The Dream Machine Revealed--Part Three of Three!
Posted 07/14/08 at 02:10:00 AM by David Murphy
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And thus, the grand conclusion of the Dream Machine 2008 unveiling comes to its final edition. And do we have a reveal for you! We're going to show you the ultra-secret case that encloses the mighty guts of our speedy Skulltrail machine. We're also giving you a first-look at the not-quite-as-secret videocards powering the graphics of this hefty rig. Before it catches ablaze, we'll also show you the cooling setup, and what we used to rock out whilst checking the cooler for leaks.
That's right. Today, you're getting the case, the graphics, the cooling and the sound--an epic conclusion to the most powerful rig we've ever built. If you're just joining us, you'll want to check out the first two editions of the Dream Machine saga, where we officially showed off this machine's spankin'-fast processors.
Without further ado, we'll begin with the craziest and most expensive part of the dream machine...
The Case
Before:
After:
We challenged readers to guess what case we were planning on using in the last edition of the Dream Machine Reveal series, and only one of you got it right. And we were pretty amazed at that. So congratulations bholstege. You correctly pinned it down. For this year's Dream Machine, we're using the case of the HP Blackbird 002.
Before all the naysayers start blasting the comment thread, here's why we made this decision. For starters, we like to use cases in the Dream Machine that have never been featured previously. So while all the top case manufacturers do indeed make awesome EATX cases (a necessity for our Skulltrail motherboard), a scant few had cases in the works that would have been able to house our rig in the necessary timeframe.
The HP Blackbird 002 case isn't without its faults. Modifying the case in any fashion is extremely difficult, given that every little nuance has been crafted and locked to HP's proprietary design. But we didn't see this as a hindrance so much as a challenge. We joked in its review that the HP Blackbird 002 was a mediocre machine trapped inside an awesome chassis. How appropriate, then, for us to rip out the boring guts of the Blackbird and rebuild a Kick Ass machine inside of its heavy black frame.
But that's not to say that we didn't make subtle modifications to the case as a whole. And by subtle, we mean outlandish. Because it's not enough for the Dream Machine to have a sweet case: it has to have an amazing customized case. We've done painting. That's old-and-busted compared to our mega-tweak this year: chroming the entire case.
The Videocard(s)
Due to Nvidia's decision to not suppot SLI on Skulltrail platforms, we turned to AMD to power the graphics of the Dream Machine 2008. But with four GPUs spread across two cards, we think we made the right decision. As it stands, two dual-GPU Radeon HD 4870 X2 cards stomp on one of Nvidia's top-of-the-line Geforce GTX 280 cards. The performance is nearly doubled in our 3DMark Vantage graphical test, and that's just using engineering samples of these AMD powerhouses. Look for a full review of these cards as soon as we can get our hands on final versions!
The Cooling
We've assembled a custom water cooling kit using parts from a number of top manufacturers for this year's Dream Machine. The internal constraints of the HP Blackbird 002 case forced us to go with a smaller two-fan reservoir than we would have preferred to use. Using Danger Den's Black Ice Pro2 Xflow radiator allowed us to connect our half-inch Tygon tubing to at opposing ends of the radiator, giving us a better chance to improve the case's inner aesthetics. We're using the same reservoir as last year's Dream Machine, Danger Den's single-bay variant.
Our pump also remains the same as last year's. Seeing that the Danger Den DD12V-D5 is one of the fastest, beefiest, quietest pumps we've seen, we see no need to switch out our top-of-the-line water pusher. As for the CPU blocks, we've opted for two of D-TEK's FuZion v2s. Not only is their performance impeccable, but we absolutely love the blocks' quick-lock Intel mounting mechanism. We didn't have to remove the motherboard at all to install this year's cooling setup, and that alone makes us thrilled to bits.
