So.. How bout a build log? Meet Kagutsuchi!

Kolor-Pikker wrote in post #17935957
Ah, I went back and took a look at the motherboard, MSI gaming series do use Killer NICs which are widely known to have problems, for me it'd be Intel or bust. Gigabyte boards typically offer two NICs of each type depending on preference, but their overall quality has dropped recently, especially on the X99 platform.

The audio on the mobo is going to be essentially identical with any board, since nearly all of them use the Realtek 1150 chip at the core, which are $4 BoM for the manufacturer - not exactly high-end.
Add-on sound cards like the Asus Essence STX II or the old Creative X-Fi Titanium are a better pick if you want to drive high-end headphones and also get some hardware features like surround headphone simulation.
The best choice would be an external USB-based audio interface, since it's not under interference from surrounding components or less than ideal power from your PSU (unless you have a high-end PSU with very stable power output), but they do not feature hardware audio if gaming is your thing.

Actually several motherboards now have payed attention and incorporated really good audio solutions - The MSI has a C-Media CM6632A, the Gigabyte G1 Gaming uses what is essentially the Sound Blaster ZxR on-board, the Maximus VIII Formula i bought has an ESS Sabre chip and a TI R45801 amplifier. The weakness on these actually is they route to the front jacks instead of the rear sadly... your weakpoint at that point is the poor quality of the front panel wiring and jacks. At least the Maximus has a microphone jack on the back panel.. the MSI did NOT have that. I will say the MSI audio was actually not too bad, The issue was more the drivers/software for it, like the software for everything else, wasnt very good.. at all, there were no EQ controls for instance...

I had the X-fi Titanium HD in the old computer, and it was one of the multiple parts that died, As much as i would love external USB audio (ie a Modi-Magnus) that makes wiring up my headset (Sennheiser Game One) more difficult as i have to somehow route the microphone seperate. Which on the MSI meant running a line all the way to the front part of the case. I will likely add a external headphone amp at some point in the future, maybe, but my primary audio(IE for my gaming headset) I want as an add in board for easier wire routing.. i know its silly..its just what i want and how i want things done. The other option i considered was a Sound Blaster X7, but its a lot more pricey... Nice though...

Right now its either the Strix RAID DLX or the Sound Blaster ZxR, I like the 1/4" jacks on the ZxR and the dedicated PCI-E power for the Strix, Both have 600 ohm amps and some fairly good audio components on them. Unless the Maximus' audio is good. Which it might be, TBH I've heard the SupremeFX 2015 implementation is quite good. Basically, horses for courses.. The ZxR uses a burr-brown DAC which im more partial to.. so im probubly getting the ZxR...

Really for VERY high end audio i have my desktop connected to my home theater as well. So the audio card IS more dedicated to gaming and listening to music while gaming/editing photos. For really listening to music i usually use my turntable and my RZ900 + Polk RTi A9

So... funny story, my Laptop also has a Killer NIC, and yesterday it started doing the -exact- same behavior as the MSI mainboard which cemented my decision to return it. Same drivers crashing en masse... so joy.. At least it seems the laptop got ironed out after reinstalling the drivers. So thats good.

I've been moving towards external audio devices. Having the sound controller on my desk with a short lead to the headphones makes for very little room for noise to be introduced to the audio feed. Plus you can get units with professional grade inputs for higher end microphones. So much nicer to work with if you do need a decent mic.

Luckless wrote in post #17948712
I've been moving towards external audio devices. Having the sound controller on my desk with a short lead to the headphones makes for very little room for noise to be introduced to the audio feed. Plus you can get units with professional grade inputs for higher end microphones. So much nicer to work with if you do need a decent mic.

I've considered it.. I want a Vali 2 to be honest and a set of extremely good non-Grado cans.. Like maybe some HD650s or HD700s.. or perhaps go in a different direction.. But for gaming theres different priorities

The good news is that the ESS Sabre and audio stage on the Maximus VIII really do work well with the Game Ones, It doesnt work as well with my HD280s or my SR125s though.. though i really dislike my SR125s on most everything

Its finally... FINALLY done.. I will clean my desk up and maybe do a finale video showing it finally running

So at the end of it all heres my final specs:

NZXT H440 Black/Red w/ 3x Noctua NF-F12 iPPC 2000 PWM intakes, 1x Corsair AF140 exhaust
Intel Core i7 6700k @ 4.635ghz
Asus Maximus VIII Formula
32gb GSkill Trident Z DDR4-3200
eVGA GTX 980 Ti SSC @ 1435 core
500gb 850 EVO
500gb 840 EVO
600gb WD Velociraptor
2TB Samsung Ecodrive
2TB WD Green
5TB WD Black
Corsair H110i CPU Cooler w/ 2x Noctua NF-A14 iPPC-3000 in a pull config


