Let's Build Us Some Dream Rigs!

Been spending my time reading about high-end customs and the prices bandied about ($5000 - $8000) got me thinking I can spend imaginary funds as well as the next guy!  Since there doesn't seem to be a lot of building going on, why don't we pay ourselves unlimited monopoly money and see what we come up with.

Turns out if I was a bazillionnaire, I still wouldn't spend $4000.  Old habits, in my case bang for buck, die hard I suppose...

Here's what I came up with on PC Part Picker, so that's before performing my patented shop fu on it to bring the price down another couple hundred:

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/aaAN

I figure the 3770K at a reasonable daily OC, RAID 0 the SSDs, RAID 1 the HDDs and I could have a lot of fun with this balanced beast.  I can't say I feel like I cut a lot of corners, just everything I want and nothing I don't.  (Maybe a crazy case from a niche place like Mountain Mods, which wasn't on the list, but feel free to link to cool kit.)  The PSU is platinum and could easily handle a second GTX 690, if ever.  Everything is red and black too, so it has a bit of suh-weet style...

So what you got?  Are you a frequency freak?  A storage squirrel?  A waterworks engineer?  Where's your wishlist at HH?

No? O.K. then this: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2012/06/with-16-petaflops-and-1-6m-cores-doe-supercomputer-is-worlds-fastest/

I would make something stupidly fast with 8k....

thats actually fairly close to what I was thinking...lol 

Oooooh what a fun little game! 

I'm on it! 

CPU: i7 3960X - $1,029
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116491 

Mobo: ASRock X79 Extreme11 - $599
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157327&Tpk=ASRock%20Extreme11 

Graphics: FOURx GTX 680 Lightning - $599 each,  $2499.96 for 4.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127693  

SSD: FOUR x Plextor M3 Pro 512GB in RAID 0 - $649 each $2599.96
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820249022 

PSU: Corsair AX 1200i Platinum rated PSU -  $349
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139039 

RAM: 8x 4GB Samsung 30nm Green RAM (SO overclockable, check my thread in the RAM section) 8GB kit is $46.99 - so 4x kits = $187.96
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147096  

Case: Silverstone TJ11 $659
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163178 

Cooling: Full watercooling loop. To make it easier we'll just go with an XSPC Raystorm kit. $299
http://www.frozencpu.com/products/15140/ex-wat-203/XSPC_Raystorm_RX360_Extreme_Universal_CPU_Water_Cooling_Kit_w_RX360_Radiator_and_Free_Kill_Coil_Hot_item.html?tl=g30c321s1310   

4x Heatkiller GTX 680 blocks - $519.96 total
http://www.frozencpu.com/products/16431/ex-blc-1167/HEATKILLER_GPU-X_GTX_680_Hole_Edition_Reference_Design_Full_Coverage_Water_Block_-_Nickel_Black_15521.html?tl=g30c311s1631

2x Black Ice 560mm Rads - $375.90 total
http://www.frozencpu.com/products/10466/ex-rad-183/Black_Ice_SR1_Low_Air_Flow_Optimized_-_560_Radiator_-_Black.html?tl=g30c95s1148  

Monsoon compression fittings 6 pack x5: 194.95
http://www.frozencpu.com/products/14929/ex-tub-1103/Monsoon_Free_Center_Compression_Fitting_-_12ID_x_34OD_-_Modders_6_Pack_Matte_Black_FCC-1234-6P-MB.html 

Grand total: $9313.69 ...... before sales tax. :D

Congratulation on taking the spending crown!  (And thanks for playing along, srsly) I like what you did with the SSDs, but this highlights the downside of these bombastic builds: Plextor just announced the M5 Pro, ahhh, all glory is fleeting...

eunoia:

Congratulation on taking the spending crown!  (And thanks for playing along, srsly) I like what you did with the SSDs, but this highlights the downside of these bombastic builds: Plextor just announced the M5 Pro, ahhh, all glory is fleeting...

They did, and it looks most attractive.

That said though, the M3 Pro does seem to perform better in sequential reads/writes than the M5Pro, but the M5P does perform better with random, which is where it's important.

Still.. 4 of either in RAID 0 is going to be blisteringly fast. 

