any recommendations on my first build???

[uglymilk]

Im thinking of building this ive never built anything before and im wondering if im missing anything or anything is incompatible or if anyone has any suggestions on something to change!



Thermaltake level 10gt case

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133192

i7 extreme

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116491

Asus rampage IV extreme

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131802

Thermaltake water 2.0 extrmeme

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835106190

Gskill ripjaws z series 32gig ddr3 2400

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231522

Cooler master 1200w

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171055

Evga gtx 690

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130781

Western digital hdd 500gb 7200rpm

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136697

Dlink n300 wireless adapter

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833127460

Asus xonar sound card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829132054

card reader

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820223109

Blue ray burner

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136249

nzxt fan controller

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811992004

[RickyTick]

I can't imagine dumping that much money into a build and not having an SSD. Look at the Samsung 830 or 840 SSD.

[uglymilk]

I was debating on it but will look more into it thanks! Anyone and anything else???

[RickyTick]

Assuming this is primarily a gaming rig, there's no reason to have 32 gb of ram.

[uglymilk]

I will be using it for gaming a lot but I also am going to school for software engineering so eventually ill be programmingnd I don't want something that's going to be too outdated in the next couple years

[JeffAHayes19]

Ditto to what RickyTick said on your hard drive. As I was clicking on each part and looking at what are (even to ME, and I don't build skimpy) ASTRONOMICAL figures and specs for most of your equipment, I figured when I got down to HD, you'd have something like a 512 GB SSD (or at least 256) for a boot drive and installed software, and then have a fast secondary drive (or three) for DATA STORAGE (I'd think AT LEAST one or two 2-3 TB 7200 RPM drives -- when I can buy those with their OWN ENCLOSURES as externals at Costco for $129 (Seagate, 3TB, SATA 3), I figure you could put in a couple for less than that on the inside of that massive case you have.

Even if, unlike me, you don't take a lot of photos and download lots of video and whatnot from the net, the drives are just too inexpensive to pass up... Mirror one to the other for data backup, and put a small partition on one (or maybe a third) to back up your Windows system installation??? As it is, that 500 GB drive in that system is like putting Toyo tires on a Rolls Royce, I think.

I also find it downright obscene that ANY video card with 4 GB DDR5 RAM running at 512-bits would FAIL to have a single HDMI output, but if you don't care, I don't. To me that's a lot simpler than those seven discrete audio wires you're gonna use with that audio card.

Also, you have both a PCI-E x1 audio card AND WiFi card (from what I could tell), but only ONE available PCI-E x1 slot on that motherboard. Perhaps you can plug one into one of the larger PCI-E slots? I've never tried plugging a card where it didn't seem to fit.

Lastly, I, too, was considering one of the 6/12-lane high-end Sandy Bridge chips for my build that's still in the box, for the moment, BUT after looking more seriously into Ivy Bridge and the speed comparison chart for various CPUs, there's NOWHERE NEAR the bang-for-the-buck to make it worth the extra $700 over an Ivy Bridge 3770K, in my opinion (and Intel has plans for a 6/12 version of Ivy Bridge sometime in the coming year, so you maybe could still upgrade.

And having that MB with 4 full-sized PCI-E slots (at the expense of smaller PCI-E slots or standard PCI slots) makes little sense to me when your card will use one, or two at the most. If you reconsider this build on Ivy Bridge LGA 1155 terms, you could save A BIG chunka change and not lose much in the way of performance.

Here's the link to the Passmark ratings for ever processor ever made (I think -- it's A LOT!)... http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_lookup.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-3770K+%40+3.50GHz The 3770K is 75% as fast as the CPU you're looking at for $700 less (31% the cost of the Sandy Bridge chip you want). Switching to LGA 1155 also (as I discovered when I made the switch before I got serious) reduces MB cost (most expensive is less than that ASUS). The only downside is that 32GB is your MAXIMUM RAM, vs. 64GB with LGA 2011. But then you plan on only 32GB, anyway (which should be more than enough for most of us for years to come).

Well, you asked... Unlike the moderators, as a fellow builder just on the VERGE of upgrading the Core i7 920 CPU, MB and RAM in my Coolermaster Haf 932 case to a 3770 Core i7 (decided against spending $30 more for the "K" version, since I likely won't overclock, anyway), I know I build my own to save $$$. Looks like you really want some SERIOUS gaming graphics, so your video card is a big part of your system. But I think that would work with most modern MBs (or something similar would).

One last thing... have you checked about HOW MUCH 2400 Mhz DDR3 RAM you can run, stably, on that MB? I'm almost certain that would put the board into OC, which often greatly decreases how much RAM is stable, based on what I've been reading prior to my own purchase. You may have already asked and answered all these questions, but I thought I'd pose them. I'd certainly want to know the answers.

