Building a new computer would like some advice
- Thread starter Altrus
- Start date
Merlin
The Tech Wizard
If this is your first build, as you stated, I would stay away from RAID. Don't worry about doing it now. One day down the line when you understand how it really works and you have a second computer to play with and can have it down and in pieces to experiment with, then I would suggest trying to implement RAID into your main rig. Same goes with non-air cooling, you didn't mention it but I will here, don't. Water is expensive and difficult to install/maintain. You don't have to worry about leaks with air and I with 4 liquid coolers I still need fans for the PSU and the HDDs. Try it on a second rig and once you make a big mistake and learn then you can go all out. With that case air won't be a problem but I wish I didn't have any lights in mine since it's on 24/7 and I like it dark when I sleep.
The Antec 1200 is a nice big black case. Are you sure you need something that intense? If you like it then get it, but I have a $25 that looks good but I ran out of room so now I need a bigger one. If you can fill that whole thing up I will be impressed. If you put lights in it it wont be as dramatic since the paint doesn't look that glossy but I'd need to have someone confirm this.
Anyone know if Antec makes a 1200, without the door fan?
The Antec 1200 is a nice big black case. Are you sure you need something that intense? If you like it then get it, but I have a $25 that looks good but I ran out of room so now I need a bigger one. If you can fill that whole thing up I will be impressed. If you put lights in it it wont be as dramatic since the paint doesn't look that glossy but I'd need to have someone confirm this.
Anyone know if Antec makes a 1200, without the door fan?
madmat
Soup Nazi
Stay away from water cooling? You're a fascist aren't you?
"You've got to start somewhere" and "there's no time like the present" are two of my favorite sayings and in this case they're both true. But, you need to do your homework first. Don't just blindly jump in feet first. Go read reviews, read forum posts, ask questions, visit LAN gaming centers and talk to guys there that have liquid cooled systems. After you've decided on your system, whether it be a kit or DIY system, make sure to build it properly. Assemble your PC with the kit installed to route the tubing/wiring for the pump and then remove the PC guts, fill, bleed and leak test by jumpering the PSU and running the pump. Let it run for 8 hours or so and once you're certain it's leak free, resume your build. Make sure to stress the fittings while you leak test so there are no nasty surprises when you finish your build.
madmat
Soup Nazi
Not going for water cooling? Just because he said so? That's sad. Pitiful and sad.
Altrus
Coastermaker
No you miss understand...not going for it "YET"... I still need to read up on it...not just going to throw a fish tank in my computer without understanding how to do it...
...and I like that 1200 alot so I want to stay with that case...
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Operative words in his post were "just yet..."
Water cooling is a rewarding experience as it gives great performance (usually) and does so quietly. As long as you approach it with a bit of respect (water can and will kill your PC) and patience, you will be fine, whenever you choose to go water... if you decide to go water.
madmat
Soup Nazi
Gotcha. I think the 1200 would lend itself well to water cooling if you put a Thermochill PA160 in the spot that the 200mm fan resides in so there's that for future consideration.
Wow, leave for a day and see the hornet's nest I stirred up. These were my assumptions, I can hedge a bet here since I've been right once or twice in the past.
I said don't do water because the first one is difficult and since he posted
Second was the fact that he mention cost was an issue. Cost is an issue to all of us, but cost might be higher on his 'importance list' than mine. I agree that water is a superior system, but if you don't OC then it's overkill and risky.
Water leaks, tubing decays, water scales, pumps fail, so do fans, but who has one fan to cool everything?
Once again, keep in mind that I might be wrong to assume all of this, but it seems that I had Altrus pegged. How come you weren't so defensive of RAID?
Is this necessary? No. Is it a bragging right? Yes.
Is water cooling necessary? No. is it a bragging right? Yes.
I said don't do water because the first one is difficult and since he posted
I was able to figure out that this was his first build.
Second was the fact that he mention cost was an issue. Cost is an issue to all of us, but cost might be higher on his 'importance list' than mine. I agree that water is a superior system, but if you don't OC then it's overkill and risky.
Water leaks, tubing decays, water scales, pumps fail, so do fans, but who has one fan to cool everything?
Once again, keep in mind that I might be wrong to assume all of this, but it seems that I had Altrus pegged. How come you weren't so defensive of RAID?
Is this necessary? No. Is it a bragging right? Yes.
Is water cooling necessary? No. is it a bragging right? Yes.
