Origin Genesis Review: Triple Titan Terror
by Ryan Smith on April 23, 2013 9:00 AM EST
As some of you might recall, as part of NVIDIA’s GTX Titan launch NVIDIA not only sent out individual cards, but also some custom concept systems to showcase the unique aspects of Titan. Specifically its high quality construction and how its blower-style cooler means it can be exploited to pack high performance systems into relatively small spaces. NVIDIA shipped us two such concept systems, a small form factor (SFF) Falcon Northwest Tiki, and at the opposite end of the spectrum was the obscenely powerful tri-SLI Origin Genesis.
Of course that was almost two months ago, and there’s no getting around the fact that as the reviewer assigned to the Genesis I’ve ended up turning in this review very late. An initial delay to focus on the Titan launch turned into a serious illness, followed by not one but two conferences, two more video card launches, and some other fun stuff in between. So living up to the motto “better late than never”, now that everything has settled down (relatively speaking) I can finally pick back up where I left off and finish our look at Titan with the final piece of the puzzle: Origin’s monster gaming machine.
With the Genesis the idea was that Origin would put together a triple Titan system to showcase just how quiet Titan’s blower-style coolers were even when the cards were tightly packed together. Instead Origin unexpectedly exceeded NVIDIA’s specifications and was able to get three Titans hooked up to water in time for the Titan launch. The end result somewhat defeats the original purpose of sending the system out – we can’t tell you what three stock Titans sounds like – but in the end we got something far more interesting: three Titans hooked up to water, creating a tri-SLI system effectively unrestrained by heat and cooled by one of the only things quieter than NVIDIA’s blowers. Ultimately if one Titan on its own is powerful, then three Titans is nothing short of obscene. This is the same sentiment behind the Origin’s Genesis system we’re reviewing today.
In Origin’s product lineup, Genesis is Origin’s brand for their line full-tower computers. As a boutique builder, Origin uses a number of different configurations on their Genesis lineup, offering multiple CPU/motherboard combinations and multiple cases under the same Genesis heading. As a result Genesis spans everything from relatively simple systems to XL-ATX monsters.
The Genesis system we’ll be looking at today is positioned at the top end of that lineup, and is intended to be the fastest thing that can be put together in an ATX form factor. Sparing no expense, Origin has assembled a Genesis system that packs in Origin’s best components, best cooling, greatest overclocks, and highest price tag. Based around the combination of a Corsair Obsidian 800D case, NVIDIA’s GTX Titan, and Intel’s X79/SNB-E platform, it’s a luxury computer like no other.
With that thought in mind, let’s take a look at just how a $9,000 luxury gaming computer is built and configured.
| Origin Genesis (2013) Specifications | |
| Chassis | Corsair Obsidian 800D |
| Processor |
Intel Core i7-3970X (6x3.5GHz + HTT, Turbo to 4.0GHz, 4.9GHz Overclock, 32nm, 15MB L3, 150W) |
| Motherboard | Intel DX79SR(X79 Chipset) |
| Memory | 4x4GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3-1866 (expandable to 64GB) |
| Graphics |
3x NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan 6GB in SLI 3x (2688 CUDA cores, 837/6008MHz core/RAM, 952/6208MHz Overclock, 384-bit memory bus) |
| Storage |
2x Corsair Neutron GTX 120GB SATA 6Gbps SSD (LAMD), RAID-0 Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB 7200-RPM SATA HDD |
| Optical Drive(s) | Hitachi-LG 14x BD Burner |
| Power Supply | Corsair AX1200i |
| Networking | 2x Intel 82579L Gigabit Ethernet |
| Audio |
Realtek ALC892 Speaker, mic/line-in, surround jacks, optical out for 7.1 sound |
| Front Side |
Optical drive 40-In-1 Media Card Reader 2x USB 2.0 2x USB 3.0 IEEE 1394a Headphone and mic jacks 4-channel fan controller Koolance RP-401X2 Reservoir |
| Top | - |
| Back Side |
4x USB 3.0 6x USB 2.0 Optical out IEEE 1394a 2x Ethernet Speaker, mic/line-in, surround, and optical jacks 6x DVI-D (3x GTX Titan) 3x HDMI (3x GTX Titan) 2x DisplayPort (3x GTX Titan) |
| Operating System | Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit SP1 |
| Dimensions |
24" x 9" x 24" (609.6mm x 228.6mm x 609.6mm) |
| Extras |
Card reader Custom liquid-cooling loop, CPU & GPU Custom LED lighting 80 Plus Platinum PSU |
| Warranty | 1-year parts, 45 days shipping, lifetime labor and 24/7 support |
| Pricing | As configured: $8,499 (+$479 paint job) |
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shadowofthesun - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
Gotta agree with this- I ended up ditching my HDMI via nVidia setup because it worked extremely poorly in Linux and even in Windows would fail to initialize my HDMI output as an audio device if the screen went to sleep. Luckily the optical out works fine.viliu - Tuesday, April 30, 2013 - link
meh, the same as a Ferrari, it's obviously quick, but noisy, hot and draws a hell of a lot of fuel.But i'l bet ur lick ur back side for one of those... Anyway, there are always beautiful things for car/boats/computers and whatever enthusiasts .I will definitely want one of those, even if i already have a nice car and a good computer, but as human i will always want more and never will be happy whit whatever i have nowwingless - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
Can I finally play a game with triple monitors in 3D on this machine? Barely; Still this is an amazing machine, especially for those in cold climates. I like it!APassingMe - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
Thanks for the great review, it reminds me of all the reasons why I still read AnandTech after all these years.However, could you please run your reviews through a good third party for a quality check? It really is distracting to read through the review and have to pause and think.... what's missing here... Oh, it's just that "of" is left off or something similar, I know it slows down the overall release of the review but please consider it.
Thanks.
-APassingMe
geniekid - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
I feel like the whole point of liquid cooling is to shunt heat to a radiator which is then cooled by a low flow fan. Why then do you need 13 million (possible exaggeration) case fans?A5 - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
There are two reasons to watercool:1) Reduce noise and maximize cooling on modest machines
2) Maximize cooling to reach insane performance heights.
This system is firmly in the second camp. It simply wouldn't be possible to run it at these clocks on air cooling.
A5 - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
Also, in this case, each case fan slot is actually a radiator with 2+ fans on it.DanNeely - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
If it was a more modest setup you wouldn't; but this system has a heavy overclocked CPU and 4 heavily overclocked GPUs; which means it's trying to dump close to 1200W through the radiators. In a more mainstream system you'd have ~80-150W from the CPU and 150-300W from the GPU. In that case a single 3x120 rad with one set of fans (vs push pull) would probably be adequate, and be much quieter under load than the GPUs blower.justaviking - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
Compute performance? I was curious what sort of compute performance you'd get with 3 Titans. Did I just miss that? Of course, it doesn't really matter. I did not find $9k in my pocket this morning. But it would still be interesting to see.colinstu - Tuesday, April 23, 2013 - link
Hope 6-8 years from now this same amount of power can be had in the space of a small matx case and for $600-1200. But then again... just imagine how the games will be (or won't be) by then.