And frankly, I really think you're NUTS if you don't use a SSD for your boot drive/installed software drive on a system of this magnitude. Put recycled motor oil in your Aston Martin while you're at it, if you don't, lol. I recently got the 256 GB ADATA drive on sale at Newegg, only to have another moderator point me to a review saying it's one of the best drives its size (even at full price). It's not such a touch choice today... 3.5 years ago when I built my 920 system, all SSDs WERE NOT made alike, and I read SCATHING reviews about how most non-Intel-brand drives would becoming increasingly slower as they aged and their NANDs didn't process frequently used commands as efficiently. I ended up with an 80 GB Intel M-25, when I wanted more, and it STILL was never as fast as advertized... I think much has changed since then.

Have fun with your build... Vroooom! Vrooooom!! Vroooooooooom!!!
Jeff

[uglymilk]

Hey Jeff thank you for you reccomendations!!!

I have decided to go with a 256 gb samsung 840 pro ssd and i have been thinking more hard drives i want the ssd for windows plus another hdd maybe a 1tb then i was thinking maybe a 1tb so i can dual boot with Linux but im still debating on that since i have never done anything with dual booting or linux.

Ive also been having a hard time with the processor I do want a ivy bridge and know they have the 6/12 coming out but im not sure if i will have the money for it when it comes out and of coarse i want the best of the best i really like that mb for the extra overclocking stuff they include as i want to start messing around with that as well but you have a good point where it could save me almost a thousand bucks for just a little less power.

The hdmi isnt too big of a deal to me im just gonna run dual monitors off of the DVI ports but thank you for catching the sound card and wireless card i may just get the sound card and have an external wireless adapter.

You were right about the ram the 2400 will run in oc so i decided to bump it down to the 1866 http://www.gskill.com/products.php?index=435

Thanks for all your help now the processor is my biggest problem but i keep changing my mind on whether to change it or not i dont think ill have my mind made up until i hit the place order button and only then because i wont be able to change it!

[JeffAHayes19]

Hey Jeff thank you for you reccomendations!!!

Thanks for all your help now the processor is my biggest problem but i keep changing my mind on whether to change it or not i dont think ill have my mind made up until i hit the place order button and only then because i wont be able to change it!

You're welcome, uglymilk (have felt bad I didn't hang around and help more new builders after I did my build in 2009). I can really appreciate your indecision and what you said in your last sentence... Been there, done that, quite a few times with electronics.

One thing to bear in mind is that No matter HOW "killer" the system you build today is, it won't be in a year or so, and that's where spending all those extra $$$ on a processor that's going on two years old would concern me most -- that, plus the fact that the Ivy Bridge processors, in addition to having a smaller, more sophisticated architecture, offer features not available in Sandy Bridge (once again, I looked at the same series of CPUs for at least a good week before I decided Ivy Bridge was the way to go).

As far as "future-proofing" goes, that can go only so far. Has kept my current system relevant for 3.5 years, though, and the only reason I'm upgrading now is that my MB seems glitchy and I keep losing built-in features (both ethernet ports failed; had to buy a separate card for that). Added SATA 3 and USB 3, but don't have enough of either of those already, either. I finally got around to unboxing my stuff last night and have been reading through the owner's manual and BIOS settings manual (called UEFI on my ASRock MB). I'm not sure if Z68-series MBs and/or Sandy Bridge processors allow for it, but according to what I've read in my documentation thus far, extra RAM may be used as a sort of SUPERFAST SSD with my new MB for both caching and booting. I've had a series-1 (920) system for 3.5 years with 12 GB of RAM on a motherboard capable of 24. At the time, folks told me I was crazy for putting in more than 6-8 GB, but I didn't listen. Well, I have one of those desktop utilities that shows how much RAM is being used at any given moment, as well as real-time graphs of the work load on the 8 different cores, and AT THE MOST I've never seen my system go past about 5 GB of RAM usage. I'd like to think I've gotten SOME benefit from the extra RAM I installed, but if I have, I don't know what it is (I DO Have Adobe Premeire Elements installed, which IS 64-bit native, but I haven't really used it -- it just came with my last Photoshop Elements... Seems Photoshop releases a new version of BOTH each year just in time for Christmas shopping season, and thus far I've been able to find the combo-pack on sale for less than the normal price of just Photoshop Elements EVERY SINGLE BLACK FRIDAY that's rolled around... I have every version of Elements since 6, I think, and will likely get 11 this coming BF, as Photoshop has already announced the new release). Why not just by CS6??? Well, so far I've gotten the Elements combo pack for $79 every year. JUST CS6 is $479 -- ON SALE -- and I have never even mastered elements... would just be $$$ wasted.

