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GED's Prodigy: i7-3770K - Asus P8Z77-I Deluxe - 16GB 2400MHz RAM - GA Radeon HD6870

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ged

Joined
Mar 16, 2011
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44
Motherboard
Bitfenix Prodigy, Intel 520 SSD
CPU
IvyBridge i7-3770K, 16GB 2400MHz RAM
Graphics
ATi Radeon 6870 of course !
Mac
  1. MacBook Air
Mobile Phone
  1. Android
GED's Prodigy: i7-3770K - Asus P8Z77-I Deluxe - 16GB 2400MHz RAM - GA Radeon HD6870

BitFenix_Prodigy_news.jpg
Components

Bitfenix Prodigy White Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811345017

Rosewill Green Series RG630-S12 630W 80 PLUS Certified "Compatible with Core i7,i5" Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182200

ASUS P8Z77-I Deluxe LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Mini ITX Intel Motherboard with USB BIOS
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131840

Intel Core i7-3770K Ivy Bridge 3.5GHz (3.9GHz Turbo) LGA 1155 77W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 4000 BX80637I73770Kp
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116501

CORSAIR H80 (CWCH80) High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181016

G.SKILL Trident X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2400 (PC3 19200) Desktop Memory Model F3-2400C10D-16GTX
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231589

Intel 520 Series Cherryville SSDSC2CW240A310 2.5" 240GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) - OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820167088

GIGABYTE GV-R687OC-1GD Radeon HD 6870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125357

Apple OS X Lion 10.7.4 @ Mac Apps Store
Mac App Store - OS X Lion

ADATA 16GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820211572

LG SATA BDXL Blu-ray Burner,3D Play Back (WH14NS40) - OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136250

Mac BluRay Player
http://www.macblurayplayer.com/

Already Owned

ASUS BT-211 USB Bluetooth dongle
http://www.amazon.com/Asus-Mini-Bluetooth-Dongle-USB-BT211/dp/B0041UJVI2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1346219083&sr=8-1&keywords=ASUS+USB-BT21

IOGear GUH287 USB Hub + Card Reader
http://www.amazon.com/IOGEAR-Card-Reader-GUH287-Black/dp/B00330OVIG/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1346219183&sr=1-1&keywords=iogear+guh287

Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136533

StarTech SV431DVIUAHR 4 Port High Resolution USB DVI Dual Link KVM Switch with Audio
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817707176

Dell 3007 WFP-HC LCD Monitor
Dell 3007 WFP-HC | eBay

Matias Tactile Pro 3 Keyboard & random wheel mouse
Matias Tactile Pro 3


Comments

I initially started with the Zotac Z77 ITX motherboard as I liked it better due to the mSATA port. That board that I bought on amazon did not work, so I went back to newegg and ordered the ASUS (the ASRock ITX has the wrong Ethernet chip).

The Bitfenix Prodigy case requires a small Power Supply (depth of 140mm/5.51")

Initially, I wanted the i3570K (3.4GHz instead of 3.5GHz) but the comments from GSkill support in the reviews of the memory seemed to indicate that the memory was only certified for the 3770K +$130 :(

The Bluray player is dirt-cheap ($59). The last one I had bought cost me several hundreds, and this one even burns 128GB disks.


Lion 10.7 install
Took me a while to be able to get it to work, so I've captured the exact process:

1.1 Go in BIOS, load Optimal defaults.
1.2 BIOS: Under Advanced/USB Configuration, disable Intel xHCI Mode and disable EHCI Hand-Off (Disabled by default in BIOS).
1.3 BIOS: Under Advanced/Onboard Devices Configuration, disable Asmedia USB 3
1.4 BIOS: I did not touch X.M.P. (Ai Tweaker/Ai Overclock Tuner).
1.5 BIOS: Under Boot disable "Wait For 'F1' If Error" (to avoid a potential catch-22: no keyboard detected, press F1 key to continue)
1.6 BIOS: while in 'Boot', make sure that your USB stick is recognized as the Boot Option #1, otherwise click on "Hard Drive BBS Priorities" to make your USB stick #1

2.1 USB stick made with UniBeast 1.4.0 on my Snow Leopard machine
2.2 Run BridgeHelper 5.0.0 to "USB" on my Snow Leopard machine to update the USB stick with an IvyBridge kernel (Unibeast install the standard Lion 10.7.4 kernel which crashes with IvyBridge CPUs)
2.3 copied BridgeHelper 5.0.0 and MultiBeast 4.6.1 on the USB stick too.

3.1 Boot on the "USB" stick. When at the beginning of install, go to menu Utilities, and pick "Disk Utility". Format partition/disk Quit "Disk Utility" and install Lion from stick.
3.2 I partitioned the 240GB as 32G for Lion and the rest for System, both formatted as HFS.

4. Reboot from USB stick -> USB, Utilities -> Terminal:
rm /Volume/Lion/mach_kernel
reboot

5.1 Reboot, At the Chimera prompt, do not pick the usual "USB" try boot from "Lion" hard drive - will fail with "Can't find" error and will return you to chimera prompt: USB/Lion. This second time, choose "USB" stick. That boots you to Lion from your hard drive in 1280x800, and to finish the install: I did not provide personal information, nor an apple ID, and created an "admin" account (different from my usual account). Identify directly connected keyboard as ANSI. Command-N to open a new finder window and navigate to the USB stick where BridgeHelper & MultiBeast are waiting.
5.2 In Lion, I run BridgeHelper 5.0.0 to update the HD to an IvyBridge kernel. it includes:
- Intel HD4000 kexts for testing
- Updated USB kexts for 7 series chipset (Intel Z77) USB ports.
- Patched AppleAHCIPort.kext for 7 series chipset (Intel Z77) SATA ports
5.3 Multibeast v4.6.1 (to install drivers and create a boot setup with Chimera)
Multibeast:
- Check System Utilites
- Open Drivers & Bootladers
- Open Kext & Enablers
- Open Audio
- Open Realtek ALC8xx
- Open Non-DSDT HDAEnabler
- Check ALC898
- Open Patched AppleHDA
- Check ALC898
- Open Disk
- I did NOT check IOAHCIBlockStorageInjector, as I believe that BridgeHelper 5.0.0 already takes care of that.
- Check TRIM support (My Intel 520 SSD supports TRIM)
- Nothing under Graphics
- Open Miscellaneous
- Check FakeSMC
- Open FakeSMC Plugins
- Check Motherboard plugins
- Check AMD Radeon plugins (I have an Gigabyte 6870 AMD Radeon card in the PCIE slot)
- Check HWMonitor application, which installs an app that hides in your menu bar and gives you info on the temperature/speed of your hardware)
- Open Patched AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement
- Check OS X 10.7.4 Ivy Bridge
- Open Network
- Check hnak's AppleIntelE1000e Ethernet
- Open Bootloaders
- Check Chimera v1.10.0 r1394
- Open Customization
- Open System Definitions
- Open Mac Pro
- Check MacPro 3,1 (This is the default from booting with the Stick, I have had problems in the past where TimeMachine refused to restore the backup complaining that the machine type was not the same as the one on which the backup was made).
- Open Themes
- Check tonymacx86 remixed.
Press the Continue button, Enter your password and let MultiBeast install…

7. Eject USB stick, Apple Menu -> Restart,

8.1 Up and running with my screen native (2500x1600) resolution is now detected and enabled by default
8.2 I downloaded SuperDuper and used it to clone the Lion as System. Created in /Extra an org.chameleon.boot.plist and made the "System" partition the default boot disk.
8.3 I created my personal user account on the "System" partition on the SSD and moved away the freshly created Music/Pictures/Public and replaced them with symlinks to the 1TB rotating harddrive various directories. That way my growing collection of Pictures, Music & Movies is on the regular harddrive, while the rest (small) of my account is on the ~200GB speedy SSD.

---
I've not yet tested sleep with Lion.

I've been playing with a light overclocking. I can with no troubles boost the memory from 1333MHz to 2400MHz. However any attempt to increase the CPU freq gives me a curious case of disappearing keyboard & mouse: during BIOS and Chimera both keyboard and mouse are present, but upon reaching the Apple login screen, I cannot enter my password as neither the mouse nor the keyboard react anymore.... Adding more keyboards/mouses are still not recognized....

Current GeekBench 32-bit score is 15854

The Asus MB comes with a min-PCIE card which is supposed to give me Bluetooth and Wifi. None work. no BT, no Wifi.

I'm connected by wired Ethernet.

The system is much more noisier than my previous Antec Solo build. I'm guessing the 3 fans on the 6870 are for something there...

There has definitively been something wrong with USB: very often my keyboard and mouse are not recognized upon boot.

Mountain Lion 10.8 install

I mostly followed the easy (Thanks tonymac and gang) instructions at http://www.tonymacx86.com/61-unibeast-install-os-x-mountain-lion-any-supported-intel-based-pc.html

Remove the ATi AMD Radeon 6870, and plug my screen in the DVI connector for the onboard HD4000.

Boot on the USB stick and choose your "MountainLion" disk partition.
Keep installing until you're at the desktop.

System Preferences -> Security
Click the lock to make changes. Enter your password.
Allow applications downloaded from: anywhere.

Multibeast v5.0.2 (to install drivers and create a boot setup with Chimera)
Multibeast:
- I did NOT check UserDSDST
- Open Drivers & Bootloaders
- Open Drivers
- Open Audio
- Open Realtek ALC8xx
- Open Without DSDT
- Check ALC898
- Open Disk
- Check TRIM Enabler (My Intel 520 SSD supports TRIM)
- Nothing under Graphics
- Open Miscellaneous
- Check FakeSMC
- Open FakeSMC Plugins
- Check Motherboard plugins
- Check AMD Radeon plugins (I have an Gigabyte 6870 AMD Radeon card in the PCIE slot)
- Check HWMonitor application, which installs an app that hides in your menu bar and gives you info on the temperature/speed of your hardware)
- Open Network
- Check hnak's AppleIntelE1000e Ethernet
- Open System
- Open Patched AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement
- Check OS X 10.8.0
- Open Bootloaders
- Check Chimera 1.11.1 r1394
- Open Customizations
- Open System Definitions
- Open Mac Pro
- Check MacPro 3,1 (This is the default from booting with the Stick, I have had problems in the past where TimeMachine refused to restore the backup complaining that the machine type was not the same as the one on which the backup was made).
- Open Themes
- Check tonymacx86.
Press the Continue button, Enter your password and let MultiBeast install…

After MultiBeast finishes, create a /Extra/org.Chameleon.Boot.plist using a terminal.
Code:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
        <key>Boot Banner</key>
        <string>No</string>
        <key>GraphicsEnabler</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>Kernel Flags</key>
        <string>PCIRootUID=1</string>
        <key>Timeout</key>
        <string>4</string>
        <key>GenerateCStates</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>GeneratePStates</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>Default Partition</key>
        <string>hd(0,3)</string>

</dict>
</plist>

Eject USB stick, Apple Menu -> Restart,
You should now boot from your internal HD.

Apple Menu -> Shutdown
Cut the power, and re-bolt in the ATi AMD Radeon HD6870
Reboot, and now I am using the PCI-express GPU, and I can boost the resolution from 1280x800 to 2560x1600.

Sleep does not work (fans keep running, and no way to wake up)

USB seems to work way better: my keyboard and mouse have yet to disappear...

Thanks! I would like to thank tonymac and the community here for all their support.

What does not work for me:

Sleep & Cpuspeed does not work for me. I understand that there are hacked UEFI bios that I could use, but I did not try those as sleep is not important to me.

The two USB 3.0 ASmedia ports are disabled in the BIOS. I have enough (4 x USB 3.0 & 4 x USB 2.0) ports already on the motherboard.

The built-in Wifi + Bluetooth are not recognized. I use wired Ethernet, so no need for Wifi. And I use a $10 USB dongle for bluetooth.

Overclocking: RAM has been overclocked at 2400MHz and is very stable. When using Lion, I was not able to overclock significantly the CPU without having stability issues.

Mountain Lion's Airplay mirroring. Despite updating to an iMac 12,2 system type and setting the integrated DVI port as the first port to init, I could not get the OS airplay mirroring working. The iTunes (and only iTunes) airplay mirroring does work fine and that is enough for me to send my iTunes movies to the Apple TV.

Edit Log:
2012Aug21: Added Mountain Lion install instructions.
2012Aug21: Added Mac BluRay Player & Bluray drive
2012Aug28: Added the Bluetooth and card reader that I forgot.
2012Aug28: Added a what does not work section.
 
Hey Ged, that's fantastic, your build is very close to what I am accumulating parts for.

