Post Your Computer Build

I think it remains unclear. I don't think I made it any clearer either.

That's interesting, and if you are recording then probably audio latency does matter to you. To music listeners, it is irrelevant, but it is a number that audiophiles like to play with.

It sounds like the Microsoft experience, by the way, hasn't changed a great deal over the last decade or so: I abandoned it at Windows XP.

 

To be fair to Microsoft (in this case at least) I think combining a just released CPU/Mobo/DDR4/NVME SSD with a barely out of pre-release OS was asking for trouble.

It often takes hardware companies a while to catch up and iron out drivers, just look at Nvidia with Win7.

 

I'd rather not

But Microsoft and the hardware people really should be better at this stuff. It is, after all, the perpetual upgrades that keep them in business to their mutual profit.



(I make no attempt to deny my anti-MS prejudice. It is far too obvious!)

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Well, for the record, I built my new system, installed windows 10, and had zero issues driver or otherwise

 

@Skyline, but to be fair if it's the rig you have listed here, then all those components had been around for quite a while before Win10 was released.

On the other hand I was one of the first UK consumers to get a 6700K (to avoid the shortages), it was sat on my desk for a few weeks before the mobo came out to run it on. The DDR4 was specially tuned for Skylake instead of X99, and I also had one of the first to get the NVMe based M.2 drive. All very new techs that arrived at the same time windows 10 did.

Edit: I'd previously been running a Lynnfield based i5 750 machine (overclocked by 1GHz) for the last 5 years, so I was keen for an upgrade.

 

When I saw the mess Samsung was making out of NVMe support and I saw the AHCI SM951 was already available I just decided to steer clear of the former... To be fair if I'd been building a couple months later I would've gone with the 950 Pro too, cause warranty, and actual promise of support... But still, if I had cash to burn I'd just get an U.2 750 from Intel. No sweating thermals, drivers, or Samsung's whim.

 

I remember thinking very much along those same lines at the time. I almost pulled the trigger on the 951 but decided to calm myself and wait for more info.

I think the 951 is still faster in 4k operations, but the 950 has better tuned temp control so if it gets too hot it doesn't go straight into it's lowest speed profile.

If it helps, I've found that a good case side-fan lowers my GPU's VRM's by about 20c when under heavy load. If your 951 is in the same area it could go a long way to alleviating any issues it might have, but generally they only occur under heavy use.

Also if your case allows it, removing any unused drive bays to allow the front fans a direct path to your components helps all system temps.

Some cases will let you put in a fan blowing air in from underneath that might get to your 951, depending on where it is located.

I'm amazed that the 950/951 range trade blows with the Intel750, but are so much more compact.

 

Well, that was your mistake

 

Never again!! (Well not for the next 5 years at least)

 

Yeah @Deders , I haven't been too worried about it's temps because I just got a 256GB. It's working as an OS/apps drive w/the occasional RAW dump, pretty hard to have enough data/space to write to it long enough for it to be a major issue... Mine is in a similar spot on the mobo as yours (similar ASUS boards) but I've got a second GPU right by it.

If it wasn't for that GPU I wouldn't give it a second thought, there's no drive bays at all, two 140mm fans blowing directly across the entire mobo from the front (Corsair 540, cube form factor with split chamber for drives/PSU)... I'm all about that direct airflow without having intakes pushing flow along a weird S path and across things.

I've been meaning to stress test it and take some temp readings ever since I built the rig last year, but just haven't had the time to sit down and do it properly (whole thing is boxed as I move right now). If I notice it being pretty baked when testing I'll just put some mini heatsinks on it, worst case I slap it on a PCI-E riser card tho I'm not sure that'd be any better with two GPUs...

I'm not sure there's an ideal location for M.2 on desktop mobos... Some reviewers seem to favor having it higher up, above the first x16 slot, next to that first x4 slot many mobos have... But GPU backsides emanate heat too, and in that spot it's being warmed up by the CPU and VRMs from above which tend to emanate heat more consistently than GPUs even if the temps aren't quite as hot.