If you have the time, there's an exercise I think you may benefit from that I've tried... Put your Sandy Bridge build parts out of your mind for a while and see what your "ultimate" Ivy Bridge build with current MBs, etc., would look like and cost. Then -- and this is where things get interesting -- although both Newegg AND Amazon sell most of these MBs and CPUs, Newegg has much better online documentation (better pics of the MB, etc. -- stuff you can USUALLY get at Amazon, but they've had just ONE TINY PICTURE of every MB I've looked at there. However, both sites have reviews, BUT Newegg doesn't allow anyone to comment or question a review... start a conversation, whereas Amazon does (some of the better reviews may have threads longer than this one by far). So do most of your research at Newegg, and read the reviews you find relevant there, then go to Amazon and look at the reviews THEY have, and any that spark your interest, see if there's a discussion, and if not, start one. I went back and forth with a 3770K buyer several times and got great info from him before deciding to drop the "K" from my build after reading other comments (if you don't plan to do serious overclocking, the non-K CPUs have more features; but the K version of the 3770 comes at 100mhz faster and many folks have successfully OCed it by more than another full Ghz, all the way to 4.5-4.7 Ghz. You CAN overclock the non-K version, but not as much (couldn't at first, but Intel did a BIOS update to the CPUs).

I can also say I've never regretted taking my time to make a decision (unless I missed a good deal in the process), which was THE ONLY REASON I went ahead and bought my components last week -- sale was going off, lol.

In case you don't have it, I'm going to send you a link here to a page at Intel that will allow direct comparisons between up to 5 of their different CPUs. It was DOING THAT, which finally persuaded me to go with Ivy Bridge, as the ONLY major benefit I could see to Sandy Bridge was the ability to install 64GB of RAM, and that's probably overkill even for me! Let me find it right quick... Took me a minute or two, but have my link opened to a page where you can compare the different i7 CPUs -- at least I HOPE the link opens like I have it on my screen... Nope, but you can easily click on the top two (+) signs to get a list of the extreme and "standard" i7 CPUs. HOWEVER, I think Intel may need to update its chart, as it lists three versions of the 3770 (K,T,S) and NOW there's only "K" and "non-K," with only a 100 Mhz standard speed difference between them, NOT the huge differences shown on that page (2.5Ghz for the "T" and 3.1 Ghz for the "S"). Currently, it's either 3770 at 3.4 Ghz standard speed, or 3770K at 3.5 Ghz standard speed... At any rate, the comparisons between the Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge lines will be completely relevant: http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/processor-comparison/compare-intel-processors.html?select=desktop

By the way, for those of you who likely laugh at the fact that I still use AOL for my browser most of the time, I've YET to find any sort of bookmarking system on IE that comes CLOSE to what I've done with my "Favorite Places" on AOL (with folders nested inside folders, in some cases). SEVERAL THOUSAND links later, many are certainly now dead (and when I catch one, I delete it), but the FEW links I've added to my IE browser's "Favorites" are often harder to find than picking one from THOUSANDS on my AOL browser (and I REALLY don't feel like "playing with" Opera, Chrome, etc. to decide which browser I like best. I don't have that kind of time. WHEN I need to livestream an HD movie from Netflix, or something, AOL isn't up to it, but I just copy the link, open IE, and run it on there.)

Continue to take your time, and good luck, uglymilk!
Jeff

[RickyTick]

By the way, for those of you who likely laugh at the fact that I still use AOL for my browser most of the time, I've YET to find any sort of bookmarking system on IE that comes CLOSE to what I've done with my "Favorite Places" on AOL (with folders nested inside folders, in some cases). SEVERAL THOUSAND links later, many are certainly now dead (and when I catch one, I delete it), but the FEW links I've added to my IE browser's "Favorites" are often harder to find than picking one from THOUSANDS on my AOL browser (and I REALLY don't feel like "playing with" Opera, Chrome, etc. to decide which browser I like best. I don't have that kind of time. WHEN I need to livestream an HD movie from Netflix, or something, AOL isn't up to it, but I just copy the link, open IE, and run it on there.)


AOL has a browser? :confused:
;)

[uglymilk]

Thanks again jeff ill get on later tonight and put an ivy bridge build together and see how it goes! Ill put it up on here for whoever wants to take a look at it too.
Thanks for that comparison link too! Well i gotta go before my wife kills me (we're on vacation at the in laws so i probably shouldnt spend all my time on here) but i will get on later

[uglymilk]

Okay this is what im thinking for ivy bridge.

Asus maximus V extreme
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131858

i7-3770k
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116501

32gig 1600 gskill ripjaws x
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231569

fan controller
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811992004

thermaltake level 10 gt case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133192

psu
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171055

samsung 840 ssd 250 gb
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147189

card reader
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820223109

2 samsung 1tb 7200 hdd
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E1682215218

blue ray burner
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136249

thermaltake water2.0 extreme
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835106190

gtx 690
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130790


Ivy bridge total $3,077.88

Sandy bridge total $4,446.79