First Time Build! Parts Picked Out! Need Opinions!

[PcWizTech]

Hmm, it seems like a great offer but somehow i want to stay with my 1090t. It looks like i have the motherboard and the graphics card chosen now. The real question now is should i choose either the HAF X or the Storm Trooper?

[Avenger212]

HAF X will eliminate all (or most) clearance issues. I can guarantee you the NH-D14 will fit perfectly. Edit: But if you want the newest from CM go for the Storm Tropper . Personally I don't always think that the newest is always good.

[JJThomp]

Personally I think the whole HAF series is ugly and would go with the slightly better looking storm trooper.

NCIX.com - Buy Bitfenix Colossus Window Black Green Full ATX Tower Case 5X5.25 1X3.5 7X3.5INT No PS Front USB2.0 - BitFenix - BFC-CLS-500-KKWG1-RP - in Canada

Now that is a good looking case, however you would need to buy some fans to go with it as it doesn't come with nearly enough.

[GT7R]

Originally Posted by PcWizTech

My question is, does this look good to you? Do you think i should substitute the Storm Trooper for the HAF X? Will the Noctua Work on the Storm Trooper or HAF X?

The cooler will fit in both, but make sure you get a low profile RAM.
Personally I would take the HAF X by a long way, although not saying the Storm Trooper is bad either.

[Avenger212]

As the saying goes its what's in the inside that counts. I say go for the Haf X or try and consider another manufacturer.

[PcWizTech]

Alrighty it seems like i finally picked my pc parts list:
HAF X Nvidia Green Edition
Asus Crosshair V Formula Motherboard
EVGA DS SuperClocked TI GTX560
Antec High Current Pro 750w Power Supply
AMD Phenom II X6 1090t
G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8gb Ram 2X4gb
Western Digital 1tb Black Caviar
Normal CD Writer Thing
2 200m XIGMATEK Green LED Fans to replace the one 200m fan at the top of the HAF X
Noctua NH-D14 CPU Cooler

Will be getting soon:
BluRay Player
SSD Drive
and Fan Controller

What do you guys think? Is it all compatible? I think its great IMO!

EDIT EDIT EDIT: After checking the power supply calculator newegg calculated that i need about 534w of power to power up my PC. Should i get a 600w PSU? Is this calculator incorrect?

[lightninstrikr]

Originally Posted by PcWizTech

After checking the power supply calculator newegg calculated that i need about 534w of power to power up my PC. Should i get a 600w PSU? Is this calculator incorrect?

I would say always, always, always get a bigger PSU than you "need". PSU's generally are the most efficient when running at 50%-70% of their total capacity (534w out of 600w is about 89% while out of 750w it would be roughly 71%) and if you do get a bigger one than you need you are less likely to have to replace it when you upgrade later. It would also be beneficial to get a highly rated PSU (like silver or gold certified) so that you not only save money on electricity but your system also gets better and "cleaner" power which will make everything last longer. Too many people cheap out on the most critical part of their system (the thing that makes it all run)...

The Antec HCP 750W you have in your sights is a good buy IMO.

Just my 3.14 cents...

[Dragonstongue]

If you have a hefty reliance on core efficeny, the Intel 2500-2600 are just overall bette rprocessors for the $

However, if you just need a good chip, that can handle some gaming and workloads, the 1090T or 1075T would also be a good choice, try to find a black edition model and overclock it, they are apprently really easy to get a pretty good boost out of.

Myself, am using a Phenom II 955BE with a hyper 212+ cooler with push/pull of the stock fan, and it cools this chip overclocked and voltes to almost 4.1Ghz, it never has exceded 43c load temps(though I think this is wrong :P)

Anyways. if you want to save a few bones over the 1100T, get a 1090T and overclock it that one small bump, you get the 1100T basically for no extra $. A 1075T overclocked, once again easy to do, on the highest end of the spectrum really does not miss much clock speed compared to its 2 older and more pricey brothers.

A 955BE or 965BE, cannot touch a 6 cores work speed, but are still very good all around performers, they also overclock very well with the new C3 stepping and do not need much voltage to do so with a good motherboard.

