My gaming rig was built pretty much "sans budget", in that I really went pretty all out on it because I hadn't built anything like this in a while. 3930K (good clocker, too; 4.94Ghz 24/7 @ 1.376v, will do 5.45GHz @ 1.512v for benching), Rampage IV Extreme, 4x4GB G.Skill Ripjaws Z 2133 9-11-10-28 (and 4x4GB G.Skill Trident X 2400 9-11-11-31, 4x4GB Trident X 2666 10-11-11), as of now 2x EVGA GTX670 FTW 2GB in SLI being replaced with 2x EVGA GTX780Ti Classifieds (and for benching, 2x MSI 680 Lightning's, 1x MSI R7970 Lightning), Creative X-Fi Titanium HD, NZXT HALE90 1200W PSU (I made all custom cables and sleeved them myself), an NZXT Switch 810 but moved into a CaseLabs Magnum TH10 w Pedestal and 120mm extended top, 2x Slim BD-R/W drives, etc.
The whole thing is water-cooled, custom loop; Apogee HD on CPU, MIPS Ni/BLK Rampage IV Extreme VRM+SB Block Kit, 2x Heatkiller 680 blocks for 670FTW's + 2x Aquacomputer blocks for the 680 Lightnings + 1x EK Block for 7970Ltg (and now 2x Aquacomputer blocks for 780Ti's; all have backplates), EK RAM Blocks w Universal RAM Adapters... Water is pumped by a dual-pump MCP35X2 (white top, added Swiftech Heatsink and Noiseblocker 80mm fan) through 1/2x3/4" white Primochill Advanced LRT Tubing and connects with all Bitspower fittings (compression fittings; about 3 dozen rotary angled adapters as well); Bitspower 250mL cylinder res + XSPC bay res (dual res = easier filling/bleeding). Aquaero 6 (the top of the line model) is controlling everything.
The case has way more room for rads than the Switch, so I went from an EX420 and a UT60 240 both P-P to: 4x Alphacool Monsta 480's, 1x Alphacool UT60 420, 1x XSPC EX420, 1x Alphacool UT60 360, and 1x Alphacool UT60 240. 120mm-based rads have push-pull Koolance fans (2600rpm/108cfm/5.4mmH2O), 140mm-based have Bgears Blasters 140mm fans (1800rpm/103cfm/3.5mmH2O); all rads are using shrouds and decoupling gaskets, so it goes like such: case-2mm decoupling gasket-fan-gasket-20mm/30mm shroud-gasket-radiator-gasket-shroud-gasket-fan.
So yeah, when I do things I tend to OVER do them...
Storage, which as it sits obviously is not something I want to have as a bottleneck, is as follows:
SSD
- Samsung 830 256GB SSD (OS)
- Plextor M5P-Xtreme 512GB SSD (major programs)
- *2x Micro Center branded SanDisk 120GB SSD's in RAID0 (for fun; got 18 of them @ $40/ea when they discontinued them)
CONTROLLER
- LSI MegaRAID SAS 9361-8i (PCIe3.0 x8, 1GB DDR3-1866 cache, 12GB/sec SAS) with an Expander
HARD DRIVES
- 5x Western Digital Blue 1TB (WD10EZEX, single-platter drives; insanely fast, ~190-210MB/sec R/W @ edge of platter!); 2x in RAID1, the rest on their own
- 2x Western Digital VelociRaptor 1TB in RAID0 (Max/Min 402/341 MB/sec)
- 2x Seagate Barracuda 2TB (7200.14 models; 1TB/platter)
- 2x Hitachi Ultrastar 3TB
- 4x Western Digital RE 2TB for local storage of critical data (entire array is backed up to a pure storage server I built, to 12x WD RE 3TB off an LSI 9386-16i)
LOCAL BUT NOT INTERNAL
*SAS to expander, using an "old" file server case
- 8x Western Digital Red 4TB using file system RAID for media storage (currently ~1,992 films and ~4,000 episodes of TV shows, all 1080p30 with uncompressed 5.1-7.2ch audio; also, about 35,000 audio tracks, FLAC)
- 5x Seagate 1TB SAS 15krpm Cheetah's
- 2x Hitachi Ultrastar 4TB
- 3x Western Digital Black 640GB
I am kind of a pack rat....
Anyway, point is, even with all of that, the absolute best game drives?
The WD10EZEX!!! Without a doubt!
These are "Blue" drives, but 1TB/platter, single-platter design and updated firmware reducing seek time has made them powerhouses! Best part? They're $50-60/ea all the time!
I have never, NEVER seen more than a 2 second difference in load times between an SSD (and I have some top-of-the-line models, including 840Pro/EVO, Intel 520/530, etc, alongside the above mentioned) and this hard drive.
The key? KEEP THE GAMES YOU WANT TO BE FAST ON THE OUTSIDE OF THE DISK!!!! That, and keep it organized and free of fragmentation!
