James' PCs
Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 7:59 pm
As some of you may know from the 'Let's see your computer' thread , one of my biggest hobbies besides my Cavs is computers. I got my first PC in the summer of 1998; it was a Pentium II 350MHz with a voodoo 1 'graphics accelerator', 64MB of RAM, a whopping 2GB hard drive with Windows 98 all housed in a fabulously 90's looking beige case. Since then I've been hooked on the hobby and I spend quite a fair chunk of my spare time on them.
Rather than clog up the aforementioned thread, I thought I'd start one just for my PCs similar to a WIP thread that I can add too over time.
So without further explanation, these are my current PCs. (You may notice I like to name them after Red Dwarf characters. )
'Holly-III' The Main Rig:
Out of the PC's I currently own, this is the one I've had the longest. It has had so many upgrades since 2008 when I first bought it that I believe almost every component has been replaced apart from the CPU, motherboard, DVD drive and RAM. It had a major upgrade in 2012 when I replaced the case, put in an SSD (my first), a new storage HDD, new GPU and for the first time upgraded to Windows 7. Since then I have majorly reworked the cooling, upgraded the GPU again and worked on the internal ascetics with better cable management including replacing the orange TX750 with a blue HX750.
Just to show off how many tweaks I do to my PCs over time, here it is in 2012:
Just 7 months ago:
And here it is now:
This is the one I use the most and I use it for everything; web browsing, watching Blu-ray movies, gaming (yes it's still decent for most games) and for work.
Full specs:
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9650 @ 4GHz (445MHz FSB x9 multi)
Asus Rampage Formula x48 motherboard
Zotac GeForce GTX 960
8GB (4x2GB) Corsair Dominator DDR2 RAM @ 1066Mhz 5-5-5-15 T1
Corsair HX750w PSU
Noctua NH-D15
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium HD
Asus Xonar D1 (yes, 2 sound cards, 1 for each OS)
Asus PCE-N15 wireless card
120GB Corsair Force GT SSD - Windows 7 Pro 64 bit
Seagate Barracuda 3TB HDD - Windows XP Pro
SONY DVD RW
Samsung Blu-Ray RW
Cooler Master Silencio 550 case
3x Cooler Master Excalibur fans + Akasa Fan Controller Jr
'Hudzen-10' The Gaming PC
This is the PC I built primarily for Gaming in the Summer of 2014. After 6 years of service, my Q9650 was finally showing it's age in games and it was time to upgrade. I didn't want the hassle of upgrading the CPU, motherboard, RAM and reinstalling windows on Holly so I built a whole new PC. Apart from the GTX 760 which was carried over from Holly, everything was new. Since first building it, I have already upgraded the GPU, SSD and added more RAM. I've also added in a wireless card.
Full specs:
Intel i5 4690k @ 4.5GHz
Asus Maximus VII Ranger motherboard
EVGA GeForce GTX 970 ACX2.0+
16GB (2x8GB) Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3 RAM @ 2400MHz 11-13-13-31 T1
Corsair AX860i PSU
Corsair Hydro H110
Creative Sound Blaster ZXR
Asus PCE-AC56 wireless card
250GB Samsung 850 evo SSD - Windows 10 Pro 64 bit
2TB Seagate Barracuda HDD
Pioneer DVD RW
Corsair Carbide 500r case
Corsair 140mm fan
'Kryten' The Retro Rig
One of my favourite eras of PC gaming was the early to mid 2000s, so many fantastic games came out around that time. Unfortunately I missed a large chunk of the games from that time mainly due to temporarily migrating to a console (PS2) and lack of funds for a new PC at the time (I was still on a 2GHz Pentium 4 and a NVidia 6200 until 2006). Quake 4, Bioshock 1 and 2, DOOM 3, Unreal 2, Unreal Tournament 2003/4, Prey, F.E.A.R, Rise of Nations, (I could go on) are all games I missed at the time and wanted to try out. There were also many games that I had played and wanted to play again, this time around with all the graphics set to max in order to get the best experience from them. Unfortunately, many of these games have problems running on the latest hardware and operating systems. Features like EAX sound effects are troublesome to enable and don't always work and some games like Axis and Allies (2004) simply will not run properly on new hardware due to lack of support. There was only one thing for it, build a dedicated rig!
