Black OPS HailStorm Review

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   As mentioned in another post, I recently ordered one of these:

System Configuration:

Chassis Model: Special Deal Hot Seller - Black OPS HailStorm Edition

Exterior Finish: - Standard Factory Finish

Trim Accents: - Standard Factory Finish

Processor: Intel Core i7 Extreme Edition 990X 3.46GHz (Six-Core) (Extreme Performance)

Motherboard: ASUS Rampage III Extreme (Intel X58 Chipset) (Features USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gb/s)

System Memory: 12GB DDR3 1600MHz Digital Storm Certified (Highly Recommended) (Hand Tested)

Power Supply: 1000W Digital Storm Certified (Dual/Triple/Quad SLI Compatible) (Silent Edition Highly Recommended)

Expansion Bay: - No Thanks

Hard Drive Set 1: Operating System: 1x (2TB Western Digital (7200 RPM) 
(64MB Cache) (Model: Black Edition WD2002FAEX) (SATA 6Gbps)

Set 1 Raid Options: - No Thanks

Hard Drive Set 2: Multimedia\Data: - No Thanks

Hard Drive Set 3: Backup\Misc.: - No Thanks

Optical Drive 1: Blu-Ray & DVD Writer/Reader (Burn + Play Blu-Ray & DVDs) (12x BD-R) (Lite-On iHBS112)

Optical Drive 2: - No Thanks

Internet Access: High Speed Network Port (Supports High-Speed Cable / DSL / Network Connections)

Video Card(s): 1x NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 3GB (PhysX) (EVGA Classified 03G-P3-1598-AR)

Add-on Card: - No Thanks

Sound Card: Integrated Motherboard Audio

Extreme Cooling: H20: Stage 3: FrostChill Cooling System: CPU Only

H20 Tube Color: Blue Tubing with High-Performance Fluid (UV Lighting Reactive)

Chassis Airflow: Upgrade Chassis With LED Performance Fans (Blue) (Up to 6 Fans)

Internal Lighting: Internal Chassis Lighting System (UV) (Creates Glowing Effect for H20 Tubes)

Enhancements: - No Thanks

Chassis Mods: - No Thanks

Noise Reduction: Noise Suppression Package Stage 2 (Optimized Airflow & Fan Speeds with Noise Dampening Material)

CPU Boost: Stage 3: Overclock the processor between 4.2GHz to 4.6GHz (Requires i7 990X Processor)

Graphics Boost: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my video card(s)

Memory Boost: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my memory

OS Boost: - No Thanks, Please do not tweak the services on the operating system

Windows OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (64-Bit Edition)

Recovery Tools: Windows Recovery Toolkit (Bundled with Windows 7 CD)

Virus Protection: - No Thanks

Office: - No Thanks

Benchmarking: - No Thanks

Pre-Install Game: - No Thanks

Display: - No Thanks

Surge Shield: - No Thanks

Speakers: - No Thanks

Keyboard: - No Thanks

Mouse: - No Thanks

External Storage: - No Thanks

Exclusive T-Shirt: FREE: Digital Storm T-Shirt - Black (Xtra Large)

Priority Build: Please Prioritize: Ship Within Four Business Days After Order Is Successfully Processed

Warranty: Life-time Expert Customer Care with 3 Year Limited Warranty

____________________________________________________________

Reason for buying:  I wanted a system that would allow me strong 
performance in both 3D modeling/animation and gaming.  I do Autodesk 
Maya as a hobby, and after using the Mac version for years, I finally 
realized that the Windows version seems to work better.  As for gaming, I
 do mostly Microsoft Flight Simulator X, as the shoot-em-up games tend 
to make me feel carsick. 

I discovered Digital Storm after cancelling a similar order with one of 
their competitors back east.  That competitor  (hint:  their name is a 
synonym for "beginning") apparently builds quality systems, but I was 
not willing to tolerate their lack of communication long enough to 
actually own one.  So after reading many fine reviews on this site, I 
decided to order from DS.

The ordering process had one hitch:  They really REALLY take the utmost 
in precaution if you want the system sent to somewhere other than your 
billing address. In spite of the fact that my office is registered as a 
valid shipping address with my credit card company, DS still wanted 
faxed copies of my credit card and a personal ID.  In this age of 
identity theft, I was reluctant to do this, but they assured me that the
 documents are shredded as soon as they are inspected.  (I really hope 
so.)  Anyway, I do appreciate their due diligence in this regard, in 
spite of it being a pain.

Once my order was approved, the status went from Stage 1 to Stage 5 
within a couple of days.  I of course jumped right to Stage 8.  (Don't 
we all.)  When Stage 5 started to show signs of not progressing to Stage
 6, I pinged Alex and asked him to poke around.  He responded promptly 
and told me that they were putting the system through its paces.  I 
reminded him that I had selected the 4-day build, and I think he went 
and gave Thanh a motivational speech, because my system did in fact ship
 on the 4'th day.

I selected the wooden crate option, and when it arrived at our office 
loading dock on Monday, I was blown away by its size and construction.  
The FedEx lady said "Here's your dead body" as she wheeled it off of the
 truck.  When I finally got it home that afternoon, I said some bad 
words, as I had forgotten to charge my screw gun.  
 Eleven or so screws later with a hand-held phillips head, I had what I 
thought would be the top of the crate removed.  You see, I figured if I 
removed the side that the "this end up" arrows pointed at, I would be 
faced with the foam that covers the box with the manual, followed by the
 computer itself.  Evidently I think differently from the folks who pack
 the crates.  

Anyway, I finally got the computer upstairs into my office, removed the 
protective foam that is inside the enclosure, plugged everything in, and
 fired it up.  The Bios immediately reported the overclock of 4.42 GHz, 
and WIndows 7 booted without issue...which is how it has performed from 
day one.

This machine scores quite well when running Cinebench.  It doesn't 
totally kill my 2-year old 8-core Mac Pro, but it does edge it out by a 
couple of points...which is not bad considering it has 2 less cores. 
And  Flight Simulator X runs beautifully with all settings cranked to 
full.  The overclock is rock-solid in terms of stability.

The only issue I have had is with one of the LED fans on the top of the 
case.  The  light on the middle fan sometimes gets brighter for a few 
seconds, then goes back to matching the others.  It can be a little 
distracting...if anybody has any suggestions, please let me know.  My 
guess is that it has something to do with the wiring.  I may call DS 
next week about it.  Unless one of you tells me it's normal.

To summarize, my experience with Digital Storm has been extremely 
positive.  The staff is polite and very responsive, and as a company, 
they do what they say they are going to do.  When you really need 
information, Alex is right there to help.  I would not hesitate to 
recommend DS to anyone, and this is big coming from me, as I tend to be 
pretty critical at times.  (Just ask the people I work with.)

So on to the pictures: