for the bottom of the case (blowing upward onto the GPU)
-Fairly quiet Apevia 80mm blue LED fan for the rear of the case.

All the new stuff:

The old setup, with the awesome stock CPU cooler and trusty & reliable but quantitatively inferior and off-color red Ripjaws RAM...

Chaos! Man, I really had to do some serious finagling to get everything to fit in there.

And my processor, scraped clean and ready for its new cooler...

 

[OtherSyde]

This is the first time I've ever installed a liquid cooling system, so it took me a little while, but here are a few shots of the system up and running...

My CPU temps at idle and max have dropped by about 20 to 40 degrees instantly, and my GPU is running about 5-6 degrees cooler as well. So far so good!

As for the future, since EVGA doesn't void your warranty for removing your GPU's heat sink/fans and liquid-cooling it, I think I may do that soon as well. Also, I'm waiting on the Broadwell processors to come out, and will eventually then get a new processor, and a Micro-ATX motherboard that supports SLI.

Questions/comments welcome!
'

 

[0zzy]

The blue is so sexy man, especially in the dark

 

[peche]

Nice Build !

 

[OtherSyde]

I got a new fan in today. I had mounted a powerful 90MM MassCool fan in the vented floor of my case to blow air directly up into the 970's ACX cooling unit and help circulation, but I should warn everyone that said model of fan is INSANELY LOUD. I mean, there are nine other fans in my case - five 120mm fans (4 Apevia and 1 Corsair), one 80mm Apevia as an exhaust fan, the PSU fan, and the two GPU fans, but adding this one single 90mm MassCool fan literally doubled the noise output of the the total unit all by itself! I'm not normally someone to complain about such things as fan noise if the fan is helping performance (and it really does move a lot of air), but it sounded like a god damn vacuum-cleaner siting next to me on the desk!

So, as @rtwjunkie suggested about halfway down Page 2 in my other thread here, I ordered a 92mm Vantec Stealth fan that moves a good amount of air but is totally silent, and mounted it in place of the incredibly noisy MassCool fan.


The old MassCool fan - DON'T buy one of these unless you don't care at all about noise output, like maybe if your tower will be in a cabinet or under the desk or something:

And the new Vantec fan, and its new home:

 

[rtwjunkie]

It's great to hear your noise and airflow situation is getting balanced! And I am pleased you like the Vantec!

And of course, very nice system you built.

 

[Caring1]

The old MassCool fan - DON'T buy one of these unless you don't care at all about noise output, like maybe if your tower will be in a cabinet or under the desk or something:

Advice taken
Lucky you added that last bit, or i'd be wondering why you posted in the builders advice thread

 

[OtherSyde]

Advice taken
Lucky you added that last bit, or i'd be wondering why you posted in the builders advice thread

Haha yeah maybe this thread should be moved to the Project Logs subforum; I just created it here without thinking since my previous thread about MOBO/CPU/GPU upgrade advice was here, but this isn't really an "advice" thread I guess. Unless you count people learning from my mistakes. If an admin wants to move it, please go for it.

Also, I just noticed we have similar system specs - ASRock Z77 Extreme4 MOBO (well, the one I ordered is the Extreme4-M mATX model, but basically the same deal), i5 3570K, AIO liquid CPU cooling, etc. How do you like overclocking your 3570K? How well does it work on the ASRock Z77 chipset?

 

[Caring1]

Actually I've got both boards and had the processor on both, it's on the ATX one atm and running stock, I know, what a waste not overclocking a K processor.
If it wasn't for high power bills and not needing the extra grunt I would play with it.
I've had them both since they first came out new and the only issue I have had was I pushed a stick of Ram in too hard in one slot and literally folded it flat down on to the board, so now I can't use 4 sticks in the mAtx one.
It's running perfectly happy with 8Gb and an i3 in it now for my son.

 

[Cvrk]

Everybody keeps insisting with the air filters. They reduce drastically the air flow. However i see that your temps are looking fantastic,so that's good.

