[inc0gn3gr0]

I am looking to building a new PC and I would like some help on my purchase before I buy. This is my build, so far:
AMD FX-8150 3.6GHz
GIGABYTE GA-990FXA-UD3 AM3+ AMD 990FX
SAMSUNG 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
CORSAIR H80 (CWCH80) High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
XFX 7970 Double Dissipation

My questions/concerns are:
Has anyone had any bad experiences with the H80 (NEVER used water cooling ever, a bit paranoid), also what kind of OCs can I get on 8150. I hear that the samsung ram OCs well up to 2133. Also I am looking into getting a 64GB SSD just for my OS, I would like suggestions on one, but also I was wondering is it really worth it for a PC that is rarely if every going to be shut off since I can really only fit the OS on there as a lot of games are rather large, so I plan on using a mechanical HD for that. I am also looking at this case http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811352013 and wondering what people's opinion on it.

Thanks in advance

[trents]

The H80 is a good unit but you might want to look at the H100. The FX CPUs really put out the heat when you start adding vcore in the overclocking process. But the H100 is an external mount radiator so check that it would work with your case.

My other suggestion is if you plain on running the ram at higher than 1600 then get ram rated for higher transfer rates rather than taking a chance that the Samsung 1600 will get you there. But maybe you have already purchased the components you have listed.

SSD will still give you considerably faster program load times than any Hard Disk storage device. If you're doing a lot of read/write in you computing it would be a good way to go. But I would go up to a 128 gb SSD so you could actually store some of your large programs on it. In case you haven't noticed we're good a spending other people's money around here.

[inc0gn3gr0]

Since I will be OCing for the first time, as well as using water cooling for the first time. I kind of figured the H80 was the conservative choice, as for RAM is there any RAM you suggest, I mostly play just about a little of everything and I hear ram timings don't matter so much for MMOs as they do for FPS, which I don't play that often, and I don't want to spend a boat load on RAM.

I haven't ordered the components yet, but I haven't seen any H80 8150 OC recommendations. As for the SSD, I have a lot of HD space (in mechanical HDs) 4.5TB which I plan on continuing to use so I am really looking to see how little I can get away with :P. I do dual boot so maybe 128 is best any SSD suggestions?

[trents]

Actually, I have never run a SSD so I don't have any recommendations but what I have read it seems that Intel makes fast SSD drives. I'm waiting for prices to come down closer to what mechanical drives are. But that's not likely to happen anytime soon until the mechanical sector recovers from the floods in Thailand that wiped out their production facilities and caused prices to almost triple in some cases. No competition for the SSD sector right now.

Concerning ram, my only recommendation is that you go with something that will do 1866 at low voltages.

[tym64]

I run 120 gb Solid state drive. With windows 7. From my experience, The games Load and run faster on a Solid state drive.

I have 80 Gigs Free, That is with windows 7 and the programs I use. I use 2 500 gig sata for slave drives.

If you can swing it 120 intels are sweet!! Thats what I have. I had liquid cooling. Not a fan of it. I went back to air. If your gonna run your set up overclocked IMHO run a liquid cooler.

I am a gamer. Play all the latest games. I run 3.8 Fx 6100, Play for long periods of time. No heating issues.

[LZ_Xray]

Originally Posted by inc0gn3gr0

I do dual boot so maybe 128 is best any SSD suggestions?

Intel 320s have been bulletproof reliable for me. They're SATAII so there's faster drives out there, but the speed difference between II and III is unnoticeable on a daily basis unless you do things that have a large amount of disk I/O. Lot of good info on drives in the HD/SSD forum.

[midlight21]

I just upgraded to a Crucial M4 128GB SSD and so far I love it. Boot times are awesome and I've read they are reliable.

[mjw21a]

Well, my Corsair H100 died over the weekend. Turned the computer on and got a burning smell though it booted into Windows. Looked inside and the lights weren't on for the H100, and the fans weren't spinning. Recabled it a few times to no effect so I picked up a Noctual NH-D14. Run's a few degree's warmer but its significantly quieter.

I'll be getting the H100 replaced under warranty and I'll give the replacement to a mate. I don't want to run it again due to what I now percieve as poor reliabillity.

[dtrunk]

personally I would spend a little more, get a better waterblock for the cpu EK HF series, and something like http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835106183. No idea if this thing is any good, but a self sustained pump/reservoir (and radiator/fan) or separate radiator/fan will give you better performance and worth the few extra $$.

Otherwise, I've heard good things about the Antec Kuhler http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835209054 . it has a thicker radiator than any of the corsair units.

[mjw21a]

I'd have to say I recommend high end air due to better reliabillity and minimal maintenance. Nothing more required than a can of compressed air.

Stick with Thermalright, Noctua or Prolimatech air coolers and you can't go wrong. Noctua coolers are arguably the best value including two of their rather expensive quality fans, thermal grease and retention mechanisms for both Intel and AMD. Nothing else required.

[trents]

Noctua D14 is arguably the best air cooler out of the box with stock fans, etc. and is almost as good a the H100 H20 but will need a case at least 8" wide to accommodate its size.

[Knufire]

Any reason for the AMD? It only performs better than the 2500K in VERY specific applications (the Bulldozer architecture performs like an octocore with integer calculations, but performs like a quadcore in floating point calculations). The 2500K also mops the floor with it in terms of heat output and power consumption.

[mjw21a]

I believe FX-8150 will have the edge with new software moving forward. Mind you, I've often found that buying for what will be better in the future is pointless. Sometimes the industry goes in another direction to what you think, and at others your hardware is just that far behind that while it does use all of the CPU resources it's not clocked high enough or ts IPC isn't high enough to be overly useful with the software released.....

I suspect that won't be the case these days as we really do have far more processing power on hand than we can make use of....

[ShadowPho]

Originally Posted by Knufire

Any reason for the AMD? It only performs better than the 2500K in VERY specific applications (the Bulldozer architecture performs like an octocore with integer calculations, but performs like a quadcore in floating point calculations). The 2500K also mops the floor with it in terms of heat output and power consumption.

In addition 2500k overclocks better then fx-8150 [afaik]. Clocking a 2500k to 4.5GHz is pretty easy, and trivial to cool with a $22 cooler.

[mjw21a]

Depends on whether someone wants to overclock. Since the OP does the 2500K is currently the best way to go