|OT| The PC Hardware Thread -- Buy/Upgrade/Ask/Answer

[gabbo]

So I finally got a new CPU. Took a random look through pcpartpicker, as I have been doing literally every day and one of the local stores had single a 5800x left for pickup. Took a chance and managed to snag it. Felt like garbage all afternoon though, so pics this weekend as I put it together and bottleneck it with my 970

 

[Stevey]

I feel like I'm never going to be able to buy a 3080

 

[gabbo]

I feel like I'm never going to be able to buy a any video card released in the last 3 years

Closer to my reality

 

[Ascheroth]

Huh, it looks like Ryzen CPUs are in stock again. Maybe now is the time to grab one.
Still debating between the 5600x and 5800x
The 5800x I can get for 440€, the 5600x for 340€.
Might as well just get the 5800x because whatever, I'll keep it for a couple of years again, most likely.
Still need to look into what Motherboard to get.

Or do you guys recommend going for a different processor?

Honestly it's looking like I'm pretty much building a new PC except the graphics card, and the hard drives I'll keep too, lol.

 

[Knurek]

My interest in Ryzen 5xxx went down significantly when I realized they only mobos that handle those CPUs all come with active cooling.
Waiting for 11600K to drop next month instead.

 

[Ascheroth]

My interest in Ryzen 5xxx went down significantly when I realized they only mobos that handle those CPUs all come with active cooling.
Waiting for 11600K to drop next month instead.

Is that bad? I'm totally clueless when it comes to Motherboard stuff.

 

[ScreamingTrees]

My interest in Ryzen 5xxx went down significantly when I realized they only mobos that handle those CPUs all come with active cooling.
Waiting for 11600K to drop next month instead.

There are a few B550 boards that are passively cooled. In the X570, the ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero doesn't have a fan on it but I think that's the only X570 passively cooled.

The only time I ever hear the fan on the motherboard I have (Gigabyte Aorus Master), is when the computer turns on and then the fan curve kicks in to make it quiet.

 

[Knurek]

Is that bad? I'm totally clueless when it comes to Motherboard stuff.

It's not bad if you're okay with another fan in your case.
I'd rather have a PC that's quiet.

There are a few B550 boards that are passively cooled. In the X570, the ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero doesn't have a fan on it but I think that's the only X570 passively cooled.

That's a €550 mobo though.

 

[Pommes]

That's a €550 mobo though.

There is also the GIGABYTE X570 AORUS Xtreme for ~900 €

 

[Ascheroth]

Alright, I think I've decided (unless anyone here thinks something is a very bad idea).

CPU: Ryzen 5800x - 445,99€
Mainboard: MSI MAG B550 Tomahawk - 166,50 €
RAM: Crucial Ballistix BL2K8G36C16U4B 3600 MHz DDR4 - 80,57 €

And probably grab myself a Meshify 2 case (152,39€). They seem very comfy for building.

Any m2 NVMe recommendations? I'd probably grab 1 TB, PCie 4.0 is probably overkill? Dunno.

And any cooler recommendations?
Edit: I'll grab a be Quiet! Pure Rock 2 as a cooler.
Edit edit: And a Samsung EVO 970 1TB NVMe, because at this point why not.

 

[Ascheroth]

Went ahead and ordered it yesterday
If I'm lucky I get everything in time to build it on the weekend, but I kind of expect to get it early next week.

Looking forward to use all that power for playing Visual Novels and 2D indie games

 

[gabbo]

Went ahead and ordered it yesterday
If I'm lucky I get everything in time to build it on the weekend, but I kind of expect to get it early next week.

Looking forward to use all that power for playing Visual Novels and 2D indie games

let us know how it goes. I was too tired to post pics of my adventure ( and I forgot to take some after opening the mobo)

 

[Ascheroth]

let us know how it goes. I was too tired to post pics of my adventure ( and I forgot to take some after opening the mobo)

Will do.
Hopefully everything goes smoothly

 

[xinek]

If I'm getting occasional errors in the event viewer that my ssd has a bad block, does that mean it's failing? A couple of time recently, my PC has blue screened suddenly, and after reboot, it goes right to the bios because the boot disk isn't found. I shut the PC's power supply off via the switch on the back, and then it will later start up normally. Nothing shows up in the event viewer, just a message that the system didn't shut down cleanly. Other than that, everything is working fine.

 

[Parsnip]

If I'm getting occasional errors in the event viewer that my ssd has a bad block, does that mean it's failing? A couple of time recently, my PC has blue screened suddenly, and after reboot, it goes right to the bios because the boot disk isn't found. I shut the PC's power supply off via the switch on the back, and then it will later start up normally. Nothing shows up in the event viewer, just a message that the system didn't shut down cleanly. Other than that, everything is working fine.

