[LPC Project] - DARK KNIGHT II

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

Hello,
Im presenting on this forum my lastest project.

You can check the original iteration of it on my original PT Forum:

- https://www.portugal-tech.pt/showthread.php?6552-LPC-Project-DARK-KNIGHT-II

But for time sake im just posting my latest revision of it.

After a long transformation process in my previous case, I decided to test something different... something new...
And as such I decided to redo the project around a new case.

Thus Dark Knight II was born!

I bought a black NZXT H6 Flow, where I will install a fully THERMALRIGHT project.
I particularly like this brand and I already know their coolers.

Therefore we will have:

4 Thermalright 120mm ARGB fans (3 front and 1 rear)
4 Thermalright 140mm ARGB Fans (2 below and 2 above)

Total 8 fans, all ARGB, and everything will be synchronized by the motherboard.

Best Regards

LPC

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

Hello Again!
Here is my lastest update on this project.

After testing Intel Platform i resolved to give AM5 another Chance...

Here is the hardware purchased...

Ryzen 7 9800X3D
A new cooler from ThermalRight (a brand I really like) PHANTOM SPIRIT 120 EVO
MSI MAG B850 TOMAHAWK MAX WIFI
Patriot Viper VENOM 2x32GB DDR5 Memory (6000 MT - CL30)
Multiple NVMe´s for the system.

I took advantage of the case that I love... the NZXT H6 Flow, the power supply the Corsair HX1200 and the graphics the ASUS TUF 4070 TI, although the graphics will be replaced by an ASUS TUF 7900XTX 24GB as I'm not sure that the 9070XT will be anything great or better than the 7900XTX.

So here are some images of the products and the assembly....

I hope you like it...

In this new assembly I decided to put 3 NVMe's and not just 2 as I usually do... I put 2 Kingston KC3000 (which continue to be one of the best Gen 4 on the market), one of 2TB (main) and another of 512GB (tertiary), which will use the fastest slots on the board.

Then I have a Kingston NVMe, the 1TB NV3, which serves as the system's secondary drive.

All these SSDs were chosen for their excellent price/quality ratio and performance.

Here are the SSDs already mounted on the board...
They are all cooled by the heatsinks that come with the motherboard, but in any case they don't get very hot (unlike the Gen 5 ones which should definitely be avoided!).

Here we have the 9800X3D already mounted on the socket and ready to take with the thermal paste and the cooler...
Here the board is all "closed" and ready to be mounted in the box and the other components applied.

Here we have the system assembled and ready to be turned on... The memories and the CPU heatsink were already installed.
The graphics were already assembled... However, soon i should receive the other one and I will redo this assembly again, making some corrections that I need to make to the system.

In any case, I can say that this system has been 90% stable for now and without any major problems...

I've had 2x BSODs on Windows 11, but given the irregular nature, we conclude that it will be a driver issue because I've already tested everything else and it's not...

However, for now I'm quite satisfied... The CPU is quite cool and there are no problems with cooling it. Now we just have to hope that you can try out the platform a little more.

With my best regards,

LPC

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

Hello Again!
Giving an update to my current project!

I have resolved to return to the "all RED TEAM" and purchased this beauty... No more NVIDIA or INTEL this time around!

I had one of these in the past (and also the Sapphire equivalent), and I really liked it.
And as Upscalers mature, the impact of RT is mitigated.

For me, the difference is really the larger 24GB Frame Buffer.
Here is the rest of the assembly and design of the graphic...

I would like to point out that I took advantage of the fact that I changed the system again and made 2 corrections that were not to my liking when assembling my AM5 system.

1) I added another CPU power cable (I went from 1 to 2), thus being able to distribute the OC load across the 2 cables.
2) I changed the orientation of the cooler to be higher up and a little further away from the graphics card, allowing better air circulation inside the case.

I'll leave the system working in the box... (still testing the lighting)

Here is my current build...
It may or may not stop here... I'm waiting to see what AMD has to offer with the 9070XT and whether they beat this 7900XTX.