And congratz for you ,that is one nice build I just reminded myself about how poor i am.
Seriously that is an amazing build. Corsair is my all time favorite brand in IT(and Logitech). I am a sucker for whatever they make. I just don't see enough people out there making Corsair builds .

 

[OtherSyde]

Everybody keeps insisting with the air filters. They reduce drastically the air flow. However i see that your temps are looking fantastic,so that's good.

And congratz for you ,that is one nice build I just reminded myself about how poor i am.
Seriously that is an amazing build. Corsair is my all time favorite brand in IT(and Logitech). I am a sucker for whatever they make. I just don't see enough people out there making Corsair builds .

Thanks! I'm a sucker for Corsair too, their stuff has a rugged and yet somehow refined look to it.
And you're right - my apartment is new and very clean (not really dusty at all), so I think I'll remove the dust filters and see how and if my temps change at all.

 

[bonehead123]

I just don't see enough people out there making Corsair builds

I just recently built a rig with a Carbide 540 air....I will post pics asap for those who like their stuff

 

[bonehead123]

I just don't see enough people out there making Corsair builds

Not to hijack this thread, but here ya go....



Yes I know I need to move the light strip so the blue shows through all 3 front fans.... it's on my list for this weekend along with installing a water cooler

 

[OtherSyde]

Not to hijack this thread, but here ya go....

View attachment 64449 View attachment 64450 View attachment 64451

Yes I know I need to move the light strip so the blue shows through all 3 front fans.... it's on my list for this weekend along with installing a water cooler

Is that the bigger version of the Carbide Air 240? I think the 540, right? You should add another blue LED strip; I bought this exact one on ebay here for like $4.50 and it's worked great for over 2 years now, but if you wanna go legit you can buy the same thing on Newegg for like $15 I think.

Also, MOAR PIX! Bigger pix!!

 

[bonehead123]

Yes, that is the 240's Bigger/older Brother
And big it is....you could probably fit a 240 inside of it & still have plenty of room left over....... I am comptemplating another mitx build this summer & will most likely use a 240 for it.

As for the light strips, I got mine from Staples, of all places, for $7....just happened to see it laying on the clearance table & grabbed it ! It is the same thing as those ones on ebay, but I won't order them & wait 3-5 weeks to get them from China.....

 

[OtherSyde]

Quick update, my ASRock Z77 board situation didn't pan out - the company I ordered one from (they're REALLY hard to find nowadays!) sent me a full ATX version of the same board, and when I contacted them they immediately acknowledged their mistake and offered a full refund since all of their mATX 1155 boards were sold out by then So I sent it back and found a nice ASUS Maximus Gene V board on eBay from another tech-savvy overclocker in Canada, and bought it for about $150 or so. Came with the original box, manuals, and all the accessories (cables, SLI bridge, back plate, etc) and looked basically brand new. So installed that and promptly OC'ed my 3570K to 4.4GHz (it was a tad unstable at 4.5GHz, but I will fiddle with it more later and try to get it higher).

Here's the old H61 budget Gigabyte board for comparison:

And the new Maximus board - the red bits (RAM slots and PCIe x16 slot, and glowing buttons/LED numbers) are really the only thing that irks me, but maybe I'll just get creative with a black magic marker or something... Also, I didn't previously realize that mATX boards varied in width so much! I had to re-route a lot of my cables to different grommets before installing this new board!

Fortunately, with all the blue lights on, the red-colored bits are barely visible, and even less so when I put on the side-panel with its tinted window pane.

And most importantly of course, the performance!

Loving the new board so far! I can now play Crysis 3 at 1080p, maxed out on literally EVERYTHING at 4x SMAA with VSYNC on and still hold a sold, non-stop 60fps. Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon runs at about 90-160fps, and I just beat that last night - great game. I fired up Deus Ex:HR a few days ago in anticipation of the upcoming Mankind Divided, and it runs at roughly 170-220fps, which is absolutely ridiculous.

This has definitely been a learning experience so far, and my only remaining aspiration with this build is to get another GTX 970 and take advantage of the new MOBO's SLI capability Thanks to all the guys here on the boards who gave great advice throughout!