Sabertooth X58 - 2 Questions

[Illydth]

glad to hear you are up and running. Did you already switch to the marvell controller? If if is not needed i would keep everything on the Intel one. currently you are not going to gain much performance out of the marvell controller, and the intel one works faster (from what i can tell with my setup) though it will not hurt anything to run on the marvell.

I haven't switched anything over, I'm at work now so I won't be able to play till after 10 CST tonight.

If there's even a chance that the Intel controller + RAID will cause the SSD to have a shorter life span then I'm going to bite the bullet and move the SSD over to the Marvel controller where I know nothing else is and AHCI is enabled. I've read the tests on the Marvel and I know it sucks from a controller perspective (though one test I was reading was only showing it crappy with RAID drives), but how much worse could it be for a single SSD drive right?

As of last night I ONLY got Windows installed and updates applied before I hit bed (was up till 4 that morning specing component parts so by Midnight when I started software installation I was bushed) so it's not like I'm losing more than about 30 minutes of work to reinstall this thing. (I did get BIOS updated to 8.02 so at least I've got the most recent on the ASUS board).

Funny Story:

Spent all day screwing with the installation (teaching the kids while putting the computer together basically doubles the time it takes), so by about 9 last night I got the rig down to my office and plugged it up (Keyboard, Mouse, Network, Single Monitor...the most basic config I could work with) and hit the power switch. Both kids, having been "involved" all day watching and "working" with me on the build (and my wife who's jealous as hell right now

) were down there watching.

Now, I'm WELL known for having the worst luck in the world, computer wise or otherwise. I've got friends who I've worked with in the past on builds who WILL NOT let me touch any new builds they do other than to watch...they consider me CURSED. This is about the 5th or 6th build I've done in the last 15 years so I'm pretty experienced at this sort of thing...except that I can't remember ONE build I've done in the last 10 that has POSTed right off the bat...due to one thing or the other.

So here they're standing in my office as I punch the power button. Fans spin up across the board, LED's come on...

Screen Stays blank. For like 5 seconds...monitor's flashing it's "no signal" light at me...I'm sitting there staring at this thing going "You have 2 more seconds to come on before I pack you up and haul you to a computer chop shop and have them POST you cause I'm NOT dealing with ANOTHER failed component..."...The wife's got this "I knew this was going to happen, see you in two weeks" smirk on her face....

And then the monitor pops on and BIOS shows.

Doesn't sound like much but a "first try POST" for me is pretty good..

Now, If I can just install the Silver Arrow tonight WITHOUT mucking up something...

--Illydth

 

[Mumbles37]

Congrats on the successful first POST

That PC is going to be a beast! The Silver Arrow is a great cooler, too.

I've got my SSD on the Marvel controller, works perfectly.

 

[ShortAlieN]

haha, yeah. good deal man. I am currently a big fan of the sabertooth board. It has been really successful for many people that I know, including me. cant wait to see the pics.

 

[Illydth]

*whew*

So I have the silver arrow installed and the SSD moved over to the Marvel controller...the last "inside" work should be done.

Couple pieces of FYI for anyone using an ASUS Sabertooth X-58 Motherboard, Thermalright Silver Arrow (I suspect the NH-D14 as well since they look REALLY BLOODY FAMILIAR to each other), and the Antec DF-85 Case...if you are not using all three of these, your mileage may vary. (hopefully Google indexes this post correctly).

(Linking the DF-85 so that everyone can see the specs/size of the case to compare to their chosen case).

http://www.newegg.co...N82E16811129087

The Cooler itself, will install JUST FINE in the case..the COOLER is tall and big, but not so tall and big that it won't fit within the case specs...

Not so the fans!

There are two problems with the Thermalright Silver Arrow installing into this case:

FIRST:

With the stock 140 MM fans that ship with the Silver Arrow (again, I suspect the NH-D14 is the same) the case DOES NOT PROPERLY CLOSE. Now, this is only by a few millimeters or so. You can squeeze the case side into the frame and get room enough to screw in the thumb screw to close the case up. There IS a VERY MINOR amount of warping that this will cause to your external case wall...it's not visible looking down the side, but it is there. What this will do to the fans, clips, or cooler long term, I have no idea. The case side touches the FANS (held on by the retaining clips) and NOT the Cooler itself. Case width on the DF-85 is 8.40" according to spec...I would be looking for at least 8.60" and probably 8.75" to allow the door to close properly.

On the good news side: however, the cooler DOES NOT interfere with the optional side fan slot on the DF-85 case, that fan will sit several inches below where the Silver Arrow sits on the CPU to blow over the graphics cards unobstructed.

EDIT -- LATER

Leaving the above so people can learn from my stupidity.

So regarding this first problem I seem to be an idiot. I failed to realize that the fan's aren't exactly "Circular" in design. The external casing of the fans have a "flat" side to them (sort of like a figure 8 with the sides cut down straight where the dips on either side are). If you install the fans with the flat side facing out toward your side wall the extra "height" from the fans will pretty much disappear and all will install properly, and the case does close.

