Slight improvement on my Balls to the Walls build
Not to much was involved with this upgrade. After I built my first custom pc build I upgraded it to this Balls to the Walls build. After a few months with the motherboard I choose I have been very disappointed. In those month I have had a handful of issues when dealing with this motherboard and did not want to deal a less than stellar for this build.
Purpose
Other than the weird issues described in my Balls to the Walls build I had another major issue that caused me not to be able to load windows at all. This time it was caused by trying to add an internal drive and not bothering to open the bios setup before I did. I couldn't ever pinpoint what happened but between my install of windows, the motherboard, and the m.2 drive I could not get windows to boot even in safe mode or from a repair usb. I troubleshoot everything I could think of. I finally pinpointed it to the motherboard because I could not get anything to load. So I RMAed that board and decided to move onto a different mini ITX motherboard altogether.
Parts List
Here are the parts I used for my build thanks to PCPartPicker Part List
| Type | Item | Price |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | Intel Core i7-8700 3.2 GHz 6-Core Processor | Purchased For $339.99 |
| CPU Cooler | Noctua NH-U9S 46.44 CFM CPU Cooler | Purchased For $59.99 |
| Motherboard | Asus ROG STRIX B360-I GAMING Mini ITX LGA1151 Motherboard | Purchased For $134.71 |
| Memory | G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 Memory | Purchased For $299.99 |
| Storage | Samsung 970 Evo 500 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive | Purchased For $156.87 |
| Storage | Western Digital Scorpio Blue 1 TB 2.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive | Purchased For $60.00 |
| Storage | Western Digital Red 5 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive | Purchased For $225.94 |
| Video Card | EVGA GeForce GTX 960 4 GB FTW ACX 2.0+ Video Card | Purchased For $229.99 |
| Power Supply | Corsair SF 600 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular SFX Power Supply | Purchased For $119.99 |
| Case Fan | Noctua NF-R8 PWM 31.37 CFM 80 mm Fan | Purchased For $16.65 |
| Case Fan | Noctua NF-P12 PWM 120 mm Fan | Purchased For $19.95 |
| Custom | Ncase M1 v3 | Purchased For $215.00 |
| Total | $1879.07 |
Parts Explanation
Only two new parts on this build. I choose the motherboard because I did not need the overclocking features of the higher end motherboards and this one was priced just right too. I noticed while picking this one out that there are not a lot of reasonably priced motherboards and the prices can easily go into the $200s. Now there are however a lot more to choose from. Back when I choose the motherboard I am upgrading from there were only four mini ITX boards to choose from with the LGA1151 slot.
I also wanted to gain better boot hard drive speeds and after seeing how nice the Samsung drives are in my dad's new pc I had to get one for myself. When it went on sale I snatched it up quickly. I have had absolutely no regrets or complaints with it so far.
Build
This build was quick and painless. Just had to remove and reapply the the thermal paste to mount the CPU cooler, re-seat everything and zip tie all the cords in place. I have been completely happy with this build and have not run into a task that has slowed me down. I now use the 5TB drive as a shared drive in my network.
Date Build Completed: September 15, 2018