I'm particularly proud of how this PC turned out. For once I got it right first time both in terms of performance and looks and I had no problems building it:
Full Specs:
Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 @ 4.25Ghz (425MHz FSB x10 multi)
Asus Maximums II Formula motherboard
XFX GeForce 7950GT 512MB (soon to be SLI)
4GB (2x2GB) Corsair Dominator DDR2 RAM @ 1066Mhz 5-5-5-15 T1
Corsair RM850 PSU
Cooler Master Hyper 212evo
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite Pro
2x 1TB Seagate Barracuda HDD in RAID 0 - Windows XP Pro
Pioneer DVD RW
3.5" floppy drive
Corsair Carbide 300r windowed case
2x corsair 120mm AF fans, 2x standard corsair 140mm fans, 1x Noctua NF-A15
'Queeg-500-III' The LAN box
So for the last 3 years or so I've been going to LAN parties almost every week with my mates. up until now I've been taking Hudzen-10 or Holly for this. Only problem is that disconnecting a PC, putting it on the back seat of a Cavalier, driving 10 miles, unpacking it and setting it up only to take it down again and repeat the process every week does take it's toll on the case and the internal hardware. Not to mention it's a big risk moving around £1000+ worth of hardware. My solution? Build a dedicated rig of course! Allot of the components I salvaged from my previous second PC which died on me last year, Queeg-500-II. (now you see how the naming scheme works!) a couple of components were new and the rest was all bought for as little money as possible on eBay.
I've had a few problems with this one. At the beginning of the month, the WD black hard drive died and had to be sent back to the manufacturer. When I was building it I thought the mobo was broken as it wouldn't boot. It took me ages of swapping out components to finally work out that it was a dead i5 750 CPU, oh well, ended up replacing it with a i7 870 so not too bad. Overall though I'm really impressed with the performance of this PC. Considering how little it cost me it gives Hudzen-10 a run for it's money in games.
Full specs:
Intel i7 870 @ 4.0Ghz (200MHz BCLK x9 multi) (eBay)
Asus Maximus III Formula motherboard (eBay)
EVGA Geforce GTX 760 ACX (originally from Holly then Hudzen-10)
8GB (2x4GB) Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3 RAM @ 2400MHz 11-13-13-31 T1 (originally from Hudzen-10)
Corsair TX750w PSU (originally from Holly then Queeg-500-II)
Corsair Hydro H80i GT (New)
Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty Pro (eBay)
Asus PCE-N10 (originally from Queeg-500-II)
240GB SanDisk Ultra Plus (originally from Hudzen-10) - Windows 7 + XP dual boot
1TB Western Digital Black (originally from Queeg-500-II)
Pioneer DVD RW (originally from Queeg-500-II)
Generic Novatech crap box case (originally from Holly then Queeg-500-II)
2x Noctua NF-R8 80mm fans (originally from Queeg-500-II)
As you can see most of these components are hand me downs from PC's that have been upgraded.
These PC's represent literally 1000s of hours of work over many years and they reflect my passion for PC hardware and the community.
Now you've seen my PC's I want to see yours, feel free to start your own PC WIP thread and show off your other pride and joy!
Happy computing!
Rather than clog up the aforementioned thread, I thought I'd start one just for my PCs similar to a WIP thread that I can add too over time.
So without further explanation, these are my current PCs. (You may notice I like to name them after Red Dwarf characters. )
'Holly-III' The Main Rig:
Out of the PC's I currently own, this is the one I've had the longest. It has had so many upgrades since 2008 when I first bought it that I believe almost every component has been replaced apart from the CPU, motherboard, DVD drive and RAM. It had a major upgrade in 2012 when I replaced the case, put in an SSD (my first), a new storage HDD, new GPU and for the first time upgraded to Windows 7. Since then I have majorly reworked the cooling, upgraded the GPU again and worked on the internal ascetics with better cable management including replacing the orange TX750 with a blue HX750.
Just to show off how many tweaks I do to my PCs over time, here it is in 2012:
Just 7 months ago:
And here it is now:
This is the one I use the most and I use it for everything; web browsing, watching Blu-ray movies, gaming (yes it's still decent for most games) and for work.
Full specs:
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9650 @ 4GHz (445MHz FSB x9 multi)
Asus Rampage Formula x48 motherboard
Zotac GeForce GTX 960
8GB (4x2GB) Corsair Dominator DDR2 RAM @ 1066Mhz 5-5-5-15 T1
Corsair HX750w PSU
Noctua NH-D15
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium HD
Asus Xonar D1 (yes, 2 sound cards, 1 for each OS)
Asus PCE-N15 wireless card
120GB Corsair Force GT SSD - Windows 7 Pro 64 bit
Seagate Barracuda 3TB HDD - Windows XP Pro
SONY DVD RW
Samsung Blu-Ray RW
Cooler Master Silencio 550 case
3x Cooler Master Excalibur fans + Akasa Fan Controller Jr
'Hudzen-10' The Gaming PC
This is the PC I built primarily for Gaming in the Summer of 2014. After 6 years of service, my Q9650 was finally showing it's age in games and it was time to upgrade. I didn't want the hassle of upgrading the CPU, motherboard, RAM and reinstalling windows on Holly so I built a whole new PC. Apart from the GTX 760 which was carried over from Holly, everything was new. Since first building it, I have already upgraded the GPU, SSD and added more RAM. I've also added in a wireless card.
