Fractal XL R2 Watercooled Build - for my 1st!

Hi guys,

As the title says I'm looking at building a watercooled Fractal XL R2 for my very 1st PC build and am looking for some advice.

As a bit of background, I have a XPS 1730 Laptop (The Beast if anyone remembers them) and whilst its served me well it well past its time, and I decided I'd rather drop that amount of coin on a kickarse desktop this time.
I've pulled apart the XPS that many times I've lost count for simple things like cleaning the dust out to putting some artic silver on the GPU's.
I also work with communications gear and IT stuff on a daily basis so not really daunted with doing most things if I've got a decent set of instructions.

So.... this is what I'm looking at putting together -

Case: Fractal XL R2
CPU: i7 4770K
Motherboard: Gigabyte G1 Sniper 5
GPU: Gainward GTX770 Phantom 4GB
PSU: Antec High Current Pro 750W
Memory: G.Skill 16BG (2x8GB) 2400MHz DDR3
SSD: Corasair Force Series GT 240GB
HDD: WD Velicoraptor1TB 10,000rpm
Optical: Pioneer BDR-208DBKS. Bluray writer
Soundcard: Creative Soundblaster ZxR PCI-e

Monitor: Dell 27" Ultrasharp IPS 2560x1440, 5ms

Watercooling: No idea, but I've had a read through the beginners guide here on Overclockers.


OS will be Win7 or Win8 if I see a need to go to it.

In the future I'd like to go triple screen with another GPU in SLI

Cheers ,
BroncosXR8



P.S I'm based in Australia and have got most of my prices from http://www.scorptec.com.au/

My price comes to $3,841 AUD

Questions are -

Is the PSU good enough? With future intentions in mind.
Am I overkilling it on the motherboard?
Do I even need a soundcard with that motherboard?
Have I overspent in some areas and underspent in others?


and lastly will it all fit?!

Give the beginners guide to water cooling again, read many many posts and much of all of the stickies. I suggest you build the rig stock and then start deciding on watercooling parts etc. Watercooling isn't hard, but there are many oddities and things that take a bit to understand. Terminologies and knowing what parts are good, liquids, leak testing etc.

Just spend time reading the stickies and keep up on the posts for a few weeks you should be fine.

Good luck!

Don't need 2400 ram, no need for a soundcard unless you do music heavily, like a few 1000 AUD in equipment. Most of us use the optical out to a stereo, some do buy a soundcard for the analog out for really expensive headphones. Some use the optical out to a separate headphone amp/decoder, just for the headphones.

Lastly, will the case hold a good watercooling setup? If you're planning SLI later, you'll want 120x3 AND a 120x2 radiator in the case for silent running. Plan ahead for that.

Looks great to me, memory doesn't need to be higher than 1600mhz realistically, and you don't need a soundcard unless your speakers are worth $1000+

If you want to SLI and have multiscreen I'd get a GTX 780...

Case: Fractal XL R2 - Great case.
CPU: i7 4770K - Gaming only ? 4670k could do the same job.
Motherboard: Gigabyte G1 Sniper 5 - Overdoing it. If you like Gigabyte, an UD5 is well enough, or a Z87X-OC ( not force )
GPU: Gainward GTX770 Phantom 4GB - Good. wth this 1440p monitor you could also choose a GTX 780.
PSU: Antec High Current Pro 750W - Good PSU
Memory: G.Skill 16BG (2x8GB) 2400MHz DDR3 - 1600mhz with cas8 could shave alot on the price and will not reduce gaming performance.
SSD: Corasair Force Series GT 240GB - I'd prefer a Samsung Pro, OCZ Vector or similar
HDD: WD Velicoraptor1TB 10,000rpm - Why ? Get a 1tb or 2tb WD Black instead.
Optical: Pioneer BDR-208DBKS. Bluray writer - Your pick !
Soundcard: Creative Soundblaster ZxR PCI-e - Dont "really" need a sound card. On board will be ok unless you have really good headphone/speaker ( 150$ ++ set ).

Monitor: Dell 27" Ultrasharp IPS 2560x1440, 5ms - Great monitor. If you search EB you could find some korea "perfect pixels" 1440 and 1600 monitor for cheap.

Thanks for the quick replies guys! Your inputs are great and what I expected to be honest.

I forgot to mention that it will mostly be gaming, Skyrim (I know not the most resource hungry) and Assetto Corsa (think Gran Turismo for PC) when it eventually comes out.

Thanks for the advice on the soundcard, I was wondering if I really needed it, the PC may at times be hooked up to my 1080p Sony Bravia TV and Sony surround, but it is by no means high end gear so optical out should be plenty.

@Conundrum, like you advised I'll probably start with an air cooled setup before moving on to watercooled.

@Culbrelia, any reason why the 780 for SLI and multiscreen? the 780 is a bit of a price jump over the 770 4GB.

and @Boulard83, thanks those comments are helpful. Chose the velicoraptor purely for the 10,000rpm can't say I'm to familiar with the colour codes for the WD HDDs.

Also was looking at the ROG series of motherboards if the Sniper is a bit overkill

If you end up at 3x 1440p screens, The GTX780 horsepower would not be too much ... Even at single 1440p, a single 780 is a great card. NM the 4gb on the 770, the 770 is a 20% weaker card. ++ the 780 have a 384bit memory bus, wich is good for really high resolution screens and/or surround setup.