Motherboard wise, M5A99X EVO or Sabertooth 990FX, these are some of the absolute best AMD based boards, have very good compatibility, overall good feature set that works very very well, not to mention the 3 top ASUS boards of the 900 series AMD chipsets need the lowest volts to hit the highest clock speeds, and they run very cool.

Anyways, best of luck, FYI the ASUS M5A99X EVO can be pricematched to NCIX here in canada for $148 from cendirect. I believe it is what $15 or so more then the board you are looking at, it is well worth it just for the amazing bios, not to mention it was designed to use the 6 core and FX properly because of the power phases.

Asus makes thier 24b1st all writer DVD/CD that works wonderfully, I got 2 of them on sale, very fast drives :)

I use Pricematch.ca and price it all to NCIX.ca, they usally have decent shipping costs, though newegg can sometimes be cheaper, I would use pricematch just to see the realtive costs to see if you are getting the best deal no matter where you shop

[Dragonstongue]

The HCP 750 GOLD, Corsair HX750 or similar.

Also for cases.
Haf 922/932, Corsair Carbide 400/500R, Silverstone Raven 2E or Raven 3

All of these are excellent cases in thier own regard, I have a silverstone Raven 3, the wiring took awhile, but the cooling and internal space if you take the time, is absolutely top notch.

FYI the 8gb 1866 Mhz Ripjaw X designed for Intel based boards, works wonderfully with the M5A99X EVO.

The Crosshair formula, is for the most part, paying $ for nothing. The sabertooth and not much behind it the M5A99X EVO are in someways much leaner and altogether just as good, without paying a price premium to be a ROG board, in all the revies/tests I have seen The sabertooth would be just as good, if not better pick for its price point.

The caviar black 640, caviar blue 1tb sata 6, and the caviar black 1.5-2tb are the fastest overall caviar blacks, the caviar black 1tb, most times is based on the older black series, the black 640 generally is faster then it.

But, overall seems a good pick, also just an FYI, a hyper 212+ with extra fan, at high overclocking, with good thermal paste, is only missing around 4-7c in cooling regards in matching a NH-D14, just food for thought, not to mention, it is nowhere near as huge. With an i7 920 hefty OC hefty OV, the Dh14 comes out ahead as it should, but at no kill cpu OC the hyper 212 and others in thier category do just fine.

[Dragonstongue]

I agree with one lad posted about power supplies, though I also disagree on something as well.

to answer question about PSU. If you think about it, 530+ watts I think is pushing it some, but, you do always want overhead. the cpu should draw no more then 200w even if overclocked, the GPU same 200watt even if overclocked, the rest of the system we will say 100watt, so all told, even when overclocked, 530watt would be a very high estimated power draw, though the Amps on the 12v rail should be well taken into account, between the cpu/gpu you would be around 38a at most from a 560ti and 1090/1100T

Power supply efficency, would 100% help temperatures, help keep clean power delivery, and most certainly provide more available power, but as far as save money, not really, I read a test not that long ago, for a platinum vs 75% efficent unti, to recoup the savings, it would take something like 8 years at high loads to see it pay off, I suppose a couple of cents savings is worthwhile, but you are usually paying alot more for silver-gold-platinum units then you would be for just an 80+ unit, so it truly doesnt "add up" so fast :)

But, always-always give some overhead, and go with a quality unit, and a UPS or power filtering unit can be a good idea as well. But generally a 750watt for single and some dual card gpu use is sufficent and gives overclocking and more headroom, if you went with dual gpu or more then an 850-1100watt would be better.

For GPU, GTX560Ti or GTX570, or Radeon 6950-6970, GTX560Ti EVGA-MSI-ASUS are all usually good choices, for Radeons, ASUS or XFX, I would go XFX 6950 2gb with dual fan and factory overclocked, they are excellent cards, overclock very well, and are very fast. Many of my buds own either a 560Ti or Radeon 6950 and they all say the same in regards to FPS and such, very very similar performance, a 560Ti would have to overclock very high to achieve 570 speeds, wheras a good 6950 can= to exceeed a 6970, which is almost identical performance to a GTX570