Destroy my build - $3,000 gaming setup

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Termie

Diamond Member
Aug 17, 2005
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Enumerate them please, then we will have something to talk about.

I was just waiting for you to ask.

(1) Longer Warranty
(2) Better caps
(3) Higher-quality hybrid fan for quieter operation
(4) Less heat production
(5) Fully modular
(6) Higher efficiency
(7) Higher wattage (adding the obvious for good measure)

Of course, you knew all of the above, so did you really need to ask? ;)

I know you're a fan of cheap PSUs, but please tell me why someone spending $3,500 on a rig would not want to spend an extra $30-40 to get all of the benefits above.
 
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PCJake

Senior member
Apr 4, 2008
319
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I was just waiting for you to ask.

(1) Longer Warranty
(2) Better caps
(3) Higher-quality hybrid fan for quieter operation
(4) Less heat production
(5) Fully modular
(6) Higher efficiency
(7) Higher wattage (adding the obvious for good measure)

Of course, you knew all of the above, so did you really need to ask? ;)

I know you're a fan of cheap PSUs, but please tell me why someone spending $3,500 on a rig would not want to spend an extra $30-40 to get all of the benefits above.

Indeed :)

Warranty is basically insurance provided by the manufacturer, and the "cost" is calculated very similarly. The manufacturer is taking on increased risk by offering a longer warranty (i.e. they will have to pay out more in warranty claims), so they have to build the cost of that risk into the product.

Yeah, a company can charge more for a longer warranty, thus creating the impression that the product is of higher quality just from that, but they can't sell a product without a features list, and the features list for a more expensive product has to include some compelling improvement.

I think you're just looking at the mathematics of it, and not really thinking about it from a business and marketing perspective. You're making it sound like product lines are just a big ploy, when that's not the case. More expensive products are always better in some way, even if the improvements get progressively less cost-effective. Granted, some companies choose to lower their bottom line (by making crap products to make their higher end stuff look better) rather than raising their standards for everything (by starting with a great product and making it even more exceptional)...but I believe the former is a bad way to do business and I just don't support those companies.

I like having these debates, even though they're sort of philosophical, rather than being really pertinent to my build ;)
 
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Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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And when a Gold model's warranty is two years longer than the equivalent Bronze model's? Is that just the company trying to fool us into thinking it's better as well (it might sound like I'm being sardonic, but I'm not - it's a serious question)?
There is no absolute rule in purchasing a PSU that will guarantee avoiding failures. But yes, many bits of information can be pieced together to get a decent approximation of quality if you don't have access to a teardown review of the unit from sites like JonnyGURU or Hardware Secrets.

I will point out the old caveat of statistics: correlation does not imply causation. Or in this case "full causation". The 80 Plus cert doesn't check for what caps are used, what protections are present, such as short circuit, over-voltage, etc. So long as you meet the requirements, you get the cert. Yes, there is some "bare minimum" to get the cert, but this minimum is not that "high" as one might think. Any further information cannot be gleaned from the cert itself, but yet another variable, such as warranty, as you mentioned, brand recognition, such as Seasonic, or the more typical "store review" at Newegg or elsewhere(those store reviews aren't usually useful, but "special case" reviews can be useful.

They can't even control what units the label is slapped on, as Raidmax sent in a "Gold" unit and then put the labels they acquired on some Bronze units they had. Of course, not every company would do such a sleight-of-hand, but the cert is vulnerable to these tricks. http://www.hardocp.com/article/2011/10/04/80_plus_irrelevant_to_you_when_buying_psu/#.UZWbNqLVCSp

Now, warranty length is a separate variable that can be used to "predict" PSU quality in case you don't have a teardown review and/or electrical engineering know-how to understand fully what you see inside the PSU.

You can use warranty and the 80 Plus cert "together" to get a feel for how probable the unit is a dud or quality unit. But now the subject has changed to using warranty and the 80 Plus cert to determine likeliness of quality, not the 80 Plus cert alone

If you want the statement of 80 Plus Gold>"lesser units", as-is with no hidden qualifiers, to be consistent, then it must follow that snatching an 80 Plus Gold unit from any company, including suspect ones from Coolmax or Raidmax(Raidmax as a Gold unit with only 2 years warranty), will assure me, that they will "perform" better than some "lesser" certified unit from an older generation, or even a non-certified one such as the Antec VP-450. Of course, there will always be some DOAs, but quality control can reduce the percentage of duds and to-be duds.



The statement may not hold in the absolute sense, but you can use it to get a feel for the probability of avoiding a "dud", as there is some correlation between higher level certs and reliability and/or performance.

