All my parts are in.
They are:
- CPU: 13th Gen Core i7 13700KF
- CPU cooler: DeepCool AK500
- Graphics card: ASUS Rog Strix Geforce RTX 4070Ti
- Motherboard: ASUS Rog Strix Z790-E
- RAM: 2x32gb G.Skill Trident Z5 6400
- Windows drive: Samsung 1TB 980 Pro NVMe
And that’s it. I’m reusing my current parts for the rest. There is actually quite a bit of room both behind and ‘above’ (bearing in mind all desktop PC’s that aren’t weedy office workhorses are vertical these days) my GeForce 1060 GTX. So I’m hoping I can keep my Fractal Design case because it’s really fucking nice. It’s heavy – but that’s because it’s soundproofed.
Yes, I know I have under-powered it here and there. Yes, I know G.Skill RAM goes over 7000Mhz now. And I could have afforded a Core i9. But that’s a ridiculous amount of power that day to day, in spite of all the different things I use my PC for, I just wouldn’t end up utilising except as maybe an experiment that would last all of an afternoon. And I’m not building a PC with a view to an afternoon’s stress test. I build my PC’s for longevity and multitasking – in hopefully the most efficient ways possible.
It’s daunting to say the least. With the ASUS blu-ray burner issue I am too paranoid to rely on that to boot Windows 10 off of (I will be installing that on the NVMe drive, and adding the other hard disks once I’m up and running). I’m going to burn a high capacity dvd then also put the Windows 10 .iso on a USB stick too.
Tomorrow will be a slow, slow day of backing up passwords and researching further problems that might crop up. This is the first time I’ve ever had a NVMe drive for any purpose and on paper it would seem the ultimate in speed. Whether that actually stacks up in reality remains to be seen. I’ve read lots of stats and speeds of most devices over the years I’ve been building PC’s, and the real world experience is often a tad different.
Doesn’t matter too much if I don’t get great sleep tonight – I’m not going to be fucking up nearly £2000 of equipment the day after. And my beloved Travelodge mattress is arriving tomorrow – ordered direct from Sleepeezee themselves. I can almost guarantee you right now: I will get an incredible rest before I DO start work on my next PC build.
Wish me luck.