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Topic: The 'Build Me A PC' Thread (Read 869388 times)
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sinij
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2597
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fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify
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Eternity is a very long time, especially towards the end.
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Azazel
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A friend at work has come to me for advice on what to buy for her new PC. She and her husband want to doa custom build, so I advised her to go to centrecom, which is pretty much the cheapest place to do it, and they have reasonable service. This is what they came to me with before checking the site as a base. We need the computer for work stuff, some gaming (Call of Duty?), and kids' school stuff. Not really video editing or high end gaming. budget up to around $1500 - we already have the keyboard, mouse and monitor.
http://www.centrecom.com.au/catalog/default.phpIntel Core i5 2500, 3.3 GHZ. Hard drive 2TB 7200 rpm 64mb. Memory 2x4 GB DDR3 SDRAM. Motherboard ASUS P8P 67pro version 3. Video card gigabyte GTX560 1GB. optical liteon ihas 524. operating system windows 7 home premium 64 bit. case thermaltake v9 black. power supply cooler master gx650w. cooling coolermaster hyper 212. while keeping in mind their overall wants and such (i5, 8gb, 2tb) I'm wondering what the best overall machine is that can be gotten for their budget. Using the above link. thanks!
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Lantyssa
Terracotta Army
Posts: 20848
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Their build is just peachy. We're putting something very similar together for some work machines. That machine will be able to play pretty much anything for a long time.
For cost/performance ratio, maybe look at the 1.0 and 1.5 TB drives, and a lower tier video card. Cost savings wouldn't be huge, but they have room to downgrade, save a few dollars, and still have a great machine.
Oh yeah. Get a tower cooler.
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Hahahaha! I'm really good at this!
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Lt.Dan
Terracotta Army
Posts: 758
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A friend at work has come to me for advice on what to buy for her new PC. She and her husband want to doa custom build, so I advised her to go to centrecom, which is pretty much the cheapest place to do it, and they have reasonable service. This is what they came to me with before checking the site as a base. We need the computer for work stuff, some gaming (Call of Duty?), and kids' school stuff. Not really video editing or high end gaming. budget up to around $1500 - we already have the keyboard, mouse and monitor.
http://www.centrecom.com.au/catalog/default.phpIntel Core i5 2500, 3.3 GHZ. Hard drive 2TB 7200 rpm 64mb. Memory 2x4 GB DDR3 SDRAM. Motherboard ASUS P8P 67pro version 3. Video card gigabyte GTX560 1GB. optical liteon ihas 524. operating system windows 7 home premium 64 bit. case thermaltake v9 black. power supply cooler master gx650w. cooling coolermaster hyper 212. while keeping in mind their overall wants and such (i5, 8gb, 2tb) I'm wondering what the best overall machine is that can be gotten for their budget. Using the above link. thanks! Try www.pccasegear.com.au I've shifted most of my purchases from Centrecom to PC Case Gear and found that they have more stuff in stock, generally cheaper, and are pretty good about getting other products in if they aren't listed on their site. Instead of separate case and PSU check out the Antec Sonata III and IV cases with PSU included. PSUs are reputable Antec units and the case isn't so ostentatious. I've got the Sonata III and run a GTX 460 and i5 CPU with no problems.
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MisterNoisy
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1892
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A friend at work has come to me for advice on what to buy for her new PC. She and her husband want to doa custom build, so I advised her to go to centrecom, which is pretty much the cheapest place to do it, and they have reasonable service. This is what they came to me with before checking the site as a base. We need the computer for work stuff, some gaming (Call of Duty?), and kids' school stuff. Not really video editing or high end gaming. budget up to around $1500 - we already have the keyboard, mouse and monitor.
http://www.centrecom.com.au/catalog/default.phpIntel Core i5 2500, 3.3 GHZ. Hard drive 2TB 7200 rpm 64mb. Memory 2x4 GB DDR3 SDRAM. Motherboard ASUS P8P 67pro version 3. Video card gigabyte GTX560 1GB. optical liteon ihas 524. operating system windows 7 home premium 64 bit. case thermaltake v9 black. power supply cooler master gx650w. cooling coolermaster hyper 212. while keeping in mind their overall wants and such (i5, 8gb, 2tb) I'm wondering what the best overall machine is that can be gotten for their budget. Using the above link. thanks! That build is great, though if it were me, I'd change the CPU to a 2500K for another $13 - they may not want to overclock now, but it's nice to be able to do it and not need to instead of the other way around. The 2500K is a beast, and will happily run all day long at well over 4 GHz with that motherboard and cooler.
