New X99 CAD Workstation

Today I was asked to replace one of our aging CAD workstations with something new. The user wanted bragging rights that he had the fastest computer, and gave me a budget of around $2500. I got darn close, but here is what I came up with...

Asus X99 Deluxe
Crucial 16GB Ballistix Sport Memory DDR4
Intel Core i7-5930K 3.5GHz, 6 core CPU
NZXT H230 Black Silent Case
Corsair RM Series 750W PSU
Crucial MX100 512GB SSD
NVIDIA Quadro K4000
Corsair Hydro H80i Extreme Cooler
Windows 7 Pro 64bit

For Storage I had initially looked at the Samsung XP941, as its speeds are 2x that of a SATA SSD, but had a hard time justifying the 2x price. I told the user, as the tech matures, the prices will come down, and then we can move him to one of those in a year or so.

Parts were ordered this morning, and I will post pics of the build process as we go along.

Debo wrote: Why not 32 gigs of ram? or 64? =O

DDR4 is pricey. 16GB will keep him set pretty well. RAM can always be upgraded down the line, and as its DDR4, prices will come down over the course of the next year.

The parts arrived today! (Everything but the case that is.)

Lets take a tour of the assembly outside of the case shall we....



I just realized that I forgot to take a full overview shot of the board, but here are some closeup detail shots. I was surprised by how HEAVY this board is.




SATA Express

Came with a TON of extras....

RAM installed.



CPU Time


It never ceases to amaze me how large these enthusiast chips actually are.


Make sure you line up the arrows. The notches are offset from each other, but not by much.

In its resting place, and locked down.

Time for the cooler.

All hooked up.

Graphics card


Storage. 500GB of goodness.


When the case arrives, I will detail the rest of the process.

garfi3ld wrote: are the pics dead for anyone else?

Crap.. I tried to share them from my OneDrive.... I guess I can see them because im signed into my account... Ill try to get this fixed.

UPDATE: I moving them to dropbox and we will see what happens from there.

UPDATE: DropBox doesnt allow this to work either. Neither does Flickr... Uploading to imgur now.

UPDATE: All pics are now on imgur. I have learned my lesson.
Enjoy.

The case arrived, and now the system is all built!

I like it! Case seems a bit overkill though. It just seems so big, lol. Guess they have room for a couple more drives though.

Wingless92 wrote: I like it! Case seems a bit overkill though. It just seems so big, lol. Guess they have room for a couple more drives though.

It was a good price, and looks good. If he wants to add more space, he has it.
Wiring was pretty easy too.

If anyone is looking for a great looking case with sound dampening, I can highly suggest this one.

I may be building a killer system at the computer shop in the coming weeks... Ill build log the crap out of that one!