Show us your PC Setup - Bonus points for RGB

[Andrew]

Welcome to the Battlestations 2018 thread!
 
If you want to show your fellow Neowinians what your workstation/battlestation looks like, this is the place to do it.
 
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Last year's Battlestations thread is here.

[Dysphoria]

I though I share my new build, which I just completed: Fractal Design Node 202 (i7 8700k, 32GB DDR4 3200, Zotac GTX 1070, 960 EVO nvme M.2)

 

Decided to retire my LianLi aluminum mini tower i7 3770k and go small and powerful. (let me know if someone is interested in purchasing this, will give a good deal: 16GB DDR3 2400, GTX 570, 600GB Raid 0 7200rpm + 2TB 7200RPM storage)

 

At first I was thinking of just purchasing a small build due to high cost of GPUs but at then end decided to hand pick my components and use my existing GTX 1070 and wait it our for the next gen of GPUs.

 

As stated in the link I decided to go for the compact Fractal Design Node 202 case. It's only slightly bigger than my PS4 and definitely more quiet.

When picking components for the build I had to keep in mind the small space I will have available to work with within the case.

 

CPU/Heat-sink Cooler: went with the i7 8700k and to keep it cool in such a limited space used Scythe's BIG Shuriken 2 Rev. B 45.5 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler.

 

Thermal Compound: I used Gelid Solution GC-Extreme 3.5g thermal paste between the CPU and the heat sink. Rated as best performing thermal paste but I do recommend warming it up before aplication by placing the syringe in a zip-lock bag and placing it under hot water.

 

RAM: Low profile Corsair - Vengeance LPX 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200

 

Motherboard: Gigabyte's Z370N. Mini ITX with 2 nvme m.2 slots so I can run my Samsung 960 EVO 500GB in Raid 0

 

Storage: My OS and some games are installed on the Raid 0 2x Samsung 960 EVO 500GB, and my other files are located on a Crucial 1TB MX300 SSD (Small, fast, and now spinning drives)

 

GPU: I used the Zotac GTX 1070 AMP! edition as I already had it and did not feel like spending $1000+ to get a 1080ti. Runs everything at 1440p so its good enough. UPDATED TEMPS: Idle @29C & Max Load @75C (Had to play here with the case fans and create custom temp grid profiles for each in order to optimize directional airflow)

 

Power supply: Corsair SF 600. Small, powerful, fully modular.

 

Case Fans: I used Noctua's slim 120mmx15mm fans so there is more space between the GPU and the fans. In some other build people used 120mmx25mm fans.

 

Overall experience: fun to build and really happy with final product. Case makes no noise when I do regular MS Office work, web surfing, movie watching and email checking. CPU fa is the only think spinning but is doing it at 950RPMs and 10-12dbs. GPU fans are off when temp of gpu is below 40C.

Fans kick-in in higher RPMs when playing games like Battlefront II, GTA V, Witcher 3, Destiny 2 but the highest noise the Noctua fans make are 24db, and CPU fan is slightly audible, but not very notifiable when gaming and fraging other people

 

[Mindovermaster]

I love that case, Euphoria.

[Dysphoria]

1 hour ago, Mindovermaster said:

I love that case, Euphoria.

Yeah, thanks! As you can see it's sitting on the top of my mini tower and is about a third of its size.

It can also be placed horizontally like a game console. BTW those are magnetic filters that originally should be placed inside the case but for convenience and accessibility for cleaning I placed them outside the case.

 

[Mindovermaster]

Just now, Euphoria said:

Yeah, thanks! As you can see it's sitting on the top of my mini tower and is about a third of its size.

It can also be placed horizontally like a game console. BTW those are magnetic filters that originally should be placed inside the case but for convenience and accessibility for cleaning I placed them outside the case.

 

I saw another case similiar to that that had the PCI-e extender to route to the back.

[Dysphoria]

1 minute ago, Mindovermaster said:

I saw another case similiar to that that had the PCI-e extender to route to the back.

Yep, love the way they've done this. The GPU is sitting in a separate compartment with the help of the PCI-e extender so its heat does not affect the temperature of the CPU.

[Emn1ty]

That case will likely be my next purchase. I've been meaning to get away from mid/full towers.

[Dysphoria]

So I added a small little mod to the build... The WiFi antenna that comes with the Z370N Gigabyte motherboard has cables that end into a plastic stand with a magnetic footing... This looks ugly and also adds to the size and complexity of an already small case. So I thought of finding an alternative.

I used a pair of SMA female to RP-SMA male adapters and a Makerfire 2pcs 2.4G 5.8G FPV TX Antenna SMA Male Dipole Whip FPV Antenna.

They end up working perfectly fine with no degradation in signal and download and upload bandwidth. No more tangling antenna cables from the back of the case.

I tried using a regular antennas like the HUACAM HCM82 2x 8dBi 2.4GHz 5GHz 5.8GHz Dual Band Wireless Network WiFi RP SMA but the antenna ports on the motherboard are so close together that HUACAM antennas could not fit next to each-other due to the large diameter of the RP-SMA screw-in port. Since I had to do some research and some trial and error, I thought I share it here in case someone else is wondering and looking for an antenna alternative.

[Mando]

Ive rejigged some items so time to post for 2018

 

Sig Rig

• Asus Strix H S270
• i7 7700k @ 4.8ghz per core.
• Corsair AIO cooler 115i
• 3x140mm Corsair static low noise fans (2 on rad, 3rd top exhaust)
• 120mm Statitc low noise fan (rear exhaust)
• EVGA 1080ti Founders Ed
• EVGA Powerlink
• EVGA 650W GS modular supply
• 2x 123gb Samsung Evo 840 (RAID0 Striped) 256Gb Vol (1Gb/sec R/W) (behind mobo tray)
• 4x 256Gb Samsung 850 Evo (RAID0 Striped) 1Tb Vol (2Gb/sec R/W) (inside 3.5" hdd bays under bottom shroud)
• 2x8 Gb Corsair DDR4 3200Mhz LED Ram
• Razer Chroma v2 Mech
• Razer Deathadder LH Mouse
• Samsung S27D590C Curved 1080p
• Technics mini-seperates optical input.
• W10 pro
   

 

 

 

 

Tbh the airflow is surplus with the 115i and the tis founders cooler, rarely is the air warm from the exhuast fans, they dont kick in until the CPU hits 50C these days, easier on the ears. cpu idle temps hover around 28C fully OC boost mode cpu never gets past 50C the 115i is a beast of a radiator.

 

4K monitor is last piece.

[Dysphoria]

4 hours ago, Mando said:

Ive rejigged some items so time to post for 2018

 

Sig Rig

• Asus Strix H S270
• i7 7700k @ 4.8ghz per core.
• Corsair AIO cooler 115i
• 3x140mm Corsair static low noise fans (2 on rad, 3rd top exhaust)
• 120mm Statitc low noise fan (rear exhaust)
• EVGA 1080ti Founders Ed
• EVGA Powerlink
• EVGA 650W GS modular supply
• 2x 123gb Samsung Evo 840 (RAID0 Striped) 256Gb Vol (1Gb/sec R/W) (behind mobo tray)
• 4x 256Gb Samsung 850 Evo (RAID0 Striped) 1Tb Vol (2Gb/sec R/W) (inside 3.5" hdd bays under bottom shroud)
• 2x8 Gb Corsair DDR4 3200Mhz LED Ram
• Razer Chroma v2 Mech
• Razer Deathadder LH Mouse
• Samsung S27D590C Curved 1080p
• Technics mini-seperates optical input.
• W10 pro
   

 

 

 

 

 

Tbh the airflow is surplus with the 115i and the tis founders cooler, rarely is the air warm from the exhuast fans, they dont kick in until the CPU hits 50C these days, easier on the ears. cpu idle temps hover around 28C fully OC boost mode cpu never gets past 50C the 115i is a beast of a radiator.

 

4K monitor is last piece.

Clean setup and great job on wiring the cables!

Yeah have a 1440p screen... was thinking of jumping to 4k but it's still too expensive for what I want.

Acer just came up with a 4k 144MHz gsync screen but with price at $2k I think I'll wait a bit so that competition drives cost down.

[Broughton]

This thread is pretty quiet this year. Not an awful lot has changed since last year but here she is, built in 2014 and still going strong.

 

 

Edited June 19, 2018 by Broughton

[+jamesyfx]

Hey guys,

 

I spent a lot of time away from PC building and stuck to Macs and Laptops for years. Last year I decided to build a gaming PC. My plan was to spend as little as possible on quality components and get the best bang for my buck. I wanted something fairly compact, tidy and... plain. I chose components that were sorta greys originally. And later when I added LED lighting I thought I'd throw in a bit of orange.. But I can make it any colour I like.. using a dodgy method. ?

 

I had to really squeeze in the CPU cooler. Literally scraping metal to metal getting it in place!

 

Anyway here goes. Apologies for the photo quality. I don't really put the system in a well lit place... I've just attached them to the post, but sure how they'll display but hey.

 

So the desk is basically an Ikea one I took from my old house which used to be decorated in red. I'll probably change it eventually to something a bit wider and neutral in colour. And some of the bits I got from my old job which went through liquidation and I was able to get the Benq monitor (which is why they don't match.., hey, it's free. Might as well use it!) and the G502 Mouse for free.

 

 

The last photo is where the little controller is for the LED colour. It's basically sposed to be a front panel controller but I tore it down to bits and just hid it in a space behind the rear panel..

