Cooling Dframe - Computer Setup

Hey OP, may I ask what you do for living? Its always fascinating to see someone with great gaming setup setup and hear what they do.

I'm a senior system administrator for a medium sized company (2000+ people). Windows Server, and Red Hat linux mostly.

I wish I knew things.

You DO know things... for instance... you know its your cake day!!! Wait... you did know that didn't you...?

I do but I got nothing to post.

... i didn't on my cake day either...

Well that got depressing fast.

I just found out it was my parents leaving money under the pillow the whole time.

I'm pretty sure it was my mother!

Why don't you both meet and play together

Don't worry, I'm 0/2 so far.

Gave me a chuckle. I read this in the voice of Eeyore.

Dude, this is the one day you can creditwhore without worrying about repercussions. Take a picture of a cat or something retro/nostalgic and post it!

Except you put cake day in the title. I personally don't mind, but it was tagged as a shit title because of that. You know how some people are uptight about reddiquette.

Those people should find a cliff. Cake day comes but once a year - let me enjoy it.

I had a feeling looking at this that you were in either tech or engineering.

Thats in my basement in the utility closet near my theater. ;) I have an 8 bay Drobo pro with 16TB of space connected to a windows server. I have 4 TVs in my house that all have a HTPC connected to it that stream media to the TVs via XBMC. They are all connected to a central database too so i can pause on 1 TV then resume on another, watched movies and TV shows are automatically updated on all machines at the same time, etc, etc. I was going to take a pic of that as well but its not very interesting to look at. Just a hard drive enclosure sitting on a shelf, and connected to an old Dell Dimension PC. I also have Sonos setup throughout my house that stream music from my file server as well.

I think it would be awesome to include pictures of the servers! Fantastic work. I would love to do something like this for my career.

That sounds awesome. Details on how you accomplished that? Especially the play/pause stuff.

Awesome! I didn't know it was possible to sync them up, I already have MySQL installed on my home server, so I'll have to give this a try.

I have a couple of different ones... One i just built myself based on an intel core i3 with HD4000 graphics. Another is an Acer Revo RL100. Another is an Intel DC3217IYE (which is probably my favorite of the bunch). And i have a boxee box on the TV in my gaming setup room that i use as a retro game station, obviously, this one can't sync with the XBMC boxes, but i don't watch much on that TV so its not a big deal to me right now.

What protocol are you using for the xbmc network library access? I'm having problems with SMB shares, FTP is not working as well as I would like.

All the machines are running windows, so it just uses all my windows mapped drives to populate sources for xbmc... that was another reason the windows setup was easier. ;)

Jokes on you, his business is his gaming setup! He has the company servers handling all that!

Nice- that's what I'm hoping to get into someday (16 years old).

Its a really fun career path. I started to get into information security and windows/linux server administration. Be prepared tho, it really is a lifetime of learning. You can never stop. Courses, certfications... lots of ways to challenge yourself, and lots of different directions to take.

I'm taking the 70-640, tips?

I didnt know medium size was 2000 users.

Just skip the wife and kids if you must have something on par with this setup. I don't know how to put it nicely. Not saying one is exclusive to the other, but it can be done with a decent income.

Definitely. I have no kids, my GF and i have been together more than 6 years, and we decided very early on that we didn't want to have kids. There's also no chance of that accidentally happening. We both have good jobs, we have a great place, and we are very happy with where we are and feel pretty fortunate. That being said, we're not the fucking Rockefeller's or anything.

With that setup? Sure, Tony. Where do you keep the suits of armor?

I thought you had my back here man...? ;)

I actually gasped at the multi-screen picture.

You should see it in person! :)

Okay then. Where do you live? Just kidding.

Speaking of the monitor, what is it? I'm looking around for a multi-monitor panoramic display like this.

I am aspiring to be this awesome one day. Thanks for sharing.

The secret ingredient is you...

This kinda made my day, dude :)

Maybe you should stop being such a shitty human being.

He missed a word, the secret ingredient is in you, someone more successful than you.

This may sound silly, but I hate how pathetic graphics cards look with their awesome shells off.

Haha. yeah... kinda like someone opened the curtain on the wizard of oz... :P

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Best gaming setup posted here in a long time. Well done sir!

Thanks! That is high praise indeed!

People around here usually favor a very clean look to their gaming setups (myself included) but I fucking love what you've done. Everything from the mouse/keyboard combo to the case is just so crazy and aggressive looking. You also have some other nice toys haha

Thanks! I try to keep it minimalist but i do like to throw in a bit of style if possible. :)

The jelly flows through my jimmies

Upvote... cause you're a fucking wordsmith...

Throw in a snickers and you got yourself a deal...

Any chance you'll throw some of the units away? I'd be glad to pick up your garbage.

You're not the first person to offer. :P

Gotta double down man. you may not be the first but you could be the best.

You got too much cash money bro

Well... not really any more. :P

Jesse riccochet, we gotta cook! So we can buy more BATTLE!

Can you not just, like, buy us a superlab?

Have you EVER done this before? CHRIST! How quickly would the cops descend on a SUPERLAB?!?!?! I'M DEALING WITH AMATEURS!!!! ;)

Yeah, you're gonna have to buy a chicken farm as well.

Gimme the list, I'll go shopping....

It looks like someone actually as a job.

My god. This might be the single coolest place ever. Great great job! Especially loved that custom made case, really really creative, what was your inspiration?

The case is actually only custom in the fact that i painted it. Its actually an Inwin D-Frame case. It came in a bright orange color, i just spray painted the pieces with gun metal grey plasti dip. :P

How is the sound coming from the tower? With that open style of case do the fans generate alot of noise?

Do you mean the cooling tower? There is zero sound. I don't even think the fans have turned on yet during regular use... Its a great piece of equipment to be honest. The open case actually has zero sound because with the water cooling, i have removed all the fans. Its actually kind of eerie... Even the corsair power supply's fan doesn't turn on during normal load so its completely silent. If you mean the fortress tower case on my second gaming PC, sound isn't bad. Its all still air cooled so there is fan noise. In contrast to the water cooled PC it is noticeably louder, but i never noticed it before this to be honest.

Wow gotcha gotta love the power of liquid cooling - I'm new to this coolcomputersetups so I'm learning so many new things I didn't even know existed.

Yeah, i was having alot of issues keeping my gaming machine cool with air. my video cards had idling temps (just on the windows desktop) of 62 degrees celcius. They are at about 30 now. I haven't really been able to do any load testing yet cause i'm still installing everything cause i had to do a system format.

I think I just came a little bit while reading this. Absolutely glorious!

Didn't expect it quite that... early... but i guess my work here is done...

That's a cooling tower? From the size of the panoramic I just thought it was one tall speaker tower. Where do you get your ideas for hardware?

Generally someone else comes up with them... I just buy them and use them. :P

How the hell does that monitor setup work? What is it, like 5 20inch monitors on their sides all bolted together? How do you even hook em up? Dont get me wrong I know all about 2-3 monitor setups and constantly run 2 mself... but this...

Its 5 24" monitors plugged into one of my video cards. ATI created something called eyefinity to create large desktops out of multiple monitors. The ATI drivers take the combined resolution of all 5 monitors and treat it as one desktop. EDIT : they are all turned on their side in portrait mode.

How rich are you from a scale of Warren Buffet to Bill Gates?

I love it ! This is why I browse this sub coolcomputersetups.

I knew from the photos that this guy was fairly well off but I just couldn't shake that nagging feeling in my spine. It must just be another baffling case. But I continued to look through OP's photos of the gaming setup, something didn't add up. Could easily be an inside job... After hours of looking through the 16 photos I noticed something on picture number 10, something small, but something significant. A clue? I sent the image down to Tommy for enhancement. I waited twiddling my thumbs, eagerly awaiting the return of the image. Once Tommy was finished his magic my suspicions were conformed. A tag, some sort of label. It was the dam DLC tag.

I would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for you meddling kids!

Any reason why you went with XBMC over Plex? And how easy was it to setup XBMC for the setup you're running?

Back when i first started looking into media center PCs, XBMC was far and above superior to plex, it was also only available for Mac. :)
Plex has come a LONG way, but i am just sorta really down with XBMC now. Thought about trying out Plex, but what i wanted to do was create a seamless and easily understood environment for my media so anyone could use it. My GF (and other members of my family) got used to XBMC and liked how easy and intuitive it felt to use, i didn't really see a need to mess with that.
i ran the stand alone version of it for quite a while, configuration was a bit challenging for me since i wasn't really the greatest with linux. I am running XBMC on all windows machines now, and the initial configuration of setting up the database is pretty easy. all you really have to do is modify an xml file and then make sure your database permissions are set properly.

Its human nature to hate what you cannot understand...

I don't understand how you got into my house...

Well quit leaving the door unlocked... although i have been enjoying watching you sleep lately... you make the CUTEST faces...

From reading the comments, OP is legit. That case is dope.

I'll just sit here on my "gaming" rig running a core 2 quad... I am a tad envious. Lol.

Now THAT, is a gaming station right there

I are jelly, very jelly

Seriously... how much debt do you have?

Do you also have a pool of money at the back that you take the occasional dip in?

Not since the last time that i got papercuts. everywhere... Every. Where.

As a poor student, I hate this coolcomputersetups sometimes

We were all poor students at some point. :)

I dropped my soup spoon when I hit image 10.

I bet you have an awesome security system! You should post detailed schematics and pictures of it.

Sure! What could possibly go wrong?! Hey, i'll just give you my master code and access to my online services...

You sir, have waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay to much money. Please give some to this poor Indian prince that needs money for the bus.

You're the 4th nigerian prince to ask me for bus fair today... what the hell man!? Can't you guys just all pool your resources and go in a group...?

Incredible! i have nothing more to say.

How's the K90? I have the K60 right now, but totally want the K90 because of the backlit blue. Is it worth it OP?

Love your (I assume) basement theater. Still saving up to finish my basement out, but this is pretty much what I have in mind!

The basement theater room was what my entire basement layout was designed around. :P My GF and i built our house about 3 years ago and got it done by the builder. Love it. Once 4k projectors become a little more feasible i'll be looking at upgrading my projector.

So I'm curious as to what Gamecube games and SNES games you have at the Retro Station?

Very nice layout my friend. How loud is the INWIN? Are you liquid cooling everything that you can on that rig?

Post pics without the glass please? Also why Z77 with dual graphics cards?

The Z77 just had a good price/performance point in my eyes... The X79 (LGA2011) just didn't appeal to me too much... i know its the best of the best and all, but the diminishing returns just wasn't worth it for me.

This kids, is how he affords the other toys. Pay attention.

What is lord's name is the total resolution of all those monitors? Do games even support it even with eyefinity?

Hows gaming with those 5 screens? Got trouble with drivers/microstutter?

I use a 5 monitor setup as well, but without any sort of real stands. What kind is it that you have and what are your thoughts on it?

... is that a request or a statement...?

I saw all your pieces in the first picture and I thought the Death Star destroyed your gaming setup...

I have so much to learn, but how much did the monitors cost+the stands for them? Amazing build on your entire home! Glad someone is living my dream :/ im so jelly.

This is one of the first setups that seriously made my jaw drop. I'm green with envy.

And on that day the women shouted out "Come out to the club with us!", and we shall answer no, Blood Dragon has finished downloading. But damn I am impressed, only in first year engineering but I can already tell how badass that set up is.Game on my friend, game on.

Just curious about the edges of the monitors, are they taped up or is that just how they look once you debezzeled them? Otherwise solid setup!

This is beautiful. Your man cave is the kind legends are made of.

Quite an awesome setup. How much did it cost you in total?

I don't really know... i've been building this over the course of years... but everything in all the pics... including the theater...? i'm sure i'm well over $20k at this point.

Id like to see your servers...please post pics.

What is that case and how can I get it?

What monitors are they? How are the viewing angles when its vertical? I notice a discoloration and weird viewing angles when I use mine vertical.

Now you're just showing off. I like that.

Some fine work you have put into this gaming setup good man. Great motivator to finish my setup and get some updated pics up here. Just got the hole through the wall to run all my wiring into another room to never listen to CPU/GPU fans whirling ever again.

EXPENSIVE GAMER TO THE MAX

What make are the monitors on the first system? also, are they modded since they have such thin casing on the side?

Nice setup, need to upgrade that classic gaming station with a tube though ;)

This is beautiful. If I were you, I would find a way to showcase the PC and 5 monitor setup. I think that should be front and center inside a room with all eyes on it.

Thought about that. Wasn't sure if it would be worth it since i don't really game without the lights on, and i generally don't like to add "bling" to my setups. I might do it however.

Fuck you and your couch. But seriously, I'm jealous of that glorious setup.

That case looks so much better in grey. Can't see myself dropping the $500 on it though.

Hows the quality on the projector?

I've never understood why people use multiple monitors? Why would you want to spend all that money on multiple monitors, only to have inch thick lines (from the bezels) going through your screen. Why not just get 1 giant monitor (or a really good TV? You can still have multiple windows open on a giant monitor, without all the lines/bezels breaking the image up.

And i've never understood how many people really don't get this. :)
The answer i always give is this : with a large projector, or TV you're limited by the resolution. A max of 1920x1080. That will never ever be able to compete with the detail and clarity you're going to get out of a setup like this at 5400x1920. It really isn't even fair to compare. As for the bars, every single person that has said the same thing, and i've sat in front of this setup, the bars disappear quickly... you just stop noticing them while playing.

I think your thermal exhaust port is vulnerable. You might want to take care of that.

Its perfectly safe, nobody will ever be accurate enough to get any explosives down there.

Holy mother. That is absolutely amazing OP.

Its a great case. Very well designed.

I really like the portrait monitors. What made you start in Administration and what education did you go through? I'm curious. :)

So only two people can sit in the movie room?

I applaud your Star Wars reference

Dolls?! You seriously have dolls? Real Men have G1 Transformers! :P

He saw the breadth of his domain, he wept for there were no more worlds to conquer...

I have not yet created or been a part of a direct neural interface into the game of my choice... there is always room to do more. ;)

How do you like the Wii u?

Really cool to see the WSGF Stand in action like this. I thought my office was well stocked. I've got nothing on this.

You currently have the same GFX cards I am getting.

Water cooling shouldn't be necessary for 1. I never did any over clocking with them but they can be unlocked to the GHZ edition of the card which can do some mad overclocking. If you're REALLY going to do a lot of overclocking however, a water cooled setup might be worth it. However, like i mentioned in the album only EKWB actually makes the water blocks for that graphics card and i don't think they are really making them any more so if you're going to get one i'd make up your mind about it. :P
I found the stock clock speeds on the card pretty damn good. The only reason i went with the water cooling for these is because they sit so close together on the motherboard that there isn't enough room for air to circulate. Although I have seen people do it, so my open air case might just be the issue.

You cannot fathom how badly I want to play video games with you right now.

Someday I tell you.... SOMEDAY!

Okay, you're rich, we get it.

You make me dream... congratulation nice work

Okay kids. We all have a goal to work towards now. Seriously. This is truly impressive. Enjoy it well good sir.

Willing to adopt a 24 year old recent grad?

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