Aldeir
Description
This is Blackwing, the culmination of five years of upgrades... and lessons learned. This is my build's final form as far as I'm concerned, and should be able to last me a few more years. I hate wasted space in a PC case, but the previous sandwich case I came from was a little too compromised for my taste. I wanted something a little more normal, but airflow focused, and without too much wasted space, so I snapped up a Torrent Nano and got to work. I originally had a 6700 XT in here, with the 7900 GRE being the most recent and final addition.
NOTE: The prices listed are just what I paid at the time of purchase. The board was purchased in 2019, the SSD and RAM during around 2021/2022, and the 5800X3D in 2023. Everything else is from 2024.
You'll also see my other iterations of this build in the pictures, though at this point the only thing left from the 2019 build is the board, with basically everything else having been changed out for one reason or another. I'll briefly summarize the other two iterations below.
Vanquisher Evolution was, well, an EVOLUTION of its previous version, which in of itself was a redesign of the disaster that was my first ever build. The goal was to pack as much power as possible into a compact package, while still having space for high end GPUs. Unfortunately, the 600W PSU I went with at the start proved to be its achilles heel as GPU power consumption went the exact opposite way I predicted (i once naively thought that it'd remain at around 2080 ti levels, or maybe even a little lower over time), which prompted me to create Blackwing.
Vanquisher, the original, was essentially a prettier version of my first build on a new board. The only core components I kept were the SSDs and CPU, with everything else being brand new. The 1660 Ti was a big one at the time, and was the GPU I probably should've started out with, not that the RX 570 from previously was bad by any means...
Part Reviews
CPU
This is THE endgame CPU if you have a gaming centric PC on the AM4 platform.
Sips power, easy to cool, nice and stable, and the boatloads of cache work wonders. If you wanted a PC more for work, a non V-Cache Ryzen 9 would make more sense as its lower clock speed holds it back in scenarios where lots of cache is less useful.
Still, there's a reason why this CPU has the reputation that it does: it was and still very much is a monster!
CPU Cooler
This is a giant monolith of cooling POWER. While being barely audible, it decimates most common AIOs bar maybe 360s. The H100i I came from was significantly louder and didn't do as good of a job at cooling my 5800X3D.
Mounting is a bit of a pain as you can imagine, especially on ITX. There's also a dumb blue LED on the side, but you can turn it off if you don't use the built in fan splitter, which is what lets you control fan speeds through the switch on the cooler itself. Just disconnect the fans from that splitter and use your own that's connected to the motherboard itself, where you can just set your fan curve manually.
Currently, it only barely scratches 1000 RPM on fan speed and my CPU still sits at under 80C at full load...
Motherboard
At it's time, this was hands down one of the best ITX boards on the market for AM4. Cheaper than the X470 counterparts and better in both design and quality than the other B450 boards, it was basically in a class of one. Today, it still holds up very well. From humble beginnings with a Ryzen 5 2600, it now houses a Ryzen 7 5800X3D without issue.
To think you could get a board like this for just $150 a few years ago...
Memory
Once upon a time, G.Skill made multicolored versions of their Trident Z line, unlike today where its either white, black, or RGB. I managed to track these down before they went out of stock.
As for performance, worked straight away with DOCP. No complaints.
Storage
A few years ago, a 1 TB SSD under $100 was usually DRAMless junk (before some newer ones started using tricks to get around not having it). I got this one for just $85, thinking I got a massive deal.
...then of course, barely a month later, the high end SSDs started to fall to around that price.
Still, according to CDI, it's still at 100% after years of constant abuse. Even after this build is done, it seems like I'll be able to use it for plenty of other projects!
Video Card
Smashes everything at 1440p. Has the VRAM to run high textures and light RT both now and probably for a few years to come.
Cooler looks amazing. None of the other designs even come close to this. This card has very aggressive power targets in excess of 300W, and despite having the cut down version of the true 7900 series cooler designs, it keeps itself under control. I had to manually tune the fan curve though as at stock it's quite conservative.
Responded well to running the memory at 2400, and an undervolt to 1.0.
Still kind of sucks at RT, but it's gonna be a long time before it's truly viable anyway without having to rely on upscaling. Probably one of the best cards you can get for 1440p at the moment.
Case
This case was nigh impossible to find. Every example was either scalped or being sold by a shady reseller. However, I did manage to snap this up on ebay for $120.
While this case was mostly easy to build in and it looks great, I have a few annoyances.
Unfortunately, the single 180mm fan is as much of an issue as everyone says. While CPU temps are great, the GPU gets no air. And, depending on your CPU cooler, there isn't really anywhere for the hot air to go. If they made the case just a bit longer and put two 140s in the front, they could keep the same GPU compatibility and have vastly superior cooling capabilities.
I think there should have also been some top ventilation for the PSU. You have to have it pull air from the inside of the case instead, which is problematic when you use a big air cooler. I think there should've been a bigger cutout between the PSU shroud and the motherboard tray to allow for easier access to cables. It was very difficult to get some cables hooked up because of this, as theres only a small opening off to the left, leaving some connections smashed up against a wall.
All that said though, my next build will certainly be going in whatever the next iteration of the Torrent is...
Power Supply
Has the power to handle any configuration bar the most astronomically overpowered or impractical. With a long warranty, good middling size, and good quality stock cables, it's hard to see myself getting another PSU anytime soon.
The VERTEX is a nice middle of the road option compared to the more premium PRIME line and the more basic FOCUS line. This particular one comes with high quality stock cables that are very easy to manage and blend in nicely, unlike the ugly monstrosities I see on even some other "high end" units.
Also no annoying, unsightly pigtail connectors! Rejoice!
Operating System
11 years ago, my parents bought me a prebuilt. It was an HP workstation from a few years prior. While the PC itself was unremarkable, I harvested the windows key from it (it used windows 7 pro) when it came time to finally build my own PC in 2019.
Ever since then, I've been using that very key, which has given me completely free access to every pro edition of windows since. Still running W11 Pro without any issues.
Which is great, because $0 is about what I'd pay for Windows. Maybe one day Linux will be actually viable to daily drive!
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