Peripherals:

BenQ XL2730Z (Which now has a big old strip of bleed on the bottom.. unfortunately it seems being moved on/off desk repeatedly borked the panel frown.gif)
Logitech G910 Orion Spark RGB Mechanical Keyboard (Old Version with the tapered keycaps)
Logitech G502 Proteus Core
Sennheiser Game One Headset
Phillips Fidelio X2/27 Open Hi-Fi headphones

What all happened to make it take so long? I've built a dozen or so computers in my 28 years of being here and this is the first one in a very, very long time to give me such a headache (I remember my attempts with a K6 II and K6 III system that were similarly frustrating, they didnt like applications I really liked at the time and it ended with me buying a Celeron, thats beside the point)

First the M9 ACK was a bad choice in motherboard, disappointed in every way imaginable, the audio was bad, the networking kept giving me problem after problem, and it constantly crashed... Trading to the Formula was the first good decision I made (Albeit i should have done it from the start) I also had a lot of issues with the H440 case and the amount of drives I was cramming into the thing...

Then getting things running on the Formula was still a headache, it was more stable, but still not there, I went through everything, even replacing EVERY fan in this system (Which entailed ripping most of it apart) with Noctua pro-series PWM fans across the board, This helped acoustics AND thermals (Not that my thermals were too bad to begin with) but that still didnt solve the problems, Even at stock speeds my 6700 was simply unstable, and doing even a mild stress test caused one core to jump to 90 degrees... just the one... and thats just not right

Checked and reapplied thermal paste, No dice, Continued crashing, delving into crash logs and ETC kept indicating said core was having a malfunction.. time was running out, I exchanged the CPU to newegg

New one comes, Quick stock speed stability, Much better temps, Low 60s if i remember right on all cores, Screw around pushing it, Try 4.8 and no dice, boots but wont run a simple stress test... 4.7 will run albeit at a high voltage (1.42) and i just didnt wanna go that hard.. End up at 4.635 and 1.38 volts after a few hours, End up satisfied, passes stress tests.. Now Ive been using it, not one crash no matter what ive thrown at it, it runs colder and quieter than the other CPU so now im perfectly happy

I also caved and ordered Corsairs custom sleeved cables for the PSU so that the cable routing was FAR easier in the H440

Oh and in the middle of this my fairly new K95 RGB went completely kaput on me, wont stop being in the demo mode, keyboard isnt recognized at bios OR in windows... So its basically completely dead, Thus the G910 replacement

Hows it run? Great, its definitely a snappy rig, not that my old one was "slow", overall I'd describe the experience as "more consistent" around the board.. im not necessarily "Faster" i just see more stable frames in many situations, and ther system is quieter.. the on board audio isnt half shabby, Though I want to add a Vali to the mix down the line (I've always wanted tube sound) Definitely glad I ended up with Wi-Fi in the system as due to some remodeling the wired connection to the computer room is disconnected.. Thankfully my desktop is having zero issues and I'm having zero difference in performance on wireless...

If I had to do it all again... I'd have started off at the Formula motherboard, I'd have gone to a different case (The Phanteks EVOLV ATX for instance..) and id likely have gone for replacement fans from the start for the CPU CLLC... I may also have from the start invested in some different storage solution to ease cable management, Most cases seem determined to do away with the ability to EASILY route wiring for 6 drives in the system...

What do I need to finish? an RGB lighting strip to complete the lights would be good. Also maybe one of these http://www.amazon.com …437869522&pf_rd​_i=desktop

or one of these

http://www.amazon.com …liid=I2Q4AA50TV​UMR5&psc=1

Also want one of these

http://schiit.com/prod​ucts/vali-2

Kenji,

Would you consider running userbenchmark.exe from userbenchmark.com, so I can compare my 4770k OC?
Thanks!

Mine: http://www.userbenchma​rk.com/UserRun/1072790

Here is another good benchmark program Cinebench r15
http://www.maxon.net …s/cinebench/ove​rview.html

KenjiS wrote in post #17996373

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/GLCT​Qi Kagutsuchi 1 by Trevor H, on Flickr

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/GJjB​BL Kagutsuchi 2 by Trevor H, on Flickr

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/FXbc​AM Kagutsuchi 3 by Trevor H, on Flickr

I will consider running that benchmark in the morning, Been a busy few days

You know the photographer in me is thinking, "you could have done better photos"

Same with me... I really need to do that

I unfortunately fell ill. Not my year... my desk is a mess so i cannot at the moment get better pictures

that's not very good. I hope you are getting better.