Corsair Graphite Series 600T Build Log Complete: Yellowbeard's Revenge

The Corsair Graphite Series 600T Build Log, Part 1: Yellowbeard's Revenge

I have always prided myself on being a very conscientious and reliable employee. Well, you can imagine my consternation when my boss reprimanded me recently. He had seen my outdated and neglected forum post regarding my last system build and pointed out several facts and illustrated shortcomings, of which I am very ashamed. Here are some of them and in no specific order.

I have not built a system using our new Graphite Series 600T case.

I have been gaming and listening to music using a headset that was inferior to our new HS-1 headset. My old headset is certainly not as comfortable and does not sound nearly as good as the HS-1.

My old game rig that I had previously logged had only 6GB of memory. 12GB (3 x 4GB) with DHX Pro support is the way to go. I can top these beauties off with the Airflow Pro unit mounted on the memory cooler. CMP12GX3M3A1600C9 for the win!

We had released the H70 and here I was still trying to make an aged phase change cooler work on the old gaming rig. The phase change unit is far more complex than the Hydro Series coolers. The H70, like the H50 should be a breeze to install.

The old rig, while adequately powered, did not feature the AX Professional Series PSUs. The AX850 is a beast! It has a monster single rail and is fully modular. Cable management will be great and especially so in the cable friendly 600T.

At this point, I was nearly ready to turn in my beard, parrot, and eye patch accept a demotion to grounds maintenance. But he wasn’t finished.

The old system was SSD equipped but, not Force Series equipped. Time for some blazing RAID-0 action.

I had not used a memory kit with DHX Pro support which of course, meant that I had not used an Airflow Pro unit.

I was not using a DirectX 11 compliant GPU. Enter, the Gigabyte HD5970 2GB.

The final straw came when he pointed out that, according to Steam, I had not gamed since July 10, 2010. I was mortified and nearly at my breaking point when suddenly; he offered me a path to redemption, a light at the end of this tunnel of shame. He suggested that I go scour the lab and build myself a new gaming rig so that I could correct all of these wrongs and redeem myself.

Well, never one to argue with management I gathered up everything I would need. Before I actually began the build process, I took a good look at the 600T so that I could see the features first hand and see what sort of build experience I could anticipate.

The 600T Quick Tour

The Graphite Series 600T case has several of the same features the Obsidian Series 800D has. However, there are some differences. Before we begin the actual build, let’s take a look at some of these features.

The 600T features a motherboard tray that is accessible from the back side of the case. This is a very useful feature when working with CPU coolers that require back plates and also for some wiring tasks.

Users of the 800D case have raved about our grommets and how they contribute to ease of cable management, speed of the build process, and aesthetics. So, of course we included them in the 600T.

The 600T features 6 hard drive caddies that support both HDDs and SSDs. There is a 200mm fan cooling the drive bays.

The top 200mm fan provides great air flow and can also be removed to add customized water cooling components.

There are four 5.25" tool-free optical drive bays. These make optical drive installation quick and easy.

The hard drive bays are recessed slightly on the back side of the case to facilitate better cable management. Also, the motherboard tray depth is recessed also for this same purpose. This case is a dream to work with. Building a system in a 600T should be fast and easy.

The final parts selection was the motherboard and CPU. I chose the Gigabyte X58A-UD7 and the Intel Core i7 950 CPU. A close-up of the CPU can be seen in the bottom right. I fully anticipate a speedy and easy build as I have made a really sound hardware selection.

As this log progresses I’ll document how all of these components go together. Once it is built, I'll benchmark it at the stock settings. Of course, no self respecting enthusiast would run this system at stock so I'll document the OC and then benchmark it again and see what we've gained.

Stay tuned and I'll update this thread ASAP! I've decided to call this rig ::pirate:: Yellowbeard's Revenge ::pirate::

Part 2: Building the System

Direct Link to Picture Gallery

OK, this project is coming along much slower than I anticipated due to other duties. But, the machine is finally built. All I need to do now is install the OS and then take her for a test drive.

Unlike some build logs I have done in the past, I am not going to document every single detail of each phase of the build. There are literally thousands of How To type resources on the internet already so that would be redundant. I have taken the time to photograph and document some of the aspects of the build that apply directly to the case or the specific Corsair product used that may differ from the average build.

My first step was to install the H70. However, before installing the H70, I decided to mount and route the 8 pin EPS 12v connector. Due to the location of the H70, it is much easier to do this before the cooler is mounted. My connector is located in the upper left hand corner of the motherboard and is very convenient to the access hole there.