If it's not always finding your boot disk, it might be a bad sata cable or loose cable connection. Easy and cheap fix to test at least. Well, at least if the ssd is a sata drive and not m.2.

 

[xinek]

If it's not always finding your boot disk, it might be a bad sata cable or loose cable connection. Easy and cheap fix to test at least. Well, at least if the ssd is a sata drive and not m.2.

Yeah, it's sata -- i'll give the cables a try. I really hope it's that -- replacing that disk sounds like a huge pain.

 

[Ascheroth]

I got most of my stuff today, yay.
But I haven't gotten the RAM yet... which is the one thing I bought separately via Amazon because it was cheaper and even had a faster delivery time listed then my other stuff.
I figured I'd get the RAM this week and the rest early next week, but it turned out to be the opposite

Guess I can already build it (update the BIOS if I have too) and then just slot in the RAM when it arrives and swap graphics card.

 

[Knurek]

So, it turns out 11th gen Core is actually slower for gaming workloads vs 10th gen Core.
How can Intel be so bad about this? Just... how?

 

[Ascheroth]

Man, the Meshify 2 is just pure convenience. So nice.

 

[Durante]

The one thing I miss in modern cases in terms of convenience is the toolless PCIe bracket that Lian Li used some years back.
It was easily as sturdy in terms of support as screws are (even more so really due to the larger rubberized support area), and you could very easily open and close it without any effort.

I guess it's not worth it to include a somewhat complex composite aluminium/rubber part for something you do very rarely, but it was simply better than any alternative I've seen before or since.

... I just had the horrible thought that the reason they stopped using that is because it doesn't look nice enough through a fucking window.

 

[gabbo]

Not sure of the cause, but it's happened a couple times now:
BSOD at Windows login screen as I start my pc, but before I press any keyboard or mouse button - "Attempted to write to read-only memory"
Assume this is my nvme drive, but not sure why it happened once, let alone a couple different times. I've only had it installed for about a week as my main drive.

Thought on what might be causing this to occur?

Drive is a wd sn750 250gb in my tomahawk X570 top m.2 slot

 

[Arulan]

I'm not sure if it was the most economically-sound choice, but my i7-6900K is really keeping me going thanks to the 8C/16T. A few of my friends who opted for a Intel 4C/8T around that time or even a couple of years later are facing issues with more demanding games.

 

[Parsnip]

Thinking about buying some storage. 16tb or maybe even 18tb would do me nicely. Could maybe retire some of the older 4tb drives, or put them on an external thingamabob.
Maybe I'll grab a WD Gold or something. Would be my first EAMR drive if I end up going that route.


There isn't a way to find out manufacturing date for hdd's from inside Windows right? I know the year and month is printed on the disk label (at least on some brands?), but I'm too lazy to open up the case just for that right now.

 

[Ascheroth]

Update: I did the BIOS Flashback and installed the CPU and NVMe on the Motherboard, installed that and the PSU in the case, and connected all the cables.
Once I get my RAM I just need to plug that in, install the CPU cooler and move the graphics card from my current tower into the new case.
I'm planning on moving my HDDs that have all the data into the new case as well, but that's something I'll do after I've got the thing up and running, lol.

Hopefully that will be tomorrow, and hopefully everything goes well.

 

[Parsnip]

I had real sweaty situation when I installed my mobo last time, the usb stick I was using wasn't recognized by the bios flashback at all. Luckily my old laptop still works and one of the usb slots worked too so that I could reformat the stick again and it worked then.

 

[Theswweet]

It's been a turbulent few weeks for me. I'd been camping out Microcenter for a bit to try and get a GPU, but then I ended up biting on a non-scalped 3070 on OfferUp.

...then when I went to pick up a replacement fan for my case at MC a week later they had a reference, open-box 6900 XT. So now I sold the 3070 to my roommate. I wasn't necessarily planning on going that high-end, but anything at (or, in this case, below) MSRP you just don't think about these days if you're upgrading.

 

[Knurek]

Switching from 3070 to anything AMD seems like kind of a downgrade though?

 

[Theswweet]

Switching from 3070 to anything AMD seems like kind of a downgrade though?

I got the Microcenter extended warranty. It's $100, which means anytime in 2 years I can basically return the card and get credit back. Raytracing isn't a huge deal yet, but when it is I can just upgrade again if I need to.

 

[Ascheroth]

I think my RAM is on a vacation. They sent it out last Wednesday, then it slowly moved to different locations, but there hasn't been an update in the delivery tracking since Saturday.
They say it should arrive tomorrow? I have my doubts, but we'll see. (Though I'd probably wait until the weekend anyway before finishing the build since I'm using my PC for Home Office too and need to set things up for that)
I'm just glad I'm not building a new PC because I have to, if I'd build one because my current one broke, it would suck.

