My Phantom 630 Rig

[BileMonkey]

Hi guys, have finally finished my first new 'proper' rig in about 5 years. It's been up and running a week or two now but I'd been awaiting a few extra parts to finish the build off. For the last couple of years I've been a bit nomadic and so had been gaming on an MSI Laptop (recommended on this site), which had served me pretty well to be honest, but it was starting to show its age with the latest games and, well, it's not "your" rig unless you build it from scratch. Anyway, I've finally settled down and it felt about time to build something a bit shiny shiny. I had a reasonable budget but as always, you keep finding a way to justify something that little bit more expensive and in the end I had to draw a line in the sand. Hence the i5 in a build where you may expect an i7. I'm getting married in October and if I'd spent any more money on this (let alone time - it took weeks to plan exactly what I wanted) I think the missus would have made me a eunuch.

Upon first build I'd been a bit pikey with case fans and had recycled the stock cooler fans and some old fans from the misssus' build in to case. The problem was that some of the old fans were super noisy and I had to run the case's integrated controller at it's lowest setting. So, I swapped all the case fans bar the 200mm side panel fan and the two 200mm top fans for Corsair AF140 quiet editions. I can now run at the mid-setting near enough silent and the high-setting is perfectly tolerable. Well worth the upgrade.

Other than gaming, the rig is mainly used for Photoshop and video editing. An i7 would have been nice for video editing, but with DaVinci Resolve and Prem. Pro being well GPU accelerated these days I can't say as I've ever 'missed' the extra hyper-threading.

Anyway, this is my new baby :wub:

The specs:

CPU: Intel i5 4670K @ 4.2GHz
CPU COOLER: NZXT Kraken X60, fans swapped out to 140mm Akasa Vipers as stock fans far too noisy.
RAM:32GB Corsair Dominator Plat. 1833MHz @ 9-9-9-27-175
MOBO: MSI Z87 GD65
GPU: 2x nVidia GTX780 in SLI
HDD1: Crucial M500 480GB
HDD2:3 x 1TB Seagate Barracuda in matrix RAID (1TB RAID0 and 1.2TB RAID5)
Case: NZXT Phantom 630
Cooling: 6xAF140quiets and 3x200mm NZXTs (1 side-panel, 2 top)
PSU: Corsair AX680
SCREEN1: Dell 2713HM
SCREEN2: Dell 2407WFP
KBD: MS Natural (not very "gaming" but I've used MS Naturals for the last 15 years and wouldn't use anything else now, they're just so comfy to type on).
MOUSE: RAT 7
GAMEPADS: Razer Nostromo and Wired XBox 360 Controller

Pics:

 

[WillSK]

very nice looking rig mate. I'm getting a 630 at some point this week (also in gunmetal grey). How did you find building in it?

 

[BileMonkey]

Thanks WillSK! It's a really nice case to build with. One of the 200mm fans had come DoA, but NZXT UK shipped a replacement out to me when contacted. Other than that it was flawless. There's TONS of room for cable management around the back of the MoBo tray, and the modular HDD bays are super-simple to get how you want them. Only thing to be aware of is that if you add extra fans you may need to get extension cables to run them to the on-board controller. The cables on the Corsair AF140s were very short and needed them. All in all it's a really roomy, simple case to build with.

 

[WillSK]

Thanks WillSK! It's a really nice case to build with. One of the 200mm fans had come DoA, but NZXT UK shipped a replacement out to me when contacted. Other than that it was flawless. There's TONS of room for cable management around the back of the MoBo tray, and the modular HDD bays are super-simple to get how you want them. Only thing to be aware of is that if you add extra fans you may need to get extension cables to run them to the on-board controller. The cables on the Corsair AF140s were very short and needed them. All in all it's a really roomy, simple case to build with.

thanks for letting me know. did you keep the side 200 or have you moved that up to the top along with the other 200mm? Also what are your thoughts regarding the fan hinge to blow air on the gpus. do you find it improves temps?

 

[BileMonkey]

In the end I kept the side intake 200mm but moved the front one to the top for two in the roof. I replaced the front 200mm with 2x140s as the latter shifts more air and the 200mm sat a little low to get good airflow over the HDDs in that position. If you mount bottom fans and run a single GPU I think the angled fan is unnecessary. With two GPUs the top one runs a couple of degrees cooler with it in place. It's not a huge difference TBH, but every little helps. The top card was 8°C warmer under load than the bottom one without it, and 6°C warmer under load with it (with it angled a bit, too). Really, I need to fabricate some kind of shroud for it to channel airflow from the angled fan into the top GPU a bit more effectively.