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madmat
Soup Nazi
Is water cooling necessary? In my mind it's absolutely crucial because it's ten times more efficient than air. Is RAID necessary? Not really and unless you go with redundant RAID it's risky as hell. Do I run RAID, yes I have a 1TB RAID -0 stripe but I don't keep anything that I'll miss (terribly) on it so should I break my array it's no harm, no foul but for a casual user, my advice is avoid RAID -0 like the plague. RAID -5 on the other hand offers nearly the same performance and is able to heal itself on the fly while the system is up and running although you have to have at least 3 drives and you lose a third of the actual space of those drives so it's a costly proposition. By the by, the second PC I built for myself was water cooled although I was a hydraulics tech at the time. As to scale and tubing deterioration, the tubing will get discolored and lose some flexibility but it won't deteriorate and scale only forms if you use tap water, anyone who uses tap water is foolish because there's flora and fauna in it that will bloom in time, the chlorine (which is a corrosive agent as well) only keeps it under control for a limited time whereas distilled water has no scale, flora or fauna in it. In fact it won't even conduct electricity since it's pure H2O which are both excellent electrical insulators.
SLI memory isn't the same as regular memory, it has EPP instructions in the SPD that further tweak the ram for better performance over standard non-SLI ram. Standard ram only sets the CAS, RAS to CAS prefetch, RCD and TRCD along with the command latency (1t or 2t) whereas SLI ram has the info for all the obscure settings that no-one understands and setting them beyond "auto" (the default setting in the bios) can make a large difference in overall ram performance.
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Altrus
Coastermaker
Would it be better to get then its none SLI twin? They appear to be almost the exact same thing, model, speeds, everything appears to be the same one has a gold and silver heat spreader and the other has a black sli heat spreader? would the sli ready memory be better?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227199
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227269
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So we agree that water is by far better, but not necessary on every machine. By second build was a Koolance, and I would recommend that particular system for it's ease to novice builders.
"Fools are around to point out the wrong way to do things."
I have run a RAID 0 for the last 5 years and never had a drive fail. Like you said it's foolish not to back up. That being said, it should be on another separate physical drive.
"Fools are around to point out the wrong way to do things."
I have run a RAID 0 for the last 5 years and never had a drive fail. Like you said it's foolish not to back up. That being said, it should be on another separate physical drive.
madmat
Soup Nazi
5 Years ago I had a pair of WD 120gig SATA drives in a -0 stripe and it broke (one of the drives failed) and I lost all my data. Stuff that I didn't have backed up and was impossible to replace so I'm not a huge fan.
If the SLI memory is the same or near the same cost I'd say get it, it will only improve the performance of your PC. I thought I was pretty clear on what it did in my prior post, better performance is good and therefore a compelling reason to purchase one part over another.
Here's where you compare; http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/memory/ocz_ddr2_pc2_6400_sli_ready_edition and http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/memory/ocz_ddr2_pc2_6400_vista_performance_gold_2gb_edition on the page for the SLI ram you'll see that it has EPP settings whereas the gold doesn't offer them. The EPP settings can make your ram perform at it's best. Although if you look a bit you can find ram with EPP settings for considerably less than that OCZ. You won't see much benefit from running 4 gigs of ram versus 2 gigs so you can save considerable coin there. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820146673 which is over half the cost of the OCZ and has better timings (better speeds on the memory) than the OCZ. Mushkin is also a pretty decent brand.
If the SLI memory is the same or near the same cost I'd say get it, it will only improve the performance of your PC. I thought I was pretty clear on what it did in my prior post, better performance is good and therefore a compelling reason to purchase one part over another.
Here's where you compare; http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/memory/ocz_ddr2_pc2_6400_sli_ready_edition and http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/memory/ocz_ddr2_pc2_6400_vista_performance_gold_2gb_edition on the page for the SLI ram you'll see that it has EPP settings whereas the gold doesn't offer them. The EPP settings can make your ram perform at it's best. Although if you look a bit you can find ram with EPP settings for considerably less than that OCZ. You won't see much benefit from running 4 gigs of ram versus 2 gigs so you can save considerable coin there. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820146673 which is over half the cost of the OCZ and has better timings (better speeds on the memory) than the OCZ. Mushkin is also a pretty decent brand.
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madmat
Soup Nazi
Not so much a bad taste as a lesson learned. The integrity of the data on a RAID -0 stripe is only as secure as the drives holding it and unlike a normal situation where you use two drives singly, where you only lose the data on the one drive when it dies, you lose all the data on your stripe when one drive dies. It's an inherently risky setup. Look into it on any storage related site or forum and the consensus is the same, non redundant RAID is risky. Fast but risky.