I would say warranty length is a stronger indicator of quality than the 80 Plus certification, but use of that measure does have some limitations when in the territory of 5 year vs 7 year ones, as many units with 5 year warranties are good performers.
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
12,078
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I think you're just looking at the mathematics of it, and not really thinking about it from a business and marketing perspective. You're making it sound like product lines are just a big ploy, when that's not the case. More expensive products are always better in some way, even if the improvements get progressively less cost-effective. Granted, some companies choose to lower their bottom line (by making crap products to make their higher end stuff look better) rather than raising their standards for everything (by starting with a great product and making it even more exceptional)...but I believe the former is a bad way to do business and I just don't support those companies.

I like having these debates, even though they're sort of philosophical, rather than being really pertinent to my build ;)
You've got it backwards, as business culture and marketing culture do not have benefiting the consumer as their primary goal. Indirectly, if helping the consumer increases profit, they will help him out, but that is not always the case.
From a business perspective, saving each cent of funds coming in is important. Maximizing the difference between revenue and cost is quite a strong force for the businessman. Putting out crap yet successfully increasing profit is perfectly acceptable if there is no tempering ethical force to stop them.
From a marketing perspective, the primary goal is to get people to shell out as much $$$ as possible. You don't have to understand the nuances so long as you get people psychologically hooked into buying stuff. Ignorance is valuable to the marketer, because you can then hype the crap out of "cool-sounding" jargon such as clockspeed and convince them that "more is better".

To make sure the company doesn't have to eat the cost of replacing a unit, they take greater pains to insure against failure. You pay them more, and they in turn should pour the money into protecting the product from failure and giving you fine customer support.


You're seeing a disagreement when there isn't one. Insurance against the probability of failure is precisely that of using components less prone to failure.
 

PCJake

Senior member
Apr 4, 2008
319
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You've got it backwards, as business culture and marketing culture do not have benefiting the consumer as their primary goal. Indirectly, if helping the consumer increases profit, they will help him out, but that is not always the case.
From a business perspective, saving each cent of funds coming in is important. Maximizing the difference between revenue and cost is quite a strong force for the businessman. Putting out crap yet successfully increasing profit is perfectly acceptable if there is no tempering ethical force to stop them.
From a marketing perspective, the primary goal is to get people to shell out as much $$$ as possible. You don't have to understand the nuances so long as you get people psychologically hooked into buying stuff. Ignorance is valuable to the marketer, because you can then hype the crap out of "cool-sounding" jargon such as clockspeed and convince them that "more is better".

To make sure the company doesn't have to eat the cost of replacing a unit, they take greater pains to insure against failure. You pay them more, and they in turn should pour the money into protecting the product from failure and giving you fine customer support.


You're seeing a disagreement when there isn't one. Insurance against the probability of failure is precisely that of using components less prone to failure.

*sigh*...

Fine, I guess I'll just be backwards. I don't know what's different now compared to a few hours ago, when I said that I like having these philosophical discussions...maybe my caffeine buzz has just worn off, but I'm officially done talking about this now. If I waste five bucks because a company tricked me into thinking one of their products was actually, god forbid, better than another, then I'll just skip lunch the next day. "BAD JAKE," I'll say. Time to move on and change the subject:

What do you guys think I should spend on a motherboard in the context of this build? Obviously it's hard to say when there aren't any LGA 1150 boards on the market...but let's pretend that this were an Ivy bridge build. About how much would you recommend spending for a suitable board?
 
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crashtech

Lifer
Jan 4, 2013
10,695
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[OT]Not all businesses have such an unethical mindset. Many operate with a core value that states whoever adds the most value to the customer will eventually win.[/OT]
 

Sleepingforest

Platinum Member
Nov 18, 2012
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Okay, here's my 50 cents: there are a few basic issues which govern motherboard choice. most obvious is whether you want to overclock. If so, you'll need a Z87 board. Even on a very high end build, you have to make a decision about whether you want SLI. There are some (like me) who just wouldn't want to deal with the potential issues, the increased heat and power usage, and so on even if they had the money. So you'll have to make a decision there as well. After that, there are a couple more issues: how many fan headers do you want or need? Of that number, how many are PWM? How many USB 3.0 headers do you want? Do you want eSATA?

There are a few things that SHOULDN'T enter consideration though. Typically, the software suite isnt worth worrying about--even Asus's vaunted fan controls are inferior to the godly SpeedFan, for example, and the rest tends to be stuff like antivirus trials--in other words, more for lining the pockets of the company than for you. Thunderbolt doesn't seem like it's going to enter the market in a significant way anytime, and a PCIe card will exist if it ever does become a big deal.

You can get a solid non-SLI Ivy Bridge board for $100 or so; a 2-way SLI board is $140 or so. I expect Haswell motherboards will be marked up about 50%, maybe more.
 
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Automaticman

Member
Sep 3, 2009
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Yeah, the primary things I look for, are the PCIe slots, layout and configuration (PLX chip, does something get disabled if I plug a soundcard in etc..). Obviously we want a Z87, but since were overclocking i like to make sure I get a board with a decent power delivery and, hopefully, cooling.

