Description

Upgrading from a 10 year old machine after my GTX680 died (and i7-3770k started feeling pretty slow). This is an amazing upgrade and the build was very easy in the Fractal North case.

After looking up other builds and reading about the clearance I finally decided it would be safe going for the Arctic liquid freezer 240, and with the new III version just released I took a slight risk and went for it. It was a very tight fit with the motherboard and RAM (which I found much cheaper hence the random RGB), but they did all fit without issues - just make sure you do all the cables before securing the radiator.

Part Reviews

CPU

Excellent CPU, probably better value for performance than the i9, although if only gaming (and still wanting intel) I'd suggest looking at the i5-14600k instead.

CPU Cooler

Great cooler, has been keeping my i7-14700k at around 25 degrees idle, fans are quiet, radiator is thiccccck. I went for the 240 to be able to have it top exhaust in the Fractal North, if not as worried about front mounting a radiator then I would suggest just going for the 360 which would be even better. Reason for dropping a star is that the pipes are very rigid and one of them seems to have a slight kink which does worry me.

Motherboard

Brilliant assuming not paying full price. Does have some pretty large heatsinks.

Memory

Fast DDR5 RAM, not the fastest but was very cheap when I was building and still just about fit under the Arctic liquid freezer III.

Storage

One of the fastest and most reliable SSDs around, also currently a £35 cashback offer from Samsung.

Video Card

Fantastic graphics card. Dual fans seems plenty to keep it cool with this case configuration and it ended up being the cheapest 4070 super at the time of build.

Case

The best looking case around.

It was a bit fiddly fitting the aio cooler and the top cables, but generally I'm very happy with the case.

I might get round to replacing the two included 140mm front fans eventually, but for now they seem good enough - although definitely set the fan curve manually as they start quite loud by default and don't need to be.

Power Supply

More than enough for my build and helps future proof. Found brand new and sealed half price on eBay otherwise I would've probably settled for a 750-850W PSU.

Case Fan

Good slim fans - I bought incase the aio was too thick to use with the included fans but these are good enough for the rear exhaust and side intakes in the mesh if I ever get around to putting them in. Probably the only thing I'd change from the build would be going for the normal P12 PWM instead.

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Comments

DashT-Y
  • 1 year 1 month ago

Hey, first off, I just wanted to congratulate you because it looks really good! Now, I have a small question to ask you, hoping you can help. I have exactly the same case and AIO, and I'm currently having an issue closing the top of the case. I had to remove some washer spacers in the middle of the radiator mounting because it wouldn't close. I was wondering if you had the same issue as me?

Cool build

Purekize
  • 11 months ago

I m waiting for the same build. Did u have any problems with bios update ?