If you use a 600T and an H70, you'll need to remove the stock rear exhaust fan as the H70 mounts there. Start by removing the 4 screws holding the fan, circled in red below.

Before you begin installing the fans, decide if you are going to use the H70 fans in an intake setup or an exhaust setup. The fans have directional arrows on them.

Here is the hardware you will need from the H70 mounting supplies to attach the cooler to an Intel based system. Note that the back plate is compatible with sockets 775, 1156, and 1366. It will also work with the upcoming socket 1155 boards using the 1156 holes.

The H70 mounts in the same fashion as the H50. Instead of being redundant here, I'll link the previous H50 mounting resources:

H50 Mounting Resources

The H70 looks great mounted over the X58A UD7. I have seen posts where some users want to mount the fans to the radiator and then mount the entire unit of fan+radiator+fan. I found it to be much easier if you mount the second fan last, after you have mounted the cooling block + pump assembly. It would be almost impossible to mount the cooling block + pump with the second fan mounted.

I also mounted the Airflow Pro onto the Airflow 2 fan over a kit of CMP12GX3M3A1600C9. The unit looks and performs very well. We have also prepared a Guide for Mounting the Airflow Pro.

Mounting the AX850 PSU was a breeze and the 600T mounting for PSUs is extremely secure. First, there is a dual hole pattern on the back of the case for the PSU mounting screws. This allows users to mount PSUs in either orientation.

There is also a retention lip just under the motherboard that stabilizes the PSU.

And finally, there is an adjustable retention clip with knurled thumb screws that mounts to the front of the PSU.

The last components to go inside the were the 2 F120 SSDs. They quickly and easily mount to the removable drive trays with 4 screws.

Note, you'll need to remove one HDD mounting pin from the right side of the tray to mount an SSD.

As a side note, the removable drive trays accomodate standard HDDs also. To mount a HDD, simply flex the tray as show, just wide enough to sit a HDD into it.

Once the drive is sitting in the tray, just make sure that the 4 pins go into the 4 corresponding holes on the HDD.

The 600T features a top panel that is easy to access. You'll find the power switch, reset switch, USB ports, firewire port, the front panel audio ports, and the fan controller knob here.

The top exhaust fan is mounted inside the case, under the top grill area. Here is a picture, prior to the motherboard installation.

A quick release mesh grill covers this area from the top of the case. The 120mm fan is removable. The internal grill also has mounting points for two 120mm fans or a 240mm radiator. The mounting points are circled in red.

Here is a view of the wiring that you get to hide by using the grommets and access holes in the 600T case. I have done a bit of zip tying and tidying up to make the wiring more manageable. Note the routing of the power cables to the appropriate components.

Here is a shot of the inside of the case with everything mounted and all of the motherboard and power connections in place. The cable routing features of this case really make building a tidy system very easy. It's ready to install the side panels and operating system.

The next section will be benchmarks at stock settings and OCed settings. Let the fun begin! ::pirate::

Part 3: Benchmarks

Direct Link to Picture Gallery

As promised, I have FINALLY gotten the benchmarks together and loaded the screen shots. It goes without saying that OCing is cool and that faster is better. So, I won't bore you to death with charts and percentages and such. The screenshots speak for themselves. I have put the stock and OCed benchmarks side by side here, with the stock scores on the left and the OCed scores on the right.

I took a screenshot using CPU-Z 1.56 to show the stock speeds against the OCed speeds and the memory frequency and timings.

Here's the main screen. As you can see, we got a 4.2GHz OC out of the 950 cooling it with the H70:

And, here's the memory tab. The memory frequency is a bit below the stock memory speed. Due to the BClock we attained, we hit one of those odd spots where we could not use the 10x memory multiplier with this memory. This was a case of trading a bit of memory frequency to attain a higher CPU OC:

I did some testing with SuperPI with both the 1M and 32M benchmark. SuperPI is known to respond well obviously to CPU speed and it is also sensitive to memory latencies. I don't think using the 8x memory multiplier here is a bad choice as is evidenced by the OCed score in both 1M and 32M:

Futuremark has a new 3D benchmark out, 3DMark 11. Like it's predecessors, the benchmark is designed to really test your graphics processing power. From the Futuremark website:

3DMark 11 is the latest version of the world’s most popular benchmark for measuring the 3D graphics performance of gaming PCs. 3DMark 11 uses a native DirectX 11 engine designed to make extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11, including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading

Of course it is heavily influenced by CPU frequency in addition to GPU frequency as you can see in the results below.

