Legit Reviews

I appologize for not posting in a while, school has kept me really busy. Now that it's last semester and I already got a job lined up, I can finally relax (but only a little, since I still need to graduate ). Don't know how many of you remember my old (now 6-year old) pile of junk I call PC that makes almost as much noise as a vacuum cleaner when I turn it on, that miraculously still runs many of the latest games (although with lowest graphics settings and at abou 20 fps, so "runs" is a relative term ).

Anyway I decided to finally start planning/building my next monster rig. So I would like your suggestions/feedback as I'm thinking of even building the case myself (this is my last semester at a university, might as well make full use of their physics lab that I found out about a month ago while working on my Senior Design project).

For the CPU I'm thinking of using a Core Duo (I haven't been keeping up with the news so I don't know if Athlons are on par or still lagging behind now), and for the graphics I have yet to decide whether to go with NVIDIA or ATI, however since DirectX 10 API was built jointly by Microsoft and NVIDIA, I'm guessing that NVIDIA probably makes better use of DirectX 10 than ATI at the moment (however, feel free to tell me otherwise as I have no evidence to back up my speculation). And as far as I know, 8800 is the only graphics card that currently supports DirectX 10, although that is likely to change by May (which is when I actually plan to buy the parts).

I'm also planning to use water-cooling (although I haven't decided yet whether to use the Nautilus that Apoptosis is using or build my own from parts (I haven't done water-cooling before but I'm up to the challenge and I have read enough about it). As for the power-supply I'm still trying to decide what to use, or even what power. Another thing is the motherboard, there are just so many of them, it's hard to decide (I plan on overclocking, so it needs to suport that).

And finally, for the case, I want to do something original, yet elegant-looking. Since I still don't have the sign-up bonus, I think I will concentrate on the case for now. I want a unique design, and a case that is out of the ordinary (as opposed to just cutting out a window on the side and putting a plexiglass there after throwing in a few LEDs). Here are the two that really impressed me so far:

Image: http://images.people.overclockers.ru/101844.jpg
http://forum.modding.ru/viewtopic.php?t ... 7c3c63ca95 (xooler is the builder of the case, and it was created for SLI-Machine contest sponsored by NVIDIA for Russian gamers)

Image: http://www.g69t.it/public/Scimitar/G69T_DBNP566_L.jpg
http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.p ... ge=1&pp=20 (this is the guy's entire 80+ page worklog of a project that took over 2 years, it's very impressive although I don't really have access to that kind of machinery )

Whatever you build do it of something that you love, props for choosing such adventourus inspirational cases, but seen as though its your first time, keep it simple(ish) as you will learn through your 'mistakes' on this one and will be able to do a much better one next time round (yeah, when you get the bug there will be a next time!)

That SLi PC is just a freaking big PCIe card!

Dan

water cooling... wish i had the nerve to do that ( and money =P)

Good luck with your new computer =)

I personally like my Athlon X2, but Core 2 Duo wasn't out when I got it. Also, Nvidia is the way to go for video cards.

I would try to hold off putting a lot of money into a new video card until the R600 comes out, or at least engineering samples start to hit the review sites

Yes, currently I'm not buying the parts yet. Sorry for not making it clear, but I'm just planning which parts to get. I will probably start buying in March or April. Right now I'm just trying to come up with an original idea for the case. I'm trying to come up with some ideas, so if you have any case proposals, feel free to throw them my way.

One thing I was thinking of is making Armored Core mecha-like case but that might get too complicated, especially trying to hide the motherboard with video card and CPU attached to it inside. One idea I had was using the mecha rocket-packs to conseal the CPU/graphics card as shown below (red = motherboard, green = graphics card, blue = CPU with heatsink). The problem is, if I ever decided to use more cards in my motherboard with this design, whether it's a 2nd graphics card or anything else, I would be screwed.

I would appreciate any other ideas for the case, I just want something unique, preferably futuristic-looking.

are u gona mod a premade case or build your own? personally, i like the slick look of the antec p series case and any lian li would do.