First post, first from-scratch rig!

[cHubbyFker]

Hey guys! Figured I'd finally register, and get some input on my upcoming build! Have been a subscriber for a long time, so I'm looking forward to being a part of the community!

 

This is going to be my first complete from-scratch build, and it's looking like a complete beast, so any help is greatly appreciated.

Now, since I'm a student, and I don't have ~4000 dollars to spend straight away (PC parts in Sweden are a great deal more expensive, but more on that later), the parts will be bought over the coming 4-5 months. This is a pretty over-the-top rig, especially for a student, but I'm currently at a point where I'm relatively stable financially, so I've decided that I want to invest in a system where I won't feel restricted by the hardware.

 

In essence, my hope for this rig is to be able to run star citizen in all its fully specced glory on an Acer X34 ultrawide, with a framerate solidly in the 60-100 fps range, to take advantage of the refresh rate of the monitor. This is of course going to require some beefy hardware, so let's get to it!

 

PCPartPicker part list

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($326.95 @ SuperBiiz) 

CPU Cooler: NZXT Kraken X61 106.1 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  ($119.99 @ B&H) 

Motherboard: Asus Z97-A ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($139.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury White 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($39.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury White 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($39.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury White 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($39.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury White 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($39.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($84.89 @ OutletPC) 

Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($84.89 @ OutletPC) 

Storage: Western Digital BLACK SERIES 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($69.99 @ Newegg) 

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB STRIX Video Card (2-Way SLI)  ($696.98 @ Newegg) 

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB STRIX Video Card (2-Way SLI)  ($696.98 @ Newegg) 

Case: NZXT H440 (White/Black) ATX Mid Tower Case  ($99.99 @ NCIX US) 

Power Supply: Corsair RM 1000W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($155.99 @ Amazon) 

Total: $2636.60

 

Beyond the above, I'm also thinking of getting 2 noctua NF-F14s for the top fan spaces. This is because I want the output fans to be a bit more silent. I'll probably make a custom fan/lighting controller for this rig as well.

 

Also, as I will probably be looking to overclock the rig quite heavily, I've been thinking of liquid cooling the GPUs using the NZXT Kraken G10 GPU brackets, along with NZXT Kraken x41 AIO coolers. The idea is that I will be able to carry this over into future builds, assuming compatability doesn't become an issue. It will hopefully also be relatively hassle-free (at least compared to a custom loop).

 

Now, as I said in the beginning, all this is going to set me back about 4100 USD (5600 with the x34), assuming i buy it all here in Sweden. Luckily, my brother lives in the US, and is coming home to visit in about 3 weeks, so I'm going to get him to buy the first 980ti, the SSDs, the RAM, and the PSU over there, and bring it back here with him (This saves me over 500 USD!!!). I'm gonna get him to rig everything up before he leaves, to make sure nothing's DOA.

 

All of these are going to go into my current rig in this first step, which will most likely bottleneck the living sh*t out of my 2600k, but hey, YOLO i guess.

 

 

So, to my questions, starting from the top:

 

1) Is the Asus Z97-A going to give me enough possibilities for overclocking? There's a bundle with this and the 4790k at my favorite retailer, putting it at about the same price as it would be in the US.

 

2) How much temp headroom is the Kraken x61 going to give me? How high of a stable OC will I be able to get on the 4790k, without turning my PC into a furnace, or turbine?

 

3) I've found it quite difficult to find up to date GPU benchmark spreadsheets containing all 980ti permutations. Is the Strix 980ti the way to go, or should I look at another manufacturer?

 

4) Is there any point to liquid cooling the 980ti:s with Kraken X41s? From what I've seen, the Asus cards are pretty damn cool and quiet. These components will most likely be the last ones I buy, so I will have some time to decide when the components are actually in place, but I want to be able to work out my budget properly.

 

5) I've been looking for some technical drawings of the h440, to ensure that all of these components will work out, but have been unable to find any. Does anyone know where to find them? As far as I can tell, things should work out fine, but I'd rather be 100% sure, than sorry. 

 

6) If one of the components I buy from the US goes FUBAR, is there any possibility of RMAing them even though I'm not living in the US? I'm mostly concerned about the PSU and GPU here.

 

7) I'm currently running a 2600k on an Asus P8H67-MPro Mobo. There shouldn't be any problem running the 980ti on this platform for about a month until I get the new mobo+cpu, right?

 

8) Is my hope of running SC at full settings at ultrawide 1440p 100fps realistic? Could I even have some headroom?

 

 

There. Wall of text over. Thanks for reading through this far! If there are any issues I have missed, or if you have any general input, I'd happily take it! If you have any questions - shoot!

 

 

Tjipp!

[Kobathor]

Yes, you could OC a good deal with Z97.

 

Watercooling CPU- sure. I can't recommend a cooler since I don't use any. 

 

From what I hear on the forums (from people with 980tis,) you should get something other than a STRIX cooler for a 980ti. MSI makes good ones I hear, and so does a bunch of other manufacturers.

 

I would say, unless you're (heavily) OCing your GPUs, don't watercool them. That's what the aftermarket coolers are for.

 

I would get a full tower case for that 980ti SLI. A mid tower would be super cramped.

 

I don't know about the RMA situation.

 

You should be fine putting 1 980ti in your current setup.

 

With that 980ti SLI you will probably be doing great at 1440p (we haven't seen much of the game yet, so who knows about its SLI compatibility.)

 

 

 

Looks like a fun build.

[Bl00dgod]

hi,

no need for more than 8-16gb of ram if you dont use it as a rendering workstation

2 ti should work fine but no need for an extra watercooling like the kraken x41

there are already the evga 980ti hybrid for example or the evga hydro if you're going for a custom loop

 

are you planning to get a raid with the 850 evo?

[cHubbyFker]

Yes, you could OC a good deal with Z97.

 

Watercooling CPU- sure. I can't recommend a cooler since I don't use any. 

 

I would say, unless you're (heavily) OCing your GPUs, don't watercool them. That's what the aftermarket coolers are for.

 

With that 980ti SLI you will probably be doing great at 1440p (we haven't seen much of the game yet, so who knows about its SLI compatibility.)

 

I would get a full tower case for that 980ti SLI. A mid tower would be super cramped.

 

Looks like a fun build.

 

Thanks for the input dude! 

 

Yeah, I know it's kinda silly to target a build at a game that's still in alpha, but I get actual goosebumps just thinking about the experience :3

 

The h440 SHOULD be okay for dual 980s. I'll have to remove some HDD sleds, but as I'm only going to be running one HDD in this system, i'm completely fine with that. I just really don't want a huge tower under my desk  

 

Speaking of that, there's actually one more question I have:

 

How should I arrange the case fans to get good airflow? My apartment is an absolute dustbowl, and I don't want to have to clear out a metric tonne of dust out of the case every week. The way I've figured it, I'll have two 140s pulling air in through the front, one 120 pulling it in from the rear (i'll have to add an air filter here, but no biggie), and two 140s pulling all that air through the x61 radiator, and pushing it out of the top. As far as I can tell, this is the most effective way of maintaining positive air pressure in the case, and should also yield higher airflow through the radiator than just the 140s alone. Am I right in this reasoning? 

 

Edit: I also thought all fans apart from the rear 120 should be Static Pressure fans, as the h440 restricts airflow through the front and top quite heavily

[cHubbyFker]

hi,

no need for more than 8-16gb of ram if you dont use it as a rendering workstation

2 ti should work fine but no need for an extra watercooling like the kraken x41

there are already the evga 980ti hybrid for example or the evga hydro if you're going for a custom loop

 

are you planning to get a raid with the 850 evo?

 

I do alot of programming and graphic design, but nothing too demanding. I am going to be doing more and more video editing in the future, and since ram costs pretty much half as much in the US, I figured it wouldn't hurt to go a bit heavy on the ram.

 

Haven't decided quite yet. While I would love me some raid action, those 250gigs are going to start to feel real cramped once I start getting my game library in there. In the end, I'm not sure the performance gain from raiding them will wheigh out having to put my games on a mechanical drive, but as I haven't done a raid 0 setup before, maybe I'm wrong in that assumption.

[Bl00dgod]

Haven't decided quite yet. While I would love me some raid action, those 250gigs are going to start to feel real cramped once I start getting my game library in there. In the end, I'm not sure the performance gain from raiding them will wheigh out having to put my games on a mechanical drive, but as I haven't done a raid 0 setup before, maybe I'm wrong in that assumption.

actually there ŕe a lot of sales on 500gb ssds at least in germany ( 140euros for 500gb 850evo ) ...then maybe in us etc too

no need to get all games on your ssd ... steam and others allow having multiple locations for your games so you could put the ones with many loading sequenzes on the ssd

[greeatzy]

1) Absolutely!

 

2) You should expect at 4.5GHz idle around 35C and load around 70C.

 

3) I would recommend MSI or EVGA.

 

4) I don't see the point at it, slap the two cards in overclock them and enjoy.

 

5) Well you can go to PCPartPicker and pick all of the components and if there is a problem with compatibility it will say it.

 

6) Not sure.

 

7) As long as it's one GPU you should be fine.

 

8) Your CPU could be a problem for the headroom and for maxing all of the settings.

[cHubbyFker]

 

1) Absolutely!

 

2) You should expect at 4.5GHz idle around 35C and load around 70C.

 

3) I would recommend MSI or EVGA.

 

4) I don't see the point at it, slap the two cards in overclock them and enjoy.

 

5) Well you can go to PCPartPicker and pick all of the components and if there is a problem with compatibility it will say it.

 

6) Not sure.

 

7) As long as it's one GPU you should be fine.

 

8) Your CPU could be a problem for the headroom and for maxing all of the settings.

 

 

Thanks!

 

Are the EVGA and MSI variants really as cool? Both are dual fan setups as opposed to the three on the ASUS card.

 

I don't think I have much of a choice when it comes to the CPU, as LGA 1151 and 2011-3s are much more expensive (the cheapest 6700k bundle I can find comes at equivalent to about a 130 USD premium), and I haven't seen any benchmarks that show a significant overhead on performance, apart from total war: atilla, which is of course a very cpu dependent title... When the time comes to buy them, I might reconcider on that skylake though...

 

Think you could take a look at the fan layout I described in an earlier response, and tell me if it's sound?

[cHubbyFker]

actually there ŕe a lot of sales on 500gb ssds at least in germany ( 140euros for 500gb 850evo ) ...then maybe in us etc too

no need to get all games on your ssd ... steam and others allow having multiple locations for your games so you could put the ones with many loading sequenzes on the ssd

 

Hmm... I could probably buy another 120gig ssd for the OS and a couple of lighter applications like the adobe suite, and run 2x 250s in raid 0 for my game library. Sounds quite lucrative.

[Bl00dgod]

Hmm... I could probably buy another 120gig ssd for the OS and a couple of lighter applications like the adobe suite, and run 2x 250s in raid 0 for my game library. Sounds quite lucrative.

IMO wouldnt recommend 120 for OS, i got a 120gb m4 crucial ssd, almost 4 years ago( crystaldiscinfo says 98% left ) for win7 on my old build + opera + nvidia drivers (other programs on my hdd ) and only have like 30gb left

if you can afford it you could go for a M.2 ssd for more speed without a raid

[cHubbyFker]

IMO wouldnt recommend 120 for OS, i got a 120gb m4 crucial ssd, almost 4 years ago( crystaldiscinfo says 98% left ) for win7 on my old build + opera + nvidia drivers (other programs on my hdd ) and only have like 30gb left

if you can afford it you could go for a M.2 ssd for more speed without a raid

 

Will have to look closer into storage obviously Thanks!