DJenkins Posted September 29, 2013 Share Posted September 29, 2013 Hey guys, I've finally decided to submit my build here. This thing took quite a while to get going and I still feel is a work in progress but at least it's at a stage where I think the components I've chosen are working the best they can. I'm greedy and wanted this machine to do a bit of everything, which made finding suitable components tricky. I'd like to thank braindeadmac and PunkNugget for their help in setting me on the right path for overclocking and choosing components. There's another guy out there called Tutor who also contributes a lot to these style of builds and I can't forget info@turnpcintomac.com who I first approached about the build in the first stage. RampageDev has also contributed to troubleshooting and I hope he'll work his magic in tidying up my system files soon as well Also I'm going to submit while I'm at the top of the Geekbench 3 list for highest OSX multi-core score... but now that I've said this I doubt it'll last very long!! Specs: EVGA SR-2 motherboard 2 x X5679 CPU with Noctua DH14 coolers 48GB G.Skill Ripjaws Z 1600MHz RAM MSI GTX570 Twin Frozr II GPU driving a 30" Apple cinema display Silverstone Strider ST1500 PSU OCZ 240GB 6Gb/s SSD - OSX 10.8.4 OCZ 120GB 6Gb/s SSD - Media Cache OCZ 240GB PCIe SSD - Windows 7 Areca 1213-4i 8TB RAID 5 - Media Storage Firewire 1394a/b card - Backup HDDs and Edirol FA-66 audio interface with Yamaha HS50M audio monitors Lian Li PC Z-70 tower case Performance: I don't always run overclocked but I've spent a bit of time seeing what the machine was capable of. I was quite happy with the results, even in comparison to what others achieved with higher clocked CPUs like the X5680 and X5690. Note I never torture tested for extensive amounts of time, but did let it run through prime95 OSX for a while and things were cruising along ok. Out of interest I smashed it with prime95 and a demanding Cinema4D render at the same time and not surprisingly that set things crashing down after about 20 minutes or so - both these processes were fighting over 100% resources on all cores simultaneously! Temps never broke 60°C which I thought was great for a system without liquid cooling. The guys with the top OSX Geekbench scores use a method called underclocking, which provides greater CPU performance but limits you to OSX 10.7.3 as the latest operating system. I prefer OSX 10.8 so I went the traditional overclocking route. I also think higher clocked memory would have enabled me to push things further as I had to stay within 1600MHz limits. The scores are: Cinebench 11.5 = 21.96 Geekbench 3 = 35,739 (current highest OSX score) Geekbench 2 = 33,182 (second highest score to braindeadmac using overclocking and latest OSX version, 6th highest overall OSX score) Photos: Note: I'm nowhere near patient enough to sleeve cables to nice colours as my case is closed up and windowless... so some photoshop may have been to make things look a bit nicer for display here Also the tan colour of the Noctua fans leaves a lot to be desired! Anyway I hope you guys like the build. If anyone is thinking of doing the same thing I would suggest doing a lot of research on compatible hardware first. I had a lot of trouble with RAM, firewire and RAID cards at first. The other thing is these SR-2 boards can be difficult to deal with and I'm still convinced I got one with extra demons inside so make sure you have a lot of patience! Thanks for looking. 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BALDY_MAN Posted September 29, 2013 Share Posted September 29, 2013 GREAT BUILD well done Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJenkins Posted October 4, 2013 Author Share Posted October 4, 2013 GREAT BUILD well done Thanks man of baldyness! Damn build bug makes me still want to try more things & new machines though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabio1971 Posted October 4, 2013 Share Posted October 4, 2013 Great job Fabio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mountainleo Posted October 5, 2013 Share Posted October 5, 2013 No Cable Management .... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJenkins Posted October 8, 2013 Author Share Posted October 8, 2013 No Cable Management .... The board is actually too tall/far away from the PSU for the cables to reach around the back. Doesn't really bother me though, the case is always closed up. Not the tidiest operation but thought I'd share anyway to show there are some 12 core workhorses out there kicking ass Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mountainleo Posted October 8, 2013 Share Posted October 8, 2013 Cable Extentions ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJenkins Posted October 9, 2013 Author Share Posted October 9, 2013 Cable Extentions ? hmmm even looks to be some nice pre-sleeved ones out there that go with my Silverstone PSU. Thanks for the tip off - just don't tell anyone I didn't sleeve them myself I might add this whole affair has been my first time diving inside a computer case so I'm willing to admit there's still plenty to learn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mountainleo Posted October 9, 2013 Share Posted October 9, 2013 With sleeved Cables behind the Motherboard Tray would be nice Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BALDY_MAN Posted October 12, 2013 Share Posted October 12, 2013 i think its still a great build. its a lot of work to get the board working in osx and i myself in the past have left cable management till last as a custom build is always evolving and the wallet shinking Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allan Posted December 3, 2013 Share Posted December 3, 2013 Perfect!! Very Beautiful!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KOSTY Posted December 5, 2013 Share Posted December 5, 2013 Amazing ! Congratulation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabio1971 Posted December 16, 2013 Share Posted December 16, 2013 Congrats DJenkins Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts