Quiet SB Moderate Gaming Build - feedback please

[Rekonn]

Hi everyone, here's a new system I'm planning below. Please take a look and let me know if you can spot any issues with this build or have any suggestions. I'd like to play Starcraft 2 and some FPS games at high quality settings, but I see myself as a moderate gamer because I'm using a 19" monitor with a max resolution of 1440x900. So, I don't think I'll need crossfire, just one good card. I'd also like to hook up the pc to my hdtv via hdmi cable to watch downloaded shows and movies. I may do some overclocking as well, getting to 4.5ghz on air without voltage increase would be sweet.

$225 cpu: Intel i5-2500K
$40 heatsink: Scythe Mugen 2 Rev B
$10 Arctic Silver 5
$124 motherboard: Asrock P67 PRO3
$70 ram: G.SKILL Ripjaws X 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600 CAS 7
$90 case: Lian Li Lancool PC-K7B
$90 psu: Antec TruePower TP-650
$180 vid card: Asus Radeon 6850 1GB
$215 hard drive: OCZ Vertex 2 120GB SSD
$99 Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit

I'll only be using one SSD drive, so I'm planning to remove the hard drive cage altogether from the case to have unobstructed airflow from the front two 120mm fans to the back. Are the case fans that come with the K7 ok? I'm wondering if I should give them a chance, or just order 3 new case fans with everything else.

How many fan headers does the Asrock P67 PRO3 have?

Per SPCR's silent gaming build, the Asus 6850 stock cooling should be very quiet. But, if I do decide to get a Geild Icy vision cooler or something similar, will there be enough space for it considering the Mugen 2 heatsink?

I'm thinking the PSU is overkill. If you know of a cheaper PSU that's reliable, quiet, and has modular cables, let me know.

Is there something else coming up very soon that I might want to wait for? Think I read something about new SSDs coming out soon, but I have no idea when that is.

[Rekonn]

Found the answer to one of my questions, the Asrock P67 PRO3 motherboard has one four-pin connector for the CPU cooler and four three-pin connectors for auxiliary fans. So, that should work well with the K7 case that'll have 3 120mm case fans + cpu fan. motherboard review link

As for vid card, I'm now seriously considering the XFX 6870 with silent cooling that's currently selling for $226 after rebate. I was initially thinking of getting a 6850 card + aftermarket cooler, but now that this is out I may be better off spending about the same money but getting a more powerful card that will still be very quiet. There's a couple threads on the card with more info here and here.

[livetaswim06]

Artic cooling MX-2 is better according to the 80 way TIM roundup

Click Here

[Rekonn]

Excellent article! Learned a lot reading that, but I'm a litte confused because it still looks like the Arctic Silver 5 is better than the MX-2.

Arctic Silver 5, 37.55°C, A+
Arctic Cooling MX-2, 38.20°C, A-

[CA_Steve]

Starcraft II at 14x9 isn't a gpu hog - your 5870 will be running cool.

I stay away from electrically conductive thermal pastes like AS5 - I don't want to have a "oh shit, a stringer of thermal paste landed on my mobo" incident to try and clean up. Just get a paste that tests well, is easy to apply, and is an electrical insulator. They all test within a couple of degrees - don't sweat it.

Blizzard makes use of compressed data - not sure if I'd opt for a Sandforce based SSD. If you have the $'s, look at the Crucial C300 128GB.

[fumino]

here is a (slightly) cheaper, fully modular psu. tweaktown's review is pretty good.

for the video card, you could look at xfx's 6850's that have that same silent cooler, a design that was too quiet for anandtech to even measure properly! ;D

definitely dont go with AS-5, either the mx-2, or shin-etsu x-23

btw, was just wondering if there was any specific reason you wanted to go with that case?

[Rekonn]

Ok, you guys have convinced me to go with the MX-2.

CA_Steve, looking at newegg, I see the price difference between the Vertex 2 and the C300 is about ~$40. Got a link comparing the two? The budget increase is fine, but I'd like to know what difference it would actually make. Then again, I could play the waiting game and go for a Vertex Pro 3 when it comes out.

Fumino, will check out that psu, thanks. For the vid card, one person on this forum said the card makes a vibrating noise loud enough he's thinking of returning it. Need to do more research, may go back to the idea of buying the least expensive 6850 and using an arctic twin turbo pro. As for the K7 case, I really like how it looks, the black brushed aluminum and clean, simple, symmetrical design. 3 120mm case fans should do a good job for cooling as well.

[CA_Steve]

Bit-Tech:
"There are downsides to SandForce’s system though, most prominently the fact that when dealing with already heavily compressed or entirely random data, the drive’s performance drops due to its compression technology being unable to kick in. This introduces some variation in performance – if a game fully unpacks its textures and other data you’ll find a SandForce SSD to be very quick at loading levels, but if it only partially unpacks its files a SandForce SSD may not be noticeably faster than a decent Indilinx-powered drive. "

Anandtech review of C300 128GB.

Random read speed is what you want to maximize for gaming. All the mainstream SSDs have great sequential read speeds.

[Rekonn]

Well, looks like the decision to wait or not has been made for me due to the Intel SATA bug. I looked at newegg, seems like you can't buy any sandy bridge motherboard right now. Hopefully the C400 ssd will be out by the time I can buy a system.

[Rekonn]

Just bought a power supply, Antec Truepower New 550W for $39.99 after rebate and free shipping. 48 hour deal from newegg, use coupon code EMCYTZT277. LINK

[Rekonn]

"Crucial’s M4 SSD will hit the shelves in mid-March." LINK

Sweet... this makes the wait a little easier.

[Rekonn]

Got all the parts, built my computer, and have been enjoying how ridiculously fast it is compared to my old POS. Here's the parts I wound up choosing. Once the motherboard was available, I couldn't hold out for the Crucial M4 anymore and went with the C300 SSD.

Intel i5-2500K
Scythe Mugen 2 Rev B
Arctic Cooling MX4
Asrock P67 PRO3
G.SKILL Ripjaws X 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600 CAS 9 1.5V
Lian Li Lancool PC-K7B
Antec Truepower New 550W
MSI Cyclone Radeon 6850
128GB C300 SSD
Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit

At this point I'm tweaking fan speeds and stress testing with Prime95. Any recommendations for a good and free way to stress test the vid card?

[djkest]

A program called Furmark puts some crazy stress on your graphics card.

I'd be interested to see what type of framerates you get.
I really like my 6850, so far.

[Rekonn]

Just downloaded and ran Furmark v1.9, chose the 720 Benchmark preset, score is 2278 (37fps). This is with everything at stock, nothing overclocked. Ambient temp (motherboard sensor) is 23C - vid card went from 29C to 56C during the benchmark. Vid card fan (default settings) speed went from 40% to 59%.

[kuzzia]

About the PSU. You might consider the Cooler Master Silent Pro M 500 or 600, if you think 650 W is overkill.

They should have the same fan as the 700W version that has been reviewed & recommended here at SPCR. 14 dBA @ 1 m at idle, modular.

[CA_Steve]

Just downloaded and ran Furmark v1.9, chose the 720 Benchmark preset, score is 2278 (37fps). This is with everything at stock, nothing overclocked. Ambient temp (motherboard sensor) is 23C - vid card went from 29C to 56C during the benchmark. Vid card fan (default settings) speed went from 40% to 59%.

Only 56C while running Furmark - that is awesome. It looks like you have plenty of headroom to lower fan speeds.

Congrats on your build.

[Rekonn]

Thanks! After lowering fan speeds using the Asrock AXTU utility and the MSI Afterburner utility, the system is very quiet. I'm finding the most noticeable noise is now caused by case resonance. Pressing with my hand on the top and side of the case reduces the noise right away. I suspect the 3 fans that come with the case are the cause, and am thinking about getting anti vibration mounts like these.

I'm also thinking about replacing the case fans altogether. There's one in the front that makes a chafing noise that I definitely want to replace. And from there it's easy to justify the upgrade to higher quality fans for all 3 spots.