So far I have
CPU: i7 3770K (same as you)
Case: Bitfenix Prodigy (same as you)
Cooling: H80 (same as you)
GPU: Gigabyte GTX 670 (I have seen someone getting this one up and running with ML)

I'll probably try to get the same PSU as you have as well, but really I'm looking at any 650W-ish one that will fit in the case so not a big deal.
Mobo: I will wait for Gigabyte's announcement in the next couple weeks to see what they have for Z77 ITX.
RAM: now for this one I am intrigued about your choice. I had decided on choosing 1600Mhz RAM - 2x8GB sticks like you have to max out the ram I can put on an ITX board, but you have chosen 2400Mhz to pair with the same CPU... I can't remember why I was planning to buy 1600MHz but I may have concluded wrong. What were your reasons for choosing this RAM for your build?

Ta
 
Awesome build, and great write up. any chance you can post more pics of everything assembled inside the case? im considering the case for my next build, thanks. :)
 
RAM: now for this one I am intrigued about your choice. I had decided on choosing 1600Mhz RAM - 2x8GB sticks like you have to max out the ram I can put on an ITX board, but you have chosen 2400Mhz to pair with the same CPU... I can't remember why I was planning to buy 1600MHz but I may have concluded wrong. What were your reasons for choosing this RAM for your build?

You first have to understand where I am coming from. My previous build - i7-960 - degraded over time to the point that it could not work more than 5 minutes without a reboot. No message in the console log, so I had no clue on which part had gone wrong: cpu? memory? motherboard? (Now that I've build a new one, my suspicions are on the secondary disk for TimeMachine which is now dead).

First, the size: 16GB: I plan to run multiple virtual machines: Win7 for Quicken and Linux 32-bit and 64-bit for software development and testing.

That RAM was the only one on newegg which had the tag "for Z77 and 3rd generation Intel Core Processors"
newegg_Z77_RAM.png


By reading the reviews, I also learned that Gskill certifies their RAM to work with the CPU, and that's why I upgraded from i5-3570K to i7-3770K which IMHO is not worth the price difference for the performance diff. But being burned by an unreliable machine, I made sure to pay extra for certifications.

And indeed it was very easy to push from 1333MHz to 2400MHz (I just set in the BIOS: DDR3-2400MHz, and it works and it's stable)
 
Hey Ged, that's fantastic, your build is very close to what I am accumulating parts for.

So far I have
CPU: i7 3770K (same as you)
Case: Bitfenix Prodigy (same as you)
Cooling: H80 (same as you)
GPU: Gigabyte GTX 670 (I have seen someone getting this one up and running with ML)

I'll probably try to get the same PSU as you have as well, but really I'm looking at any 650W-ish one that will fit in the case so not a big deal.
Mobo: I will wait for Gigabyte's announcement in the next couple weeks to see what they have for Z77 ITX.
RAM: now for this one I am intrigued about your choice. I had decided on choosing 1600Mhz RAM - 2x8GB sticks like you have to max out the ram I can put on an ITX board, but you have chosen 2400Mhz to pair with the same CPU... I can't remember why I was planning to buy 1600MHz but I may have concluded wrong. What were your reasons for choosing this RAM for your build?

Ta

Exactly the same build as i want, like you i am waiting for the gigabyte boards and tonymacs verdict, ho and that gigabyte gtx670 running on ML wasn't me by any chance was it :)
 
Awesome build, and great write up. any chance you can post more pics of everything assembled inside the case? im considering the case for my next build, thanks. :)

Here you go:

1) View from the left side with the HD6870 in position.
The 3 fans of the 6870 are exactly in the position where the left cover is fully drilled,
so there is plenty of air coming in through that way. Nice design here.
GED_prodigy_left01.JPG


2) View from the left side with the HD6870 removed.
Note that following instructions from bitfenix, I have removed the additional drive cage.
Without the additional drive cage, the bitfenix still has: two 3.5 bays and 2 2.5"" bays on the right cover = 4 drives. Not bad...
GED_prodigy_left02.JPG


3) View from the right side.
Here is one problem with the case: the front panel is not a front panel: it is a right-front panel mounted on the side panel.
Given that the ASUS motherboard has its audio cable on the left-rear side... the cable is very extended.
Once you have cabled the right panel, you cannot really open it much without un-cabling :(
Not a major problem, just an annoyance.
Notice the Intel 520 SSD is installed in the bay in the panel itself.
Also note that I had to rotate the HD80 cooler to an horizontal position to get it to fit.
GED_prodigy_right01.JPG


