PC build thread

[Ziggy]

Speaking about Black Friday / Cyber Monday deals and power supplies, I actually got a decent deal. NewEgg had a Thermaltake 500w 80 plus on sale. They were $27.99, but then only $25.99 with a $2 promo code. And with free shipping. They're normally $40-50 from most retailers. They were such a great price, and perfect for a couple of future retro PC projects I have planned, so I decided to pick up two of them.

I was really hoping for a black-Friday or cyber Monday deal on a i9-10900KF. Didn't happen
I don't want a lesser processor, so I will buy this one, just not right now.

Damn, that's a hefty looking processor! I can't believe how ridiculous processors have become. I can remember encoding video on my crappy little single core Pentium 4. The CPU load would be at 100% the entire time, you had to walk away until it was finished.

[bmoc]

So I got my RTX 3050 for Christmas and it turns out that it is too big for my current case. My father in-law came to the rescue with a case that he had laying around. The case he had laying around was way nicer that the one that I was going to get for the new rig. My old mobo doesn't have the right USB headers for the case so I'll have to somehow survive without front USB ports for a few months until my tax returns come in. A small price to pay for a free case!

[Ziggy]

Awesome!

You know, I've read several times an explanation of the USB 3 naming conventions, but I still can't remember off the top of my head what everything is called. But I have seen cheap adapters out there that will let you use front panel connectors with different gen motherboard headers.

[bmoc]

I may be putting together the new rig this weekend if UPS delivers everything on time. I was able to order parts earlier than anticipated because I got a big fat mortgage escrow refund that I was not expecting. No need to wait on tax refunds! Since I saved some money on the case, I decided to add some decent speakers to the order. I went with the Logitech Z623 speakers. I used to have Klipsch Promedia 2.1 speakers many years ago. I loved the way they sounded but they have some design flaws and are somewhat prone to failure even if they are well taken care of. I also didn't like that you can't power them off. For the past few years, I've been rocking some cheapo Logitech speakers and I really missed having something that was better quality.

[emwearz]

One of my XFX 6600XT's fans just packed it in today, I got the card secondhand a few months back for a really good price, so not overtly shattered, new fans cost me about $15 form China, love those big delivery windows.

The good news is, with a small undervolt and underclock of 10% or so, the single remaining fan is not going mental while gaming and the card is cool enough not to throttle, so will run it in this state until the replacement fans arrived, good news is I am only really playing the Steam version of Chrono Trigger at the moment, so nothing is being pushed.

[Ziggy]

I may be putting together the new rig this weekend if UPS delivers everything on time. I was able to order parts earlier than anticipated because I got a big fat mortgage escrow refund that I was not expecting. No need to wait on tax refunds! Since I saved some money on the case, I decided to add some decent speakers to the order. I went with the Logitech Z623 speakers. I used to have Klipsch Promedia 2.1 speakers many years ago. I loved the way they sounded but they have some design flaws and are somewhat prone to failure even if they are well taken care of. I also didn't like that you can't power them off. For the past few years, I've been rocking some cheapo Logitech speakers and I really missed having something that was better quality.

Nice! Definitely post picks if you can, I'd love to see them!

When I built my (current main desktop) Ryzen 7 PC in 2019, I definitely factored in good speakers into the budget. I had OK sounding speakers already, but I've never had speakers that didn't have some kind of issue. Either the volume knob gets super scratchy and cuts in and out, or the cheap cable breaks down even though I never touch it. I have a 2.1 Altec Lansing set that works and sounds great, but the speakers pick up lots of interference. It was always something. So I ended up getting Bose Companion 2 Series III speakers, which are 2.0 (no sub woofer) and I've been perfectly happy with them. I liked them so much that I picked up another set for my PVM setup.

One of my XFX 6600XT's fans just packed it in today, I got the card secondhand a few months back for a really good price, so not overtly shattered, new fans cost me about $15 form China, love those big delivery windows.

The good news is, with a small undervolt and underclock of 10% or so, the single remaining fan is not going mental while gaming and the card is cool enough not to throttle, so will run it in this state until the replacement fans arrived, good news is I am only really playing the Steam version of Chrono Trigger at the moment, so nothing is being pushed.

Ugh, that reminds me, I still gotta look at my 9800 that I blew up (I posted about it on the last page).

Yeah, those shipping estimates from China are a real pain in the ass sometimes. "Delivers in 6-30 days".

[JoeAwesome]

Just bought a pre-made HP Pavilion 590. I wanted a low-level emulation/stream budget machine for the living room. Here were some of the original specs:

1TB HDD
Ryzen 3 2200g with Vega on board graphics
8GB ram
180w PSU (lol)

Believe it or not, good for Dreamcast emulation as is. Love it for fightcade, too, but I decided to add a bit:

256GB SSD for the OS
Another 8GB stick for 16GB total
NVIDIA GTX 1050 2GB

Pretty much maxed out since the PSU is proprietary, and there’s only two slots for RAM. When the price goes down, a 1050 ti card is the next upgrade, then the CPU, possibly. Otherwise, it runs even SFV well.

[Ziggy]

Pretty much maxed out since the PSU is proprietary

Is it? There's a few small form factor PSUs that aren't the standard ATX size. Are you sure it's not one of those?

[JoeAwesome]

The way it powers the motherboard, I’m certain it’s proprietary. Not to say a fangled solution couldn’t be made, but it’s not with your typical plug as stock.

[Ziggy]

Ah, I see. There's a 310w version PSU for this computer, but it looks like you're only option to get one is used off eBay or similar, and they're not especially cheap.