After messing around with the colors of the RGB, i settled for now on the RED Team Theme...

It color matches my Razer Keyboard and NPlay Mouse.
For future updates to this project, I have already ordered a new monitor.

Finally after almost 5 years with my faithful friend BenQ EW3270U 4K HDR
Its being Retired somewhat (its going to my son computer).

And here comes this new 32" 4K OLED...

AGON AG326 UD

- https://aoc.com/pt/gaming/products/monitors/ag326ud

Best Regards,

LPC

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

Hello Again!
My new "precious" have arrived!
And what a blast it is!

Its trully an transformative event! For me coming from a 60hz VA 4k Panel (that was OK) to QD-OLED, is like entering in a new dimension...
The imagem is way more "alive", the whites are more white, the colors are super rich and the black is real black... Its incredible!!

And on top of that the ultra smooth 165hz on the OS and on the games are superb! Its my first time using an OLED and im selled on this tech!
Here i left some more images of the monitor on CP2077!

If the GPU has the horsepower to pull at least 60 FPS on the 4k, with the help of Frame Gen it can easly go to 120fps and enabling Anti-Lag, the motion is flawless!

Next Week im updating my perifericals...

New Keyboard + New Mouse + New Mat (all from Razer).

Thanks for watching...

LPC

 

[Space Lynx]

It's a nice setup, well done! Don't forget to enable EXPO on in the BIOS so your ram will actually run at those timings. I'm sure you already did, just a friendly reminder.

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

It's a nice setup, well done! Don't forget to enable EXPO on in the BIOS so your ram will actually run at those timings. I'm sure you already did, just a friendly reminder.

Hi!
Thanks for your post!

Yes, i have enabled Expo on the Bios.

I have also done a little OC on the CPU by enabling the "+200mhz" option and altering the follow options:

This is on PBO but on Curve Optimizer.

- Scalar: 10x
- Enable Positive
- + 200

I have also these options:

- Negative
- -20 (i have tested -30 and -25, but it was not stable on Torture Testing)

I have now: 5.4ghz on all cores, stable.

Best Regards,

LPC

 

[Space Lynx]

What game besides cyberpunk are you most looking forward to playing with these specs? I personally have my eye on Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, but I am going to wait about 6 months for patches and a sale price.

Also, keep in mind a lot of older games look amazing in 4k OLED, so consider going through your library and checking those out too. Many will easily run at 4k 240hz 240 fps with those specs you have. Such as the Barman Arkham games, but those require edits to unlock the refresh rate.

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

What game besides cyberpunk are you most looking forward to playing with these specs? I personally have my eye on Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, but I am going to wait about 6 months for patches and a sale price.

Also, keep in mind a lot of older games look amazing in 4k OLED, so consider going through your library and checking those out too. Many will easily run at 4k 240hz 240 fps with those specs you have. Such as the Barman Arkham games, but those require edits to unlock the refresh rate.

Hi!
Thanks for your reply!

Well i do like sci-fi, rpg´s and mainly SP Games. I don´t have the time anymore for multiplayer games, because my life is very busy, so the little time i have left for my hobbie i try to spend it wisely!

Currently im trying Witcher 3, but im going to sort some old games that i have on my game accounts and test it on this monitor.

For future games, im waiting for the next Mass Effect and the EXODUS game.

With my very best regards,

LPC

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

Hello Again!

I've been meaning to do this update for several days, but unfortunately time has been short...
But now I have some time and I'm going to do it... As I said, I was doing a complete remodeling of my system...
And it wasn't just the tower, the accessories were also renewed...
So, I ordered some stuff from Razer, a brand that I personally like and the integration of Synapse in their various products.

So, I ordered a complete setup... The Razer Nommo V2 Pro sound system, the Ornata V2 keyboard (I already had an old one that was refurbished and since I know that the V3 is worse than the V2, I bought this new one), the Razer Cobra Mouse and the XXL Razer Gigantus V2 mouse pad.

Here are some photos of the acquisitions:

I particularly like the overall quality of Razer products...
Everything is already set up on my desk...

I ended up going with AMD's "Red Team" theme for this system... What can I say about the products I purchased?
I already knew the keyboard, as I had another one just like it for several years... it's an excellent keyboard for those who write and also for those who play.
I don't like very noisy keyboards, but I like to hear the "click" of the mechanical keys... So for me this keyboard was perfect.
Very positive note for the wrist support, which is soft and lasts a long time (my previous one was already falling apart... but I used it intensively...).

The Razer Cobra is a mouse that for me was an interesting choice... I had the Razer Basilisk V3 here which is a brutal mouse, but for me it wasn't right because the mouse is huge and has a very large hump which made my hand slip backwards making it uncomfortable.

This Razer Cobra is lower and lighter. Which is more interesting to me. The sensor is not the same as the Basilisk but it is still very good.
So if we calibrate the mouse to the Gigantus V2 mouse pad, the accuracy is fantastic! Light, fast and accurate.

Finally I left the best... The Razer Nommo V2 Pro cases are simply fantastic!
I already had a good set of Edifier speakers, but these really offer unparalleled audio quality and precision...
They deliver brutal and super precise sound... even with THX the 360º positioning is fantastic in games... The sound is super loud and with the subwoofer we have those impacts in the bass!

Playing with this sound on this OLED monitor is simply surreal...

Kind regards,

LPC

 

[Lord Paulus Cobris (LPC)]

Hello Guys (and Gals!)!
After almost 1 week of waiting, I received yesterday the 9070 XT I had ordered.
I bought an ASUS again.
The ASUS TUF GAMING RX 9070 XT.
It replaced my old ASUS TUF 7900 XTX.

Here are some photos of the product:

I can say that the board is a bit smaller than the ASUS 7900XTX, and also a good bit lighter.
The design is interesting, but I personally liked the design of the 7900XTX better.

It's still powered by 3x 8-pin power like the 7900xtx, so swapping out the hardware was pretty easy...
It was essentially just a case of taking one out and putting the other in and that's it...
Here are some pictures of the board already mounted in my system...

The theme is compatible with my current system, so the colors look relatively good.
It should be noted that the board is made of metal, only the fans are made of plastic. The frame is metal and the backplate is also metal.

I cleaned up the drivers and reinstalled everything for this video card.

The card is very cool and in terms of cooling it is a little above the 7900xtx's cooling
I didn't notice much coil noise until 250 fps... from there you can hear a little coil noise, but it's low enough not to be annoying.
In terms of fan noise, for now they are silent (I'm using the SILENT bios), so the fans start at a low speed of 700 rpm and run normally around that.

But even running Port Royal at the maximum you can (350W with several peaks of 400 and 450w), it didn't go above 55c! which is impressive!
But if the performance in terms of silence and cooling is impressive, what is even more impressive is what can be done with UV and OC!

To give an example... In default running a Port Royal, I got a base value of: 18268 Points.
However, and still without touching the memories, just by adjusting the Watt consumption and the GPU voltage I got these settings and values: +10 Consumption limit and -160mv on the GPU I got: 19620 Points.

An increase of more than 1000 Points just by making these adjustments... The next phase will be to balance consumption with voltage...
The idea is to have the card between 250 and 275W and with the maximum possible performance.

I can say that I am super happy with this new product from AMD. And I think it will sell like hot cakes throughout its service life.
It would be interesting if AMD presented a 9080 XTX with a little more juice (400W), a little more BUS and of course more RAM (24GB).

Here is a final image of the system in operation... It has AMD's "RED TEAM" theme and it looks great on it!!!

I hope you like it!

Kind regards,

LPC

 

[A Computer Guy]

Nice build! Those GPU's are huge. I fear what would happen if that GPU stand ever kicks out.