eva2000

While I bench and test the latest gear, I always kept to my very old 24/7 main work rig but it's time to upgrade the 24/7 main work with more up to date gear and finally after many years a new pc case - Lian Li PC-7FNWX with USB3.0 ports and side window.

Old 24/7 main work rig ~6yrs old now:

• Pentium 550 3.4Ghz Prescott
• DFI 875P-T motherboard
• Gecube 9800Pro Extreme PCI
• 1GB Kingston KHX3200 Winbond BH-5
• Pioneer DVD-RW IDE
• 80GB WD IDE
• 8x 320GB Seagate 7200.8 ( 2x 4 disk raid 5 arrays)
• Raidcore PCI-X Raid 5 controller (saved me 4 times from disk failures over last 6yrs never lost any data! )
• 650W Silverstone PSU
• cpu has been cooled for past 6 yrs with Cathar G4 Storm water block, with Thermochill HE120.3 rad and MCP650 pump
• No case open desk

Old system photos before i swapped to 650W Silverstone psu. The other drives are in another drive rack also pulled from an old Lian Li PC-60 case.



New 24/7 main work rig build last night - yet to install OS etc

• Xeon W3540 3845B010
• DFI Prolimatech Megahalem + 120x38mm Scythe UltraKaze 2000rpm 88cfm fan
• DFI UT X58-T3EH8
• 1GB HIS HD5570
• 6GB OCZ Platinum DDR3-1333 OCZ3P1333LVA6GK Animals (2000mhz binned micron specials)
• Pioneer DVD-RW IDE
• 640GB Samsung SATAII (HD642JJ)
• 2x 1GB Samsung F3 SATAII 103SJ
• 2x 1GB Samsung F1 SATAII 103UJ
• 2x 32GB OCZ Core V1 SSD (scratch disk installed in Manhattan dual drive L-Type hot swappable mobile racks)
• Shintaro USB3.0 PCI-E 2 port card
• Shintaro Blazer USB3.0 2.5" & 3.5" SATA hdd docker
• Corsair HX850 modular - only had to use 3 cables (2x 4pin molexes + 1x SATA power cable) as the drives are in Lian Li EX-H34B hot swap back plane
• Lian Li PC-7FNWX USB3.0 case

Some quick photos, didn't do many as busy with private client work - hence need my new 24/7 work rig setup ASAP.











Will later bump from 6GB to 12GB DDR3 as well as add Highpoint RR3520 PCI-E raid controller and another add in a 4x 2TB raid 5 array swapping out 2x1GB Samsung F1 103UJ. The Lian Li PC-7FNWX has 2x USB 3.0 ports on top which i passed through the PCI slots at back to the Shintaro 3.0 PCI-E card.

One minor problem is the Lian Li EX-H34B hot swap backside 120x25mm fan back plane uses included right angle SATA connector to straight connector on other end, but straight connector uses the latch type tab connectors which don't fit DFI UT X58-T3EH8 motherboard. So for now removed the fan to accommodate straight end to straight end normal non-latch tab SATA connectors.

Top side power/reset buttons, 2x USB 3.0 ports, HD Audio and E-SATA connection. Also the 2x Lian Li PC-7FNWX USB 3.0 top ports pass through cables to the Shintaro 2x USB3.0 PCI-E card. Removed Lian Li EX-H34B back plane fan part for straight end to end SATA non-latch tab usage for now. Once find the right non-latch right angle SATA cables, will re-add fan for EX-H34B.





Was going to go with Mini-ITX system but need the disk drive space so rather than full tower, went with the Lian Li PC-7FNWX which is apparently distributed by the good folks and former i4memory.com sponsor, mittoni.com.au !

Bought the Lian Li PC-7FNWX, EX-H34B hot swap, Shintaro USB3.0 gear and Samsung F3 SATAII drives and HX850 psu from itsdirect.com.au - very fast delivery ordered Thursday and delivered Friday next day - definitely will be getting more of my business in future with such fast delivery times

Yesterday put in an order for 2x Dell U2410 24" LCD 1920x1200 monitors to replace my 6+ yr old 20" BenQ FP2091 1600x1200 and 22" BenQ 1680x1050 monitor setup as well

Update: Man didn't realise how long it's going to take to migrate all my data over to the new rig and resetup all apps and settings ! Still setting up apps and configs etc at stock speeds for now

Hard drives run cool even without the Lian Li EX-H34B hotswap backplane 120mm fan. According to Powermate wattage meter, idling around 130 watts with spikes to 215 watts with 8x 32M HyperPi load or around 233 watts for Prime95 blend custom 4900MB available memory (5.37GB used in windows task manager).