Well if you go 3 screen surround and higher than 1080p on them, your going to need a lot of horsepower for high frame rates, thus 780 and SLI. And yes, you still want 3 gb+ of Vram on the cards. 3gb is fine I think for the next few years. In fact Skyrim with lots of mods can really use up Vram.

And plan ahead on the GPUs. In a year you add another 770, and a year after that they are outdated, where the 780 might be a winner for a few years.

Just for gaming you can drop the CPU down a bit, the 4670K would be plenty good, gaming doesn't need all the cores and multithreading.

I think the ROG are top end boards, you don't need a massive board for your needs, you need a good board.

And you can edit your post if you forgot something? I do it all the time, just like this scentence.

hmmm I hadn't really expected to need to go to the 780 but thanks it's something I'll look into.

I'll also investigate the 4670K.

I got caught out when I bought the XPS with not getting top of the line options and therefore got restricted from OCíng the CPU so am a little wary of things like that.

A 770 is a rebadged 680, while a 780 is a whole new GPU, a downgraded Titan, which the Titan itself is a downgraded Tesla K20X, GK 110.

In other words, 780/Titan are new tech, while 770 is not neccesarily. I think the 780 and Titan will have a longer relevance than any other 7xx.

Culbrelai said:

A 770 is a rebadged 680, while a 780 is a whole new GPU, a downgraded Titan, which the Titan itself is a downgraded Tesla K20X, GK 110.

In other words, 780/Titan are new tech, while 770 is not neccesarily. I think the 780 and Titan will have a longer relevance than any other 7xx.

Click to expand...

+1.

I game at 5760x1080 ( 3 1080p screens ) on a single 780. BF3 run ULTRA with 2xMSAA at 45+ fps, mostly 50-55fps. Butter smooth.

OK so after a further play around on www.scorptec.com.au I've come to this setup on the recommendations above, which reduces the cost by around $400 and gets some better equipment in areas whilst scaling back on those that were a bit over the top.

Case: Fractal XL R2
CPU: i5 4670K
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UDH5
GPU: Gigabyte GTX780 Overclocked 3GB
PSU: Antec High Current Pro 750W
Memory: Corsair 16GB (2x8GB) 1600MHz DDR3
SSD: Vertex 256GB 560mb/510mb R/W
HDD: WD Black 2TB, 7200rpm
Optical: Pioneer BDR-208DBKS. Bluray writer

With a AUD $3466 down from $3841

I've also being looking at the Asus PB278Q 27" PLS LED 2560x1440, 5ms Monitor which will drop the price another $176

The UD5H is IMO a bit pricey. Have you looked at the Asus Pro, the ASRock Extreme6 and the Gigabyte OC (the one suggested by Boulard)?

This is a nice PSU and it's cheaper compared to the Antec that is not exactly a great PSU. Besides, if you want to spend more than $200, you can go for this

Now your build is better ! really. Nothing really overpriced in the lot.

AX PSU are pricey to. I paid 109.99$ for my HX750 but if you buy as a whole, you wont be looking/waiting for good deal as i do.

As for the MB, i like the UD5, it's a feature rich board for an OK price.

The vertex you choose is a Vertex 4 i guess ?

Just get this Rosewill 750W Capstone 80+ Gold for $70 AR. There is no reason to spend that much on a sub 1000W PSU.

ilovecats said:

Just get this Rosewill 750W Capstone 80+ Gold for $70 AR. There is no reason to spend that much on a sub 1000W PSU.

Click to expand...

He's from Australia.

What's your speaker setup? That determines whether you'll see a benefit from the sound card or not.

Are you actually going to burn Blurays? Combo drives (read Bluray, read and write CD/DVD) are usually a good bit cheaper.

This is from pccasegear.com. All prices are in AUD. Way cheaper, same performance.

Monitor: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Achieva-...pt=AU_comp_monitor&hash=item1c341f7718&_uhb=1

So I've been mixing and matching many parts taking into consideration the recommendations you nice fellows at OC.com have made, and have come up with this list which I'll order in a couple of days and hopefully it'll be waiting for me when I get home.



@Knufire, thanks for the link to pccasegear.com their prices are generally a little cheaper then scorptecs with a better range. They actually have a pre-built system on their front page which is very similar to the specs you chose and comes in a little cheaper.

I don't have any PC speakers yet though if it does get hooked up to the home theatre setup I have a Sony Muteki 6.2 system which isn't super good gear but does a real good job of shaking the walls, not that I can really crank it in the townhouse I currently live in Sydney.

I figured I won't really need the BD writer, I have one in the XPS and have never used it.
The 1TB Black should do me for the moment with the externals I have, and the case has plenty of room to add further HDD's later.

@Hippograf thanks for link on the PSU's that was some good info and I've made the changes.

I looked at the MB's mentioned and finally settled on the Gigabyte OC, though almost went the ASrock.

The only component I didn't want to change was the case, as I'm a big fan of that stealthy understated look of the Fractal R2 and the build quality.

I suppose now I have to start looking at the cooling options

I'd have chosen the MK3, but if you want an high-end PSU the AX series is a prime option.