The Soundcard
The latest X-Fi card out of Creative's Lab (tee-hee) is packed into a smaller form-factor than its predecessors. And once again, as if we couldn't stress the issue enough, Creative has slapped support for front-panel connections onto this new card, the X-Fi Titanium. Since we aren't opting for a triple-videocard setup, this gives us plenty of room to stash the Titanium in one of the Dream Machine's empty PCI Express slots. A pair of optical SPDIFs and included Dolby Digital encoding round out the mix of this awesome upgrade in soundcards.
Coming Next Week:
And there you have it! But we're not done with the Dream Machine 2008 just yet. Check back next Monday for an exclusive look at the all the behind-the-scenes construction for this year's rig, including all the heartaches, drills, and coolant leaks. And we haven't forgotten about those two mysterious hard drives from the first Dream Machine Unveiled article. We'll have the full details of those come July 21--see you then!
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Submitted by Synthmilk on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 10:48pm
I was wondering if the sound card choice could be clarified. The article above just says it's a "X-Fi Titanium", however the picture is of the "X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro Series" card, and the magazine article shows the same picture but says it's a "X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty" card.
I've been looking at the differences between the "X-Fi Titanium" and the "X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro Gamer" cards, and it appears the "Fatal1ty" branded card's only justification for it's higher price is it has "64MB of X-RAM".
I can't seem to find a current review of either card on MPC.com, is the "Fatal1ty" card worth the extra money?
Don't Slow Down, Take a Intel Xeon.
Submitted by TheDuck on Mon, 07/28/2008 - 7:31pm
Thinking about it, why didn't you use 2 Xeons with 128 GB memory? That's MUCH better!
Isn't it?
Submitted by brokenmoth08 on Wed, 07/30/2008 - 1:48pm
Are those server parts? I want to hear more about what your talking about!
Submitted by SpazzAttack on Sat, 08/02/2008 - 12:35pm
Edit: I must correct myself here. I saw that a section of Creative's proprietary connector for their front panel I/O drive does indeed work with a standard HD audio connector! Funny though, how Creative has not one mention of this in their documentation.
On the positive side, it looks like Creative finally got their Vista x64 drivers working right.
Hey the Cat is out of the
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Wed, 07/23/2008 - 10:55pm
Hey the Cat is out of the bag now. Read the Comic Con article. HP is referred to as a friend. Maximum PC has a personal relationship with HP and the fact that HP has had numerous over cover magazine ads is just too much and to see the Dream Macine 2008 is build using an HP case this is just too much coincidence.
What other parts of DM08 did HP tell you guys to use? Huh?
This is a worse conspiracy than the one Emperor Palpatine made to destroy the Jedi.
Keith, as I mentioned in
Submitted by willsmith on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 11:56am
Keith, as I mentioned in about 3 other threads this morning, there isn't any kind of grand conspiracy. I'm starting to take your snide insinuations that Maximum PC is crooked as a personal attack on me. I would not allow any kind of advertiser influence to affect our editorial content. I would not continue to work here should something like that happen. Period. The End. No further comment needed.
If you don't believe that, there's not much else I can do. But please stop spreading malicious, unsubstantiated lies around our site.
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Fri, 07/25/2008 - 1:20am
I appologize. It's hard to see that I live for a laugh. I was merely entertaining myself. I am really sorry and hope that you never take anything I say personally or seriously. Perhaps I should have added ha ha not serious to my posts.
In my book MaxPC is the best non porn magazine around. Heck I just renewed my subscription for another two years. So I love you guys.
They gave us HP decals to
Submitted by dreamreality on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 9:21am
They gave us HP decals to put on every new rig to improve performance by 2mhz.
Submitted by Malagant on Wed, 07/23/2008 - 6:12pm
Have you guy's seen the new Biohazard rapture skulltrail edition PC. I'm sure it is faster then this, as the cpu's are OC to 4.8 ghz and you can get 2 GeForce GTX 280 1GB DDR3 in SLI. Don't get me wrong but this is still an awesome pc but not the fastest.
""Computing is no longer a game for pussies. It's a full-contact, balls-out, game for Spartans only. My computer cools itself by pumping my own blood through it's hottest zones. And I cool myself down by DRINKING FREON, MOTHERFUCKERS!””