I have a lot of drives so the amount of SATA ports is important to me. Then any other features like debug LEDs, dual bios, onboard switches etc. Not gonna lie, looks are a factor too. I might not pick a board just because i like it's looks, but i might rule one out that I don't (like the new gold ASUS boards...blehh).

I'd probably be looking for something $200 or so (for a nice crossfire/SLI board), but you might have to add more for the new product tax for Haswell boards. Also consider if Thunderbolt is something you have any interest in.
 

PCJake

Senior member
Apr 4, 2008
319
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0
Quick update: going to go for the SeaSonic SS-660XP2 660W Platinum PSU, but I'm going to wait until it goes on sale. If it drops to around $100 I'll grab it.

Also, I'm going to order the Corsair 550D case sooner than the rest of the parts. Probably early next week. That way I can put my current components in there and compare temps to my current case.
 

Termie

Diamond Member
Aug 17, 2005
7,949
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www.techbuyersguru.com
Another update: I just grabbed the Crucial Ballistix Tactical 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3 1600 RAM for $99.99 from Newegg! Awesome deal for awesome RAM.

Nice call! Great set of RAM, great price. They'll overclock to 1866 easily, although in a recent comparison article, Tom's Hardware wasn't able to get them to 2133.

Sleepingforest absolutely nailed it on motherboards above. I agree with everything, except I don't think there will actually be much of a new adopter tax on high end Haswell motherboards, as high end Ivy Bridge motherboards are still near their original prices. For instance, the Maximus V Gene I have costs $20 more now than when I bought it 11 months ago, and other boards in that price range have gone up recently.
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
12,078
2,772
136
[OT]Not all businesses have such an unethical mindset. Many operate with a core value that states whoever adds the most value to the customer will eventually win.[/OT]

That's because a happy customer will not go around in a fit of fury that will lower sales by releasing bad press (OCZ is suffering from that) through reviews or neg feedback on Ebay. That would then kill sales volume real quick if there is noticeably consistent pattern. But even ethical businesses won't go around with extra overhead just for the sake of it because a dead business is a useless one. It's just that they won't go so far to cut costs in unethical ways.

I personally am going to give Zalman a few stabs right myself because they screwed up the rebate processing(I did everything right and then they use the UPC of a different product to deny my claim.
 
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Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
12,078
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*sigh*...

Fine, I guess I'll just be backwards. I don't know what's different now compared to a few hours ago, when I said that I like having these philosophical discussions...maybe my caffeine buzz has just worn off, but I'm officially done talking about this now. If I waste five bucks because a company tricked me into thinking one of their products was actually, god forbid, better than another, then I'll just skip lunch the next day. "BAD JAKE," I'll say.
I'm only posting this clarify myself. No response needed if you don't want to do so.

I never said you were backwards. The backwards comment is in reference to a specific thought, not you as a person. It is just that neither the business incentives nor the marketer's incentives are necessarily more favorable to producing "quality". Some businesses do care but others don't depending on the incentives. Marketers usually never do unless specifically marketing quality, and even then, they will milk a few more $$$ out of the consumer.
 

PCJake

Senior member
Apr 4, 2008
319
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And it is low profile, so it won't interfere with CPU coolers.

Yeah, I think it's pretty much perfect for me. Looking forward to messing around with it.

Man, it pays to check prices on a daily basis - I almost didn't look.
 

mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
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Nice call! Great set of RAM, great price. They'll overclock to 1866 easily, although in a recent comparison article, Tom's Hardware wasn't able to get them to 2133.

Sleepingforest absolutely nailed it on motherboards above. I agree with everything, except I don't think there will actually be much of a new adopter tax on high end Haswell motherboards, as high end Ivy Bridge motherboards are still near their original prices. For instance, the Maximus V Gene I have costs $20 more now than when I bought it 11 months ago, and other boards in that price range have gone up recently.

Theoretically speaking, Haswell motherboards should have a lower BOM cost than prior boards because most of the voltage regulation is now done on the CPU.

Whether that translates into lower prices for the end-user is anybody's guess though. My 2c is that they will be priced higher initially because early-adopters will gladly pay more but will eventually drop to sub-7 series pricing as supply increases and competition kicks in.
 

mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
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You've got it backwards, as business culture and marketing culture do not have benefiting the consumer as their primary goal. Indirectly, if helping the consumer increases profit, they will help him out, but that is not always the case.
From a business perspective, saving each cent of funds coming in is important. Maximizing the difference between revenue and cost is quite a strong force for the businessman. Putting out crap yet successfully increasing profit is perfectly acceptable if there is no tempering ethical force to stop them.
From a marketing perspective, the primary goal is to get people to shell out as much $$$ as possible. You don't have to understand the nuances so long as you get people psychologically hooked into buying stuff. Ignorance is valuable to the marketer, because you can then hype the crap out of "cool-sounding" jargon such as clockspeed and convince them that "more is better".