Another favorite from Futuremark is PCMark Vantage. This is an excellent test for evaluating how your computer will perform what many refer to as "real world" tasks. From the Futuremark website:

PCMark Vantage is the first objective hardware performance benchmark for PCs running Windows 7 or Windows Vista. From desktops and laptops to workstations and gaming rigs, PCMark Vantage helps you find the hardware and software bottlenecks that stop you getting more from your PC.

Once again, the results show a solid gain in performance from the additional 1.2GHz of processing power.

An old favorite of mine is the Framebuffer Crysis Warhead Benchmarking Tool ver 0.33 developed by Mr John. I have used it in the past and it is a solid tool for GPU testing as Crysis Warhead is still one of the most demanding games out there. Once again, OCing shows much better results across the board in the framerates. This first shot the results using the GAMER preset which represents an user with an average or median amount of "eye candy".

Just for fun, to illustrate the raw power of the CPU in this benchmark, we also ran at the PERFORMANCE preset. This preset runs the test at a very low graphical setting. As expected with the GPU we have, the framerates were outstanding and improved with the OC.

Another test that we have run in the past to illustrate real world tasks is a video encoding test using Auto Gordian Knot ver 2.55. This encoding tool encodes video to an .avi format and it is multi threaded. It will utilize all 8 virtual cores, courtesy of Intel's Hyper Threading, and is a great test to illustrate the gains made by OCing your CPU. Our 1.2GHz OC nets a 5 min 21 second improvement while encoding one of our most favorite movie titles, Yellowbeard.

So, I presented all of this to my boss this past Monday. He glanced over it and noted that it was pretty good work. But, he looked up at me and pointed out that since it's now 2011, I should have done all this with Sandy Bridge? :eek:

I have always prided myself on being a very conscientious and reliable employee.

You are without a doubt.::pirate::

I can not wait to see your built 600T Graphite !!

Can I have it when you're done? :)

We expect shinies, Yellowbeard!

What, your not done yet???? Shame on you!

I actually did good bit of picture editing today. I need to reshoot a few and I'll get the next phase up ASAP.

I actually did good bit of picture editing today. I need to reshoot a few and I'll get the next phase up ASAP.

You better get going I might call your boss for those 2 F120's for Project Carbon:D::p:

You better get going I might call your boss for those 2 F120's for Project Carbon:D::p:

LOL...he's in CA, and I'm in GA. So, I'm safe for now :p:

Update BUMP ::pirate::

Happy Holidays All!

Nice job & review!

Forget what they said about wanting the new system, you keep it you deserver it, just send me your/the old parts I'll be happy! :): ;):

Part 3: Benchmarks

 

 

So, I presented all of this to my boss this past Monday. He glanced over it and noted that it was pretty good work. But, he looked up at me and told me that since it's now 2011, shouldn't I have done all this with Sandy Bridge? :eek:

Edit: Slaps head for you, what was you thinking? :eek: :laughing: :D:

The above system build would work well for Fourm Warz, come join in the fun, we could use you on our team.

Company? Ya'll just look like normal people to us. ;): I haven't seen any rules saying a company couldn't join in the fun.

After all this is a fourm you could bring your own team from here & compete agenst us & the rest. "rather have you on our theam tho" Raymo could better answer any questions one might have. I'll ask & return with a reply.

Something tells me that a company can't enter the contest :)

Of coarse they can enter... The more.. the more we get to kick *** :laughing:

:eek: :D: :p:

Man my sig showed up. :eek: Is that thing old or what? :laughing: wonder what happened to my old post? I started back at zero..

:eek: :D: :p:

 

Man my sig showed up. :eek: Is that thing old or what? :laughing: wonder what happened to my old post? I started back at zero..

Hi all my first post here. I bought the 600T and it is amazing! I used to have a very old case from Chieftech for the last 10 years. The CS-601.

Here are my pictures.

http://www.abload.de/thumb/cimg00929r61.jpghttp://www.abload.de/thumb/cimg0093wjt2.jpghttp://www.abload.de/thumb/cimg00873tx2.jpghttp://www.abload.de/thumb/cimg00913qsi.jpg

Hey Yellowbeard(awesome movie!)

I just have two quick questions about the fan you have mounted where the middle drive cage goes.. What size is it? and How did you mount it?