 

[Xavi C]

Awesome build, congratulations! Only comments, tidy up GPUs' power cables and that thin cord from the cooler

 

[Feronix]

Nice rig and cable management, though the PWM cable could be hidden a tad better and I'm not a big fan of the lack of colour scheme.

 

[TheRamJam]

Those Intel & Corsair stickers spoil the front of the case IMO.

What was your reasons for the nVidia GTX770's?? MSI do a nice GTX770 OC which would have matched your motherboard perfectly

Otherwise a nice clean tidy build

 

[chiewleong]

very nice build. I'm thinking getting one in this month. now i'm considering this case and the phanteks enthoo primo... currently, i'm using shinobi xl...
one question, will XSPC AX360 can fit on the top of the case? if not, I might consider ex360 at the top or rx240 at the bottom, even maybe AIO WC kit like swiftech h220.
thanks in advance.

 

[BileMonkey]

Only comments, tidy up GPUs' power cables and that thin cord from the cooler

Nice rig and cable management, though the PWM cable could be hidden a tad better and I'm not a big fan of the lack of colour scheme.

Thanks guys. That PWM cable bugs me, too, but not sure what to do with it as it plugs in an inch or two from the cooler. I suppose I could pluck up the courage to shorten it? <eek>

GPU cables are also a bit messy. Each modular cable has 2x 6+2pin connectors, so there's that spare loop of cable on each one. Maybe the easy solution there is to get some Braided replacements as I'm pretty sure Corsair do them. Or at least some braided extensions. Should be a simple fix that one.

The lack of colour scheme is something else I'm toying with, too. I don't want to lose the Akasa Vipers as they're performing brilliantly, are quiet, and good 140mm radiator fans are still quite rare. Re-colouring the blades red would be the answer there. Then it's the GEFORCE GTX logos on the cards. I've seen a few mods on this site, some more successful than others, to deal with them so might give it a crack.

Those Intel & Corsair stickers spoil the front of the case IMO.

What was your reasons for the nVidia GTX770's?? MSI do a nice GTX770 OC which would have matched your motherboard perfectly

Agree re:the stickers. Will lose them. It's just kind of a force of habit to stick cr@p like that on I suppose. At least I avoided the MSI Gaming Shield, that thing was enormous.

The cards are MSI GTX780s, I don't think they had their TwinFrozr ones out when I first placed the order, but in any case running SLI meant getting ones with reference coolers, otherwise the top one cooks. I know what you mean about the looks, though, the MSI red and black of the gaming series cards looks proper mint against the GD motherboards. I do quite like the stock coolers, though, they look nicely industrial, just a shame you can't set the light colour like you can on the Kraken.

Thanks for all the feedback guys, some food for thought there, and some encouragement to do some more tinkering

 

[BileMonkey]

very nice build. I'm thinking getting one in this month. now i'm considering this case and the phanteks enthoo primo... currently, i'm using shinobi xl...
one question, will XSPC AX360 can fit on the top of the case? if not, I might consider ex360 at the top or rx240 at the bottom, even maybe AIO WC kit like swiftech h220.
thanks in advance.

A 360 should fit in the top no problem, but not in the roof section. There probably won't be enough motherboard mosfet HS clearance to run it push pull unless it's a seriously thin radiator. You'd fit the rad inside the main area above the mobo and the 3*120 fans will sit in the roof area. You'll also lose use of the top optical bay slot, but that's not likely a bigee unless you need the three spare bays for on of those drive bay XSPC units AND absolutely need an internal optical as well. Also, you'd get a 240 in the front OR the bottom, but not both, but with the 240 in the bottom you can still run 2x140 fans in the front as well, whereas with a front 240 you'd only get one more 140 in the bottom.

Cheers,

Lee.

 

[chiewleong]

I see. thanks for clearing my doubts on this casing. I like this case so much.
so, no push and pull config at the top, only pull config.
thanks a lot. now, reconsidering my choice of casing, either continue using shinobi XL or waiting for phanteks enthoo primo....