To make sure the company doesn't have to eat the cost of replacing a unit, they take greater pains to insure against failure. You pay them more, and they in turn should pour the money into protecting the product from failure and giving you fine customer support.


You're seeing a disagreement when there isn't one. Insurance against the probability of failure is precisely that of using components less prone to failure.

:thumbsup: to the whole post, especially the bolded.
 

TY-1

Member
Mar 27, 2013
186
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Another update: I just grabbed the Crucial Ballistix Tactical 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3 1600 RAM for $99.99 from Newegg! Awesome deal for awesome RAM.

For the price that is a great deal.

The only thing I personally would be concerned about is the 1.35 voltage. I have heard a number of people having issue with RAM that uses that level of voltage (a few builds by the guys over at Tom's had it happen), so I stick (pun not intended) mainly to RAM with 1.5 voltage for the builds I've done for people. If anyone has extra input on this issue then I am all ears as there are a number of RAM kits that are starting to use the 1.35 voltage level (the set noted above being a perfect example).
 

mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
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I was just waiting for you to ask.

(1) Longer Warranty
(2) Better caps
(3) Higher-quality hybrid fan for quieter operation
(4) Less heat production
(5) Fully modular
(6) Higher efficiency
(7) Higher wattage (adding the obvious for good measure)

Of course, you knew all of the above, so did you really need to ask? ;)

I know you're a fan of cheap PSUs, but please tell me why someone spending $3,500 on a rig would not want to spend an extra $30-40 to get all of the benefits above.

Inexpensive and good value, not cheap. ;) All of your points are of course correct, but that gets back to my original point. I don't think that the value that you get from those is worth $60 more (which is what an X series normally goes for).

For the record:
1. Worth something I suppose, but IMHO self-insuring is better when you're spending this amount of money.
2. Plenty of $60 units use good caps, the marginal benefit from ultra-high quality caps is low.
3. "Hybrid" in this case meaning "can start and stop". That's only useful if the rest of your system can do so as well. Running really slowly is below the noise floor on a system that doesn't take great pains to be quiet.
4. Sure, but the difference is negligible and isn't sent into the case anyway.
5. This can be a pro or a con depending on your use case.
6. Sure, but it'll take a long time to make back the cost difference.
7. Yes, but of course that doesn't matter unless you are going for some overclocked SLI monster (and maybe not even then).
 

mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
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For the price that is a great deal.

The only thing I personally would be concerned about is the 1.35 voltage. I have heard a number of people having issue with RAM that uses that level of voltage (a few builds by the guys over at Tom's had it happen), so I stick (pun not intended) mainly to RAM with 1.5 voltage for the builds I've done for people. If anyone has extra input on this issue then I am all ears as there are a number of RAM kits that are starting to use the 1.35 voltage level (the set noted above being a perfect example).

1.35V is totally fine and is the DDR3L standard. If you end up having trouble with stability at 1.35V (unlikely), you can always run them at 1.5V.
 

TY-1

Member
Mar 27, 2013
186
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1.35V is totally fine and is the DDR3L standard. If you end up having trouble with stability at 1.35V (unlikely), you can always run them at 1.5V.

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind.

Looking back at the Tom's build it seems that it wasn't the RAM that was the issue, but rather the combination of the Asrock Extreme4 mobo and the Noctuna NH-D14 causing the mobo to warp and crack near the mounting points. However, I'm still wondering why there was an issue running the RAM, the 8gb package of the DDR3 1600 Crucial Ballistix Tactical at 1.5v to get the 8-8-8-24 Timing when it is supposed to be able to run at that Timing wiht just 1.35v.

Maybe I missed some detail when reading back over the article?
 

Termie

Diamond Member
Aug 17, 2005
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Inexpensive and good value, not cheap. ;) All of your points are of course correct, but that gets back to my original point. I don't think that the value that you get from those is worth $60 more (which is what an X series normally goes for).

For the record:
1. Worth something I suppose, but IMHO self-insuring is better when you're spending this amount of money.
2. Plenty of $60 units use good caps, the marginal benefit from ultra-high quality caps is low.
3. "Hybrid" in this case meaning "can start and stop". That's only useful if the rest of your system can do so as well. Running really slowly is below the noise floor on a system that doesn't take great pains to be quiet.
4. Sure, but the difference is negligible and isn't sent into the case anyway.
5. This can be a pro or a con depending on your use case.
6. Sure, but it'll take a long time to make back the cost difference.
7. Yes, but of course that doesn't matter unless you are going for some overclocked SLI monster (and maybe not even then).

You see, we agree...in a way. ;)

The OP should certainly review the points you and I made and decide which option is best.
 
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