- last edited on by
ROGBot
Hello everyone,
For the last few of weeks I have been gathering parts in order to build my new system, and finally today the last missing parts arrived 😄
I have spend a few hours already installing the board, the case fans, cpu, cpu cooler and the ram and also spent much time reading about other similar builds, taking ideas etc
I'll be updating this thread as soon as I have some progress to show, but for now just a couple to see how things shaping up.
So here's what it looked like a few hours ago:
Had to remove the upper part of the G.Skill's heatsink in order to clear/make room for the Noctua Nh-D14.
At first I was going to install the cooler with it's stock fans, but then I decided that I could try and (maybe) just get an extra few degrees of cooling out of it by upgrading the fans (which are already awesome) with a couple that give more airflow and higher static pressure without adding nothing to the noise; so i got myself another NF-F12PWM (replaced the front NF-P12) and an NF-A15PWM (replaced the very good already NF-P14, but the new A series A15 fan is even better). Ofcourse this gave me a bit of a headache since the fan clips weren't designed to hold a 150mm fan buut a 140mm one, so it took quite some trials and errrors before finalizing the mounting (used the stock fan clips but had to replace the 2 little plastick anchors with tie-ups)
Next I replaced all the stock fans from the case and yet again used Noctua's NF-F12's for the top (for the time being I placed them as intakes, will have to see how it goes temp wise and maybe I'll try them as exhausts too and see what works better), the NF-P14 from the cooler went at the back as exhaust and 2 x NF-A14's (one blowing the hot swap bay and the other as intake from the bottom compartment towards the motherboard compartment). Regarding cooling I only miss one more NF-F12 that will be blowing the bottom HDD cage from the side (most probably will be here tomorrow).
It took me quite some time to get things straight and get the combo card to install safely and correctly up there on the top corner, see the clearances are (very) tight and I'm glad I had read a few suggestions around the forum about it and that it's better to install the little antenna wires before installing the card.
I also read about all the people having problems with the card and from what I understand the culprit is most probably the bottom fastening screw; many have reported that taking it off does indeed solve the issues they had and also didn't hamper the installation at all (it's pretty snug anyway and there's no weight on the tiny card to fear coming loose). And so opted to remove that screw myself too, otherwise it would be almost impossible to remove it afterwards without having to take the whole board out if I happen to face those dreaded problems too.
Now next up is to put in the PSU, the VGA and it's cooler and ofcourse a complete fresh install of windows etc. To get an idea, this is the cooler that will be taking care of my 6970 and that extra bracket with the fans will be going on top (to be honest the stock cooler of the card was quite good and temps were at bay even at full load, but the tiny 80mm fans were unbearable above 75% rpm, so the decision to go for an aftermarket cooler was the logical choice.
vga fan bracket and heatsink vs the stock card cooler setup
That's all for now, hope you enjoyed it and will be updating as soon as I'm done
Cheers,
Nikos
P.S: anybody can shed some light on this ? check the attached photo, there's a 9 pin header down there at the (almost) bottom right corner of the board but I couldn't find any documentation about it, neither in the forums nor in the manual. Anyone knows what it is for ? :confused:
For the last few of weeks I have been gathering parts in order to build my new system, and finally today the last missing parts arrived 😄
I have spend a few hours already installing the board, the case fans, cpu, cpu cooler and the ram and also spent much time reading about other similar builds, taking ideas etc
I'll be updating this thread as soon as I have some progress to show, but for now just a couple to see how things shaping up.
So here's what it looked like a few hours ago:
Had to remove the upper part of the G.Skill's heatsink in order to clear/make room for the Noctua Nh-D14.
At first I was going to install the cooler with it's stock fans, but then I decided that I could try and (maybe) just get an extra few degrees of cooling out of it by upgrading the fans (which are already awesome) with a couple that give more airflow and higher static pressure without adding nothing to the noise; so i got myself another NF-F12PWM (replaced the front NF-P12) and an NF-A15PWM (replaced the very good already NF-P14, but the new A series A15 fan is even better). Ofcourse this gave me a bit of a headache since the fan clips weren't designed to hold a 150mm fan buut a 140mm one, so it took quite some trials and errrors before finalizing the mounting (used the stock fan clips but had to replace the 2 little plastick anchors with tie-ups)
Next I replaced all the stock fans from the case and yet again used Noctua's NF-F12's for the top (for the time being I placed them as intakes, will have to see how it goes temp wise and maybe I'll try them as exhausts too and see what works better), the NF-P14 from the cooler went at the back as exhaust and 2 x NF-A14's (one blowing the hot swap bay and the other as intake from the bottom compartment towards the motherboard compartment). Regarding cooling I only miss one more NF-F12 that will be blowing the bottom HDD cage from the side (most probably will be here tomorrow).
It took me quite some time to get things straight and get the combo card to install safely and correctly up there on the top corner, see the clearances are (very) tight and I'm glad I had read a few suggestions around the forum about it and that it's better to install the little antenna wires before installing the card.
I also read about all the people having problems with the card and from what I understand the culprit is most probably the bottom fastening screw; many have reported that taking it off does indeed solve the issues they had and also didn't hamper the installation at all (it's pretty snug anyway and there's no weight on the tiny card to fear coming loose). And so opted to remove that screw myself too, otherwise it would be almost impossible to remove it afterwards without having to take the whole board out if I happen to face those dreaded problems too.
Now next up is to put in the PSU, the VGA and it's cooler and ofcourse a complete fresh install of windows etc. To get an idea, this is the cooler that will be taking care of my 6970 and that extra bracket with the fans will be going on top (to be honest the stock cooler of the card was quite good and temps were at bay even at full load, but the tiny 80mm fans were unbearable above 75% rpm, so the decision to go for an aftermarket cooler was the logical choice.
vga fan bracket and heatsink vs the stock card cooler setup
That's all for now, hope you enjoyed it and will be updating as soon as I'm done
Cheers,
Nikos
P.S: anybody can shed some light on this ? check the attached photo, there's a 9 pin header down there at the (almost) bottom right corner of the board but I couldn't find any documentation about it, neither in the forums nor in the manual. Anyone knows what it is for ? :confused:
Update:
I finished my build and here's what i ended up with 😮
Now I need to fix my SSD's positioning a bit (probably with a bit of velcro I think) and then on to fine tune the system and start searching for a stable 24/7 OC :cool:
I finished my build and here's what i ended up with 😮
Now I need to fix my SSD's positioning a bit (probably with a bit of velcro I think) and then on to fine tune the system and start searching for a stable 24/7 OC :cool:
