Overhauling The Rig...

doc18 · TweakNOOB Joined: 10 Sep 2003 Posts: 161

well, it's about that time

i've had this one awhile, and its held over well, considering how much extra i squeezed outta it.

but now its time for some serious speed to last through the rest of college. i already ordered everything already, and i got most of it. case should come in tommorrow. and HOPEFULLY (fingers crossed) the processor will ship tommorrow. (it had BETTER. im leaving for college sunday, and with 2 day shipping, it doesnt give me much room for error. otherwise its gonna be a pain in the ! to get it. ) Here we go::

CASE: NZXT LEXA, $138 w/ shipping

http://tweaknews.pricegrabber.com/search_techspecs_full.php/masterid=13115970

MOTHERBOARD: Asus P5W DH (omgz this thing is sweeeet, but expensive XD), $270 w/ 2 day shipping

http://tweaknews.pricegrabber.com/search_techspecs_full.php/masterid=22098611

PROCESSOR: Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 :-D, $370 w/ 2 day shipping

http://tweaknews.pricegrabber.com/search_techspecs_full.php/masterid=22879556

CPU cooler: Zalman CNPS 9500, $49 w/ 3 day free shipping

http://tweaknews.pricegrabber.com/search_techspecs_full.php/masterid=12213293

VIDEO CARD: XFX 7900gt w/ vivo (plenty of room to tweak with, from what i've heard), $270, shipped plus mib

http://tweaknews.pricegrabber.com/search_techspecs_full.php/masterid=18872551

GPU cooler: Zalman VF900 Cu-LED, $52 w/ 2 day shipping

http://tweaknews.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php/masterid=21287411/search=zalman+vf900

MEMORY: 2GB G.Skill DDR2-800, $245 shipped

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820231065

TOTAL: ~$1400

wow... at first i really wasnt intending on spending this much, but... if you'll look over all the reviews, not only does this out class an fx-62, but all the components have quite the overclocking headroom

I'll actually be letting the Audigy collect dust in favor of the dolby digital live (see my speakers for the reason why... digital connection = no eax). even with the added cpu overhead from onboard audio, it won't matter much with this kind of power. I'll be switching over the power supply, optical and hard drives, and maybe a couple of other things from this machine. And i get to drop the floppy drive in favor of usb flashing

Well, let me know what you think. any suggestions or questions or anything. I'll let you know how it performs when it's up and running, along with some piccies

_________________
Asus P5W DH (bios 1407)
Core 2 Duo e6600 @ 3.25Ghz with Zalmn CNPS 9500LED
2GB G.Skill DDR2 800 @ 360Mhz 1:1 3-3-3-12
XFX 7900gt w/ vivo @ 560mhz core/1.6ghz mem with Zalmn VF900 Cu - LED
74GB WD Raptor + 200GB Seagate 7200.7
NZXT Lexa case

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2old2care · Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 11:53 pm Post subject:

Looks sweet.

Good luck getting the cpu....many places are expecting them on Monday.

I would have considered the P5B it has the new ICH8 southbridge. Of course I've had to return an 875 chipset Asus board, so I might be biased.

Hope it all comes together for you.

Benchies.

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Liquid-Cooled Q9450 and an EeePC
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meobius · Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 4:52 am Post subject:

Looks good, not a big fan of asus, but that board seems ok.
Not sure switching over the psu is going to be a good idea.
you need one that has 24pins plus an 8pin 12v plug and a 6pin VGA plug.
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doc18 · TweakNOOB Joined: 10 Sep 2003 Posts: 161

2old...
i looked at that mobo too. a new southbridge would've been nice, but at the same time, didn't they get rid of pata on that one? the motherboard would've hadto've put an additional chip to take care of most optical drives, which kinda makes it sound like it would end up slower/not as efficient. the only other thing is that the p5b uses the (newer) 965 mch chipset that i didn't really find that impressive. 975 chipset has crossfire support, dolby master studion instead of reg hd audio ( hence dd live), and overclocks better, apparently. lol i did a lot of research on this... but i couldn't really see any terrible improvements from having the newer southbridge over the older northbridge. unless im missing something? Confused

meobius,
had problems with asus? lol to be honest, at first i was looking for an a bit board, since i've really liked this one, but i guess their higher-end boards won't be out for a bit.

as far as the psu goes, that is a thought. im not sure how long psu's are normally good for, so i might have to replace this one at some point while having the new system. but it does natively have a 24pin atx power connector (currently using the 20 pin adaptor for it). the video card came with the 6 pin pcie power plug adaptor, but what about the 8 pin 12v plug?? the motherboard doesnt have that. nor does the video card. what would i use it for? i thought those were used on server-type motherboards? maybe im wrong? hmm
_________________
Asus P5W DH (bios 1407)
Core 2 Duo e6600 @ 3.25Ghz with Zalmn CNPS 9500LED
2GB G.Skill DDR2 800 @ 360Mhz 1:1 3-3-3-12
XFX 7900gt w/ vivo @ 560mhz core/1.6ghz mem with Zalmn VF900 Cu - LED
74GB WD Raptor + 200GB Seagate 7200.7
NZXT Lexa case

2old2care · Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 11:44 pm Post subject:

It still supports PATA, but only one channel, which is enough for your optical drives.