Mystery Hard Drives?
Submitted by B-1 Pilot on Mon, 07/21/2008 - 5:16pm
It's Monday the 21st... what's the dealio?
"Unfortunately, the
Submitted by TheMurph on Mon, 07/21/2008 - 6:51pm
"Unfortunately, the non-disclosure date for these drives has been bumped back by two weeks as the request of the manufacturer. Feel free to speculate in the comments as much as you'd like: we've seen plenty of back-and-forth about whether these Photoshop-blurry drives are standard magnetic drives, SSDs, nuclear-powered, et cetera. Are they Western Digital's rumored 20,000 RPM Velociraptor drives? Have we added some Photoshop trickery to make them look like a number of drives we could be using? Find out in two weeks!"
--http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/behindthescenes_how_we_built_2008_dream_machine
Submitted by mikeart03a on Mon, 07/21/2008 - 1:59pm
Well, looks like the nVidia vs. ATi war is over for the most part now. Either way, if it ain't broke why fix it? Dream machine is supposed to be about cutting edge hardware, why is everyone bitching about a video card that's not even out on the market? The fact that MPC was able to pull this off was great. Now that's cutting edge!
- mike_art03a
IT Technician
Gov't of Canada
You got it Pontiac
Submitted by GreenTurtle on Mon, 07/21/2008 - 5:48pm
That's right!!! The point is to have fun with it; not get Your knickers in a knot.
The grass is always greener on the other side.
Submitted by KindaNoob on Mon, 07/21/2008 - 6:53am
hi guys..
i am new to this site.. but i think what you guys do is amazing!!!.. it really is a dream machine!
i just want to know one thing.. how much did it cost you guys in total to make this super computer?
Submitted by TheMurph on Mon, 07/21/2008 - 12:06pm
I hope you're sitting down: $17,285
Submitted by SpazzAttack on Tue, 07/22/2008 - 7:33am
Murph, How much did the case by itself, mods and all, cost?
Submitted by TheMurph on Tue, 07/22/2008 - 9:22am
$1,000 for the case. $5,000 for the chroming.
Submitted by SpazzAttack on Tue, 07/22/2008 - 6:33pm
$$$ Cha-ching! $$$
The chroming does look good. That case was a good surprise! :-)
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 12:21pm
This is to cancel out that good comment with a bad one.
ATI and HP stink. ATI has always had stinky drivers. They have never been able to hammer out their drivers. Heck years and years ago they made different drivers to support different games because their drivers were crap. I figured it was because they were too busy drinking with Bob and Doug McKenzie.
Submitted by Subaruspec on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 10:37am
bout time someone puts a good comment on here
Submitted by thinknoffcenter on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 9:07am
dear fanboys and naysayers.........WHAAAAAH!!!! piss, moan, and cry like little bitches all you want about MPC's choice of hardware.! it's not gonna matter, you don't like it then go out drop a boatload of money and build your own version of what you would think is the ultimate dream machine, then go down, up or over to MPC's offices set it up next to theres and run the benchmarks and get everyones opinion of who's performs and looks better. If you lose, then the staff gets bragging rights and gets to give you a mega-wedgie and kick your ass out thier building. If MPC loses then i'm sure the guys will give you your props and hey, you might even get a job (highly unlikely.) otherwise get a life, stop whining and get off of ATI/Nvidia's jock. BASICALLY GROW UP!!!! oh and as far as the HP Blackbird case, if you were really a loyal reader of the magazine, you would know that our good man Will Smith pointed out that the editorial and review's department is COMPLETELY SEPARATE from the advertising department, which means that HP being an avid advertiser (like they are in many other PC magazines) would have nothing to do with thier decision to use the Blackbird case. MPC rules, and if you stop reading cause of a choice of hardware or thier opinion on it then your a retard and shouldn't be anywhere near a PC or an electrical outlet. As for my homies at MPC.....keep up the good work......Dream Machine 08 looks awesome......AND THAT'S COMING FROM AN NVIDIA FAN!!!!
