My first Intel build since a Pentium II

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Makaveli@BETA

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Hi everyone, i'm just about to replace my aging Opteron 170 system that has served me so well for the past couple of years. And i'm going to building a i7 rig my first build on the darkside :D since the pentium II.

After looking at my options I've decided to go the X58 route over lynnfield. I'm looking for any suggestion on my component selections and I plan to post some pictures as soon as I start the build.

Intel Core i7 920 D0
Asus P6T Deluxe V2 Socket 1366
OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 1600MHz Platinum XTC 6GB
Noctua NH-U12P SE2 or TRUE Revision C or Megahalems.

This upgrade will cost me $1000 roughly, I will be using my previous tower, drives 640WD for boot and 2x 750WD storage and a Enermax Infinity 720Watts.


I did price together to lynnfield system just incase.

Intel Core i7 860
MSI P55-GD80 Socket 1156
OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 1600MHz Platinum Edition Low Voltage 4GB
Noctua NH-U12P SE2 or TRUE Revision C or Megahalems.

roughly $900 so the difference in price was so small that I decided to go the X58 route.

I previously upgraded my 3870 to a 4890 so already have this for the build. I just need to transfer my S1 Rev 2 onto the new card.

The one question I do have is my x58 motherboard choice. What is the feedback on this board? I decided on this one because the price was good, I don't intend on speeding 400-500 on a motherboard which most of the top end X58 ones currently retail for.

I did also put together an AMD system but the gap in price wasn't large enough for the peformance I would be giving up.

AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition
MSI 790FX-GD70 ATX AM3
OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 1600MHz Platinum Edition Low Voltage 4GB
Noctua NH-U12P SE2

Around $700.

O also most forget I will be throwing a SSD in the rig sometime in the january timeframe I believe.
 
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Makaveli@BETA said:
The one question I do have is my x58 motherboard choice. What is the feedback on this board? I decided on this one because the price was good, I don't intended on speeding 400-500 on a motherboard which most of the top end X58 ones currently retail for.
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It's a very good and solid motherboard.
 
I picked up a 920 D0 lot 3910A636
&
Asus P6T Deluxe V2 tonight

Do have a few questions before I purchase the memory.

1. Does ram speed really matter, would it be worthwhile to stick with fast 1333 memory?

2. Will populating the board with 12GB of ram limiting maximum overlock?

3. Also any clearance issues with the 3 HSF's of choice with all ram slots filled?
 
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With the Mega, you'll need to get ram "short" ram without the heat spreaders just to have a chance at being able to populate all 6 dimms.

If you going to run 6x dimms, I would get lower speed stuff with very tight timings or tighter timed higher speed sticks. Since you have to run the uncore at least 2x the memory speed, you're going to have to run a very high QPI/Dimm voltage (this is what vvt on Asus boards are called) in order to make it not error. There is a reason max Intel memory spec is only 1066 on 1366 boards. I would say get a Xeon for 6x dimms, but looks like you already grab a 920.

Here is some reading for you: http://i4memory.com/f83/12gb-higher-club-18879/
 
Makaveli@BETA said:
going to building a i7 rig my first build on the darkside :D since the pentium II.

After looking at my options I've decided to go the X58 route over lynnfield. I'm looking for any suggestion on my component selections and I plan to post some pictures as soon as I start the build.
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Not darkside! Welcome back to the Light side!

It's a solid board, I've heard good thing's about. However I really like my board, both in looks and performance. It's all black, and supports 3 way SLI + Physx. It's been a good overclocker for me too. Only prob I have with it is, only one slot is 16x. (16x 8x 4x 8x). $239.99 too. with a $20 mail in rebate, $219.99.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188049&Tpk=evga x58 sli le
 
Are you looking for advice on other components, or do you have the whole build planned already?
 
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For a second there, I read it as first build since Pentium II. :p
 
mastrdrver said:
With the Mega, you'll need to get ram "short" ram without the heat spreaders just to have a chance at being able to populate all 6 dimms.

If you going to run 6x dimms, I would get lower speed stuff with very tight timings or tighter timed higher speed sticks. Since you have to run the uncore at least 2x the memory speed, you're going to have to run a very high QPI/Dimm voltage (this is what vvt on Asus boards are called) in order to make it not error. There is a reason max Intel memory spec is only 1066 on 1366 boards. I would say get a Xeon for 6x dimms, but looks like you already grab a 920.

Here is some reading for you: http://i4memory.com/f83/12gb-higher-club-18879/
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I've actually been hearing many good things about that board lately it looks good too. I already picked up my board but when looking for that EVGA board in canada the cheapest I see it is $299 with a $20 mail in rebate from Ncix.com. I picked up the PT6 V2 for $309.99 at canadacomputers close to me so thought I got a decent deal.