Full specs:
Intel i5 4690k @ 4.5GHz
Asus Maximus VII Ranger motherboard
EVGA GeForce GTX 970 ACX2.0+
16GB (2x8GB) Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3 RAM @ 2400MHz 11-13-13-31 T1
Corsair AX860i PSU
Corsair Hydro H110
Creative Sound Blaster ZXR
Asus PCE-AC56 wireless card
250GB Samsung 850 evo SSD - Windows 10 Pro 64 bit
2TB Seagate Barracuda HDD
Pioneer DVD RW
Corsair Carbide 500r case
Corsair 140mm fan
'Kryten' The Retro Rig
One of my favourite eras of PC gaming was the early to mid 2000s, so many fantastic games came out around that time. Unfortunately I missed a large chunk of the games from that time mainly due to temporarily migrating to a console (PS2) and lack of funds for a new PC at the time (I was still on a 2GHz Pentium 4 and a NVidia 6200 until 2006). Quake 4, Bioshock 1 and 2, DOOM 3, Unreal 2, Unreal Tournament 2003/4, Prey, F.E.A.R, Rise of Nations, (I could go on) are all games I missed at the time and wanted to try out. There were also many games that I had played and wanted to play again, this time around with all the graphics set to max in order to get the best experience from them. Unfortunately, many of these games have problems running on the latest hardware and operating systems. Features like EAX sound effects are troublesome to enable and don't always work and some games like Axis and Allies (2004) simply will not run properly on new hardware due to lack of support. There was only one thing for it, build a dedicated rig!
I'm particularly proud of how this PC turned out. For once I got it right first time both in terms of performance and looks and I had no problems building it:
Full Specs:
Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 @ 4.25Ghz (425MHz FSB x10 multi)
Asus Maximums II Formula motherboard
XFX GeForce 7950GT 512MB (soon to be SLI)
4GB (2x2GB) Corsair Dominator DDR2 RAM @ 1066Mhz 5-5-5-15 T1
Corsair RM850 PSU
Cooler Master Hyper 212evo
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite Pro
2x 1TB Seagate Barracuda HDD in RAID 0 - Windows XP Pro
Pioneer DVD RW
3.5" floppy drive
Corsair Carbide 300r windowed case
2x corsair 120mm AF fans, 2x standard corsair 140mm fans, 1x Noctua NF-A15
'Queeg-500-III' The LAN box
So for the last 3 years or so I've been going to LAN parties almost every week with my mates. up until now I've been taking Hudzen-10 or Holly for this. Only problem is that disconnecting a PC, putting it on the back seat of a Cavalier, driving 10 miles, unpacking it and setting it up only to take it down again and repeat the process every week does take it's toll on the case and the internal hardware. Not to mention it's a big risk moving around £1000+ worth of hardware. My solution? Build a dedicated rig of course! Allot of the components I salvaged from my previous second PC which died on me last year, Queeg-500-II. (now you see how the naming scheme works!) a couple of components were new and the rest was all bought for as little money as possible on eBay.
I've had a few problems with this one. At the beginning of the month, the WD black hard drive died and had to be sent back to the manufacturer. When I was building it I thought the mobo was broken as it wouldn't boot. It took me ages of swapping out components to finally work out that it was a dead i5 750 CPU, oh well, ended up replacing it with a i7 870 so not too bad. Overall though I'm really impressed with the performance of this PC. Considering how little it cost me it gives Hudzen-10 a run for it's money in games.
Full specs:
Intel i7 870 @ 4.0Ghz (200MHz BCLK x9 multi) (eBay)
Asus Maximus III Formula motherboard (eBay)
EVGA Geforce GTX 760 ACX (originally from Holly then Hudzen-10)
8GB (2x4GB) Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3 RAM @ 2400MHz 11-13-13-31 T1 (originally from Hudzen-10)
Corsair TX750w PSU (originally from Holly then Queeg-500-II)
Corsair Hydro H80i GT (New)
Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty Pro (eBay)
Asus PCE-N10 (originally from Queeg-500-II)
240GB SanDisk Ultra Plus (originally from Hudzen-10) - Windows 7 + XP dual boot
1TB Western Digital Black (originally from Queeg-500-II)
Pioneer DVD RW (originally from Queeg-500-II)
Generic Novatech crap box case (originally from Holly then Queeg-500-II)
2x Noctua NF-R8 80mm fans (originally from Queeg-500-II)
As you can see most of these components are hand me downs from PC's that have been upgraded.
These PC's represent literally 1000s of hours of work over many years and they reflect my passion for PC hardware and the community.
Now you've seen my PC's I want to see yours, feel free to start your own PC WIP thread and show off your other pride and joy!
Happy computing!