I was toying between adding 4 680's or 2 690s.. went with the 680's 'cause it'd appear more impressive in a loop, and they'd be more overclockable. :D

I like games like this.

After reading the Asrock HTPC review I got an itch to build an all out one. Here is my take on a no holds barred HTPC build.

I5 3570 K - $229 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504)

G.SKILL Trident X Series 16GB - $199 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231589)

ASRock Z77E-ITX - $149 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157312)

Crucial M4 CT256M4SSD3 mSATA 256GB SATA III - $219 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148613)

LIAN LI PC-Q08B - $109 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112265)

CORSAIR H70 Core - $86 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181019)

Corsair Air Series SP120 Quiet Edition - $18 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181024)

Corsair Air Series AF140 Quiet Edition - $22 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181028) That Blue LED case fan has to go if this is going to be a HTPC!!

Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 - $115 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815116036)

SILVERSTONE ST45SF-G 450W - $100 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817256084)

LITE-ON 12X BD-R 2X BD-RE 16X - $110 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106348)

Western Digital Caviar Green WD30EZRX 3TB - $165 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136874)

or

Western Digital Red WD30EFRX 3TB - $240 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822236344)

I don't know whether the WD reds are good in raid in an actual PC (in raid enclosures no doubt they are better) but two of either the red or green in RAID 1 is what I was thinking.

Total Cost $1836 (with the WD reds, $1686 with the green)

AHHH a therapeutic quickie, now I wish i still smoked!!

Crap should have made those links properly, sorry about that.

Nice little HTPC you have there sir.. thanks for playing :D

No GPU though? Sad face.

andandand.. Plextor M5 Pro for the SSD! Heckyeah!

Nice build! Not what I expected when I started this, but it's still a monster...a compact, whisper-quiet monster!  I know very little about HTPCs because I live in a sarcophagus so my PC is literally between my monitor and TV, but this is appreciated, I'm learning a lot. The Intel HD Graphics 4000 you'll get from the 3570K/Z77 combination replaces the discrete GPU? Does the Hauppage tuner thinger also replace a PVR?  Honestly, the only thing I'm sure of is that it's a DVD/BR player and the large HDs are for storing tons o' media.  Could you explain a bit about what else you might use this for? What else it's connected to?  (Use small words, I'm not super bright. :D) 

Also: I was looking at the link for the mobo and was intrigued by this:

Overclocking is no longer for K-series CPU users only, for those CPUs that aren’t K-series, ASRock No-K OC can unleash your CPU’s power by boosting its frequency with just one click.

What is this strange magic? Anybody know what this is about?

Erakith:

I was toying between adding 4 680's or 2 690s.. went with the 680's 'cause it'd appear more impressive in a loop, and they'd be more overclockable. :D

That's more than fair, 'cause it would look AWESOME and that's kinda what we're going for here!

eunoia:

 

Also: I was looking at the link for the mobo and was intrigued by this:

No-K OC Technology

Overclocking is no longer for K-series CPU users only, for those CPUs that aren’t K-series, ASRock No-K OC can unleash your CPU’s power by boosting its frequency with just one click.

 

 

 

 

What is this strange magic? Anybody know what this is about?

No-K OC works by increasing the BCLK and upping the multi to the chips max. Non-k processors don't have unlocked multis but you CAN overclock them a little.

Example: 2011 3820. You can increase the BCLK to 125mhz, and then throw that on the max 3820 multi of 38 and you have 4.75 Ghz. 1155 CPU's wont hit that frequency, but tuning correctly you can get 108 or so BCLK. 

Yea like Erakith said The No-K OC tech is an easy way of overclocking the processor by increasing the BCLK frequency. Its for people who don't know how to tune their processors to get the most out of them. The utility can also be used as a beginning step to overclock to higher frequencies. Asus also has a similar system with their Auto Tuning ( go figure Asus and Asrock have similar features) for a standard overclock and then an extreme one. The Asus Ai Suite changes the Bclk frequency and the voltage on the processor to achieve a more stable OC and it can be done from the desktop so you don't have to go into the bios if you don't want to. The desktop suite is actually quite robust and I used it to OC my i5 2500k to 4.3 Ghz with a Bclk of 103.2 I believe (Just moved my OS to a new drive and I'm having some problems getting AI suite to play nice but the OC is still in effect because it was saved into the BIOS).The "K" part in the product code for the processors denotes that they have potentially an infinite multiplier, meaning if you can keep the chipset cool enough you could hit 6, 7, maybe even 8 Ghz, the non "K" skus have a ceiling for their frequency and are therefore harder to OC. So basically the No-K OC tech should allow you to easily OC a non "k" processor like the i5 3450 or i5 3570 but probably not as high as the i5 3570k. 