I want memory I can overclock, but also want to have the ability to fill all six slots if I have to.
 
TheQuestian said:
Are you looking for advice on other components, or do you have the whole build planned already?
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I already jumped the gun on the purchase of some items because of sales this week that end on the 22nd.

Some advice on two remaining items to buy 6GB kit of memory and the aftermarket heatsink and fan.

What I can expect overclocking wise, there are alot of people on the forum with this motherboard and 920 D0 combo.
 
450 said:
For a second there, I read it as first build since Pentium II. :p
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haha no this is my current rig

AMD Opteron 170 2000MHz @ 2500MHz
Asus A8N32 SLI-Deluxe
4096 MB of DDR 500 OCZ PC4000EB 3-3-2-8 2T
Asus HD3870 RV670 + AC S1 rev 1.2 Passive (just picked up a 4890)
2X WD7500AAKS 750GB SATAII 7200RPM 16MB
WD6400AAKS 640GB SATAII 7200RPM 16MB
Samsung 225BW x2 22'
LiteOn - 52327S
DVD R/W: LiteOn -1693S
Creative X-Fi Extreme Music
 
The place i'm planning on buying might not have OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 1600MHz Platinum XTC 6GB in stock.

Anyone used these sticks if so any possitive or negative feedback.
Mushkin XP3-12800 Cas 7-8-7-20 DDR3-1600MHZ 6GB.

Also is there a difference between this

Thermalright ULTRA-120 Trueblack REV.C
&
And the TRUE rev C that kyle just wrote about?
 
Welcome to the dark side again :)

Okay, my last Intel build until a few years ago was an old Celeron 333 that I overclocked to 500 Mhz back in the Pentium II days where the fastest CPU was a 450 Mhz. I was quite proud of that overclock and computer at the time for what I paid. A celeron 333 was about $70 and a pentium II 450 was about $700.

Since the Ghz wars hard started I was an AMD man. Tird 1.33 Ghz all the way through to an Opteron 165 I OC'd to 3.2 Ghz (another proud overclock I had).

However, after that AMD began to slide on competitiveness. Losing performance versus cost value. Still, I think they are regaining ground again, but until then, I am using Intels again. Started when I got my first Q6600. Switched that to a Q9450, and turned my secondary machine into using an e8400. Now I have a I7 920 in my main rig.

I am getting a bit tempted to swap out my e8400 in my second machine though. Looking for a low cost/wattage solution as it is a SFF machine. AMD quads are looking pretty good in this category right now at least. However, for price versus performance, you can't beat a $200 i7 920 overclocked to 4Ghz or more.
 
I agree wish our dollar was on par with you guys like it was last year. You won't find a i7 920 in canada cheaper than $300. As i've gotten into my later 20's I don't have as much time to upgrade as frequently as in the past(Money is also spent on things that are more important lol I don't mean women). So my system builds tend to last longer, just look at how long I stayed on 939. And the option to go 6 cores is worth the $50 premium I paid for my board over a 1156 setup.

And yes I know everyone is saying gulftown will only be an extreme edition, but I think intel will release cheaper models as time goes by.

I'm an experienced overclocker but this will be new to me on the i7 so i'm looking forward to the challenge. From what i've seen on the forum most people try to stick to around 3.6Ghz as its a good balance of Vcore and heat output. Once you start hitting the 3.8-4+ Range recommendations for water start to come up.
 
It was a tough choice between the TRUE and the Noctua based on the rewiews and comments I saw.

Had to make a choice though...

Thermalright ULTRA-120 Trueblack REV.C

Scythe S-FLEX SFF21G 120MM Cooling Fan 1900RPM 35.0DBA 75CFM

I will be putting this on a fan controller so noise won't be an issue. Will have to decide after If I should go push pull, based on temps.

Last item to purchase will be memory.
 
My first Intel build is in my sig :p (unless you count an old 300a) Welcome to the dark side.
 
If you want to save some coin I have heard nothing but good stuff about Asrock's X58 offerings. Sounds fitting as they are in relations with Asus.
 
All good kits of memory

Mushkin XP3-12800 DDR3-1600MHZ is looking to be my choice right now.

Can get them for $175 Cdn.
 
Ok so I just bought the Muskin set, all reviews seem positive and plenty of users running this kit in 12GB config aswell and no issues. Also shouldn't have any clearance problems under the TRUE with 6 slots populated when I decide to go with more memory.
 
Your price seems aweful high for the phenom 2 build! For an am3/ddr3 955be build, I would do:

CPU: Phenom II 955BE 179.99 @newegg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...03674&cm_re=phenom_955-_-19-103-674-_-Product

Ram: 2x2gb Gskill Ripjaws 1.5v (can do 1333+ at cas7, 1600@cas8, or ~2000 at cas9) 85.99@newegg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...7&cm_re=g.skill_ripjaw-_-20-231-277-_-Product

Motherboard: Asus M4A78T-E 790gx/sb750 129.99@newegg (I prefer the Gigabyte 790gx/sb750 board, but its a bit more pricey)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131366


Total Cost: 395.97
Total cost with 8gb(4x2) ram 480.96

Lots and lots of leftover money to spend here. I would just go ahead and get a more expensive 790fx board with 2x pci-e x16 slots, and a second 4890 for xfire (though u can still double card xfire in a 790gx boiard, one slot will be x8, but x8 is still fine for current gen gfx cards, x16 has tons of unused leftover bwidth; but you will have enough leftover cash compared to a 900 dollar intel build to go with the 790fx board and still have cash left over).
It will still be cheaper than either socket intel build, and with xfire 4890's driving your games, it will blow either of your other builds out of the water in games.

Just IMO, since you mentioned you priced out an amd build.
 
Yes these are canadian prices!!!!

The gap between bloomfield setup and AMD was $300, lynnfield to AMD was about $200 difference in price.

So for me the $300 difference was worth the money. if It was bigger I would have probably gone with lynnfield or AMD.

Also in your AMD build you are using a cheaper board than I selected for mine.
 
My TRUE Blackedition :D just arrived from Ncix today got it expressed shipped. Now i'm just waiting for the memory to arrive which might not be until Friday. I hope to start the build this weekend and to add some pics, the excitement is building :p
 
gwarren007 said:
Are those canada prices?
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No they are USA prices off Newegg.com. I live in FL.


790GX boards are cheap! The only real disadvantage compared to a 790FX solution, is like the i5 boards, there are only enough gfx PCI-E lanes for 1 x16 or 2 x8's. But really, x8 is plenty for modern gfx cards, reviews have shown basically zero performance difference between x8 and x16 slots. If I was using dual core video card like 4770X2, I would want x16, but for 2 single GPU cards, 2 x8 slots is fine.

I have the Gigabyte MA790GP-UD4H, its a ddr2 board, but it has the 1 x16/2 x8 configuration. My scores with 2 4770's almost exactly match those of reviewers/people using them in double x16 slots. Note I normally only use 1 4770, I borrowed a friends last week just to test them out.

So if you have no beef using single core GPUs, then you can save a few bucks and go with 790gx. Combined with the massive amount of money you will save going Phenom II over i5/i7, you can easily afford to fit 2 4870's/4890's into the build and still match the total build cost of an intel build using just one gfx card, which WILL give you better fps in games.

gwarren007 said:
I was letting him know your build was in canada pricing.
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But its not. I included links to the items @newegg, does it say newegg.ca? I have build over half a dozen AMD Phenom II X4 boxes for friends and customers in the last few months, total cpu/memory/mobo cost for every build was right around 400 bucks, slightly more with an 8gb setup, slightly less with a 4gb configuration. I always go 790gx as my friends and custies are not using dual gpu's, and I find the backup onboard dx10 gfx very useful as a backup in case your GPU dies... you can still run win7 with all the UI bells and whistles running (and even game at lower settings in a pinch) while you are waiting for the RMA or replacement to arrive! Very convenient.
 
Malakai said:
No they are USA prices off Newegg.com. I live in FL.


790GX boards are cheap! The only real disadvantage compared to a 790FX solution, is like the i5 boards, there are only enough gfx PCI-E lanes for 1 x16 or 2 x8's. But really, x8 is plenty for modern gfx cards, reviews have shown basically zero performance difference between x8 and x16 slots. If I was using dual core video card like 4770X2, I would want x16, but for 2 single GPU cards, 2 x8 slots is fine.

I have the Gigabyte MA790GP-UD4H, its a ddr2 board, but it has the 1 x16/2 x8 configuration. My scores with 2 4770's almost exactly match those of reviewers/people using them in double x16 slots. Note I normally only use 1 4770, I borrowed a friends last week just to test them out.

So if you have no beef using single core GPUs, then you can save a few bucks and go with 790gx. Combined with the massive amount of money you will save going Phenom II over i5/i7, you can easily afford to fit 2 4870's/4890's into the build and still match the total build cost of an intel build using just one gfx card, which WILL give you better fps in games.