Backsides of the mobo is another interesting choice but I'm not sure if that really works with all cases. Intel could easily make a tiny 750, but they purposely chose to have it on a card with a beefy heatsink or a 2.5" box with plenty of surface to dissipate; can't fault that. I'd rather have the U.2 arrangement even with the pricey/bulky cable. Who knows what'll really end up being the standard tho...

For now it's a pretty small niche, laptops favor M.2 obviously, even SFF & NUCs do. I imagine there's still a workstation market for U.2 tho.

 

@Impulse Very nice. If you do go for a riser, make sure it has a wide gap between it and and 951. iirc the 951 is double sided, whereas the 950 is not. Some risers are closer than others. The Asus one that came with my mobo seems pretty wide, I think you can order it separately.

Some people have made sketchups of a riser that angles the M.2 drive at 90 degrees for better air contact. Not sure how far they got or if any have been made.

Like you say GPU heat, especially from dual GPU's would be counter productive.

Asus are convinced U2 will eventually be the dominant connection, hence why when they design small form factor boards, they opt for U2 over a 2nd M.2.

 

I was using a late 2009 iMac 27 inch for the past 6 years, and had planned to have been using it for the next two years, but when its gpu died, I didn't want to pay 650 to replace the entire motherboard. So, as a result, I went ahead and built my first computer. My priorities were silence and efficiency. I also had to have a monitor of equal or greater quality to my iMac.

CPU: Intel i5 6500
Cpu Cooler: Noctua NH-U12S
Motherboard: Gigabyte B150M-DS3H
Memory: 16GB (2x8GB) G.Skill NT Series
Storage: Samsung Evo 850 500GB
Video Card: MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G
Case: Fractal Define R5 Titanium Windowless
Power Suppy: EVGA Supernova G2 550
Optical Drive: Some cheap LG drive
Operating System: Windows 10 Home 64bit
Monitor: BenQ GW2765
Wifi: Rosewill N300
Keyboard: Corsair K65 RGB
Mouse: Mionix Castor
Speakers: Creative T10 Innovations


PC was snappy and dead silent-- worked as planned. Plan on replacing the two stock Fractal fans with Noctua fans, and adding an additional Noctua fan in the front.

 

I love to see neat cables


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There was a guy a while back that got some cheap stick-on heat sinks on amazon, and stuck them on the chips of a 950 M.2 drive, and had measurable and significant performance increases since it reduced thermal throttling. Linus at LinusTechTips has already commented that he can't wait for the inevitable water cooling stuff to show up.

 

Ya, pretty nice wiring job @TMRaven , specially for a first build.

 

Hah, WC is probably overkill, but yeah; I imagine even some low profile heatsinks should help plenty. Any increase in surface area will help heat dissipation if you have decent airflow. AFAIK it's mostly the controller that gets really hot, not the NAND chips, so you don't even need a ton of sinks.

As far as performance increases, dunno, Anand tested the SM951 and even subjecting it to constant throttling (you can see throughout spike and drop repeatedly in their graphs) the net difference was like in the order of 5%... I guess there's always fringe usage cases tho, depending on what you're writing, how long, etc.

 

Damn, that 970 Gaming has some serious sag.

Funnily enough even my dinky 780 ACX (no backplate) visibly sagged compared to my 980 Ti ACX 2.0+ (backplate). Despite no practical thermal benefit I'd rather spend the $5-20 premium to keep the card straight.

 

I'm definitely planning on getting a backplate for my next graphics card, now if only Nvidia would release the new titan already.

 

That looks similar to my planned build (though I have a monitor). About how much was the system total?

 

I did lots of looking and whatnot to find deals and promo codes and refurbished/used deals. The system came out to 1400, but then I spent like 200 on peripherals; lol.