That said, I DO NOT recommend a case UNDER 8.4" wide to install the Silver Arrow. There's only a few mm of space between the case wall and the fan top, so any less width to your case and you'll either have to do without a side wall or bend/mod your case. When I took the case side off this time around (to re-do the SATA connectors) I noted that the frontmost fin tower was being fractionally bent by the pressure the side wall of the case put onto the fan in the prior config...I wonder if over time it'd have cracked the heat pipe? *shudder*.

Anyway, the first "problem" is actually not a problem if you watch the fan orientation in the clips.

END EDIT

SECOND:

With the fans in place you CANNOT orient the Silver Arrow on the CPU so that the fan on the outside of the Silver Arrow (the one not in between the fin towers) is over the memory chips (Corsair Vengeance 3x4GB). The Vengeance stock heat spreaders are too tall to allow the Silver Arrow to seat down onto the CPU...by a lot. I actually question whether even WITHOUT the heat spreader on the chips whether the Silver Arrow would seat. Chips are in slots DIMM_A1, DIMM_B1, DIMM_C1 (according to ASUS Sabertooth Manual) and I suspect that AT LEAST DIMM_A1 and A2 would be blocked by the fan, with the potential for DIMM_B2 to be blocked as well.

While I'm sure people will scream about this, I have the fans oriented so that I have one closest to the back case fans and one in the middle (blowing toward the back of the case of course) so that the heat from the sink is blowing directly out toward the back case fan which is then blowing out of the case. I'd say there's about a half inch of room between the back case fan and the CPU Cooling fan.

The problem, obviously, is that the fin tower closest to the RAM chips is getting only PULL heat removal...there's no fan actively blowing the heat away from these fins (other than the airflow through the case itself). I suspect this will make my setup somewhat significantly warmer than it would otherwise be.but using the very scientific test of putting my hand into the case between the front of the case and the "front" fin tower (the one closest to the RAM slots), I can feel air blowing toward the fin tower (I assume from the front of the case) so there's going to be at least SOME cooling going on there.

All this said, I've got to say that while the thing looked ugly as SIN coming out of the box, there's DEFINITELY something very cool looking to that cooler sitting in the case with it closed up through the window.

And in case anyone wonders:

Idle Temp according to BIOS just after booting up with the STOCK Intel cooler: 38-39C CPU

Idle Temp according to BIOS just after booting up with the Silver Arrow cooler: 31-32C CPU.

Yea, that's a difference.

--Illydth

 

[ShortAlieN]

sounds like you're having fun.

 

[Illydth]

Heh, Stock speeds, no OC at this point:

Windows experience index: 7.5....

CPU / RAM: 7.5 (RAM running at 1066 which is well below the 1600 it's rated at.)

Graphics and Hard Disk Data Transfer: 7.7.

Worth every penny.

--Illydth

 

[S_I_N]

Processor AMD Phenom(tm) II X6 1090T

Determined by lowest subscore

Processor 7.5 7.5

Memory (RAM) 4.00 GB 7.5

Graphics NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti 7.9

Gaming graphics 2815 MB Total available graphics memory 7.9

Primary hard disk 63GB Free (74GB Total) 7.8

hehehe I got my 1090t installed today and I was able to save an assload on the washer and dryer purchase so I jetted to Best Buy and got an SSD as well. I'm pleased as well. Now if I can just find the multi option in the bios I'll get to oc'n but its looking like even though I have a BE processor maybe this mobo doesnt give multi control

 

[yuri04]

Which motherboard are we talking about here?

the Asus Crosshair IV? if so, check the Extreme Tweaker menu, there should be a CPU Ratio option there, which is the multi.

It's also in the manual (3.3)

 

[Illydth]

Wait...how the H, E Double Hockey Sticks do you have 63G of 74G total free on your primary HD? There's NO WAY you have Windows 7 installed into 10G of space...and if you do start sharing your secrets my friend!.

(Of course you're likely to come back and tell me this is a Linux box, in which case i congratulate you on your fine choice of operating system.

)

--Illydth

 

[Illydth]

So one more fast question:

Anyone know of a good place to get the X58 MOBO's S/PDIF interface? I JUST realized that if I stay with onboard sound (any real reason I shouldn't on this board?) the one thing I CAN'T do is plug my Coaxial cable into the board (I don't think...I believe that's one of the two ports that the S/PDIF header gives you?).

I admit I haven't looked at sound through the Manual yet so I might have a header for the Coaxial (Digital) cable to my 5.1 system, but I believe I need the S/PDIF header for that right? And if so, anyone know a good place to get one? (I guess there's always e-bay).

--Illydth

 

[S_I_N]

no my friend I am running win7 pro 64bit. I was amazed as well I am totally updated and all (well except sp1) but I havent installed anything else other than Microsoft Security Essentials Windows Live Moonlight and Firefox so far. All I have done so far is follow a few tweak guides that disables this and that and removes unwanted features. I have been saving files to my storage raid but thats nothing but downloaded drivers and such.