TR Forums

TML wrote:

RAM - $120 2x8 GiB PC3-12800 Crucial BLS8G3D1609DS1S00 (DDR3-1600, CAS 9, 1.5 V)

That looks like a good deal to me. Otherwise, I'd suggest this low-profile 2x8 GiB kit.

I am curious what caused you to choose the Fractal Designs Node 304 case over the Silverstone Sugo SG08.

Are you going to use the stock Intel CPU cooler?

JustAnEngineer wrote:

I am curious what caused you to choose the Fractal Designs Node 304 case over the Silverstone Sugo SG08.

Are you going to use the stock Intel CPU cooler?

The Fractal Node close in size, and I could get the case plus a decent PSU for significantly less ($150 all in) than the $200 for the sg08. Plus the PSU in the SG08 is custom to that case. The Node has more internal drive bays as well, so all-in-all, the Node 304 allows more flexibility going forward.

Yes, I am going to use the stock cooler, at least for now.

TML wrote:

JustAnEngineer wrote:

What caused you to choose the Fractal Designs Node 304 case over the Silverstone Sugo SG08?

The Fractal Node is close in size.

19.6 liters vs. 14.8 liters = 32% larger.

TML wrote:

The PSU in the SG08 is custom to that case.

viewtopic.php?f=33&t=89213&p=1175598&hilit=#p1175598

In the forum thread to which I twice directed you, I wrote:

If you have to replace the original power supply, the SG08 will accept an ATX or Micro-ATX power supply that is no more than 140 mm (5.51") deep with the standard ATX 150 mm (5.91") width and 86 mm (3.39") height.

TML wrote:

I could get the case plus a decent PSU for significantly less ($150 in all) than the $200 for the sg08. The Node has more internal drive bays as well, so all-in-all, the Node 304 allows more flexibility going forward.

I can agree with these two points.

JustAnEngineer wrote:

19.6 liters vs. 14.8 liters = 32% larger.

Whilst true, this figure is very misleading for most people:

32% more volume is possible with less than a 10% increase in all directions
Something that's 11" wide instead of 10" wide is still "similar", in my humble opinion.

Ignoring that completely though, I like the Node because it looks good.
Form > Function yet again

Thanks for backing me up, Chrispy. I was indeed concerned with linear inches, and did realize that volumetrically, it is significantly larger.

Okay folks, the first bits started trickling in today! Case, PSU, RAM and GPU all arrived. Unfortunately, newegg didn't process the rest of my order in time, so CPU, Mobo and SSD will get here on Monday, despite signing up for ShopRunner's 2 day shipping trial. Oh well...

Here are some pictures to whet your appetite...










Overall, I'm happy with the case in terms of size. I got my hand in there for reference. It doesn't seem too large, but should still give me enough room to work. And 3 sides actually come off for installing all the hardware, so it shouldn't be too difficult in terms of space. Also, it has what appears to be, to my untrained eyes, a massive fan in the back, and plenty of mesh panels that should allow decent airflow. Hopefully I won't have any heat issues. More to come next week...

Eww! Gross! Giant hairy man hands! >_<

Hehe, only serious. The parts look fun, tho! Makes me wish I wasn't so broke I can't even pay attention!

Time to report in about the final build. The final shipment of components arrived on Monday. Mobo, CPU and SSD. See pics below. Everything looked good. I got everything laid out and put up TRs "How to build a PC" video. The build went pretty smoothly for the most part. Notable bumps were installing the cooler (my own idiocy) and just fitting all the cabling in there in a semi-neat manner (see pics). Probably not the best cabling job ya'll have seen, but it should do the trick, and it's cramped in there! I tried to keep the middle space clear as much as possible. I finally got everything in there, plugged it into my TV (more on issues with the TV later...) and plugged it into the wall to boot up. Before I even look to push the start button, the rear fan starts stuttering. Starting BRIEFLY then stopping. Over and over. Also, power on light was blinking. Crap. Talk to Gilligan, who suggest I take out the GPU and see what happens. Everything boots up. The issue seemed to be the order in which the PCI-e power cables were plugged into the GPU, because the two connectors come on the same cord (is this standard?). Anyway, I switched them, and everything works fine. Boots up, I install Win8 to the (GLORIOUS) SSD, and I am operational! Windows boot times are <10s, and I can do a full restart in <15s. The way personal computers were meant to work!