Anyway, (and it's still early in this c2duo stuff) the Gigabyte 965/ICH8 mobo seems to be the fastest out of the blocks.

I'm sure you'll be happy with that mobo, especially if you think you might go crossfire someday.
_________________
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Liquid-Cooled Q9450 and an EeePC
.

doc18 · TweakNOOB Joined: 10 Sep 2003 Posts: 161

well, i checked it out, and the boards that use the 965 southbridge used a JMicron JMB363 chip to provide the IDE channel. now, maybe with futher bios revisions 965/ich8 chipset will become better, and like you said, it's still a little early in the c2d arena to know whats best. this should hold me over for awhile though

oh yeah, and meobius, i saw what you meant. some boards need the 8-pin eatx 12v connector, but this board only requires the 4 pin. glad i landed on the right side of the pond

def something to look out for...
_________________
Asus P5W DH (bios 1407)
Core 2 Duo e6600 @ 3.25Ghz with Zalmn CNPS 9500LED
2GB G.Skill DDR2 800 @ 360Mhz 1:1 3-3-3-12
XFX 7900gt w/ vivo @ 560mhz core/1.6ghz mem with Zalmn VF900 Cu - LED
74GB WD Raptor + 200GB Seagate 7200.7
NZXT Lexa case

doc18 · TweakNOOB Joined: 10 Sep 2003 Posts: 161

well, finally got enough time outside of school to check back here. finally got everything together and built well enough... im still playing around with it, but here's what i got:

atm, this is the best i can get with a Vcore ceiling of 1.5v. Vram is at 2.25V, and all other voltages at auto. went through the trouble of taking off the chipset heatsink faceplates for better airflow and reseating the heatsinks themselves using arctic silver 5.

i dont really wanna go past 1.5v with it on 24/7 with current air temps here (avg of 85ºF in the room). at load using orthos for an hour, max i've seen is 56ºC using PC Probe (asus motherboard software) and 69ºC using Core Temp to measure the temperature of each core from the diode sensors, with a TCaseMax of 85ºC. At idle cpu is at 35º and motherboard is at 46º (from PC Probe)

which is not to say i didnt try pushing this thing to it's limits :-)

stable with Orthos, too, but Vcore of 1.575v makes it too hot for me to consider running it 24/7 without reducing the lifespan.

On the video side, i switched out the stock cooling on the 7900gt with the zalman vf900cu - led and here's what i've got it overclocked to:

i havent done anything else to the card, yet. but i do know of a pretty successful hard mod to bump up core clocks more :-) when i feel like its not giving enough power anymore

and now, on with the benchies

P.S. all the 3Dmark scores were with prime95 torture testing using large in-place FFT's on one of the cores :-)

Well, what do you guy's think? Anything else you'd like to see?

I'll post up pics of the rig in the case section tommorrow, probably.
_________________
Asus P5W DH (bios 1407)
Core 2 Duo e6600 @ 3.25Ghz with Zalmn CNPS 9500LED
2GB G.Skill DDR2 800 @ 360Mhz 1:1 3-3-3-12
XFX 7900gt w/ vivo @ 560mhz core/1.6ghz mem with Zalmn VF900 Cu - LED
74GB WD Raptor + 200GB Seagate 7200.7
NZXT Lexa case

[TN] Nathan · ALMIGHTY PWNER! Joined: 14 Feb 2002 Posts: 7406

Good lord!

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2old2care · Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 10:22 am Post subject:

These conroe's are impressive aren't they? Very Happy

The low end 6300 I built, out powers my D960 in pure number crunching ability.

I hope your happy with it...it looks really good number-wise...Pics?
_________________
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Liquid-Cooled Q9450 and an EeePC
.

Xal · Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 11:18 am Post subject:

Very nice

Can I have it

Enjoy dude, thats a sick rig

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Phenom II x4 955 @ Stock
Asus M3N78-EM
4gb Corsair XMS2 DDR2 667 @ 800
1gb Powercolor Radeon HD 5850 @ Stock
X-fi Extreme Audio PCI E
Nexus 600W Silent PSU
Nexus Fans
Custom case

sickofsoyo · Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 2:06 pm Post subject:

wow... that is crazy...
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lanparty pro875b
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