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sexy computers that weren't built by either me or luke okay that's a little

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unusual but that's what's going to be happening today welcome to my video on

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the digital storm bolt 3 a pre-built gaming rig with an attitude as big as

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its price tag but not as big as the price tag of the machine luke will be

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showing off soon massage that like

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button below if you want to see him bench a computer worth nearly ten

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thousand dollars

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freshbooks is the online accounting service for small business owners that

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gives you the tools to make you feel like the boss you are click on my face

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to learn more about it let's get this out of the way a

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custom-built machine would be cheaper and it's pretty easy to do these days

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but by the same token changing your own oil

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is just plain not that difficult and yet some folks don't want to get their hands

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dirty so we'll be checking out the digital storm bolt 3 from the

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perspective of someone who wants a new pc and clean hands now i've been

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intrigued by the tiny yet powerful bolt series ever since i first laid eyes on

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one at a party at ces 2013 but it's

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taken until the third generation for me to finally get my hands on one for

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review and a lot has changed for one

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thing the bolt has put on weight at about the same rate as a washed up celeb

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in the last three years it isn't really that small anymore at just shy of 20

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liters the bolt 3 is 30 percent larger than the silverstone raven rv z01 and

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nearly three times the volume of those custom steam machine prototypes that

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valve was sending out during the steamos beta but maybe big can still be sexy

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right let's take a tour and see what digital storm has done to justify their

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tiny beauty's additional heft starting at the front is a customized face plate

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that includes an RGB backlit digital storm logo configurable through software

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a slimline optical drive a dvd writer for us and front jacks including audio

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and two usb 3.0 ports on the right side

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is the side panel i guess with a curiously positioned air intake and not

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much else to see other than perhaps a better look at the black brushed

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aluminum finish that's as irresistible to the eye as it is to your fingerprints

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on the top is the first hint that there's a serious business pc inside

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with a grill that covers most of it and two Corsair static pressure series fans

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acting as intakes through a filter that combined with positive internal air

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pressure should do a solid job of keeping most of the dust out of this pc

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which is good because this puppy is a work of art whose beauty i would never

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want to see tarnished by the effects of age and the left side panel with its

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full sized acrylic window is where we see all of that magic happen perhaps now

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is a good time to reveal the specs of this bad boy then there's a custom

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liquid cooled and modestly overclocked core i7 4790k processor on an ASUS z97i

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deluxe motherboard with 16 gigs of dual channel ddr3 memory a 250 gig samsung

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850 evo SSD a one terabyte seagate hard

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drive a 600 watt 80 plus gold rated modular silverstone power supply a top

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of the line gtx 980 ti on a pci express riser cable that enables its showcase

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style mounting at the bottom of the machine and RGB led strips running

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through the interior allowing you to change not only that front logo but also

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the lighting of the entire inside but aside from listing specs what can we

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say about this hardware well this mix means all of the latest features 2x2 ac

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wi-fi enough usb 3 ports to choke a small mammal diy grade flexibility if

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you ever want to get into overclocking or throw some significant upgrades at

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the system with support for standard motherboards and curiously even quadruple width graphics cards

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means that i guess my summary is this if the point of buying a pre-built machine

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is to have someone knowledgeable pick everything out for you so you know

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you're getting the good stuff without

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putting any time or thought into it then mission freaking accomplished i've seen

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a lot of expensive computers with proprietary motherboards questionable

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power supplies and generic memory in them digital storm has avoided all of

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these pitfalls even going as far as to provide custom yellow dyed coolant for

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the top of the line swiftek dual 120 millimeter all-in-one water cooler and

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matching yellow paracord style power cable extensions that give the computer

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a surprisingly not off-the-shelf look

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for something that wasn't built by the owner which doesn't

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mean it wasn't hand built by someone i actually used to work at a retailer

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where i was in charge of the custom-built computer department and i

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think you guys would probably be surprised how much work and care goes

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into building something like this when it's not being done on an assembly line

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in china somewhere and it really shows in the back you can see the custom

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controller that digital storm uses for led management temperature monitoring

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and fan control and you can also see that they've got tidy cabling down to a

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freaking science here in spite of the fact that behind the motherboard tray it

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will have literally no impact on performance it's just taking pride in

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your work which i guess leads us pretty well into performance doesn't it

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the big drawback of compact gaming machines in the past has been their

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disappointing thermal with throttling being a major issue and or acoustic

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performance with even the bolt one with its 1u power supply getting a little bit

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on the louder side when under load and i guess that's where the bolt 3 put on

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some well-deserved extra pounds almost all the cooling in this machine with the

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exception of the power supply and graphics card is handled by 120

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millimeter fans and thanks to the very spacious bottom graphics card mounting

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area our gtx 980 ti not only avoided

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thermal throttling but turboed up nicely and stayed quiet even under load which

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leads us to the conclusion i can do math just as well as you spreadsheet warriors

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who are crunching the costs of the components of this system in excel right

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now so i'll save you the trouble with some promos they have running the

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bolt 3 costs a little over 500 more than

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buying all of the exact same components down to you know the included but

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thankfully not installed mcafee software the os was actually very clean wire

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extensions and water dye and all that stuff and then putting them together

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yourself and the performance wouldn't be different so then what do you get for

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your money the machine is extraordinarily well packaged which

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combined with digital storms qa means that the likelihood of dealing with an

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rma or an incompatible component is minuscule you get more than just a

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pretty face with the components they picked out for me being pretty much

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impossible to criticize from a quality or reliability perspective and you get

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to just click buy instead of tinkering with it yourself for the

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let's be honest eight would be conservative probably closer to 15 to 20

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hours that it would take for a relatively inexperienced builder to

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piece together all the parts themselves online and then put it together

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considering how pcmr showpiece worthy it

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looks and while as a hot rodder myself reviewing a stock car off the lot isn't

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exactly my wheelhouse if i try to think of it

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less in terms of what i could build for the same amount and more in terms of the

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other things in my life that i know how to do but pay more to have someone else

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do for me like eating out at a restaurant or the things that i just

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don't feel like learning how to do like car maintenance

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it just doesn't seem nearly as outlandish anymore and i'd feel a heck

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of a lot better recommending this to a non-diy oriented friend than most of the

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pre-built pcs i've ever seen so thanks for watching guys if this video sucked

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you know where that button is but if it was awesome get subscribed hit the like

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corner buying a cool t-shirt like this one or even with a direct monthly

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contribution through our community forum now that you're done doing all of that

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stuff you're probably wondering what to watch next so click that little button

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in the top right corner to check out my apple watch video where i tried really

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really really really really hard not to let it turn into a rant this is not an

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apple watch that should tell you all you need to know about the apple watch

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watch the video anyway there's more to say