But its not. I included links to the items @newegg, does it say newegg.ca? I have build over half a dozen AMD Phenom II X4 boxes for friends and customers in the last few months, total cpu/memory/mobo cost for every build was right around 400 bucks, slightly more with an 8gb setup, slightly less with a 4gb configuration. I always go 790gx as my friends and custies are not using dual gpu's, and I find the backup onboard dx10 gfx very useful as a backup in case your GPU dies... you can still run win7 with all the UI bells and whistles running (and even game at lower settings in a pinch) while you are waiting for the RMA or replacement to arrive! Very convenient.
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Very valid points Malakai and thank you for the input, however I am in Canada so newegg is also not an option. Even Newegg canada is still no good for me since the items will come from the US and I will get hit with an extra charge at the border. And knowing myself I never buy value boards or anything with onboard video so I would have never looked at anything on the amd side with the 790gx. The configuration you pointed out is a very good one and I will be sure to recommend it to any of my friends looking to build an AMD system and on a slightly smaller budget than I had.

Also i've always wanted to try an intel chipset after dealing with Nvidia chipsets for what seems like an eternity now.
 
Ram showed up yesterday so I will be starting the build tonight after I grab some beer lol

Pics soon to follow...
 
gwarren007 said:
The OP is in Canada :rolleyes:
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Ah I am sorry, I misunderstood! It wasn't very clear that you were referring to the OP in the initial post, no need for rollseyes!!!!


OP, newegg.ca? Or ncix.com? I use ncix's us branch, ncixus.com, they are a good shop in my experience. My monitor is from there, and I ordered a mobo awhile ago for a friends build from there. Shipping was not as fast as newegg (not surprising since they are based in canada), but everything worked great and they have good RMA service.


So is like, AMD specifically more expensive in canada? Or intel is cheaper there? I dont really get why you being in canada makes the intel build more viable?
 
Makaveli@BETA said:
Very valid points Malakai and thank you for the input, however I am in Canada so newegg is also not an option. Even Newegg canada is still no good for me since the items will come from the US and I will get hit with an extra charge at the border. And knowing myself I never buy value boards or anything with onboard video so I would have never looked at anything on the amd side with the 790gx. The configuration you pointed out is a very good one and I will be sure to recommend it to any of my friends looking to build an AMD system and on a slightly smaller budget than I had.

Also i've always wanted to try an intel chipset after dealing with Nvidia chipsets for what seems like an eternity now.
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Cool, no problem, Im sure you will love the build. Just wanted to provide an alternative. I envy the benchmark scores i5's and much moreso i7's get, but do to several real life issues (like Crohn's disease causing me to need to spend much of my income on painkillers :( ), I had very little $$ with which to upgrade my pc.

AMD's amazing prices on Phenom II's and 790GX boards allowed me to get a very fast system for very very little money. I have built friends i7 builds, and even an extreme edition C2Q with ddr3 build as well, and my system feels just as responsive as theirs. The i7's benchmarks dominate mine ofc, but both gaming and general desktop use, they all feel mostly the same. This is why I often say, past a certain point on cpu and memory speeds, the only bottleneck for most things we do with our pc's is the video card.
My friend with the i7 build also has a 4770, and our fps in games we both play (wow, crysis, SC-FA, TF2) are about the same. And the friend with the C2Q EE (he actually paid about 800 bucks for the cpu in january hehe)+ ddr3-1333, my box with ddr2 actually has more memory bandwidth according to everest cache&mem bench, and sandra memory benches. But he has a 4870X2, and as expected, his game fps dominates both of our 4770 boxes :)

Enjoy the box! To bad there isnt a way to unlock hyperthreading on the i5's :( I would have seriously considered one if they had HT, its one of the i7's main performance advantages over PhII in heavily threaded apps, often adding 20-25% or more performance in those types of apps.
 
*Update*

The Asus Board is DOA!

I put the whole thing together, and there is no video. All fans come on but no post, taking the board back to Canada computers tomorrow for a replacement. Not too happy about it but what can I do.

Some of the high points....

I found the Rev C True very easy to mount.

I finally replaced the stock cooler on the 4890 with the S1 Rev 2, I had to add the turbo module's as I found it ran too hot passively.

Now that I went through and cleaned out the tower abit removed my floppy drive USB key booting FTW. When I get the replacement board I should be able to swap that in about 15mins and start with the Windows 7 install.
 
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Videocard Stock



Acclero S1 Rev 2 with Turbo



Parts



True Mounted



Front View



Fan Mounted



Memory clearance shouldn't have any issues with 6 Dimm's



Installing Win 7 64bit off a usb thumb drive



Checking Temps on 4890 at stock



Need to find a good overclocking guide now......
 
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My thread is pretty much dead but I do see the view count still going up so I just wanted to post a quick update.

Overclocking on this system was so easy its not even funny. I currently have the system at 3.6Ghz with Hyperthreading on at stock voltage. Turbo mode turned off but speedstep still on so it idle's at around 2.15Ghz.

Idle temps are about 39c and full load 69c.
 
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