butre

all weapons should be legal for this purpose.  nuke duels would be this country's greatest pastime. 

all weapons should be legal for this purpose.  nuke duels would be this country's greatest pastime. 

2009 or 2010 ish I bought a phenom II 955be and a motherboard that I knew could unlock it, and stuck an 8800gts on it temporarily, which eventually got upgraded to an hd6870 once I could afford it.  in 2011 the motherboard died and I replaced it with a asus m5a99x evo and in 2012 the gpu died and was replaced with an hd7850.  that configuration lasted me until early 2019 before the cpu died (was unlocked to 6 cores and cranked up to 4.3 ghz, so pretty inevitable)  at which point it got replaced with an FX 4100 until I managed to save up for my current system and retired this one to my server closet.  at one point while it was in there partially disassembled the gpu fell 6 feet and broke a couple mosfets off (they had heatsinks glued on) so I stuck a cheapo r9 390 in it
 
here's a picture of that system as it sits today:

 
original configuration didn't last long, but the final config made it 7 years.

Hardware
Motherboard: MSI Z77a1-G41 CPU: Intel Core i3-2120 Cooling: intel stock for an i5 3330 with kryonaut under it, plus some delta afb1212h fans  Case: Cooler Master Stacker 830 + 2x Startech HSB430SATBK hot swap enclosures Network: integrated GPU: whatever the igpu on a 2120 is RAM: 16gb g.skill ddr3 1600 PSU: Antec neo eco 500w?  the psu is as old as some of the people on this forum.  technically meets 80+, but predates it, so it's not certified. HBA: 6x onboard sata plus 6x off a generic sata 3.0 card I got cheap at a garage sale Boot drive: Apacer 16gb SSD (salvaged from a ticketmaster thin client) Drives: 8 x 2TB HP MB2000GCEHK (used drives from a proliant) Hot Spares: 2 x 2TB HP MB2000GCEHK (same as above) Total capacity: 20TB (Raw) 11.2 (Usable)
score: 33.2710646669 OR 46.0517018599 depending on whether hot spares count
 
Software and Configuration:
freenas.  4+4 drive raid z1 (2 vdevs, 4 drives each), a couple hot spares, and a dream
 
Usage:
stores music, movies, adult videos, backups, and downloads.
 
Backup:
this is my backup
 
Photos:

 
I cleaned up the cables in here since I took this picture, and the keyboard is no longer plugged in because it really doesn't need to be.  this was from while I was setting it back up
 
the used drives have been dead reliable for quite a while by the way.  also if you think that case is ugly now, you should've seen it when I pulled it out of storage.  thing was filled to the brim with hantavirus 

you don't need a whole lot of mounting pressure for direct die cooling.  just the weight of the cooler is plenty.  if this is for a short term overclocking session, set the pc on it's side, add a bit of blue tac on the corners of the substrate, and simply place the cooler on top.  if this is for long term use I have had luck using thermal tape to keep lightweight heatsinks on.  you could almost certainly get away with one of dynatron's skived heatsinks

once was diagnosing system instability, pulled a ram stick while it was powered on.  that made it real unstable.

once was diagnosing system instability, pulled a ram stick while it was powered on.  that made it real unstable.

I just use antifreeze in mixed metal loops.  preventing galvanic corrosion is one of the main reasons we use antifreeze after all.  of course, I don't leave mixed metal loops together long.  I just don't want to duct tape a good radiator to an a/c vent is all.
 
if you've got say a copper block and an aluminum rad then you can reduce the possibility of galvanic corrosion by electroplating the block with nickel as a base layer and then zinc as the show layer.  unfortunately nothing plates to aluminum and aluminum doesn't plate to anything so you can't get it perfect, but I've never seen galvanic corrosion between aluminum and zinc.  that will do the job until the electroplating wears off.  besides, zinc plating can have all kinds of pretty colors.  it's the perfect solution.

hit up ebay and grab a used rx570 and a used i7 3770.  it'll cost less than just buying a new 580 but will be a much more substantial upgrade.

hit up ebay and grab a used rx570 and a used i7 3770.  it'll cost less than just buying a new 580 but will be a much more substantial upgrade.

you can build anything with enough time and money to throw at the issue.

I don't think I've ever gone more than a week without making some kind of upgrade.  maybe not throwing money at it, but improving things like cable management or redecorating it.  as far as throwing money at it goes though, probably about once every other month.  I've only ever completely replaced one of my systems 3 times, so that'll be about once a decade

I have a liquor cart, if that counts

at those price points the 9400F is the most sensible choice

what slots are the sticks in?  they should be in the second and fourth slots from the CPU socket