 

[Deku]

I am not really looking for a new computer, but I have from time to time been checking on laptops.
Which brand do you recommend? I am myself using a Lenovo Legion laptop and so far I am fine with it.

 

[xinek]

So about my ssd ... I ended up picking up a nvme drive, since I'll probably need one for my next build anyway once video cards are available again. My old ssd was so damaged that I couldn't image it to the new disk, so I had to do a clean install of Windows on the nvme. What a pain -- if you see bad blocks in your event log, just go ahead and assume your drive is toast. Wish I had done that.

BTW, a lot of info online said I'd have to change all sorts of things in my bios to make the nvme drive bootable, but I didn't do any of that and it works just fine. Seems weird.

 

[Ascheroth]

Complaining on the internet really always helps, I got my RAM \o/

But yeah, as I said, still gonna wait until Friday anyway.

 

[Ascheroth]

Building unsuccessful

Getting no signal, the DRAM Debug LED on the montherboard is red, which is either unrecognized CPU or RAM according to the manual.
So my best guess is that the Flashback didn't work (I tried it 2 more times, even with different BIOS versions, but no dice, tried only using one RAM and swapping them as well and various other things) :/
But maybe it's something else, or just some faulty hardware somewhere (you never know).

Guess I'll bring it to a hardware shop next week and let them figure things out.

 

[Parsnip]

Did it seem like the flashback worked? I mean, from the led on the usb slot, does it light correctly as the instructions state when you do the flashing?

For me, having never done that before, I initially thought it worked just fine but then it turned out it didn't at all. What ended up working for me in that situation was to format the usb stick with rufus instead of through windows' own methods.
Specifically non bootable, MBR, FAT32.

Since your mobo is also MSI B550 as is mine, it's worth a shot I think.

 

[Ascheroth]

Did it seem like the flashback worked? I mean, from the led on the usb slot, does it light correctly as the instructions state when you do the flashing?

For me, having never done that before, I initially thought it worked just fine but then it turned out it didn't at all. What ended up working for me in that situation was to format the usb stick with rufus instead of through windows' own methods.
Specifically non bootable, MBR.

Since your mobo is also MSI B550 as is mine, it's worth a shot I think.

It looked like it worked (but first time doing that too), but since things aren't booting it doesn't seem like it did.
I'll be sure to give that a try, thanks!

 

[Parsnip]

It seemed like a pretty common headache based on reddit threads I found when I was looking at it a few month ago, on both Tomahawk and Mortar boards.

 

[Wildebeet]

Does anybody have any favorite mouse and/or keyboard brands? I'm in the process of building a new PC, currently running an i72500, but looks like I'm keeping my GTX 1060 for a while. I have always used rather inexpensive mice/kbs and I'm looking to find something nicer. I want something that lasts longer and maybe even repairable.

 

[TheTrain]

Does anybody have any favorite mouse and/or keyboard brands? I'm in the process of building a new PC, currently running an i72500, but looks like I'm keeping my GTX 1060 for a while. I have always used rather inexpensive mice/kbs and I'm looking to find something nicer. I want something that lasts longer and maybe even repairable.

For a mouse I've had a good experience with Roccat. Bought 2 in 7 years or so and they've always worked like charm. Currently rocking a Kone Aimo.
For a keyboard I don't have a favourite brand, I choose a cooler master because it have a standard keycap dimension.

 

[Stevey]

I have a Corsair K70 Lux RGB keyboard which I like, and for mice, I've always had Logitech.
Currently using a G502

 

[gabbo]

Does anybody have any favorite mouse and/or keyboard brands? I'm in the process of building a new PC, currently running an i72500, but looks like I'm keeping my GTX 1060 for a while. I have always used rather inexpensive mice/kbs and I'm looking to find something nicer. I want something that lasts longer and maybe even repairable.

I've never had a bad experience with Logitech, so I usually rock them. have a the G502 Lightspeed mouse with my new machine and will likely use my G710+ mechanical until it's pried from my cold dead fingers OR I feel comfortable with a wireless mechanical. I know opinions vary here about them though

 

[Valdien]

Hey everyone, hoping to get some recommendations on a new mouse. My current mouse (Kinu V2 Pro) is having issues with the scroll wheel. It'll randomly scroll up while scrolling down. Also, it lacks any side buttons, so looking to change that as well. I feel it would be certainly helpful in a lot of games. My left hand can only do so much without resorting to awkward key mapping.

Admittedly, I've never really given mouse (mice?) hardware any serious thoughts, and have stuck to using a Kinzu V2 Pro Edition since its launch in 2012. I've got two of these, although the first one had problems with the sensor. It would randomly turn off.

