Rendering & Gaming Rig

[richhallsworth]

Hi guys,

I'm planning a PC build that I'll be using for GPU based rendering using OctaneRender, and Gaming (Fallout 4, etc).

 

The only part I'm carrying forward from my current system is a recently purchased ASUS GTX 970 Strix Direct CU II OC, which I'll use as the main card for my 2 monitors. The 2 980 Ti's will be purely used by Octane for 3D rendering. It's worth noting as well that SLI will be disabled as Octane doesn't support it. So it will be the 970 powering my gaming, which it's currently doing just fine!

 

I built my current setup so I'm not 'new' to this... BUT I've never watercooled a system before. So this is where I turn to you!

 

I've started listing a few of the parts I'll need, but would be good to get any advice. I still need to choose some rads, fans and fittings, which I haven't had a chance to look at yet, but hoping you could guide me. I'm looking to do a hard tubing custom loop too.

 

Budget was around £3k which I've already blown, but this is an investment and so I'm flexible. Within reason

 

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/NQMWVn

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-5930K 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor  (£461.98 @ Novatech) 
Motherboard: Asus X99-A/USB 3.1 ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  (£221.32 @ Amazon UK) 
RAM: Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory  (£232.08 @ Ebuyer) 
Storage: Samsung 950 PRO 256GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive  (£134.99 @ Amazon UK) 
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Superclocked+ ACX 2.0+ Video Card (2-Way SLI)  (£559.86 @ Amazon UK) 
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Superclocked+ ACX 2.0+ Video Card (2-Way SLI)  (£559.86 @ Amazon UK) 

GPU: ASUS GTX 970 Strix Direct CU II OC 4GB (Already Purchased For £296.34)
Case: Corsair 750D Airflow Edition ATX Full Tower Case  (£136.99 @ Amazon UK) 
PSU: Corsair RM 1000W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  (£136.90 @ Amazon UK) 
OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) 

Res & Pump: EKWB EK-XRES 140 Revo D5 PWM - Glass (£108.77)
Water Block: EK-FC970 GTX Strix - Nickel [Strix 970 Water Block] (£82.72)

Water Block: EK-FC Titan X - Nickel [980 Ti Water Block] x2 (£166.94)
Water Block: EK-Supremacy EVO X99 - Nickel [X99 CPU Water Block] (£44.77)

Other: EK-FC Titan X Backplate - Nickel [980 Ti Backplate] x2 (£57.64)
Other: EK-FC970 GTX Strix Backplate - Nickel [Strix 970 Backplate] (£28.82)

Total: £3229.98

 

Thanks for your help!

[Mattyp92]

The blocks all look right but you still need rads, EK has a few good ones and I would put their XTC 280 on the bottom or front of your case in push pull and the PE 360 on the top in push or pull.  Also you need fitting for the parts, 2 per part.  Might as well stick with EK there too and pick a color you like, 13mm ID 19mm OD will give good flow and be sturdy and unlikely to kink but really that is up to you.  Then you just need tubing to fit it, PrimoChill's Primoflex is good stuff.  Don't forget to add a silver coil to the loop to kill impurities.  You may want a second pump if your flow rate isn't up to participate as well.

 

Edit:  just saw you want to do hard tubing, disregard the fittings and tubing I recommend but I would advise against doing hard line as your first water cooling set up, it is extra challenging especially for a beginner. 

[richhallsworth]

1 hour ago, Mattyp92 said:

The blocks all look right but you still need rads, EK has a few good ones and I would put their XTC 280 on the bottom or front of your case in push pull and the PE 360 on the top in push or pull.  Also you need fitting for the parts, 2 per part.  Might as well stick with EK there too and pick a color you like, 13mm ID 19mm OD will give good flow and be sturdy and unlikely to kink but really that is up to you.  Then you just need tubing to fit it, PrimoChill's Primoflex is good stuff.  Don't forget to add a silver coil to the loop to kill impurities.  You may want a second pump if your flow rate isn't up to participate as well.

 

Edit:  just saw you want to do hard tubing, disregard the fittings and tubing I recommend but I would advise against doing hard line as your first water cooling set up, it is extra challenging especially for a beginner. 

Thanks for the rad suggestions Matty, and yeah I was really unsure about tubing diameters too so that's a big help!

I think perhaps I will start with soft tubing, I have heard more and more not to dive straight in with hard, and I don't wanna screw up my first watercooled build.

 

[Mattyp92]

2 hours ago, richhallsworth said:

Thanks for the rad suggestions Matty, and yeah I was really unsure about tubing diameters too so that's a big help!

I think perhaps I will start with soft tubing, I have heard more and more not to dive straight in with hard, and I don't wanna screw up my first watercooled build.

 

I'm getting that same case but have only one 980 Ti.  I'm going to just get the EK X360 and expand upon that so I don't miss any of the mounting brackets and stuff.  I'm planning on trying to stuff the XE radiator that comes with it on the top of the case but in pull only rather than push pull like it should be, but the clearance is barely enough so I'm just adding a slim 140mm rad to the back exhaust to compensate.  With the extra gpus you definitely benefit from having the extra thick 280 rad in push pull and the medium 360 on top.  If you want overkill to be safe you could always add the slim 140 to the rear of yours too but you should be fine with what I already recommended.  I've spent the last like 2-3 weeks looking up different designs for a setup in that case so I figured I would pass it on since you are working with the same one.

Edited March 8, 2016 by Mattyp92
Autocorrect sucks

[richhallsworth]

3 hours ago, Mattyp92 said:

I'm getting that same case but have only one 980 Ti.  I'm going to just get the EK X360 and expand upon that so I don't miss any of the mounting brackets and stuff.  I'm planning on trying to stuff the XE radiator that comes with it on the top of the case but in pull only rather than push pull like it should be, but the clearance is barely enough so I'm just adding a slim 140mm rad to the back exhaust to compensate.  With the extra gpus you definitely benefit from having the extra thick 280 rad in push pull and the medium 360 on top.  If you want overkill to be safe you could always add the slim 140 to the rear of yours too but you should be fine with what I already recommended.  I've spent the last like 2-3 weeks looking up different designs for a setup in that case so I figured I would pass it on since you are working with the same one.

That's great advice, thanks man, I really appreciate it. I'll take a good look at the rad setup at the weekend and start drawing up a plan, but what you're saying seems pretty sound. Cheers!

[Mattyp92]

21 minutes ago, richhallsworth said:

That's great advice, thanks man, I really appreciate it. I'll take a good look at the rad setup at the weekend and start drawing up a plan, but what you're saying seems pretty sound. Cheers!

Absolutely, if you do decide to go with all 3 rads, you will probably need 2 pumps, 1 pump is likely right on the edge as it is with the 2 large rads and 4 blocks.

[richhallsworth]

Looking back at the core setup, I ran the EVGA Power Meter (https://www.evga.com/power-meter/) and it recommended a 1300W PSU. Does anyone know how accurate this tool is? My original PSU choice definitely wouldn't cut it but I was hoping to swap it out for the Corsair HX1200Wi instead.

 

Also, I checked out the specs for the i7 5930K - and it says:

 

Memory Types

DDR4 1333/1600/2133

 

So is my chosen Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 overkill? Would the system cap out at 2133 MHz although the motherboard can handle up to DDR4-3300?

 

Updated listing with new PSU and my existing hard drives - still need to add those radiators and a new res/pump:

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/D9xpqs