NEET Computers | Custom Builds and IT Services (2024)

Workstations

UE 5, VR, and 3D Rendering Workstation

Commission to deliver the most performant workstation possible on a $3K budget in Unreal Engine 5, Virtual Reality, and 3D rendering. With an i9-13900K, an RTX 4090, 64GB of RAM, and a 2TB Gen 4 NVME SSD, top-tier performance was a given. Even so, extensive tuning was necessary to ensure decent thermals and noise were achieved without holding back any component.

The 13900K is notoriously hot and power hungry, with even Hardware Unboxed's 420mm AIO liquid cooler being insufficient to prevent throttling, resulting in their chip only scoring 38k points after a 10 minute loop in Cinebench R23. In this system, diligent testing resulted in a 5.7GHz p-core boost / 5.4GHz allcore, 3.8GHz E-core frequency, and 4.5GHz RING clock, rock solid stable at just 1.21v. This brought CPU package power from 350+ watts to below 300, eliminating throttling and resulting in R23 scores exceeding 40k.

These frequencies are 100-300MHz higher than the usual Turbo Boost 2.0 tech and match those of Turbo boost Max 3.0 + Adaptive Boost. When considering that a 13900K is usually running a -300MHz AVX offset, this i9 undervolted with a dual-tower cooler faster across the board even compared to Turbo Velocity Boost.

While Raptor Lake does benefit from the bandwidth of DDR5, a well-tuned kit of DDR4 still delivers lower latency and similar performance while saving a hundred bucks. As such, the 64GB of DDR4 is overclocked from 3600MHz CL18-22-22-42 to 3733MHz CL16-21-21-38, with tightened secondary timings resulting in 10 nanoseconds less latency than TechPowerUp's 6GHz CL32 DDR5.

Finally, the PNY XLR8 RTX 4090 may lack a factory overclock, but even this reference board will outperform the best AIB tuned models after some manual tweaking. Der8aur has found Lovelace to be far more voltage limited than power limited, so the absence of a 600 Watt vBios is negligible, with MSI Afterburner's +100% voltage limit resulting in higher sustained frequencies than more power would. Consequently, with maxxed voltage, a custom fan curve, +100MHz core offset to best the STRIX OC, and a stable +1GHz on the VRAM, this PNY card tops the charts in EzBench (UE 5), OctaneBench, and V-Ray when compared to the results of the factory overclocked cards benchmarked by Tech Yes City, EposVox, and the Octane database. It's also really fast in VR and games.

Specifications:
GPU- Nvidia RTX 4090 PNY XLR8 Gaming VERTO EPIX-X RGB (w/ 24GB GDDR6X)
CPU- Intel Core i9-13900K (24 cores, 32 Threads @ up to 5.7GHz)
RAM- 64GB G.SKILL Trident Z RGB DDR4 in Dual Channel @3733MHz (16-21-21-38-CR2)
SSD- 2TB NVME Inland Performance Plus Gen4 Solid State Drive
Mobo- MSI Z690 Gaming Edge WIFI D4 ATX Motherboard
PSU- 1300 Watt EVGA G+ Power Supply (80+ Gold Certified)
Case- Fractal Design Torrent Black E-ATX Full-Tower w/ Two 180mm Fractal Fans and Three 140mm Fractal Fans and One 140mm Arctic Fan
Cooler- DeepCool AK620 Tower Cooler w/ Two DeepCool Fans
OS- Windows 11 Professional (latest version, activated)
Connectivity- 2.5Gb LAN, WiFi 6, Bluetoot 5.2

X399 Threadripper Dual-Boot Workstation

Commission to deliver a crazy amount of CPU multicore performance, memory bandwidth, and storage on the X399 Threadripper platform. At the heart is a TR 2970WX with twenty-four cores and fourty-eight threads unleashed with PBO to achieve 10% more performance than stock with 4.2GHz boost clocks and sustaining 3.8GHz during multi-core torture. It's paired with 128GB of quad-channel, triple-rank DDR4 with tightened timings to achieve DDR5 levels of memory bandwidth. The Threadripper's PCIe lanes are put to good use with Windows 11 installed on the 2TB Raid 0 array of four 500GB Samsung 970 EVO Plus NVME SSD's which combine to deliver PCIe 5.0 NVME speeds. For Kali Linux, an additional 4TB of NVME SSD's are present, as well as seven 4TB hard drives to make a total of 34TB of local storage. Finally, for encoding and CUDA acceleration, the RTX 3070 MSI Ventus 3X OC boasts a 10% boost to its VRAM and a 5% core bump to achieve 3070 TI performance.

