i cant decide between the top mid-range z77 boards..both the exact same price and warranty.

Asus P8Z77-V Pro
pro:
better VRM (12+4) although maybe measured differently from diff mfg
slightly higher memory OC support
thunderbolt upgrade path (although the cards are rumored to cost almost as much as the mobo itself)
better UEFI BIOS
better fan control
better reliability track record
con:
no eSATA and mSATA
no BT
only 1 Gigabit LAN
slightly worse audio chip

Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD5H-WB
pro:
BT
eSATA & mSATA...and extra SATA3 port
better audio chip
user comments seem to have better RMA experience in recent years
2 Gigabit LAN
con:
UEFI BIOS not as easy to use
not put in the same regard as asus reliability

Ram was incompatible...

all good now

I've seen ram that is intended to be used with Intel systems not play well with AMD systems. Even though technically they should.

I'd personally go with Asus... just had an overall better experience with them.

In my experience, GB for Intel builds, Asus for AMD builds. But that was when GB was using analog PWMs. They use digital now, and I am in the middle of testing one (Z77X-UD3H). I don't expect much from this $160 board though.

Gigabyte's UEFI is pretty much the same as the text based one, only more cumbersome and slower to use.

Just got my G55.. can finally run D3 on high settings.. :sweetjesus:

finished my build... just need a new case now. Any recommendations? I want to do a full water cooled system.
http://i.imgur.com/vmhNd.jpg

Silverstone Temjin/Raven if you have the $$, Corsair 800D for a step down, 650D, 600T :)

Hands down NZXT Phantom 410. Or get the Switch 810 if you need more space

Here's a nice clean build in the Switch. You can do the same with a Phantom

http://i.imgur.com/2R6no.jpg

I think I'm going to get the NZXT Switch 810

Switch is more WC friendly than the Phantom by a mile. I've got a Phantom and you would need to cut out a lot of it to fit rads in.

600T would be an interesting build though, with a 200mm up front, 240 up top, 120 in back, and maybe something on the case floor.

found a pic

http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6010/...c0c6fd8e12.jpg

http://i905.photobucket.com/albums/a...o/51cf0770.jpg

just swapped my case for a 550d, now i need to find some good silent fans

that looks awesome but i have too many hard drives to do that so it will looked crammed up like what i have right now

I'm new and useless to this stuff... Was wondering if anyone have thoughts on this:
How-to: Build a killer gaming PC for under $1,000 | The Verge
Using it as a guideline, but seems dated now...
Also, is this worthwhile looking into? http://www.memoryexpress.com/Product...3570K_Z77XUD3H Seems like a good deal.

anyone have any experience with the scythe 1850rpm gentle typhoons?
i plan on putting 2 on my hyper 212, but i'm not sure how loud they'll be on max

this is what my new computer (well... built it for my dad) looks like :)

Gonna re-manage the cables when I get some proper sized zipties
https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net...11032438_n.jpg

^ how are the noctuas?

really good, nice and quiet and comes with a vibration mount too (if you are just mounting to case)

One complaint though is that the wire gets in the way of the screws since they are not flat, but rather wrapped.

Real good flow, it's set up for push+pull right now thru the H70's radator. my 3930K is not OC'd (not yet) and it keeps it at a cool 38-40 degrees under load.

hey guys I'm kind of a noob to this PC building world, spent all my years since high school building my cars, but since I'm done with that, wanna pick up a new hobby and this PC stuff really interests me. Always been buying laptops or those pre assembled desktops from best buy and future shop etc, wanted to try and build my own for a change.

I have one question I wanted to ask you, do sealed air conditioned cases exist at all ? basically a case that's dust free and a regulated air temperature inside the case at all times via some kind of air conditioning unit ?
I know liquid cooling the CPU and GPU does away with most of the heat, but what about from the hard drives and motherboard ? and I despise dust and uncleanliness so I guess not buying a case with a front intake fan that sucks air into the case ??

I wanna approach this PC building using the same tendencies I had when building cars, I don't think it's too different really, for example one of my first modifications to every car I've owned is to make it breathe as well as possible, headers exhaust intake, and keep it super cool, radiators, coolers, etc....
makes sense for PC's too, with fans and liquid coolers, etc...

They do make peltiers, but they're really expensive and hard to get in a computer and most people don't bother using them, since using liquid is much easier to assemble and acquire. It should be fairly easy to watercool a system using filtered fans on the radiators to prevent dust. My personal rig is totally air cooled and there is almost no dust on the inside.

Hard drives usually don't need to be cooled since they don't get hot enough, but a single fan near a hard drive should be okay, and even then, that's probably overkill. Motherboard's generally don't need to be cooled (unless you're overclocking on the X79, where the voltage regulators get hot). But they do make waterblocks for various motherboards, usually high end ones.

^ hmm thanks for the useful info, I'll keep doing more research on the subject before I build, so just liquid cool everything I can, and get a good aluminum case a good start like you said

just realized ironically now that I'm about to get into PC building, is I always built my cars to be fast but never raced them or even drove them fast.... and now with PC's it's gonna be the same thing, since Madden, NBA 2K and Grand Theft Auto is like 99% of my gaming, that's not enough to even test a higher end PC let alone push it, haha...

so what else can I do instead of game to put a PC through it's paces just to see how it performs, what do you guys do ?

is that corsair radiator using the noctua fans?

You can always run benchmarking programs to see how your PC performs. To put it into car perspective, it's like a dyno.

To name a few would be : Passmark, Futuremark

How do you like the Z11 so far?