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XBL GT: Mister Noisy PSN: MisterNoisy Steam UID: MisterNoisy
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Lucas
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Posts: 3298
Further proof that Italians have suspect taste in games.
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Just substituted my Nvidia 250GTS with a Geforce GTX 560 (I spent 225 Euros). Also changed the power supply. Now my machine is as follows (I won't get into much detail regarding the various models): Motherboard: Asus P6TD Deluxe Power Supply: Itek ATX 720 mPower Processor: Intel i7 920 2.67GHz (overclocked to 3GHz) RAM: 6GB DDR3 Video Card: Nvidia Geforce 560GTX (EVGA if you want to know the producer) OS: Windows 7 Home Edition 64-bit Cooler Master CM-690 Nice for gaming, I guess
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" He's so impatient, it's like watching a teenager fuck a glorious older woman." - Ironwood on J.J. Abrams
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Lucas
Terracotta Army
Posts: 3298
Further proof that Italians have suspect taste in games.
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yeah, well, looks like I spoke too soon To keep the story short, 2 out of 2 EVGA 560GTX that I ordered turned out with manifacturing faults (first the fan, then the memory slots). Now I'm happily writing from my mother's Toshiba laptop 1ghz 894MB RAM
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" He's so impatient, it's like watching a teenager fuck a glorious older woman." - Ironwood on J.J. Abrams
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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Try to replace through the retailer (hopefully the egg). EVGA kept sending me refurbs and I finally just went back to newegg, explained the situation and was able to cross-ship a new card (and they accepted evga's refurb).
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ffc
Terracotta Army
Posts: 608
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What was the fan issue on the 560? I bought a cheap 6850 and the fan was going crazy until a bios update fixed the issue.
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sinij
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2597
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I hate when manufacturer sends you refurbs, fortunately for me that doesn't happen with high-end cards I tend to use, there are just not many refurbs out there.
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Eternity is a very long time, especially towards the end.
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SnakeCharmer
Terracotta Army
Posts: 3807
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Kinda on the same subject but if anyone is in the market for a really nice monitor and wants to get away from TFT screens, the LG IPS236V is a damn fine monitor for ~220 USD. My wife ganked my Dell IPS 24", which left me with my old Gateway FHD2400 with its insane amounts of backlight bleed and color shift if you moved your head an inch up or down. Been using the LG for a bit of everything and the difference between an IPS (even an LED based one) and a TFT screen is amazing.
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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I hate when manufacturer sends you refurbs, fortunately for me that doesn't happen with high-end cards I tend to use, there are just not many refurbs out there.
Pretty much every card from the first runs of evga's superclocked 8800gtx had bad paste on the memory sinks, and it was the highest end card at the time. I ended up not using that version after a lot of bullshittiness.
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Engels
Terracotta Army
Posts: 9029
inflicts shingles.
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Kinda on the same subject but if anyone is in the market for a really nice monitor and wants to get away from TFT screens, the LG IPS236V is a damn fine monitor for ~220 USD. My wife ganked my Dell IPS 24", which left me with my old Gateway FHD2400 with its insane amounts of backlight bleed and color shift if you moved your head an inch up or down. Been using the LG for a bit of everything and the difference between an IPS (even an LED based one) and a TFT screen is amazing.
QFT. I still have to wonder how they got the cost of the LG IPS down to $220.
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I should get back to nature, too. You know, like going to a shop for groceries instead of the computer. Maybe a condo in the woods that doesn't even have a health club or restaurant attached. Buy a car with only two cup holders or something. -Signe
I LIKE being bounced around by Tonkors. - Lantyssa
Babies shooting themselves in the head is the state bird of West Virginia. - schild
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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So I've been having this odd issue with Rift that's making me wonder if it's time to start saving my pennies for an upgrade (can't afford a new pc). The old girl is now 4-1/2 yrs old. For some reason Rift is pounding the shit out of the gpu...but only the heat. It's pretty much cpu-bound (C2D e6600/4GB/GTX460) but the gpu is almost perfect for Rift (scales up to about 80-90% utilization @ Ultra settings, about 400-600MB vram). Except at Ultra settings it's pegging out my evga monitor at 99C (the max it graphs!). Right now I'm running it at Medium settings with the gpu fan manually set at 100% (which will kill the bearings), the side off the case with a room fan blasting it at full speed...and that's keeping me around 80C Which can get up to 90C with full-screen shaders, but that's ok temps wise. It's what I have to do to keep those temps, especially when it's not stressing the gpu performance-wise at all. I'm torn. At the least it's reminding me I need to start saving, this computer won't game forever. On the other hand, it's just Rift and Rift isn't a game I'm willing to build a new pc for. Right now I'm eyeing: i5 2500k ASUS P8P67 Pro Corsair 8GB DDR3 1600 CM Hyper 212 Optionals depending on how my savings goes would be aftermarket cooling for my gtx460; or a second gtx460; or both a second gpu and aftermarket coolers for both. The base upgrade would run about $554. Adding the second gpu and cooling would push that to $874. I'm mostly thinking about setting myself up for another couple years gaming with this pc.