Specifications:
GPU- Nvidia RTX 3070 MSI Ventus 3X OC (w/ 8GB GDDR6)
CPU- AMD Threadripper 2970WX (24 cores, 48 Threads @ up to 4.2GHz)
RAM- 128GB G.SKILL Ripjaw V DDR4 in Quad Channel @2666MHz (16-18-18-36-CR1)
SSD- 2TB Raid 0 NVME Array (Four 500GB Samsung 970 EVO Plus
SSD- 2TB NVME Fanxiang S550 Pro Solid State Drive
SSD- 2TB NVME Intel 670P Solid State Drive
SSD- 120GB Kingston Solid State Drive
HDD- Seven 4TB Western Digital Purple 5400RPM Hard Drive
Mobo- Asrock X399 Professional Gaming ATX Motherboard
PSU- 1300 Watt EVGA SuperNOVA G2 Power Supply (80+ Gold Certified)
Case- Corsair Vengeance C70 ATX Mid-Tower w/ Two 140mm Noctua Redux Fans and Two 120mm Noctua Redux Fans
Cooler- Arctic Freezer 50 TR Dual Tower Cooler
OS- Windows 11 Professional(latest version, activated)
Connectivity- 10Gb LAN, Dual Gigabit LAN, Dual-Band WiFi, Bluetooth 4.2

Audiovisual Production on a Budget

Budget workstation commission to deliver solid music production (Ableton), Photoshop, and Premiere editing performance on a limited budget. With Adobe apps utilizing the iGPU of 6th gen processors as an additional hardware encoder via Quicksync Acceleration, the i7-6700 unleashed from its power limits for infinite turbo was a perfect fit. Its eight threads boosting up to 4GHz were plenty to push 64 duplicated tracks in Ableton before any hiccups occur, double of what the Macbook M1 Pro achieves.

The motherboard was similarly perfect for these use cases, with the higher end Realtek ALC1220 chip delivering enthusiast audio performance on this B250 board. The platform even packs an extra USB 3.2 Gen 2 10 gig chip in addition to the chipset's USB 3.0, eliminating USB lane saturation when audio gear is hooked up. With 20GB of dual-channel RAM with tightened (CL13) timings, a GTX 1050 TI providing its NVENC encoder, CUDA acceleration, and 4GB of VRAM for editing, and a 1TB NVME SSD + 1TB HDD storage configuration, every component comes together to make a responsive, capable, bang-for-buck desktop perfectly tuned and configured for its use cases.

Specifications:
GPU- Nvidia GTX 1050 TI ASUS Phoenix (w/ 4GB GDDR5)
CPU- Intel Core i7-6700 (4 cores, 8 threads @ up to 4.0GHz)
RAM- 20GB G.SKILL and Crucial RGB DDR4 in Dual Channel @2133MHz (13-14-14-32-CR1)
SSD- 1TB NVME Inland QN322 Solid State Drive
HDD- 1TB Seagate Desktop 7200RPM Hard Drive
Mobo- Gigabyte GA-Gaming B8 B250 ATX Motherboard
PSU- 500 Watt Enermax CyberBron Power Supply (80+ Bronze Certified)
Case- AZZA Spectra 280B ATX Mid-Tower w/ Five ID-Cooling aRGB Fans
Cooler- DeepCool Gammax Tower Cooler w/ One ID-Cooling aRGB Fan
OS- Windows 10 Professional (latest version, activated)
Connectivity- Gigabit LAN, WiFi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2

Ultra-Budget Workstation for CAD / CAM

Commission to deliver a CAD/CAM workstation on a $300 budget. At the heart is an FX-8350 with all eight logical cores overclocked to 4.55GHz and kept cool by a Corsair H90 140mm AIO. The RAM, HT Link, and North Bridge are all locked at a synchronous 2.6GHz. The result is single and multi-core performance on par with hexacore Ivy Bridge Xeons. Paired with a GTX 960 optimized for compute and a 512GB SSD, this rig CAM do it.

