Next month, I’ll be celebrating my 30th birthday and I’ve been quite irked at Dell’s horrendous motherboard support for my XPS 8300. So to give myself a pre-emptive birthday treat, I decided to build a new system using some of the parts from the XPS 8300.
Here’s my new specs:
Intel Core i7-4770k (New)
Asus Maximus VI Formula (New)
Corsair Obsidian 550D (New)
Seasonic X-850 (New)
Corsair Hydro Series H75 Liquid CPU Cooler (New)
Samsung Evo 840 1TB SSD
Hynix 16 GB DDR3 1333mHz memory
Gigabyte HD6950 1GB
2X1TB Western Digital Cavier Blue HDD
Blu-ray Writer/Reader
Dell ST 2420L 24′W HD LED Monitor
Logitech G15 Gaming Keyboard
Logitech G5 Gaming Mouse
Logitech Z623 2.1 Speaker System
I intend to use this platform for the next 5-7 years – something I originally planned for my Dell XPS 8300 before I discovered that the hobbled motherboard precluded it from using future graphics cards.
I did a fair bit of research and I was impressed by Asus’s Maximus VI Formula motherboard. Despite being on the market for less than a year, this motherboard has already seen more support (via BIOS updates) than my XPS 8300 received in its 3-year lifespan, so I trust Asus to provide far superior motherboard support and hardware validation than Dell.
The Asus Maximus VI Formula also looks awesome. I love its red and black printed circuit board.
I’ve always enjoyed tweaking and tinkering with things, so assembling the parts and setting up the software for this new rig was a fun experience. Cheng Peng Hui, a friend of mine, has always been good with computers and he assembled a system for me several years ago. I’ve always admired his ability to assemble computers, so it was nice to finally get my feet wet by assembling my own rig.
It’s always nice to learn something new especially something that will make me more handy. And what better way to celebrate my 30th birthday than by picking up a new skill?
The OEM Dell XPS 8300 casing was a little tricky to take apart, a far cry from the user-friendly Corsair Obsidian 550D case. It took me a couple of hours to take everything apart and put it together but it was a good learning experience. Going through this process gave me a lot more confidence for future builds and upgrades.
I am starting to see the appeal of building a customized personal computer. Building something precisely to your needs and specifications is an awesome, no-compromises experience.
Ironically, shortly after I assembled the system, the feet of my keyboard decided to break and a huge rubber section of my mouse’s scroll wheel disintegrated. To be fair, both the G15 keyboard and G5 mouse have given me thousands of hours of usage over the last 5 years, but I was kinda miffed that they decided to spoil just when I got my new system up and running.
I’m quite particular about getting my system to work precisely the way I want it to, but it seems like the Tech Gods are currently not in my favour. To replace my aging keyboard and mouse, I’m toying with the idea of getting a Logitech G 710+ gaming keyboard and a Logitech G500S gaming mouse.
I have a great deal of trust in Logitech’s build quality and software. Not all gaming software is built equal, but I’ll need more information before I finally make a decision.
It looks I have a bit more work and a lot more research to do.
