Introducing my new self-built Intel Core i3-6100 rig

[cpd2009]

Over the years, I have thought about building my own computer, but I always had a fear I would mess it up either through unintentional ESD damage or not connecting things properly. Blame a computer class I took in college. The instructor was great, but she decided to go for a custom Cooler Master CPU fan instead of using the stock unit, and it was a nightmare to install. That left a bad impression on me, and I felt that PC building was a tough proposition... until yesterday.

During the past few months, I have been acquiring the parts needed to build my own Intel Skylake rig, all suggested by Blake. Yesterday, the final part, the Intel Core i3-6100 CPU arrived at my home and I proceeded to assemble the system. I'd never imagined that a computer build would be so easy, and it's thanks to Intel developing an easy to use standard for CPU installation and mounting the cooling fan.

Here is what my new rig is made from:
-Rosewill FBM-01 MicroATX case
-Gigabyte GA-H110M-A MicroATX motherboard
-Intel Core i3-6100 dual-core processor
-Corsair Vengeance 8GB RAM Stick
-Corsair CX430 Power Supply (I already had this )

The remaining parts were reused from my old systems, consisting of a 500gb Seagate drive from Audrey, PCI-e Wifi from Ruby, a "Manhattan" 6-in-1 card reader, and DVD-RW drive from Patsy, and most importantly, the graphics card... the Nvidia GeForce 750Ti.

Later upgrades will include adding a secondary 1TB HDD and installing another Corsair 8GB RAM stick, maxing out the memory at 16GB.

The name I chose for the rig was Pearl, named after this neat little book series. Pearl is the rabbit btw... https://www.amazon.com/Pearl-Wagner-Two-...%26+wagner

So far, Pearl has literally outperformed all my previous systems, and I haven't even completed benchmarks yet. Websites load up almost instantly and system response time is much improved, noticeably when installing my software programs. I also gained two USB 3.0 ports on the back, along with four USB 2.0 ports.

I did have to make one minor change during build... Pearl's two front USB ports aren't connected because the GA-H110M-A only has one front USB header, and I decided to use that for the card reader. The card reader does have a standard USB port on it, so I can still use flash drives.

Later on, I will post screenshots of benchmarks and other things. I should get that done soon, I hope.

[cpd2009]

So far, here is the software setup for Pearl:

I installed Magix Movie Edit Pro 2015, Adobe Audition, Photoshop and Illustrator. My office suite will be Apache OpenOffice, and default browser is Microsoft Edge. Secondary browser is Torch, a Chromium-based browser that has a very good video download utility built in. Firefox has a utility as well, but it won't download certain YouTube videos that have adaptive bitrates. Malware protection will be from Malwarebytes.

[huckleberrypie]

Congratulations on your new rig mate, glad I was able to help you with it.

[cpd2009]

Benchmark time! I used 3DMark Firestrike and Mafia II Demo. Mafia II was configured at max settings.

3DMark:


Mafia II Demo: APEX (PhysX) set to high...


Mafia II Demo: APEX turned off

[huckleberrypie]

Protip: You can take screenshots off your games using MSI Afterburner. I tend to use it as Print Screen doesn't appear to work on most games anyway. You may also have to disable your integrated graphics as for some reason Mafia II appears to be reporting a bit less RAM than it should.

[cpd2009]

So far, so good with Pearl. No problems have come up and everything is running stable.

I have already converted some audio tapes to MP3 with Audition, and it takes a little over a minute to create a 90 minute MP3 at 320kbps. The program is also a lot more responsive and adding effects to audio tracks is much easier. I still have to edit a video with Magix and see if hardware accelerated rendering is supported. The i3-6100 should support hardware encoding if the Nvidia GPU doesn't. I never got Magix to encode on the 750Ti with either Ruby or Patsy.

The DirectX 11 version of Pinball Arcade is beautiful to look at. The game runs great at max settings and the DX11 version has more natural table lighting and effects.

Tomorrow, I will go to Best Buy and see about getting a 1TB hard drive. I may not get it depending on the cost, and I would hold off until January. It's not a critical need at this point, but it will be eventually needed. I'm also considering a BluRay Disc recorder. BD-R discs would be beneficial to back up my data at regular intervals and Pearl would be able to play BluRay Disc movies.

[huckleberrypie]

So far, so good with Pearl. No problems have come up and everything is running stable.

I have already converted some audio tapes to MP3 with Audition, and it takes a little over a minute to create a 90 minute MP3 at 320kbps. The program is also a lot more responsive and adding effects to audio tracks is much easier. I still have to edit a video with Magix and see if hardware accelerated rendering is supported. The i3-6100 should support hardware encoding if the Nvidia GPU doesn't. I never got Magix to encode on the 750Ti with either Ruby or Patsy.

The DirectX 11 version of Pinball Arcade is beautiful to look at. The game runs great at max settings and the DX11 version has more natural table lighting and effects.

Tomorrow, I will go to Best Buy and see about getting a 1TB hard drive. I may not get it depending on the cost, and I would hold off until January. It's not a critical need at this point, but it will be eventually needed. I'm also considering a BluRay Disc recorder. BD-R discs would be beneficial to back up my data at regular intervals and Pearl would be able to play BluRay Disc movies.

BD-Rs and BluRay in general are a rarity here, considering how it got eclipsed by USB sticks and memory cards; I do plan on getting a drive for archival purposes but I just haven't had the time for one.

Again I'm glad this rig worked out well for you, considering your workload and all that. I know you're not that into hardcore/AAA games as you focus more on retro or casual, but since there's more to higher-end gaming rigs than just, well, you know, I thought it would be of great benefit for you to have a reasonably faster system.