Pc mega upgrade..

I almost forgot about this one, with every thing going on at tribe I haven’t really had much time to post any blog content!

About three weeks ago I decided to go all out and upgrade my desktop pc. My previous pc was pushing three years old and was starting to show it. One option was to upgrade the core components but I thought it would be best to do a complete upgrade. That way I could take my old computer into tribe so I could work on something with a bit more kick over my laptop.

so with a clean slate what to go for.. My computer knowledge was a little rusty so after a couple of days research and help from my friend Joe T I placed my order with ebuyer.

Here a list of what I went for:

Two Kingston 64GB SSD SATA-II Read = 200MB/sec, Write = 110MB/sec

I splashed out on, not one but two solid state drives to hook up in Raid 0. This means that the data is stripped across both drives giving more space and better performance. Down side is if one fails I lose everything on both drives.

Two Western Digital 2TB Hard Drive SATAII 64MB Cache. These would act as my main storage platform. I set them in Raid 1 meaning the data is mirrored across both drive so if one fails its backed up on the other.

Intel i7 930 2.8GHz Socket 1366 8MB. The beasty processor, I decided that this was the best option for my price range. Some serious power in this thing.

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro rev 2. With that processor it calls for some heavy duty cooling. This fan got good reviews and looks pretty beefy.

XFX 5850 1GB DDR5 Graphics Card. Again this proved to be the best option for my price range. looking at the current benchmark stats this card performs really well, spending any more money on a graphics card would be a waste because the increased performance would be minute.

Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD3R DDR3 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard. This seemed like a good choice in Mobo, Not a lot to say really…

XFX 650W Single Rail Modular PSU. I Decided to go for a modular PSU this time around. I’ve always thought they were a good idea but never forked out the cash for one. This thing means business! Super high build quality and the packaging is really cool! being able to plug in only the cables you need is a dream when building a computer. It will increase air flow significantly too!

Kingston 6GB DDR3 2000MHz HyperX T1 XMP Memory Kit  1.65V. I splashed out on the Ram also. I thought I might as well get 6 Gig as I’m going to be doing more After effects work and other Ram heavy computing.

Coolermaster Elite 335 Case.  I also go a cheap case so I could transfer the components from my old pc into.

Antec TriCool 120mm Blue LED. and finally some nice quite blue 120mm fans to keep everything cool!

Total Cost = £1270

Click more below to see the build..

It all arrived two days after I ordered (nice one ebuyer). I got building strait away.. First I had to remove all the old components from the old pc and put them into the case…

A little bit like a hart transplant I guess

This was quite a tricky job because the new case is considerably smaller than the old so it was a bit of a tight squeeze! But I managed to get it all in there with out breaking any of the connectors . This pc was now ready to go to Tribe.

Now on to building the main computer…

The whole build was fairly strait forward. I usually come across a load of annoying problems when setting up a new pc, but not this time!

Here’s the modular power supply from XFX.

First boot. Close up of the ridiculous heat sinks on the Ram..

Rats nest.. This was before I sorted out the cables properly.

I wasn’t sure what way the processor heat sink should go on.. I realised this was the wrong way!

After a good tidy up and sorting out the heat sink.. Lovely jubbly

So in terms of performance its safe to say its silly fast! I installed windows in about 20 min. First windows boot took around 20 seconds and subsequent one around 10! The SSD Raid 0 is living up to the hype. Programs take only a couple of seconds to load up some open instantly.

I thought I would give the processor a fun for its money by rendering out a identical scene that was on my old computer. My old Pc did it in a respectable 1:39min the new one… 35sec. I couldn’t believe that difference! I’ve only ever seen a speed difference for about 20 seconds so this came to be quite a shock! It means I can cut my over all rendering times down considerably.

It’s also worth mentioning that the graphics card is pretty insane too. I’ve been playing Crysis Warhead and Bad Company 2 on full whack without a frame drop.. mind blown.

So with my old pc at tribe I wanted to be able to connect to the pc at home remotely to take advantage of the power. I found the simplest option was to use the inbuilt windows remote desktop feature. So while I’m at work I can accesses the new pc and set it off on a big render which leaves the Pc at work to carry on as normal! Magic.

Well that’s about all I can be bothered to wright about it for now, basically I’m super pleased with this purchase I just hope it will run the new Crysis ok . If you want to know any thing specific just post up a comment..