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Engels
Terracotta Army
Posts: 9029
inflicts shingles.
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Aftermarket cooling kit for your GPU. I'm serious. I had a 8800GT that ran very hot till I got a Zalman kit. Made my video card essentially overheat proof. Honestly, I think some Nvidia manufacturers really skimp on either the thermal paste or the materials or something. I've NEVER had an Nvidia card that didn't improve massively from an aftermarket cooler. Now, my ATI 5870 never breaches 80 C. I managed to get it that high by running dual monitors with Eve on one screen and World of Tanks in the other. Still ran fine, with ~25 FPS in WoT, but the GPU was a bit toasty. Still safe, but toasty. And this is with a similar rig to yours, Sky. A 6750 Core2Duo. So, save yourself some money and get yourself one of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835426026http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186046
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I should get back to nature, too. You know, like going to a shop for groceries instead of the computer. Maybe a condo in the woods that doesn't even have a health club or restaurant attached. Buy a car with only two cup holders or something. -Signe
I LIKE being bounced around by Tonkors. - Lantyssa
Babies shooting themselves in the head is the state bird of West Virginia. - schild
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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Actually I could grab one of those right now with some bottle returns, I bet. I was looking at those over the weekend (note my link to the gelid), I like the look of the zalman but apparently they don't rikey the 460. At worst I still start saving pennies for whatever is the sweet spot when I have enough pennies.
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MisterNoisy
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1892
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I like the aftermarket cooler suggestion, since the reference blower-box type cooler isn't doing the job and you seem happy with the performance of the 460 (aside from the heat). As Engels alludes to, you may want to try just removing the stock cooler, cleaning and reapplying new thermal paste and reinstalling it to see if that fixes the issue before you drop $55 on the Accelero, since you'll only be out a few bucks (assuming you don't already have a tube of thermal compound laying around) and 30 minutes that way.
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« Last Edit: June 27, 2011, 02:41:39 PM by MisterNoisy »
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XBL GT: Mister Noisy PSN: MisterNoisy Steam UID: MisterNoisy
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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Ordered the Accelero. I figure it'll carry over to the new pc with the gpu, and I'm not happy with the noise of the EE edition 460 anyway. I bought the 3-fan version, we'll see if it fits in the case I figure if the 8800GTX fit, anything will (the cooler is about 3/4" longer) Also thinking about avoiding evga in the future. Shitty thermal paste/poor adhesion on the vrm sinks was the problem with the 8800s and it took me several tries to get a decent one. Great once I got it, but if the 460s are the same (if not as severe), it's a manufacturing problem. Either that or I'll just put on an aftermarket cooler as part of the cost of doing business.
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« Last Edit: June 28, 2011, 01:17:39 PM by Sky »
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sinij
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2597
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Make sure you run your card "stock" for a while to make sure its not defective, replacing cooler is all but guaranteed to void the warranty.
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Eternity is a very long time, especially towards the end.
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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I've had the 460 since October. One of evga's strengths is their warranty program (and step up). As long as you can put it back to stock, it doesn't void the warranty. Did I mention Rift toasted my 8800GTX?
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SnakeCharmer
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Posts: 3807
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Ordered the Accelero.
When you install this, would you measure the width of the card please?
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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You mean the width of the cooler or the card or both mated together?
If I remember, I want to snap some pics while I'm doing it.
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SnakeCharmer
Terracotta Army
Posts: 3807
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Cooler and the card together.
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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Ok, I'm now a fan (har) of aftermarket cooling.