My grip style is Palm, and find the Kinzu V2 to be the perfect size. I've never felt tired or uncomfortable using it. I guess my hand size is medium.

Looking for something budget-friendly and similar to the Kinzu in size and weight. Between 40-50 USD. The cheaper the better.

Kinzu V2 Pro Dimensions & Weight:

• Height: 36 mm (1.4 in)
• Width: 64 mm (2.5 in)
• Length: 117 mm (4.6 in)
• Weight: 77 grams

 

[lashman]

Looking for something budget-friendly and similar to the Kinzu in size and weight. Between 40-50 USD. The cheaper the better.

not sure about the size, but ... how about logitech g604?

 

[Valdien]

not sure about the size, but ... how about logitech g604?

Oh, that seems uncomfortable to use. Way outta of my budget, too! ($130 AUD ) Looking for something simple and wired. Thanks though!

 

[EdwardTivrusky]

The Kinzu v3 is also expired but as it's Steelseries what about the Rival 3x or Sensei models? I'd imagine they'll be similar in size and weight to the earlier models.

 

[lashman]

Oh, that seems uncomfortable to use. Way outta of my budget, too! ($130 AUD ) Looking for something simple and wired. Thanks though!

ah dang ... sorry

 

[Valdien]

The Kinzu v3 is also expired but as it's Steelseries what about the Rival 3x or Sensei models? I'd imagine they'll be similar in size and weight to the earlier models.

Currently looking at the Rival 3. Although, it says it's not suited for palm style grip; not sure how true that is. Thanks!

 

[Alextended]

What are some solid mobos for 5800X that aren't likely to need firmware update before posting with that range of CPU? Need it forward thinking like having some USB C and M2 and what not and also smart access memory capable. Maybe with good Wi-Fi also if possible. Without breaking the bank. I almost caved and bought some peripherals and stuff for my PC (hotas) but I figure I should upgrade my specs first rather than spend money on that and postpone that further. I might not buy soon, just put them in favorites and price check every so often alongside the CPU and RAM and an M2 SSD and also possibly a new case though from what I see there's been barely any advancement in ease of building since my Carbide 400R so I might just keep it. Also a cooler and I may wait for 5700X.

 

[C-Dub]

What are some solid mobos for 5800X that aren't likely to need firmware update before posting with that range of CPU? Need it forward thinking like having some USB C and M2 and what not and also smart access memory capable. Maybe with good Wi-Fi also if possible. Without breaking the bank. I almost caved and bought some peripherals and stuff for my PC (hotas) but I figure I should upgrade my specs first rather than spend money on that and postpone that further. I might not buy soon, just put them in favorites and price check every so often alongside the CPU and RAM and an M2 SSD and also possibly a new case though from what I see there's been barely any advancement in ease of building since my Carbide 400R so I might just keep it. Also a cooler and I may wait for 5700X.

I think that's actually a bit of a unicorn, unless things have improved since December. Some stores will open up the motherboard and update the BIOS with a Zen 2 CPU so, at the very least, you can plug your Zen 3 CPU in and have it work out of the box, but depending on how old the motherboard is, it may be sold with a BIOS that's not compatible out of the box.

If you don't have access to a compatible CPU to pop in there for 20 minutes to do the BIOS update, your options are:

1) Get the store you're buying it from to do it, probably for a fee.
2) Buy a motherboard that allows you to update the BIOS without a CPU on it (BIOS flashback, though different manufacturers have different names for it).

I went for option 2. I bought a MSI MEG X570 UNIFY which is on the more expensive side, but I knew it was going to work with the 5800X that I'd ordered once I did a BIOS flashback from a USB stick. At the time there wasn't any centralised source of information for Zen 3 CPUs about which motherboards would support the new CPUs, but MSI were on the ball and confirmed not only that this board would support updating the BIOS without a CPU but also that it'd be ready in time for launch, so I just decided to pay the premium and everything worked out in that regard.

In terms of the forward-thinking aspect, it only has one USB-C port which is the most disappointing part, and as far as I'm aware it doesn't have USB-C headers either so if your case has USB-C sockets they will remain inactive, though that's only what PCPartPicker said when I was putting a build together so they may be mistaken. On the plus side, it has three M.2 sockets that all support Gen 4 NVMe, so you have a lot of storage flexibility and a clear upgrade path.

 

[Alextended]

So, wait for next batch of models then?

 

[C-Dub]

So, wait for next batch of models then?

I imagine boards that are newer will have a compatible BIOS on them. I also expect the manufacturers will shout it from the rooftops too, because the confusion about compatibility is... well.. confusing.