Specifications:
GPU- Nvidia GTX 960 (EVGA, 2GB GDDR5)
CPU- AMD FX 8350 (8 cores, 8 Threads @4.55GHz)
RAM- 16GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3 in Dual Channel @2649MHz (CL12-14-14-28-CR2)
SSD- 512GB Inland Professional Solid State Drive
Mobo- ASUS CROSSHAIR V FORMULA-Z ATX Motherboard
PSU- 750 Watt Corsair CX750 Power Supply (80+ Bronze Certified)
Case- NZXT H510 ATX Mid-Tower w/ One Red Arc Fan and One 140mm EVGA Fan
Cooler- 140mm Corsair H90 AIO Liquid Cooler w/ One 140mm EVGA Fan
OS- Windows 10 Professional(latest version, activated)
Connectivity- Gigabit LAN

CAM Workstation for Baseline Design

CAM workstation commission for local small biz Baseline Design (https://www.baselinedesignco.com/). The goal was the most performance possible in Autodesk, Enscape, and Adobe Suite for under $1k budget.

For excellent single and multicore CPU performance, an i7-10700K is at the heart of the build, with eight cores and sixteen threads locked to an AVX2 stable 4.8GHz. This processor packs Quicksync acceleration for Adobe applications, and the Intel platform enables the use of Optane memory.

Since those programs tend to use as much system memory as is available, the i7 is paired with 64GB of dual-channel, dual-rank DDR4 overclocked to 3600MHz with tightened low-latency timings.

Intel Arc Alchemist Resolve Rig

Commission to deliver an excellent Photoshop, Resolve, gaming, and music production experience for less than $1k.

For music production, minimal latency is key. This makes the monolithic architecture of Rocket Lake paired with DDR4 preferrable over AMD's chiplet designs and the hybrid architectures of 12th/13th/14th gen Intel, which increase frequency and IPC at the cost of core-to-core latency by moving the I/O die to separate silicon. Additionally, while DDR5 boosts bandwidth, this comes at the cost of bolstered latency. The i7-11700F with 8 cores and 16 threads unleashed from their PLIM boost up to 4.9Ghz and achieve the necessary single-core performance for this task while delivering excellent multi-core for photo/video editing. It's paired with 64GB of dual-channel, dual-rank 3200MHz RAM with timings tightened from CL22-22-22-42 to CL18-19-19-38.

The recent implementation of Quicksync for ARC GPU's into workstation applications make the A770 16GB the ideal price/performance pick. Resolve loves VRAM, and this BiFrost OC model with 16GB of GDDR6 outperforms the RTX 4060 TI in Resolve and Photoshop. Combined with the unleashed i7 and tuned 64GB of system memory, this pairing achieved over 20k points in PugetBench for DaVinci Resolve.

And thanks to firmware and driver improvements, Arc Alchemist GPU's are finally a good price/performance gaming option, with this system pushing ~120 FPS in COD and Cyberpunk and over 200 FPS in CS2 and R6 Seige.

Specifications:
GPU- Intel ARC A770 Acer BiFrost OC (16GB GDDR6)
CPU- Intel Core i7-11700F (8C, 16T, 4.9GHz)
RAM- 64GB DDR4 @3200MHz CL18-19-19-38
SSD- 1TB NVME Fanxiang SP610 Gen 4 SSD
SSHD- Intel Optane M10 M.2 + 4TB WD Purple HDD
Mobo- MSI Z590-A PRO ATX Motherboard
PSU- 650 Watt Powerspec (80+ Bronze)
Case- SAMA Sama-M2-BK
Cooler- Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE
Connectivity- Gigabit LAN, Dual-Band WiFi, Bluetooth 4.2