Rift, medium settings; stock cooling, fan manually set to 100% (hair dryer) and case open with floor fan blowing on full over the innards: 80C
Rift, max settings (all sliders pegged right); accelero set to auto (got to around 50%, silent): 70C
So I net 10C cooling, the pc becomes silent and I go from mediocre visuals to all the game has to offer. That's pretty awesome.
SC, width of the setup is 2-1/2". Length took some doing. Forgot when I put in the shorter 460 I put in a HD cage. I have the antec P180 with removable cages. To accommodate the length of the accelero I had to remove the cage and squeeze the drive in the lower section, which is tight up against a fan because my PSU is also long, heh. But after some wrangling, everything fits nice and it's running great.
On the stock evga cooling setup: they had absolutely gobbed the thermal goop on. And the RAM was only being served by some sort of strip of a vinyl-like material; even that was not making proper contact in some areas. No cooling on the voltage regulators at all.
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Engels
Terracotta Army
Posts: 9029
inflicts shingles.
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Great results! Glad it worked out. Still want a pic.
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I should get back to nature, too. You know, like going to a shop for groceries instead of the computer. Maybe a condo in the woods that doesn't even have a health club or restaurant attached. Buy a car with only two cup holders or something. -Signe
I LIKE being bounced around by Tonkors. - Lantyssa
Babies shooting themselves in the head is the state bird of West Virginia. - schild
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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Yeah, long weekend and I'm lazy. I'll bring the camera into work and upload while I'm disk imaging. Forgot to snap a pic of the final product because the last bit of install was fiddly.
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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Pics as promised. As I said, forgot to get the final install because zomg can't stop gaming. When I was telling my fiancee about it, I realized it's really the best the computer's been running, since I've always run stock heatsinks and heat has always been an issue. The gtx460 is really a hell of a card for $200....if it's cooled properly. Was this overkill? Maybe. She's just happy it's quiet. Really quiet.
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Hoax
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Posts: 8110
l33t kiddie
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Do you imagine you'll be able to transfer the cooler to your next card? Did you compare the Accelero to any of the Zalman aftermarket options?
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A nation consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual's morals are situational, then that individual is without morals. If a nation's laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn't a nation. -William Gibson
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SnakeCharmer
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Posts: 3807
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Holy crap that thing is huge . (that's what she said) Too big to do an SLI set up in my case due to the proximity of the two cards. From the looks of it, it just blows the hot air around in your case? Depending on your case, it may be worth it to swap the front fans around to exhaust rather than intake?
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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I've got a 12cm intake fan and a 12cm outflow fan, front to back. (also a 12cm fan on the Scythe HS for the cpu that blows to the outflow). Optimally, the intake could be a couple inches higher to make a direct front-to-back path. Haven't measured the cpu temps yet. One of the things I'm going to do as part of the wrap-up.
Hoax, the equivalent Zalman didn't appear to be compatible with the gtx460. It would be nice to take to the next card, even if I have to mod it some (since the next card will probably be years from now and new architecture). When I do upgrade my pc at some point, I'm hoping to get a board that can accomodate two 460s with these on them in SLI. Hey, I can dream.
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« Last Edit: July 05, 2011, 08:54:18 AM by Sky »
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Hoax
Terracotta Army
Posts: 8110
l33t kiddie
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Thanks Sky,
My problem is that I have an old GTX260 that can still run pretty much everything I want but its starting to have stock cooler issues but it seems stupid to spend money on aftermarket cooling instead of a new card. I may do it anyways as if I can extend the life of this card out it can be passed down where if I don't its going to fuck up and may take some of the machine with it when it does.
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A nation consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual's morals are situational, then that individual is without morals. If a nation's laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn't a nation. -William Gibson
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Sky
Terracotta Army
Posts: 32117
I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.
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MisterNoisy
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1892
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I've got a 12cm intake fan and a 12cm outflow fan, front to back. (also a 12cm fan on the Scythe HS for the cpu that blows to the outflow). Optimally, the intake could be a couple inches higher to make a direct front-to-back path. Haven't measured the cpu temps yet. One of the things I'm going to do as part of the wrap-up.
Something like this or this would be an easy way to add additional intake airflow in line with the CPU cooler, since you have 3 unused 5.25" bays under your optical drive. You could also fabricate a bracket from sheetmetal pretty easily to do the same thing.
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XBL GT: Mister Noisy PSN: MisterNoisy Steam UID: MisterNoisy
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