eva2000

Haven't done much with rig as relatives are visiting etc

Ended up ordering 3x Dell U2410 1920X1200 monitors which arrived so will set them up after relatives leave. Hooked up the rig to APC RS 1500 UPS + extra battery and Powercute 2.20 for Win7 with 20" BenQ 1600x1200 + 22" BenQ 1680x1050 and wireless receiver for A/V plugged into same UPS as my DFI UT X58 rig = 207 watts idle and 311 watts prime95 load

eva2000

Still taking it slowly on oc'ing end as it's my 24/7 work rig but just enabled Turbo mode and bumped to 145bclk with DDR3-1450Mhz 8-8-8-24 at same vcore 1.075v set in bios so power consumption according to APC Powercute still reports same 311 watts max load so far.

CPU temps around 61-63C load with DFI Megahalem + Scythe 120x38mm 2000rpm 88cfm fan in 22-23C room ambients.

PWM temps getting up there at 66C load and around 47-50C idle - not unexpected being enclosed in a case. Thinking of popping open the Lian Li PC-7NFWX's top and fitting a 140x25mm fan in the 140mm cut out space provided for better cooling there and/or adding a fan over the passive PWM heatsink.

eva2000

Two weeks ago Dell Australia had an end of financial year sale which effectively knocked ~32% off the RRP of their monitors - so I picked up 3x Dell U2410s

The monitors arrived around 2 weeks ago, but I've been very busy with work + relatives coming to visit these past 2 weeks, so only found the time today to open up one of the monitors and set it up to replace the position on my desk which had my BenQ FP2091 20" 1600x1200 monitor.

Guess the good thing about relatives visiting in that it forced me to get off my butt and clean up my room. First time in years you could actually see the desk or floor Had to get a 2nd desk to put up against my main desk to extend desk space from 120cm to 180cm.

Here's some photos below. Too busy with work right now to setup the other 2x Dell U2410 but hopefully get around to them

Cleaned up desk with old setup, 20" BenQ 1600x1200 + 22" BenQ 1680x1050 installed on Skunkworks.com.au purchased Marco gas assisted dual monitor C-clamp arm (purchased 6+ yrs ago).





Beautiful sight - 3x Dell U2410 1920x1200 monitors



Unboxing and testing of the first Dell U2410 before installing.



Dell U2410 menus













Vesa 100mm mount & Input connectors





Marco LCD arm mounting mechanism - simple installation, hold monitor in one hand and screw in screws with other hand.





Temporary setup for now as very busy with work etc. Eventually removing 22" BenQ 1680x1050 from right side and putting the 20" BenQ 1600x1200 to the right as it's shorter in width and will fit better. Then I have 2x independent Redleaf 13-30" desk C-Clamp mount arms for the remaining 2x Dell U2410

eva2000

Testing Shintaro Blazer USB3.0 2.5"/3.5" Hdd Docker with Shintaro 2 port USB3.0 PCI-E x1 card on DFI UT X58-T3EH8

with 640GB Samsung HD642JJ SATA



File copy test from 32GB OCZ Core V1 SSD to 640GB Samsung HD642JJ on USB3.0

eva2000

Finally got around to installing my 2nd Dell U2410 to replace right side 22" BenQ monitor. Use a single Redleaf RLDSK203B monitor arm unfortunately out of the 2x RLDSK202B and 2x RLDSK203B arms, only one RLDSK203B worked as the other 3 units had a defect in the safety knobs holding the tilt mechanism and VESA 100mm backplate mount were cracked as the grip part is made of plastic instead of a full steel design Getting a refund for those.

Picture of cracked safety knobs here.

RLDSK202B (left) and RLDSK203B (right)



Beware the Redleaf lcd monitor arms each model has a different minimum C clamp thickness. RLDSK202B minimum desk thickness it can clamp to is 18mm but the RLDSK203B minimum clamp thickness is 23mm. My desk is only 21mm thick, so with RLDSK203B needed a workaround, found some steel lubic spare parts to make up the thickness for it to clamp down on.



Removed right side 22" BenQ LCD from my Marco dual LCD arm and moved the VESA mount behind so I could place RLDSK203B in front



Final 2x Dell U2410 setup for now until I find time to setup 3rd Dell U2410. Love the extra real estate coming from dual LCD - 20" 1600x1200 + 22" 1680x1050 to 2x 24" 1920x1200

Bold Eagle

Again this is why I MUST come here, ty George!

Jammer

Nice thread! I can't beleive you have been running on 1GB RAM this whole time George.