Building
Saturday, March 24th, 2007. Post written by: JimBuild A PC Computer
I just finished building a new computer for myself recently. I’ve been wanting to build a new one for quite sometime now, except with the new Windows Vista on the horizon, I had to hold out until Vista was released. I bought all the parts from ncix.com, where I’ve always bought my computer parts from the past. They seem to have the best prices I can find for Canadian retailers, and living in Vancouver, I can just drive over to pick up my order, and save myself the shipping charges.
My new system specs:
- - Intel Core2duo e6600 2.4gig overclocked to 3.15.
- - Intel d975 XBX2 mobo
- - OCZ gold pc6400 ram 4gig
- - BFG Geforce 8800GTX 768mb
- - Western Digital (WD) Raptor 10,000 rpm 150gig
- - Western Digital Caviar 7,200 rpm 250gig
- - Soundblaster Audigy 4
- - Antec Neo HE550 PSU
- - Lexa NZXT mid ATX tower
- - Scythe Ninja rev. B cpu heatsink with 120mm fan
- - Windows Vista x64 (OEM)
- - Office 2007 home edition
- - LG dvd rw
Then system cost me about $3000 CAD.
Overclocking The CPU
Before I bought the machine, I did alot of reading up on the core2duo “overclockability”, and seems like alot of people could overclock it quite easily to 3.6gig or more. I’m not a hardcore OC enthusiast, so I was just hope for a moderate overclock that would boost the performance slightly. I would be happy with anything over 3.0gig – not very high expectations. 
After many hours of overclocking and testing and running stability testing programs, I was able to overclock the 2.4gig core2duo to a stable 3.15gig. I run stress prime 2004 on it overnight for a little over 9hours, and it was fine. Memtest checked out fine as well, and it was superPI stables at 32m.
I run coretemp on it and get about 40idle 65 full load, which is okay. To run coretemp on vista 64, I had to turn off the signed driver enforcement at windows boot up by pressing F8 for the option menu, and run the coretemp file as administrator.
Assembling The Computer
Putting the machine was pretty simple and straight forward. This is not a guide on how to assemble computers, so I’m not going to describe the entire process. But here’s some pretty pictures for you to enjoy.
The NZXT Lexa case, just taken out of its box. Got my tools ready, and set to go.
The package for the Intel D975 XBX2 motherboard. This is supposed to be intels first series of boards targeted towards overclockers – I suppose they want a piece of the market as well. I read alot of good reviews online about the XBX2 mobo, and the overwhelming consensus is that Intel motherboards are very stable, so this is the one I went with.
The Scythe Ninja CPU heatsink and 120mm fan. I was amazed at how large this thing was. I didn’t think it would fit into the computer case at first. It also comes with some thermal compound, so you don’t have to buy any, and it wasn’t very difficult to install either. Between reading the instructions, and doing the installation, it probably took me less than 10minutes.
The mother board, CPU, heatsink, and harddrives are all installed, one last (very important) thing to install, the video card. The Geforce 8800GTX video card is HUGE! It takes up almost the ENTIRE length of the computer case, and takes up two slots on the motherboard. I had a little trouble getting it to fit into the case, mainly because of all the wires around. After it was in the PCIe slot, there’s maybe a centimeter space left (lengthwise).
The finished machine, standing and chugging along nicely.
After I finished overcocking, and having to reset the bios via the jumpers, I finally put the case door on. The Lexa case from NZXT is a really nice mid tower case. It comes with 4 case fans installed. Two 120mm LED fans (see photo), one on the back, one on the door. One fan where the harddrives are installed, and another fan at the top of the case.
Funny story… I didn’t get a 3.5″ floppy with the system originally, thinking what would I ever use an outdated technology like that for? Well, I had hell of a time trying to flash the bios to the lastest revision without one! Mainly cuz I didn’t have any ISO burning software installed on my other pc’s to make a bootable CD. So, I had to go out and picked up a floppy for $10 and installed on this new machine as well.