Overclocked 12th Gen CAD Workstation

Commission to deliver the most price-to-performance CAD workstation possible. At the heart is an overclocked i7-12700K (5GHz P-cores, 3.8GHz E-cores, 4GHz RING) paired with 64GB of dual-channel, quad-rank DDR4 overclocked from 3200MHz to 3333MHz in Gear 1 with tightened timings. Everything comes together with an RTX 3060 TI packing 8GB of Samsung GDDR6 overclocked to 3070 bandwidth and a Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus NVME SSD to make a performant and capable workstation.

Specifications:
Nvidia RTX 3060 TI DELL (w/ 8GB GDDR6)
CPU- Intel Core i7-12700K (12 cores, 20 Threads @5GHz)
RAM- 64GB Neo Forza DDR4 in Dual Channel @3333MHz (16-18-18-36-CR2)
SSD- 1TB NVME Sabrent Rocket 4.0 PLUS Gen4 Solid State Drive
Mobo- Gigabyte Z690 UD AX D4 ATX Motherboard
PSU- 850 Watt EVGA G3 Power Supply (80+ Gold Certified)
Case- Lian Li O11 AIR Mini ATX Mid-Tower w/ Three Fans
Cooler- 280mm EVGA CLC AIO Liquid Cooler w/ Two 140mm EVGA CLC Fans and Two 140mm Lian Li Fans in push-pull
OS- Windows 11 Professional (latest version, activated)
Connectivity- 2.5Gb LAN, WiFi 6, Bluetoot 5.2

Alienware Area-51 R3 Threadripper Edition

Found the perfect home for this refurbished and upgraded Alienware. With a new clients' quad-core i7-4790 no longer up to the task of their ever-growing 3D modeling and animation projects, this 16-Core TR 1950X finally gets to do what it was designed for: shredding through Cinema4D and Blender renders. Paired with an RTX 3060 for its stellar CUDA acceleration and 12GB VRAM buffer, 64GB of Quad-Channel DDR4 memory locked at 3200MHz in a 1:1 ratio with the infinity fabric, 1.5TB of SSD storage, and 8TB of hard disk storage, this is a true workstation, with an R7 240 from my shelf needing to be slotted in for my client to use all six of his monitors.

Budget Adobe Editing for FRVS

Thank so much to Front Range Vital Signs for letting us spec and build their new workstation! Specifically designed for their use of Photoshop and Illustrator, we were able to squeeze in an i7-8700, a GTX 1050 TI, 32GB of RAM, and a 2TB HDD to backup the two 1TB NVME SSD's they provided. The Fractal Design Define R5 is perfect for their understandably dusty workshop, featuring noise-dampening mesh filters on the side, top, and front intake, ensuring the longevity of the build. The i7 not only sports excellent single-core and multi-core performance, but also an iGPU for Quicksync Acceleration in Adobe programs. The OEM GTX 1050 TI we pulled from a golf simulator may not look like much, but its 4GB of VRAM and CUDA acceleration surpass the software's recommendations. Finally, with an upgrade cooler that let us unleash the i7's power limits, tuned memory timings on the dual-channel 32GB kit, and plenty of both NVME and backup HDD storage, I'm really happy that this wonderful business finally has a design workstation that'll help them do what they do to their best!

Budget CAD for Baseline Design

When a client let me know one of my $500 gaming systems was better specc'd than the $800 Dell workstations they were looking at, it was time to do this commission. Built for peak performance in Autodesk/Autocad, Revit, and the Adobe Suite, this system manages to exceed the recommended specs of each of these programs on a tight budget. With a Ryzen 7 Pro 1700X overclocked to 3.775GHz on all cores, the 25MHz loss to single core boost is far outweighed by the 275MHz increase to all core frequency for these production apps. Benefitted further by 32GB of 3GHz dual-channel RAM, and a 1TB NVME SSD, the package comes together with an EVGA Classified GTX 770 4GB for CUDA acceleration, hardware encoding, and Shader Model 5.1 support.