I was basking in the glory of building my first PC, so I didn't notice the mouse lag right away. But when I did, I couldn't get over it. It was TERRIBLE. What the hell is going on? Google searches yield a bunch of "Mouse Lag with Win8" (not 8.1, I won't be updating until that issue is fixed....) hits. I try mouse drivers, Mobo drivers, display drivers, blah blah blah. I went and bought a corded mouse. Mouse lag persists. DAMMIT!!! Again, I turn to Gilligan, who has me turn off legacy USB in BIOS. I don't recommend this unless you are sure you have a PS2 mouse/keyboard lying around. Just leave Legacy USB on, or you won't be able to use USB devices in BIOS, haha. On the verge of re-flashing my BIOS, to fix this issue, I figure out I can use a PS2 adapter with my wireless Logitech S510 keyboard to operate in BIOS, and turn legacy USB back on. That issue is fixed, but mouse/keyboard lag persists. It turns out, its my stupid TV to which this thing is hooked up. Some of you are probably reading this saying "obviously", but to other n00bs out there, your display can really affect this. If I put the TV into "game mode" mouse lag all but disappears. Not as good as going to VGA into the TV (no digital decoding BS on the TV end of things) but almost there, and since my GPU doesn't have a normal VGA output, I will have to use this solution until I can get a DVI>VGA adapter. So FINALLY, I have the PC I wanted!

On to the next issue. What should I do with it? As I said in my initial post, I like FPS games in general. I not only don't care about campaigns in these games, I don't like it. Just multiplayer. Any suggestions? I am also open to other types of games if anyone has any strong opinions. (If I should move this to another thread, let me know)

Anyway, pics below. Thanks again everyone for all your help. It was, and should continue to be, a fun experience goofing around with computer hardware, haha.

TML wrote:

Notable bumps were installing the cooler (my own idiocy)

Always a stumbling block for first-time builders! Not idiocy! It's hard!

TML wrote:

The issue seemed to be the order in which the PCI-e power cables were plugged into the GPU, because the two connectors come on the same cord (is this standard?). Anyway, I switched them, and everything works fine.

Huh, sounds strange. Having two connectors on the same cord is very normal, but switching them shouldn't matter. Seems more likely you had one of them halfway plugged in and reseating them fixed it.

TML wrote:

Boots up, I install Win8 to the (GLORIOUS) SSD, and I am operational! Windows boot times are <10s, and I can do a full restart in <15s. The way personal computers were meant to work!

Hehe. If you really want, you can grab the Windows Performance Toolkit (part of the Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit) and do a few boot traces to make it even faster. If you're really desperate for quicker boot, open MSConfig and enable "No GUI Boot", but this will make you unable to see error messages at boot time.

TML wrote:

That issue is fixed, but mouse/keyboard lag persists. It turns out, its my stupid TV to which this thing is hooked up. Some of you are probably reading this saying "obviously", but to other n00bs out there, your display can really affect this. If I put the TV into "game mode" mouse lag all but disappears. Not as good as going to VGA into the TV (no digital decoding BS on the TV end of things) but almost there, and since my GPU doesn't have a normal VGA output, I will have to use this solution until I can get a DVI>VGA adapter.

I really don't recommend using VGA! It will probably look kind of bad unless you can use a really short cable, and even then...

VGA wasn't really designed to carry resolutions as high as 1920x1080, and it's susceptible to ghosting, blurring, and a whole host of other issues. The REAL solution to your problem is just to get another display. TVs aren't monitors!

TML wrote:

On to the next issue. What should I do with it? As I said in my initial post, I like FPS games in general. I not only don't care about campaigns in these games, I don't like it. Just multiplayer. Any suggestions? I am also open to other types of games if anyone has any strong opinions. (If I should move this to another thread, let me know)

Blacklight: Retribution! Blacklight: Retribution! It's an amazing near-future FPS game with gorgeous DX11 Unreal Engine 3 graphics, and it's totally free! It's also free of "pay 2 win" garbage, because the starter equipment is very good. Just make sure you stay on the "Proving Grounds" servers when you first start.

You can add me ingame if you want; my name is the obvious, preceded by "lunatic hime". (bit of anti-idiot encoding there.)

You might also want to check out Warframe; it's third-person, rather than first-person, but still a fantastic experience and a great test for that shiny new GPU!

Speaking of which, make sure you have your display plugged into your GPU! You might laugh, but a friend of mine paypal'd me $1000 and asked me to build and ship him a PC. This was 2 years ago. I put together a really nice system with a sandy i5 and a GTX 560 Ti, killer stuff. Sent it out to him and he gets it and he's like "it's ok, performance isn't as good as I hoped, but I guess $1000 isn't that much" and I didn't diagnose it because, well, I just wasn't that interested.

Later we start playing TERA Online and he is showing me screenshots and I'm like "why does it look so bad?" and he's like "well it runs really bad so I turned it down." I was like, "what?" and did some investigation -- turns out he had the monitor plugged into the motherboard the whole time. This was like 8 months later.

Yeah. It was a revelation for him.

Grats on your first build!

TML wrote:

On to the next issue. What should I do with it? As I said in my initial post, I like FPS games in general. I not only don't care about campaigns in these games, I don't like it. Just multiplayer. Any suggestions? I am also open to other types of games if anyone has any strong opinions. (If I should move this to another thread, let me know)

Buy BF4. While waiting for it, buy CS:GO - it's cheap. These are the only 2 multiplayer FPS games you should currently bother with, unless you are physically/mentally disabled (nothing is wrong with that, of course), in which case you should wait for "CoD: Ghosts"

Just multiplayer. Any suggestions? I am also open to other types of games if anyone has any strong opinions.

Strong opinion here: Dota2! First you will hate the game. Then you will hate all the other players. Then you will hate yourself. But then there will be a critical point where everything changes, and you will love the game and never want to bother with other multiplayer games.

...or you will have given up during one of the previous steps.

Hating the other players might not ever stop, there are large portions of the community that are just chronic jerks, so be forewarned.

weaktoss wrote:

Strong opinion here: Dota2! First you will hate the game. Then you will hate all the other players. Then you will hate yourself. But then there will be a critical point where everything changes, and you will love the game and never want to bother with other multiplayer games.

I'd strongly caution against jumping into Dota2. Maybe try League of Legends and/or Awesomenauts first. Dota2 is pretty ... uh ... mean.

JohnC wrote:

Buy BF4. While waiting for it, buy CS:GO - it's cheap. These are the only 2 multiplayer FPS games you should currently bother with, unless you are physically/mentally disabled (nothing is wrong with that, of course), in which case you should wait for "CoD: Ghosts" :wink:

Rude! o(≧◇≦ o )

Blacklight: Retribution is way better than CS:GO, while including almost everything that game has. CS:GO doesn't even have aiming! It's a fun game, to be sure, but so retro.

auxy wrote:

CS:GO doesn't even have built-in wallhack! You can also die too fast there and you cannot even pay with real money to get best weapons and attachments for them! And too much teamwork needed!

Fixed that for you

First, you two need to take it to PM.

Second, discussing game attributes is far beyond the gambit of SBA.

Third, TAKE IT ELSEWHERE.

Sorry for shouting.

Thanks for listening.