4) View from the right side with the panel lifted
There is a lot of space on the right side.
I have a theory that bitfenix put the hard disk bay in the center for weight distribution.
But it could probably be moved more to the right, so that both a full length graphics card
and the additional 3 x 3.5" bay could be installed at the same time.
Each 3.5" bay comes with a screw-less caddy. The caddy has a plugs that goes into the drive
and seems to be on silicon gromets, so that drive vibration is not transmitted to the case. Nice.
GED_prodigy_right02.JPG



5) View from the bottom.
Definitively, there is room for and it seems easy to drill new holes for the drive bay,
so that the drive bay AND the full length graphics card can co-exist...
Note the fan filter. The power supply is mostly isolated from the rest of the case by its own bay,
and gets it air from the bottom through the removable filter seen here.
GED_prodigy_bottom01.JPG



6) View from the top.
I've opened the top cover to show you the top fan mounts.
I will be adding an optical drive soon.
I've read that you can put a H100 240-mm long cooler if you're sacrificing the optical drive,
but for me, the H80 120-mm was enough.
GED_prodigy_top01.JPG


7) And finally the bitfenix prodigy stacked on top of one of my skinnier PCs. Note the size of the 51/4" drive bay which shows you how wide the case really is.
GED_prodigy_top02.JPG
 
Nice. I am also thinking about a similar system (who isn't ? ;) ) despite the fact that mini-ITX (or even micro-ATX) hackintosh-friendly z77 motherboards are suspiciously scarce. I'll go with the black bitfenix, slower mem, different SSD. I am not interested in optical drive or non-SSD HDs so I could live without the optical and both HD bays and try custom watercooling. If that proves too difficult or unstable I will just install an Corsair H100 and a Radeon 5570 I already have.

All these of course provided that sleep works ... (maybe the Zotac is a better option ? )
 
Exactly the same build as i want, like you i am waiting for the gigabyte boards and tonymacs verdict, ho and that gigabyte gtx670 running on ML wasn't me by any chance was it :)

Haha why yes it was. Gigabyte sincerely thanks you for directly influencing another sale of their GTX 670 :p Also, well done on getting it to work!

EDIT: Also Ged, thanks for your answer on my RAM question. Helps a lot, I think you've convinced me. Also a guy I had talked to in my local computer parts store had given me a rough guideline of "spend ~400 on a CPU, $200 on RAM and $400 on a GPU and it'll run anything you throw at it". Your Trident RAM fits that rule of thumb quite well.
 
SEVEN drives and a FULL-SIZE GPU !

Awesome build, and great write up. any chance you can post more pics of everything assembled inside the case? im considering the case for my next build, thanks. :)

I found something very interesting today...

Remember the view from the bottom that you see above?

The top plate into which the middle bay slides is asymmetrical: two screws on one side, and two hooks on the other.
A priori, cannot reverse. I still unscrewed it, and to my surprise, I found that the top plate mount IS symmetrical: it has four hooks and four screw holes. The top plate can be mounted BOTH ways: bay entering by the left/PCI-Express side, or you can revert the mount of the top plate to enter the bay by the right.
GED_Prodigy_topplate01.JPG


We know that the six screws under the case are also symmetrical. So maybe I can revert the bays? I cut a piece of cardboard to make sure to isolate the full-size GPU card from the metal of the bays.
GED_Prodigy_topplate02.JPG


Will the GPU card fit???
Note the diagonal cut in the cardboard to let some airflow from the bottom.
GED_Prodigy_loadedleft01.JPG


Bingo! the GPU fits!
GED_Prodigy_loadedleft02.JPG


Here the view from the top cover showing why the cardboard is mandatory.
There is still a bit of room in the middle, but it's starting to be a mess of wires...
The middle bay works normally on its two bottom & top rails, and can be slided-in or out with a click.
GED_Prodigy_loadedtop01.JPG


And finally the view from the right with the reversed bays. I now have a full-size GPU AND seven drive bay into a mini-ITX case :D
Note how the ASUS and its rear/left location stretches the front panel connector (unplugged) in the front/right.
GED_Prodigy_loadedright01.JPG


seven drive bays! of which five are well separated, well ventilated, each one uses a no-screw tray with silicon grommets so that the drive is well suspended.

Now, now, what can I put into those??? ;-)
 
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