:0 ^_^ "we Plan for
Submitted by whisp on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 2:01am
:0 ^_^
"we Plan for Tomorrow, but we Live for Today"
Submitted by GreenTurtle on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 11:42am
I like it. Couldn't agree more.
The grass is always greener on the other side.
Submitted by Subaruspec on Sat, 07/19/2008 - 12:47pm
To the fanboys at the bottom of this page its funny when ati jumps back on the high-end trian, them Max PC decides to use them in the dream machine, you are thinking about not renewing your magazine sub. Come on? what is that, thats just sad. Wipe the Tears. And now that ati is finally back up there, Nvidia has to cut prices to match up. Good Work Max PC! Hey when are theses 4870x2's due out?
-mike-
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Fri, 07/18/2008 - 11:56pm
Well I kinda have an idea that will power a great pc and help control the stray cat population.
The pound will deliver stray cats to your house in a cage. Empty the cats that are packed tightely in the cage into the bio electric generator. One cat will supply 5kw of power for thirty minutes. The process of gelatinizing the cat fuel produces no harmful exaust gases. I figure an afternoon of World of Warcraft will only cost you six cats. Now you can just about run your house on 5Kw of power and have leftovers. So you could supply some kitty power to the grid. The power company will pay you.
Your helping the environment by reducing the amount of harmful emissions and your helping to control the cat population. It's a win win situation.
What do you think? It's a great idea to help stop global warming.
Submitted by GreenTurtle on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 3:05pm
That is disgusting; and I am supprised You would actually take the time out of Your day to type that out. I take it Your not a Cat lover but keep it to Yourself. I'm sure it was a joke, but still.
The grass is always greener on the other side.
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Wed, 07/23/2008 - 12:22am
Well actually I love cats. They are delicious. Especially deepfried.
Submitted by GreenTurtle on Sun, 07/27/2008 - 11:46am
What part of "keep it to yourself" didn't You understand?
The grass is always greener on the other side.
Submitted by brokenmoth08 on Fri, 07/18/2008 - 10:55pm
I think Norm should lick the dream machine
Do it Norm DO IT! :P and post the pics :P
What about the green?
Submitted by Bender2000 on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 9:29am
You should post the power consumption of these things so I can get an idea how much my electrical bill will go up when I build one.
Submitted by RodneySB on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 10:13am
Haha, GreenBoy! If you want to save power go outside and plant a tree and stay off the computer all together. Go buy some solar pannels and run a mega efficient laptop. Not at all what this is about. Its about the blowing the doors off the car next to you muscle car.
Maybe MPC will do a GREEN Machine 2009 next year for the new customer base. I sure AL Gore would subscribe then!
I will say I was suprised that the Dell 3008WFP didn't get the monitor slot, but after doing a lot of homework I understand now, and that was going to be my next purchase. Thanks MPC for giving me a heads up that that Dell will only do smaller compressed HD. Dell says you can do BLU-RAY if you use display port that its only a issue with DVI/HDMI but as display port is just showing up, and I have a pair of 9800GX2s on the way Gateway will be getting my 1600 bucks. Just all around more versitility with the Gateway to ignore even if Dell does have a touch of more color and contrast.
Submitted by TheMurph on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 11:28am
"Maybe MPC will do a GREEN Machine 2009 next year for the new customer base."
I like that idea.
Submitted by TheDuck on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 10:28pm
Really... Who cares about green? Computers to my belief should be performance, not green.
If I see a green machine, I will probaly stop purchasing MPC every single month, and lose my
trust, the reason why I don't read PC Mag. anymore is due to their "Green Mag"!Don't Don't Don't. Instead try to experiment with the slimmest PC ever.
Submitted by TheMurph on Sun, 07/20/2008 - 11:01pm
I love having a super-powered rig at home. That said, I love looking for ways to make it more power-efficient, as I don't like paying out the nose each month when the ol' electric bill comes around.
Submitted by TheDuck on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 9:22pm
Consider trying to build the slimmest PC ever!