To be honest I chose that mobo because it had an mSata port on the back and was the only other Z77 board on newegg other than an Asus one. Picked the Asus one first but then realized that their raised Digi VRM might interfere with the radiator for the H70 and then I noticed the mSata port on the Asrock board which allowed me to have an SSD in the system (albeit its a 3.0Gb/s port and a 6.0Gb/s drive) and have the two 6.0 Gb/s HDDs in RAID 1. Having 6.0Gb/s HDDs in the system should give me better performance than a 6.0Gb/s SSD and 3.0Gb/s HDDs. That part is speculation because I believe it might be hard to benchmark the two different setups properly. There may or may not be a noticeable real world difference but my reasoning is that having the mSata SSD allows me to maximize the throughput on the 3.0Gb/s port and therefore booting the OS and launching apps really fast and the two HDDs are in the only two 6.0Gb/s ports on the board giving me the biggest, fastest and SAFEST (because I know RAID 0 would be bigger and faster) storage for my media.

I didn't add a discrete video card into the mix because I would need a bigger motherboard and therefore a bigger case. It would also make the setup louder and create a larger footprint in the media cabinet or general area (this is all wishful thinking but you get what I mean I hope). Having a quieter HTPC is more important to me than being able to play games on it. The Intel Graphics 4000 is good  for playing back movies, even 3D ones from what I've heard and the Blu Ray burner can play those as well. Since this would be a media storage/consumption machine it has a decent sized SSD to store all the different programs needed to playback, convert or rip any of the media I desire. It has the storage for all the media as well as the space to record OTA television or Cable from the Hauppage tuner. Now looking at the case and the mobo I could have gone with a discrete video card if I didn't have the tv tuner card. There are external tuners available like the HD Home Run Prime which is awesome because it allows computers on a network to watch OTA tv or Cable Tv. However by including the Hauppage tuner in my build I made it into a PVR, which I want in an HTPC. If I went with a video card instead it would become a gaming machine, and a weird one at that. This would be a machine that stays on all the time and serves a tv and maybe another monitor for surfing, streaming and watching movies. For that purpose its overly powerful but then that's what the dream is!!

Thanks for the questions btw, it gives me a chance to give my reasoning for some of the products I chose, keep in mind some of them I chose very quickly and there might be better alternatives. Like the RAM or the ODD for example, even the HDDs. Before the release of the WD reds the green drives would have been a no brainer for me but now I would have to do more research before I chose between the two.

Oh lastly the drive cage in the Lian Li Case can be removed which is what I would do to increase the cooling effect of the front fan. Instead of cramming the case full of HDD which would be better served in a proper nas box or Windows Home Server.

karanm:

Oh lastly the drive cage in the Lian Li Case can be removed which is what I would do to increase the cooling effect of the front fan. Instead of cramming the case full of HDD which would be better served in a proper nas box or Windows Home Server.

I'll reply to this one other than wall-of-text quoting.. 

The motherboard can hold a discrete GPU! It's all about the case. 

BitFenix Prodigy would fit nicely, but those Lian Li's sure are sexy.

SilverStone also make some incredible ITX chassis like the FT03 that would house a GPU with no issues. 

I just got done playing around with an ASUS P8Z77-V PRO, but I use an ASRock Extreme6 for day-to-day. Very similar boards - I prefer the ASRock though, for one of the reasons you list above: mSATA. I also prefer the fact the ASRock has a debug LED whereas the ASUS has the phase LEDs.

Yes the prodigy is a nice case and so is the silverstone but like you said Liang Li  just has that appeal. Plus I know the mobo and case can accommodate a gpu, but I don't want one for the reasons I said above. I'd rather have the tv tuner in there.