Pls critique my new build thread ?1163250

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

I've used several Asus boards over the years, and i've never had a problem w/ any of them. Theyve all been rock solid.

 

I too am looking to buy the deluxe dual.

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

I've used several Asus boards over the years, and i've never had a problem w/ any of them. Theyve all been rock solid.

 

I too am looking to buy the deluxe dual.

 

Yes, I've also used several WS/PRO/Deluxe/Premium models before and they've all been compromise-free and relatively future-proof boards.

 

 

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Question: I have an old 128Gb Vertex 2 MAX IOPS drive and I want to use it as a cache drive, maybe. Is manually setting up windows' page file to that drive the only option or are there now some BIOS-level cache-drive options? Or is it a stupid idea?

[Andre S. Veteran]

Right, but then it lacks a thunderbolt port :/

All right, you win then. It would have saved me some time if you would have stated everything you were looking for in that motherboard right off the bat instead of one feature at a time. :P

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

All right, you win then. It would have saved me some time if you would have stated everything you were looking for in that motherboard right off the bat instead of one feature at a time. :p

 

It's not about winning and I appreciate your participation in this discussion. However, I did use the words "want" and "the most feature-rich" in the same sentence the first time you asked me about the motherboard :P

[Andre S. Veteran]

It's not about winning and I appreciate your participation in this discussion. However, I did use the words "want" and "the most feature-rich" in the same sentence the first time you asked me about the motherboard :p

Yeah, well people say that and then they don't actually use half of the stuff they paid for, so I was just making sure you knew what you were getting and why. Enjoy your motherboard :)

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

Yeah, well people say that and then they don't actually use half of the stuff they paid for, so I was just making sure you knew what you were getting and why. Enjoy your motherboard :)

 

Thank you! This debate has actually helped fortify my decision.

 

And what you are saying is very true. It's just that plus or minus $40 makes only about 1-1.5% difference in my budget for this build. 

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

I've used several Asus boards over the years, and i've never had a problem w/ any of them. Theyve all been rock solid.

 

I too am looking to buy the deluxe dual.

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

I'd like to thank everyone who's found time to post a comment here.

 

Thank you, guys!

 

I've made some changes to the configuration (underlined). Hopefully, these change will result in added value and reduced noise.

 

So, here's my final build order: 

 

• Case: Corsair Obsidian 800D;
• PSU: Corsair AX860;
• Mobo: ASUS Z87 DELUXE/DUAL;
• CPU: 4770K;
• GPU: GeForce GTX770 Palit JetStream 4096MB;
• RAM: 16GB Corsair Vengeance 2400Mhz (2x8);
• SSD caching (Intel SRT): OCZ Vertex 3 MAX IOPS 128GB (a former OS drive from the old system); 
• HDD0 (OS): PCIe-SSD OCZ RevoDrive 3 X2 240GB;
• HDD1 (work): 2xOCZ Vertex 4 128GB in (RAID 1); 
• HDD2 (archive): 2xWestern Digital Red 3TB (RAID 1);
• CPU cooling: Noctua NH-D14;
• GPU cooling: Arctic Cooling Accelero Xtreme III; 
• Monitor: 27" Dell U2713H (already have);
• Keyboard + Mouse: Corsair Vengeance K95 + M95.

 

Cheers!

 

 

 

 

 

[Andre S. Veteran]

I'd suggest dropping the gimmicky 4GB GTX 770 and expensive aftermarket GPU cooler and putting the money on a way faster card instead like the GTX 780. Less hassle to install, less chance of breaking something, more frames per second, same amount of money. Some versions of the card come with really good custom coolers, largely negating the need for an aftermarket solution; I suggest the MSI Gaming with its Twin Frozr IV cooler. There's also a bunch of new highly overclocked GTX 780s rolling out from different vendors that allegedly outperform GTX Titans.

 

I'm not a fan of the NH-D14 (no pun intended) which being a monstrous dual-tower, dual-fan design, seems to do just on par with the single-tower, single-fan NH-U14S. Some reviews shows it doing slighly better and some show it do it slightly worse, so it's probably a wash. Keep in mind such a massive cooler can overhang RAM slots and cause strain to the motherboard; this why some ASUS motherboards now come with full-size backplates (i.e. TUF series, Maximus VI Formula).

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

Ok, since the first batch of ASUS Z87 DELUXE/DUAL motherboard appears to be sold out and because I've become excited about MSI after checking it out, I think, I'll give it a try :)

 

 

 

 

 

I believe my first 286 had a MicroStar Inc. motherboard.

[Farchord]

Ok, since the first batch of ASUS Z87 DELUXE/DUAL motherboard appears to be sold out and because I've become excited about MSI after checking it out, I think, I'll give it a try :)

 

 

 

 

 

I believe my first 286 had a MicroStar Inc. motherboard.

 

Which board exactly?

[+shift. MVC]

Noctua NH-D14 is definitely a good choice. Not sure I agree with Palit as the manufacturer of choice for your GPU -- for NVIDIA I would have personally gone with EVGA but things may have changed in the GPU scene since I bought my GTX 570. 

[Farchord]

Brand-wise, for video cards and motherboards, I stick to 3 brands: Asus, MSI and Gigabyte.

[Andre S. Veteran]

In case you were still on the fence for the CPU heatsink: Tom's Hardware just tested nine large coolers for Haswell and found the Noctua NH-U14S to "make the best out of a difficult situation" (the situation being Haswell - they don't like it). :)