 

Anyway, Spec:

 

Case: NZXT S340

CPU: i7 7700K, Overclocked to 4.9GHz

Cooler: Corsair H180i V2

PSU: Corsair CX650M

RAM: 16GB Team Group DDR4 1066MHz (2x 8GB)

Motherboard: ASUS Prime Z270-P

Graphics: EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 8GB

Storage: 1x SanDisk Ultra II 960GB SSD, 1x 240GB WD Black M.2 NVMe (Boot)

Network: Some TP-Link 802.11ac WiFi adapter, but I use a Netgear Orbi RBK50 with LAN Cable usually

Monitor: 1x Acer RT240Y 1080p, 1x BenQ GL2250H 1080p

Speakers: Logitech Z130

Headphone: Pioneer HDJ-1500

Mic: Blue Snowball Aluminium

KB/Mouse: Corsair K55 RGB Keyboard, Logitech G502 RGB Mouse, some Corsair Mouepad

[Mindovermaster]

Looks sweet! Did a good job being off desktops for awhile.

 

Edit: Good wire management, too.

[norseman]

 

 

 

This is my first build in a couple of years.

I was looking for something which would be fun to setup, stand up to a 2 year old should they decide to mess with it, be able to act as a file-server, gaming rig, hypervisor, et. all.

Probably going to upgrade the CPU next year when the prices for the second generation TR drop in price. (2950X)

I still have to link the HUE lights in the room to the case fans / Razer peripherals and then it is going to be quite the show.

 

Specs:

 

Case: Thermal Take View GT 20

PSU: Seasonic 850W Gold X-Series

CPU: AMD Threadripper 1900X

MOBO: Gigabyte x399 Designare EX

COOLER: NZXT x72 mounted at the top of case

VGA: EVGA Nvidia 1060 GTX AC 6GB

RAM: CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 32GB (4 x 8GB) 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM

SSD: WD Black PCIe Gen3 x4 NVMe M.2 2280 500GB Read:3400 Mb/s,Write: 2500MB/s SSD (WDS500G2X0C) x2 (Raid1)

HDD: Seagate 8TB IronWolf NAS SATA 6Gb/s NCQ 256MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Hard Drive (ST8000VN0022) x4 in (Raid 10)

OS: WIndows 10 Pro | CentOS 7.5 x64

[Mindovermaster]

We don't use the term "VGA" anymore, but nice system

[Daniel F.]

Corsair 280 Crystal matx case

Corsair cx 500w PSU

Corsair lighting Pro controller 

4x corsair a-rgb 120 LL fans

4 x corsair a-rgb light strips 

AMD Ryzen 2600 @ 4.05Ghz

Empire Gaming 240 AIO 

ASUS B450M-A motherboard

16GB Hyper X predator a-rgb Ram (2933mhz CL15) @ 3200mhz

M.2 Samsung 970 EVO (250Gb)

2TB WD HDD

Gigabyte 1060 WINDFORCE oc 6gb 

Windows 10 Pro

 

(I've turned on all the RGB in the pic its not normally that in your face lol) 

 

[+jnelsoninjax]

AMD Ryzen 7 2700X OC'd at 4.2 GHZ

Cooler Master MasterCase H500 ATX Mid-Tower

Asus ROG Crosshair VII Hero (WI-FI)

32 GB G-Skill RAM

Nvidia Geforce RTX 2080

Primary display: Yamakasi 4K

Secondary display: LG Ultrawide (HDMI) 2K

Logitech G910 keyboard

Cellphone is Poptel P9000 Max

 

[+warwagon]

I guess gamers really do like RGB.

[+trag3dy]

Just now, warwagon said:

I guess gamers really do like RGB.

It's hard not to buy new pc parts without rgb now. You would actually have to be extremely selective with your parts and probably even have to choose inferior ones just to avoid it.

[+warwagon]

4 minutes ago, trag3dy said:

It's hard not to buy new pc parts without rgb now. You would actually have to be extremely selective with your parts and probably even have to choose inferior ones just to avoid it.

I have a hard time believing that. Shouldn't be hard to find a GPU, CPU cooler, Ram and a case that doesn't have RGB. 

[+jnelsoninjax]

2 hours ago, warwagon said:

I guess gamers really do like RGB.

I am indifferent about RGB, I like it, but it is not a have to have item, it just so happened that the case I wanted had the RGB in it already so I build around it.

[Daniel F.]

13 hours ago, warwagon said:

I guess gamers really do like RGB.

 

 

when the case and mobo and ran and fans support the same implimentation...also its sat in the livingroom so i went down the show case route as its a conversation piece - tho alot of people think its some sort of speaker?

[HonkyTonk7]

I am not a fan of fancy/flashing RGB but found a good compromise me thinks

[Daniel F.]

the blue looks nice 

[Mindovermaster]

Well, you'd only get RGB with TT... 😛 

 

(as in TT does nothing but RGB)