How To Build A High-End, Overclocked PC (As Written By An Idiot)

H

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
You have to give this guy a lot of credit. He had the balls to build his own high-end rig and overclock the hell out of it. Instead of just diving right in without a clue, he did his research, scoured the internet and, in the end, wound up with a very respectable build. :cool:

Beyond that, if you've never done overclocking before, you'll want to read up elsewhere as using this article would be like taking a calculus class from a chimp. Check out sources like LifeHacker's guide to overclocking, this HardOCP Haswell-E article and X99 overclocking videos like this one. That said, here's what I found by stumbling through the internet.
Click to expand...
 
Goty said:
This as compared to the guy over at The Verge/Polygon who tried it once and just gave up because he had one small issue.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm a fan of the crew at Engadget.

Aside from this guy having an awesome name (Steve), his "I'm a normal guy" approach, emphasis on picking the right parts and doing his homework, is a service to his readers and, with any luck, it will encourage a few people to build their own rigs. :cool:

Now we just need to tell him about PC HOUND ;)
 
I was going to take offense when he talked about PC cases, saying "You can find tasteful models, but most are gonzo things with lots of bells and whistles designed to awe your pals and keep you single." But then I thought about it. My cases DO tend to impress my friends, and I AM single. Heh, well there yah go. I dunno about most though, but I find the Corsair 760T case to be tasteful, as well as my previous case, the Thermaltake Tsunami Dream (which has housed no less than 3 PCs over a span of 8 years).

Props to him for referencing some great articles, including HardOCP's "Core i7-5960X 5930K 5820K Overclocking & Performance." And he named-dropped HardOCP in the text of the article too. Fuckin' tight. He showed that even a beginner can jump in, build a decent rig, and overclock right off the bat, if you do your research right and take your time to learn. Hopefully this will encourage other first-timers to do the same.
 
It only takes a quick glance at sites like Cyberpower and iBuyPower to realize that like 95% of cases aimed at gamers are full-on obnoxious looking.
I ended up going with a Corsair 540 (cube case) just so it doesn't look like my PC is housed in Optimus Prime.
Hopefully that's one of those things case manufacturers eventually realize. Something classy and subtle without being gigantic is much appreciated.
 
I liked the article. I thought it had hit a lot of points for people who have never dived into their own builds. Kudos to him.
 
Steve said:
Yeah, I'm a fan of the crew at Engadget.

Aside from this guy having an awesome name (Steve), his "I'm a normal guy" approach, emphasis on picking the right parts and doing his homework, is a service to his readers and, with any luck, it will encourage a few people to build their own rigs. :cool:

Now we just need to tell him about PC HOUND ;)
Click to expand...

Domingo said:
It only takes a quick glance at sites like Cyberpower and iBuyPower to realize that like 95% of cases aimed at gamers are full-on obnoxious looking.
I ended up going with a Corsair 540 (cube case) just so it doesn't look like my PC is housed in Optimus Prime.
Hopefully that's one of those things case manufacturers eventually realize. Something classy and subtle without being gigantic is much appreciated.
Click to expand...



I'm a big fan of the Antec 300/900 cases. Very very sleek and cool looking without any of that stupid obnoxious plastic fenders all over crap. I think the 900 has a little more of it but if I recall I found the Antec 300 to look perfect and it still had optimal cooling, tons of fan spots.
 
Domingo said:
It only takes a quick glance at sites like Cyberpower and iBuyPower to realize that like 95% of cases aimed at gamers are full-on obnoxious looking.
I ended up going with a Corsair 540 (cube case) just so it doesn't look like my PC is housed in Optimus Prime.
Hopefully that's one of those things case manufacturers eventually realize. Something classy and subtle without being gigantic is much appreciated.
Click to expand...

uh... wtf is wrong with Optimus Prime?

Racist..
 
It's my opinion that the only wife largely approved cases out there are Lian Li's...and even some of those are a little garish.
 
I really smiled at that article. Really glad [H]'s guides got the plug. Even a noob can overclock if they read the guides :)
 
Domingo said:
It only takes a quick glance at sites like Cyberpower and iBuyPower to realize that like 95% of cases aimed at gamers are full-on obnoxious looking.
I ended up going with a Corsair 540 (cube case) just so it doesn't look like my PC is housed in Optimus Prime.
Hopefully that's one of those things case manufacturers eventually realize. Something classy and subtle without being gigantic is much appreciated.
Click to expand...

This is why I gravitate to Antec cases. No body could locate my P180 even though it was very out in the open and its not a small case either!
 
When I first read the title I thought Steve was saying the guy was an idiot, so I expected it to be able someone toasting a new build. :D
 
My only complaint is that he went Intel/Nvidia. Could have saved some serious cash if he went red team.
 
So ... criticisms over parts selection.

-256GB ssd's really aren't enough to store more than the OS nowadays. Especially if you start getting into Solidworks and other CAD progs where they're dozens of GB apiece. Windows can easily grow to 75GB with enough age.
-850W power supply is huge overkill for a build like this where 500W would probably have been sufficient.
-DDR4-2800 Mhz ram is pointless expense with DDR4.
-Personally I think buying an already outdated video card isn't smart. Especially buying it brand new when the market is going to be flooded with used 780Ti's and the like.
 
Easily running trimmed down Win7 on a 32GB SSD. If you can't do it on 256GB... :eek:

As for used video cards, I personally have had terrible luck with them, whereas everything else has been solid. So YMMV but I'd rather go new, particularly for a newb who may not know how to narrow the issue down.
 
Good read. It is funny how many cases out there look like some sort of transformer. My case looks like an A/C unit from the side :D
 
As far as the Video Card is concerned I think he made a fairly good decision. AutoCad and other 3D modeling software just do not favor team red. Adobe does have support for openCL, but last I checked it was only on the Mac version of their software. So if you want to utilize gpu compute on windows your more or less stuck with Nvidia & Cuda.

So that being said, an R290X may be the better price/performance card for gaming, its not the primary function of his rig.
 
SRTie4k said:
It's my opinion that the only wife largely approved cases out there are Lian Li's...and even some of those are a little garish.
Click to expand...

My wife likes my Corsair 650 more than any case I've owned.

A decade ago when we were early into our relationship she used to poke fun at cases that were lit up and looked like they were pulled directly out of Alien, but not to the point it would affect the relationship... I guess my computer didn't define me and I was good looking enough it didn't matter ;)
 
MisterHipster said:
My only complaint is that he went Intel/Nvidia. Could have saved some serious cash if he went red team.
Click to expand...

I didn't see that the title of the article was "How to build a Low-End, Overclocked PC (As Written by McDonalds Staff Member)"
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top