Submitted by TheDuck on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 9:21pm
Thinking about that... I agree.
But you could solar power it! And to tell you the truth, I still read PC Mag in the store,
but I don't buy it for a discrete reason...
Submitted by brokenmoth08 on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 10:30pm
If it's becauseyour afraid to go public with being a nerd, it's okay. It took my friends and the wrestling team a while to accept, but it all worked out.
Submitted by TheDuck on Thu, 07/24/2008 - 9:20pm
The Reply Comment above was added 2 times.
Submitted by brokenmoth08 on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 5:07pm
No No No, it's okay you don't need them, let Computer Shopper have them, we want serious PCs!
How about both?
Submitted by avanish11 on Fri, 07/18/2008 - 8:36pm
How about both?
Submitted by brokenmoth08 on Fri, 07/18/2008 - 9:56pm
well, a little green wont make MPC look too bad.....but just a little.
Submitted by RodneySB on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 5:10am
Its funny how everyone uses the word Fanboy when you throw benchmarks at them.
Look I don't care if Bob The Builder made the fastest video card. I just want to see from my favorite mag that I preach to my other hardware junkies about to give the bottom line.
I don't care about the GTX280s. We are talking about the best GAMMING machine. The featured MOBO would support SLI (2 cards) So run two 9800GX2s. Heck one of the 9800GX2s is close in benchmarks to two of the 4870s.
And the case is the part that gave me the sellout outlook. The video card just backed it up. When is AMD/ATI going to learn that going another 9Million in the whole this quarter is not going to get the folks who look at the facts to buy a overhyped product. Benchmarks don't lie.
So you guys take your Fanboy remark and go look at benchmarks. Who is the Fanboy now?
Submitted by SpazzAttack on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 8:59am
"So you guys take your Fanboy remark and go look at benchmarks. Who is the Fanboy now?"
The benchmarks you cited have the Radeon 4870 (a single GPU card) in the list but not the Radeon 4870 X2 (a dual GPU card). So what are you getting in a twist over?
Those benches show the 4870 only 4-8 frames/second behind the GTX 280 and 11-16 frames/second behind the 9800 GX2. And that's for 1/2 the price!!! By all indications, it looks like a single Radeon 4870 X2 will beat both a single 280 GTX and a single 9800 GX2. Assuming the software is up to the task, logic dictates that two 4870 X2s in crossfire will also beat either of the Nvidia cards in SLI.
ATI finally pulled a rabbit out of its hat and put the heat on Nvidia--that's a good thing for us consumers. Using the benchmarks you cited, the ATI 4870 X2s are now the choice for a "GAMMING machine." If only AMDs CPU division can get its act together and put the heat back on Intel! Competition is a good thing; it really is.
If you don't want to be called a fanboy, then stop behaving like one. Yeesh!
Submitted by TheMurph on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 10:12am
Quoted for truth. Let me bold it, since obviously my first reply did nothing:
The Dream Machine Uses Two 4870X2 Cards. These Are Not 4870 Cards. The X2 has two GPUs. The 4870 Has One.
Submitted by SpazzAttack on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 10:34am
I purchased a 4870 a few days ago. It's about 20-25% faster than my uber-overclocked 8800 Ultra. And the 8800 Ultras cost $200 more than the 4870s at NewEgg. This VGA card is a great deal. AMD/ATI still need to get the drivers sorted out, but I can't wait to try a pair of 4870 X2s in crossfire.
Submitted by RodneySB on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 10:29am
Yes I was looking at the single card 4870 and assumed you meant two in crossfire. The 4870x2 is appearing to beat/tie the base level 9800GX2. It is not on shelves yet. It will be more expensive ($500 in a month comparired to the base 9800gx2 at $450 Now) But lets all be honest its a close tie with the first gen 9800gx2. Check out the benchmarks on the 9800gx2 SSC for $509 NOW and again its beating the 4870x2 by 12-15%. Not bad considering it is here NOW and its going to be a better price than the 4870x2 before it hits the shelves. Again ATI a month late and a dollar short.
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