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The OcUK Ultima Finesse Blackhole is a gaming powerhouse that leverages Haswell-E's most appealing CPU and a pair of custom-cooled GTX 970 graphics cards to deliver excellent frame rates at a 2560×1440 resolution.
Gaming performance of the SLI KFA2 GTX 970 Infinity Black Edition graphics cards was excellent. That level of GPU muscle is complete overkill for 1920×1080, but is well-suited for driving a 144Hz, 2560×1440 G-Sync monitor.
Performance in other areas is strong thanks to the excellent 5820K processor and its slight overclock to 3.9GHz. The speedy 250GB Samsung 840 EVO SSD has room for a handful of games, although I would have liked to see the newer 850 EVO being used. The 2TB Seagate SSHD delivers decent (compared to a hard drive) randomised performance that will be good for loading times.
The cooling system deployed by OcUK has clearly been given serious thought. From spacing the graphics cards to lowering the fan speeds, a balance between thermals and acoustics has been targeted. And while the Ultima Finesse Blackhole performs strongly on the thermals front, acoustics emissions show clear room for improvement, especially at lower loads.
On the topic of cooling, Prolimatech's Genesis is one of the few heatsinks that I would feel confident about shipping due to its excellent mounting mechanism and distributed weight. But its fan retention system is terrible. OcUK needs to look for a solution to the poor fan mounts when shipping the system – zip-ties could be one potential answer.
Aesthetics and colour-matching are two distinct positives for the OcUK Ultima Finesse Blackhole. A sizeable amount of effort has been put into matching colours and the end result is a system that looks superb. Add in the pure white LED lighting and the Ultima Finesse Blackhole becomes a system that I would be proud to sit on my desk and show off to friends.
Some people may point out that ‘standard' LGA 1150 Haswell is just as fast as LGA 2011-3 Haswell-E in gaming, but the former is cheaper. That's a fair point, but I think that the extra ~£100-150 spend on a system of this calibre, at this price point is worth the CPU-performance upgrade to Haswell-E. It also leaves room for tri-SLI or PCIe storage capacity in the future.
I actually have very few complaints regarding the Ultima Finesse Blackhole system. One of those complaints is that I would have liked to see some of the individual components' accessories supplied. Shifting some of the default save locations off the SSD would have been a thoughtful touch. And I do not see why Windows 8.1 should cost £6.96 more than Windows 7 (minor, but slightly irritating).
Buying the parts separately would cost around £100 less than the ~£1,870 price tag of the system configuration that we tested. Given the level of build quality, cable management efforts, and included 3-year warranty, I think that £100 is a very fair and warrantable ‘build cost'.
At £1,870.92 for the tested configuration, the OcUK Ultima Finesse Blackhole rewards buyers who have made the considerable investment with superb performance, especially when gaming at 2560×1440 on a high refresh rate monitor. The system is fast, attractive, and well-built.
Overclockers UK informed us today after publication that this system will be getting an upgrade from Samsung 840 Evo to Samsung 850 Evo Solid State drives.
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Pros:
- SLI GTX 970 GPUs and Haswell-E 5820K deliver strong frame rates at 2560×1440.
- Highly attractive system design, with thoughtful component choices and lighting effects.
- Smart SSD capacity with well-balanced SSHD alongside.
- Good cooling performance throughout the system.
- Smart component choices – relevant PSU capacity, no-frills memory, low-cost motherboard.
- Fantastic aesthetics and overall system design.
Cons:
- CPU cooler's fan retention clips are not strong enough during shipping.
- The sheer number of fans makes this system comparably loud at lower loads.
- A different SSD would have been welcomed, given the 840 EVO's age and current slowdown issues.
KitGuru says: A gaming powerhouse using KFA2's excellent GTX 970 graphics cards in SLI; OcUK's Ultima Finesse Blackhole delivers superb gaming performance on a high refresh rate 2560×1440 monitor.
