What would you build?

[Xev]

I saw this interview with Kurt Russell a long time ago and he said something about he'd just do a few pushups to buff up before his movies, until, he did a movie with Stallone.

I always think about this for some reason when it comes time to build a PC after it's been a long time. I just do enough pushups to get me through the next movie. It seemed like it took a metric f-ton of pushups to get through this movie, though.

Anyway. Things.... haven't fundamentally changed since 2009. There's a CPU plugged into a Motherboard that supports a certain type of Memory and needs a powerful enough Video Card and Power Supply to go vroom to my desire/budget. Oh, and there's storage.

It's still pretty much the same.

Except.

They moved the powersupply to the bottom of the case...

Airflow Cooling, while still far from perfect (what isn't), is obviously a more prominent feature than it's ever been, in, case design. Which, is a good thing. Now, figure out how to make my case out of ... ceramic or some other naturally cooling material instead of red glowing steel and flimsy plastic and we'll be gtg.

Hard drives aren't called hard drives anymore, many times, and I jumped right into the SSD bandwagon full feet forward with 2 gumstick drives that I already lub. No moving parts... No need for drive bays... They're heatsinked and sitting between 2 push/pull system fans. FAST... and plenty, plenty, big - especially after tossing in 2 TB of Western Dig USB 3.1 storage for 60 measly clams (It's a 2 TB PnP External!). And.. there's 64 gig more storage space on a USB 3.1 thumb/flash drive for clean boot drive images or whatever..

You do have to be aware of more Drive Interface information, today, than I can ever remember, by far. And I had an OG SCSI.. I mean.. There's a lot of options, today.. And all of them good, for someone. It's a good thing. I like storage and I like having lots of storage options.

You can do your own reading to edumicate yourself on that stuff. It's a journey. Watch some of the plentiful and good videos of people installing the newer drives if you never even saw them before (1 TB internal Gumstick drives..? wha?) and it takes a lot of the mystery out of that part of it. There's several different internal form factors, now, that are all very common and plentiful. And they all have max interface capacities of their own and there are plenty of very specific interface types.. The good news, is, if speed is important to you, but, you're not obsessed with it, everything is pretty much backwards compatible. So, as long as you get a drive with the right connector for your motherboard, the thing will work and be reasonably fast. Pretty much. And, further good news, if you *are* obsessed with speed, there *are* things to look for to get more speed without more/much more cash. Pretty much.

What is USB 3.1? USB 3.1 ('gen 1...........') is USB 3.0.
What is USB 3.0? Old packaging.
What is USB 3.1 ...... Gen 2? The new name for... USB 3.1 that was 3.1 before 3.0 became 3.1
What is USB 3.x c?  C is the physical plug/connector. Specifically, the plug is... unkeyed. That is, you can't plug in your USB connector upside down because there is no upside down anymore. There's still a sideways! But.. umm,, yeah... The C connector should have most of us covered, even me, when it comes to plugging in a USB cable or device.

The bottom line on USB, is, USB 3.1 Gen 2 is the fastest. USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C, just means, you have the thing in the previous sentence, with, a connector that can't be plugged into upside down, due to it's keyless. Except for that you can.... still plug it in sideways by accident if you really try. But it's kinda flat, and, err.. umm. anyway  : ) It's VIRTUALLY keyless!

HDMI changed.. We have a 2.0, now.. I'm playing @1080p. This is for the ppl with the $500+++ video cards running hi-res monitors/tvs. So, yeah, I didn't have to mess with learning anything about it, beyond.... it's *backwards compatible*.

Video...? Umm. Video was pretty much the only thing that felt like it didn't change at all. Except the model numbers. Then again, my video isn't *that* old. Everything else is. I'm glad I squeaked in after the GTX 16xx series hit the market. Looking forward to playing with that. I had a horror moment the night my stuff had already shipped that I accidentally ordered a 10xx series due to my original order went out of stock and I had to re-order, and, the model numbers are new to me - I just had the 60 part in my head.. but, after leaping out of bed in a panic, and checking my order, I saw that all was well. (lol).

It seems like a fun time to build, actually. Lots of options. RGB has to be one of the most useless things I've ever seen. I mean, if you are a master builder or showing off a master build (1 PC out of 100), or, you're a .... DJ or something.. Something unusual.. Then.. *maybe*. And that's a big maybe. But to see it so mainstream. *boggle*

[Xev]

First, I misunderstood USB c connectors... They smaller than the normal ones. I dunno what you plug into them or why...

Well, everything except....the video card showed up yesterday. It's supposed to be here tomorrow.

No real surprises putting everything together, so far, except the USB C connector, and, I didn't realize that one of my motherboard m.2 pcie slots is a 2280 (only 80 mm long). Neither of these things caused any problems. So far, all of that research seems to be paying off.

I *luv* having a PnP 2 TB drive.. It's nearly as convenient as using a thumb/flash drive, but, it's way larger and Windows does not regard it as a removable drive (for some reason) like it does with flash drives. USB 2.0 speeds are ~ half the speed of my normal drives, and, completely acceptable. I already back up nearly everything I wanted to. The thing is the size of a Smartphone and didn't get hot even after hours of nonstop copying. No power cable, it just plugs into the USB port and works, like a thumb drive. Works fine in my ancient system and with USB 2.0.

The case is probably the nicest case I ever bought for myself by far. Cable management was great and there was ample room to work in, even with a full ATX motherboard. Great paintjob inside and out. No sharp edges. Everything fit and plugged in easy and it looks *great* with that b450 aorus pro sitting in it. Most everything is black/grey and looks tech sexah. Very minimalist looking system (especially compared to so many things I'd seen) and it does the minimalist thing well.

Anyway, so far so good! The video should be here tomorrow and then I can see if I plugged in everything properly and if it works... High hopes  : )

[Xev]

Wohoo! I'm back in the forums.. I've got no idea what my old password was... I guess I wrote it down wrong..

I'm back in alll my online accounts, now... and I even got 20+ gig STO installed without having to download more than ~ 50MBs.

Windows 10 was real easy to set up, but now, I dunno what it's doing. Windows Update said I was up to date after it downloaded like (some gauge somewhere told me..) 2 gig+.. But I'm still on version/build/whatever-they-call-it 1809.. Which, as I understand it, is 1 version/build back.

I've got NVidia drivers installed but they're installed by Windows. I downloaded and tried to install the latest version from Nvidia but the installation said I had the wrong version of Windows... So I dunno what's going on, there, either.

I still haven't braved Logitech Gaming Software, yet. Maybe it works better in 10 than it did in Windows 7..

The first thing I did when Windows came up was to get the Bluetooth earbuds going.. hehe.. It was easy! And they're great.. Getting online was easy.. Getting into my accounts was easy.. The new machine booted up, first try. I loaded Optimized Settings in BIOS and then began to tweak things like CPU Fan Off warnings, and, Boot Drive Priorities, Saved and Exited, and Windows started installing from the flash drive... Afterwards, I ditched Edge, plugged the wireless modem in, and was online in seconds.. Windows Activation happened at some point after that.

Not a single hiccup or problem so far except that I miss Windows Aero (the transparent toolbars in windows theme thingy). I found out how to turn on Transparencies... but I can't tell you what they're turned on, for.. I found out how to change the *color* of toolbars.. but, that's about it. They look crappy/old un-transparent..

I turned off Edge and went to IE just because I heard bad things about Edge. I also heard that Edge was hard to turn off and then to get IE to work, but, I had no problems at all doing that. I might try Edge. One thing I like about IE is you can block a lot of streaming video and images while surfing. *shrug* whatever.

It feels weird leaving the old PC off..... That thing's been waking me up since 2009.. I didn't have the heart to take it apart or even move it. Besides, I'm sure I forgot to drag some things off of it.

Found a great stand for the new PC that has totally ventilated shelves. I would definitely use the Coolermaster NR600 case again. I'd definitely buy all of it again. Every single part, right down to the earbuds. This has to be my most gorgeous and hiccup free build, ever (jinx!) so far. Or.. I'd have just bought Windows 10 and that 2 TB USB drive.. It wouldn't have been a horrible option and ~ 5x cheaper. If you could stand the load times, the old PC does what I want to do, comparably to this machine. STO looks a little better on the new PC, videos look a little better on the old PC and so does IE - that'd probably go away with the Windows 10 upgrade, though.

I wouldn't have built this machine any differently with the parts I had available. I haven't had a smoother or more gorgeous hardware install (even the.........rgb is...nice (I turned it off after checking it out..).). I haven't had a smoother transition into being online from 1 PC to another. I already have this PC ~ 75% similar to the old PC as far as how I use it which is good even for staying with the same version of Windows. I don't really like Windows 10 as compared to Windows 7 due to it feels bloated and I miss Aero BUT..oh yeah.. I did find one Windows 10 feature I really like, already... Color Settings/Choose Your Default App mode/DARK... Man, that is so much more pleasing to the eye than Blaring white screens with Black dot text.

Anyway, I thought I had Windows set to have to ask me for Updates. And then it went and did an update on its own, told me I was up to date, but I'm still on 1809.. Soo. Yeah. Have to figure that stuff out. I'm hoping the video driver wouldn't install due to my Windows build isn't new enough. Otherwise, I have no idea why it won't install. I'm pretty sure it said I have the 'wrong' version of Windows when the driver update failed. I dl'd the latest 64 bit version (430.86-desktop-win10-64bit-international-whql.exe), and, I'm for sure using 64-bit Windows *shrug*

[Xev]

I guess this is why my Windows version is "old" but yet Windows says I'm up to date and that my 'device' isn't 'ready' to update to *version* (not Build or anything else..) 1903 , yet...

Error attempting to update with external USB device or memory card attached
If you have an external USB device or SD memory card attached when installing Windows 10, version 1903, you may get an error message stating "This PC can't be upgraded to Windows 10." This is caused by inappropriate drive reassignment during installation.




Sample scenario: An update to Windows 10, version 1903 is attempted on a computer that has a thumb drive inserted into its USB port. Before the update, the thumb drive is mounted in the system as drive G based on the existing drive configuration. After the feature update is installed; however, the device is reassigned a different drive letter (e.g., drive H).




Note The drive reassignment is not limited to removable drives. Internal hard drives may also be affected.




To safeguard your update experience, we have applied a hold on devices with an external USB device or SD memory card attached from being offered Windows 10, version 1903 until this issue is resolved.




Affected platforms:
•Client: Windows 10, version 1903


Workaround: This issue has been partially resolved but to ensure seamless update experience, the safeguard hold is still in place. In the short term, we recommend you do the following workaround to update to Windows 10, version 1903. Remove all external media, such as USB devices and SD cards, from your computer and restart installation of the Windows 10, version 1903 feature update. The update should then proceed normally.




Note If you need to keep your external device, SD memory card, or other devices attached to your computer while updating, we recommend that you do not attempt to manually update to Windows 10, version 1903 using the Update now button or the Media Creation Tool until this issue has been resolved.

Man I'm glad I didn't get Windows 10 until now. I was always the first person to get a new Windows version, but, 7 is just good. It's a rock. It works, it doesn't break, and it runs everything well with a pleasurable interface. It doesn't try to stealth download, and, the updates are reasonably small. It's a hard version to beat. Just as I imagine that it's becoming difficult to make things like the wheel any fancier.

Are you sure there's no new versions coming..? Perhaps a Windows RGB....?

Really, don't we just want Windows to....run? If we want it to do anything else, we can install a program. Like, Star Trek Online or perhaps a bootleg City of Heroes...  : )

~~~

The new PC woke me up to some Lost in Space, this morning and has been playing video every since, > 8 hours. I tweaked something with video late last night... and now it probably looks as good or better as it did on the old PC. The Geforce 1660 is using ~ 7 watts of power and the fans for it have....never once come on. It never gets any hotter than 40c.. On the subject of fans.. Does AMD have a ... size complex thing going on with the Ryzen? It's a tiny 65 watt chip with a huuuge cooler and it never goes much past 30c.. I can't tell if the 650 watt (it's a small semi-modular 80 plus Silver that weighs like a car battery..) PSU fan has ever come on. It's not supposed to unless the power supply reaches a load of ~ >280 watts. Iirc.... Pcie SSDs use the least amount of power of all 'hard drives', too, iirc. My case temps are very good... I forget the numbers and I have to go into BIOS to check them, but, every time I do, they are surprisingly low. I just now remembered I even forgot to take the mostly unneeded air filter off of the top mesh..

I would build this PC for someone else. It's luverly. It looks sexy (no green PCB inside .. everything is black/grey/Batman-looking with a few red accents and the case has a very nicely done, thick, black paintjob as well) and runs fast and cool and quiet.

Ah well, anyway. Even the blind chicken finds the corn, sometimes. Glad this chore is finally about over. Glad I didn't succumb to a buying pre-built. Glad the extra pushups paid off  : )

[Tahquitz]

I guess this is why my Windows version is "old" but yet Windows says I'm up to date and that my 'device' isn't 'ready' to update to *version* (not Build or anything else..) 1903 , yet...

Man I'm glad I didn't get Windows 10 until now. I was always the first person to get a new Windows version, but, 7 is just good. It's a rock. It works, it doesn't break, and it runs everything well with a pleasurable interface. It doesn't try to stealth download, and, the updates are reasonably small. It's a hard version to beat. Just as I imagine that it's becoming difficult to make things like the wheel any fancier.

Are you sure there's no new versions coming..? Perhaps a Windows RGB....?

Really, don't we just want Windows to....run? If we want it to do anything else, we can install a program. Like, Star Trek Online or perhaps a bootleg City of Heroes...  : )

~~~

The new PC woke me up to some Lost in Space, this morning and has been playing video every since, > 8 hours. I tweaked something with video late last night... and now it probably looks as good or better as it did on the old PC. The Geforce 1660 is using ~ 7 watts of power and the fans for it have....never once come on. It never gets any hotter than 40c.. On the subject of fans.. Does AMD have a ... size complex thing going on with the Ryzen? It's a tiny 65 watt chip with a huuuge cooler and it never goes much past 30c.. I can't tell if the 650 watt (it's a small semi-modular 80 plus Silver that weighs like a car battery..) PSU fan has ever come on. It's not supposed to unless the power supply reaches a load of ~ >280 watts. Iirc.... Pcie SSDs use the least amount of power of all 'hard drives', too, iirc. My case temps are very good... I forget the numbers and I have to go into BIOS to check them, but, every time I do, they are surprisingly low. I just now remembered I even forgot to take the mostly unneeded air filter off of the top mesh..

I would build this PC for someone else. It's luverly. It looks sexy (no green PCB inside .. everything is black/grey/Batman-looking with a few red accents and the case has a very nicely done, thick, black paintjob as well) and runs fast and cool and quiet.

Ah well, anyway. Even the blind chicken finds the corn, sometimes. Glad this chore is finally about over. Glad I didn't succumb to a buying pre-built. Glad the extra pushups paid off  : )

We've run into that issue with our Surface Tablets, where our Wi-Fi is hammered and there's only one USB port with not enough energy for a portable hub.  And we don't have the resources for powered hub for each device when there's 100 of them.

Our answer: make a USB install for the Windows May 2019 update, then copy all the contents of that USB into a temp folder (not saying name it "Temp", anything works, really) on the hard drive.  Run it from there.  Once the update is finished, delete the temp folder.

[Xev]

That sounds like something I need to learn how to do because we now have 2 Windows 10 machines needing updates, here, and we're on a metered account.



I've ran into my first *annoying* Windows 10 bug already..

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/speakers-configuration-keeps-reverting-to-stereo/a1cc022c-b2f6-4fdd-8d67-f3b8f2eff039?page=2

I have this exact problem. The speakers will revert themselves back to Stereo from 5.1 Surround, and, often.

I can go in and tell Windows I have 5.1 speakers, save, go right back in and I'm set to Stereo. Or, maybe I'm still on 5.1 Surround. It never stays on 5.1 more than 3 re-checks. I don't even do anything but sit here and wait a few seconds and then re-run the Speaker Config until it reverts to Stereo - usually in 1 - 2 tries..

I'm usually in a program that supports 5.1 surround... so... this is kinda really annoying to be reverted back to stereo all the time.

Once a video is playing, and I set the speakers to Surround (if they aren't already, and they probably aren't) the sound seems to stay on 5.1, in, the video... But. If I go into sounds/playback tab and then select my speakers and then click "configure" - it may revert back to Stereo - and once it does, the video I'm watching reverts to stereo, too.. (setting it back to 5.1 seems to let me listen to 5.1 for the rest of the video as long as I don't go back into the configure screen).

It's annoying.

Surround can reset to Stereo without even going to configure it if I'm not watching a movie (or possibly in a game, haven't tried yet) - it just does it on its own. It *does* seem to stay on surround if I play a video and don't mess with anything during the playback. After I leave the video program I was watching the video in, Surround goes away whenever it wants, and always pretty fast.

I never noticed it until now because I was using the headphones! Steeeeeereo Headphones..

Ah well  : /

Hopefully they fixed this in 1903..

My workaround so far is just to re-re-re-re-set the speakers to 5.1 while I'm in my media player and watching a video. Hopefully that works in games, too.

~~

Another workaround, is... wear the headphones  : ) Windows Virtualization is good with these.

I wonder if having headphones has anything to do with it.. I've not had mine powered on.. but, they are installed. Can be, occasionally Windows looks for them and when not finding them, sets the sound to stereo anyway.

*shrug*

Bluetooth ftw in a small area. I have room fans and whatnot going and can do my lil chores with very nice sound. Wired quality for sure. I was thinking I had been shopping too long after I got them.. but now that I have'm, they're fun. Haven't ran into any battery/connection/volume issues yet and they're easy to wear and seem to charge pretty fast via USB cable.

[Xev]

Annnd now my Bluetooth driver isn't working..

I had to practically force Windows 10 at gunpoint to install the latest Geforce drivers. Finally got that sorted and then I couldn't get the Logitech Gaming Software download from Logitech so I could assign keys to my buttons.. so I ended up downloading it elsewhere.. Finally got that, sorted, except, I can't set up any Game profiles - I have (1) and (1) profile only, for everything. Normally you can make a profile for each game.. Then, after I was happy enough with getting up to date with drivers... the Bluetooth cut out.. and back in.. and out.. I can't get my headphones to work, at all, anymore.

Honestly, at this point, Windows 10, to me, is a big steaming pile. I wasted so much time on it already and am at the point that I just want to start all over again. I had to make accounts with Nvidea and order Free software from Microsoft and then jump through some Microsoft hoops....just to get the damn video drivers to install. And then when they did install, I had no Control Panel to adjust the blaring ugly screen.. Which entailed more hoop jumping..

It's like Windows 10 just took a big steaming dump all over my nice new PC.

I'm not wasting hours on it again, tomorrow. If stuff works, great, if not, whatever.

[Xev]

And now, today, my PC won't wake itself up.. Didn't turn itself on this morning and I can't get it to do it, now  : (

I'm really hoping my motherboard isn't crapping out at this point  : ( First the Bluetooth, now this.

Let me ask you something... This wouldn't be so damn painful if it weren't for all the downloads.. The biggest download comes when re-installing Windows, which looks like an ever looming possibility.. Is there a way I can get the latest update on one of my USB drives so that if I need to re-install Windows, I don't have to download the 2 gig or whatever of updates?

As soon as my bandwidth runs out it's game over.

Man I hope I don't have to swap this motherboard. I really took my time with this build and it's gorgeous. I'm not really looking forward to yanking the mainboard and starting all over, starting with waiting on shipping..


~~~~

Well... I got Bluetooth to work (I tried all kinds of things, this was the last) by *disabling* the device in Device Manager (uninstalling didn't work), and then, rebooting, and then, re-enabling. At that point all of my goodies came back up driverwise, there are no errors (so far....) and the headset is working beautifully/perfect again.

I still can't get BIOS to wake up this PC... It worked the first morning! But now it just sits there and won't wake itself up  : (

With the Bluetooth working again, the possibility that the problem is Not with the motherboard arises.. But why in the world would the PC stop using the Alarm function in BIOS to wake itself?? I get no LED errors on the motherboard, and, otherwise the system is running like a dream. No glitches, no problems at all except installing the video driver, which was a huge pita, and Logitech has something going on with their webpage during some transition they're in, so, I couldn't get my mouse software from them.

I reset the BIOS to Optimized settings.. Unplugged the PSU for awhile.. Replugged in, powered up and reset the alarm in BIOS, and this thing still won't wake itself up.

The hours I wasted on Bluetooth at least hopefully won't get added to, today  : / And I'm glad it's working again..

~~~~~

Sonofa.....

It was Windows 10, again.....!

https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/what-prevents-power-on-by-rtc-alarm-from-working.2517333/

Power On in BIOS is functioning, again.. The PC can once again turn itself on via a daily alarm in BIOS...

How the hell the setting got changed and why disabling and enabling Bluetooth worked, when nothing else did including completely removing the drivers, is beyond me.

Techs must be in heaven since Windows 10. I wasted so many hours that some poor sap would have paid me for to spend on their machine.. Windows 10 performs like it just came out of BETA.

~~...~~

Well.... now that my bandwidth, that I share........, isn't being sucked into Infinity...., and, I have all the Pertinent Drivers and Software Installed and Working Properly... and... I don't feel the looming doom of a complete system rebuild (with money I saved for years, dangit) from the motherboard, up...with all the rma'ing and cross-shipping and all that, and, having to dis-assemble this darn luverly assembly..

I have to once again say, much love to Bluetooth stereo earbuds.. It's a flawless wireless connection as long as I'm in range. I can leave the room to do some dishes, very nearby, and, not miss a beat with what I was watching/listening to. Can go feed the birdies outdoors... If I do go out of range then I lose signal and when I come back in range I get signal back. Speakers turn off when headphones are switched on, and turn back on when the headphones shut off or get out of range(? I'm asssuming).

I've always got something playing on my PC when I plan to be near it, so, yeah, pretty cool. Drowns out outside noise pretty well, too.

I thought the lil rubber curly things that go behind the earbud part that goes into my ear were a gimmick when I first saw the wireless earbuds (n00b!), but, now (after applying RTFM, which, I have uncharacteristically done throughout this entire process..) that I have an idea how they fit into the inside part of an ear ridge... I use them (tuck them in) and they really work to stabilize the buds in my ears so they're more comfy when moving around and doing stuff.

Anyway....

*breathe*

: )

[Xev]

The gremlin attacks seem......to have subsided. The bombardment of bad news seems to have at least taken a break and tranquility seems to have once again taken over.

Having crucial (it changed how my BIOS behaved!) Windows settings change in the background without any form of notice whatsoever was highly annoying. It was also really annoying how I was forced to make accounts with Microsoft and Nvidia to not only get my video up to date, but, to be able to .. adjust it. I finally couldn't dodge Nvidia Experience, either.. And... at the end of it all   I Windows ended up downloading ~ 6 gig..

I rejoiced the ending of stress and timesinking by making my new-to-me Windows 10 UI highly attractive and functional, and, made my first stab at blocking stuff going on without me knowing about it.

I really liked my simple and highly functional Windows 7 theme. My Windows 10 theme has all of that and more, except... the title bars could be a little more Aero-ey, but, the alternative I came up with works pretty decent with the overall Windows 10 theme I came up with, soooo, I can let go of Aero easier.

I want to like Windows 10 but that mega-stealth background activity and device weirdness has gotta go.

[Tahquitz]

The Nvidia Experience isn't required.  You can cancel off of that and still install the driver.  (Forced registration is still a huge red flag to consumer advocacy groups.) I've never made an Nvidia account when it told me to sign in.

You can make a login without a Microsoft account too, but for home systems I'd recommend it.  Your Windows 10 activation for that system is linked to your Microsoft ID so if you lose your software key and need to reinstall on that computer, it'll reactivate without it after you log back in.

[Xev]

The Nvidia Experience isn't required.  You can cancel off of that and still install the driver.

No, *you* can do that. I *used* to be able to do that.

I mean, I've been installing GeForce drivers ever since there have been GeForce drivers and never, ever, ever, ever, ever ever ever ever ever, once, have I ever installed Nvidia Experience.

Know why?

I didn't want to...

I didn't want to, this time, either, however, I exhausted every other possibility. I cannot manually install the driver software. I get an error that says something to the effect, of "You have the incorrect version of Windows". Yes, I am 100% sure I downloaded the correct drivers. They distro is named "430.86-desktop-win10-64bit-international-whql"

Windows 10 installed Nvidia drivers for me automatically during the installation process.. I could not manually update those drivers as I have done, many, many, times before.

SO finally I read all over the Internet about people having the exact same installation problems as me, and, their 1 and only solution was to install Nvidia Experience. I didn't want to do it but I was tired of screwing around and running out of options.

So..

I get Nvidia Experience downloaded and running and .... it hangs at the end of the Driver installation process. After it had already said it was 100% done.

At this point, I have the latest driver (GPU-Z confirms I finally have PhysX installed, too) but my screen has that way too Digitally Vibranced look (like it nearly always does after a new video driver install) and......... I have no CONTROL PANEL... with which to adjust things. I mean, it is nowhere. I did a search for the .exe...

This is where I am forced to make the Microsoft account... to download Free Software... that is... the Nvidia(!) control panel... I saw nowhere else to get this 1 individual component of the Nvidia driver installation. I'm not saying it doesn't exist somewhere, because it sure seems like it ought to - like, say, on NVIDIA's site... but the only way I could find to get it at the time was to make a damn Microsoft Store account that I *surely* did not want to do.

So, basically, 2 things which I have successfully avoided, since..... *ever*.... I was not able to avoid if I wanted PhysX and an up to date driver from the manufacturer instead of the vanilla MS one...

It's not something I just did on a whim.

I was *forced* into it.

Otherwise, I had to either 1.) settle for crappy drivers and hope things magically sorted themselves, someday, or 2.) spend hours and hours more scouring the Internet for a solution to successfully do what I've done a hundred times before.

So I said Screw It. Lets get it over with. And I wasn't even sure it would work, until it worked, and it barely did work, and I'm just glad it hasn't glitched out, and, I plan to make a System Restore flash/thumb drive ASAP!

*breathe*

: )

[Xev]

I'm kinda liking my storage strategy up to now..

I have a 1 TB Pcie x4 M.2 with just games, so, it's pretty empty - the emptier these things are, the better they perform, I read.. I've got a 120gig Pcie x2 m.2 that only has OS files and things that install into Windows on it - it boots and loads a video (off of the external USB drive) in the morning, in, < 1 minute (~ 45 seconds). And.... then, there's the 2 TB of USB storage that cost.. 60 bucks.. that everything else goes on.

Total Speed + ample storage (that's partly portable) from reputable manufacturers that will last into my foreseeable future, or as long as the drives do, whichever comes first, for just over $200.

~~~

Geez, I forgot the other driving factor for doing this!

I have no drives installed inside my PC.

I have 2 sticks of memory installed that are used for hard drives... but, there are no actual hard drives in this PC. No power cables for them.... no data cables for them... no modular cables to plug into the PSU, just leave them alllllllllll in the box...

It's a super clean install. Simplicity itself. There's no better airflow available. No less clutter. No less moving parts. It's just sexy. I feel modern.. again  : )

[Xev]

As long as I don't have another experience like I did when I first installed Windows on a new machine then I'm prepared to say that, as with every other version of Windows, including ME.., I've been assimilated.

Everything looks and works even better than before.

The Start button, which, I thought had been completely ruined at first, is now not only funtional... it's *useful* *gasp* I didn't even use the Start Button menu in Windows 7 all that much due to the clutter. Now, I have like 6 things in my (left click..) Start Menu and they are all useful things. For example, all I have to do is hit Start and I see if any mail has come in (and Reminders, if I ever start using them again). And then I can load up a somewhat attractive and useful internet mail interface from right within Windows just by clicking on the Mail Notification I got in the Start menu.. I like this feature even more due to I never liked logging into my account online ever since it was one of the many that got hacked when hotmail merged with outlook - I kept waiting to get told, again, my password was wrong and then the hoops get set aflame for me to start jumping through so I can get my account back. Now I never have to login - Windows can do the wincing for me. I see my .... Internet Usage... Just by clicking Start. And I can get a useful breakdown of what used the data if I want. I can not only track my game play data usage, but, I can track the patcher and how much I've downloaded in game updates alone (kinda interesting). And, I can easily find other crucial apps such as the (ha) Calculator (well.... I do seem to use it a lot..).

Thanks to a Windows 10 setting I have way less blaring white screens with black text to read, which, I haven't been able to enjoy, since... before Windows.

I'm 64-bit.. I boot fast.. My video looks and sounds beautiful (now..) in both surround, and with headphones.. The Bluetooth, now that it's not being weird, is, fabulous.. Fantastical. Besides the glitch on that day that things decided to go wrong in Windows, Bluetooth is super simple to setup and use and it works. I use it all the time.

I installed the latest version of the Realtek (sound) software & drivers from my motherboard manufactuer and installed it. The driver was older than the Windows driver.. It didn't have as many features as the Windows driver and didn't work as well, either.. Windows let me Rollback to their driver and all is well again. *boggle* I mean, that's pretty good for Windows.

My desktop looks similar in theme as it did when I had Vista... I really liked that theme. Glad I can still arrange the taskbar like I like. Actually, my desktop looks almost exactly the same as it has since Vista was new.

I've heard nothing but horror stories about Windows 10. My dad is always fighting it, nonstop.. When I first installed it and I suddenly had crucial (hey, it changed how my BIOS operated!) Windows settings get changed in the background, and, had the Bluetooth problems pop up out of nowhere, and, got the 6 gig download bill for getting Windows installed... I thought I was going to be one of those people that wanted Windows off of their Lawn. But. So far, it looks like, as with every other previous version of Windows except the pile of poopie that was Windows 386, starting with the ever more functional Windows 3... 3.1.... 3.11..., I like all the newer Windows versions, better.

10 feels modern. Like 95 did. Like Vista did. It does have an ugly-@ss Start button, though.

Anyway *shrug* I just hope we don't go down that road we went down during the Installation, again. Otherwise, I should be a happy camper. As far as I can tell... not only is Windows not downloading anything on its own anymore, it's reporting to me what does create traffic. And all my devices feel rock solid.

Now I just need to download (2-4 gig..) version 1903...which....is now available to me.. I'm going to try and put it off until the end of the usage month.. I get throttled down to 100kbs when I hit the data limit..on my errr unlimited account. No big deal if the last day or two is throttled.. Games play fine with 100kbs - the load times just suck.

[Xev]

Sooooo I was finishing up a session of STO last night and thought, hey, lets see how hot everything is..

The Video card wasn't even impressed enough (not by a longshot) to turn on a fan.. My guess is, the PSU wasn't, either.

So.. my games (the stress test) aren't even considered as a load to this system...

It's not winter, either, ya know! It's warm. And yeah, I know, I play old games, but still.. my PC reacted to my games like I was watching video (very low load)..

Anyway... had to gush some more... I haven't been happier with a new PC since 386's were new and SCSI's were hot. That's been more than a few PCs ago.

I really have to say thanks for your input, TQ! It honestly helped me out to have a sounding board. I saved that money for *years* and haven't had or built a new PC in awhile. So, yeah, it was a stressy process. Mucho Thankos for helping smooth things out. You should definitely get a Titan Star for this.

After (how old is this thread???) a year or so of debate and research...  this thread has finally, finally, finally been answered, and, the answer is good  : )

[Xev]

I just had to toss this in...

PC's been on for a couple of hours and playing video...

https://app.box.com/s/d9tr9voqefqkiu22loaz3hz2qbs6n1bd <~ (this is a new, crummy, Pic link, from Box...  : ( I miss direct links! That I had since, nearly, Box was alive.)

Not too shlabby...

[Xev]

Unless there is some reliability issue that I haven't learned about yet - don't Pcie SSDs feel like the future present?

Unless there is something I'm missing, or, I really want to store a ton of data cheap, or, have portability like I have with my (cheap, WD) 2tb external HDD,... I can't see myself buying internal HDD's or even internal SATA SSD's anymore.

Pcie SSD's do what I tried to do as a programmer with disk caching back before anyone knew what Windows was. Shove all the data into memory. Bypass the moving parts. They're also... tiny. The inside of my computer case looks like a museum/art piece - lots of more dust free than usual space filled up with pretty decals/paintjobs and lights under a glass lid. Kinda like a boxy PC version of the Robot's head in Lost in Space.

I really like what they're doing with today's PC's. Even the cases. I've never been happier with a computer case of my own or anyone else's. So far the stability's there, too. I used to crash STO daily and now, with the same game files and a new 64-bit client, I haven't crashed once in over a month. For example.

[Xev]

We're well into summer and it's not *that* cool in my place from leaving the windows open last night. PC's been on since just over 5 hours.... check these temps..

https://app.box.com/s/uvwob2h2i37qs2gkn01de3vy7i46hfj2 (damn I miss direct links..)

[Xev]

If you're in the market for a case... I still recommend this one, a lot.

http://us.coolermaster.com/product/Detail/case/MasterBox-Series/masterbox-nr600.html

We don't get rain here the entire summer, not once. It gets dusty. I've cleaned this case out....twice. And each time it looked like new afterwards. The mesh does a really great job of letting air through but not so much dust. You can feel the air getting sucked into the front of this thing so you know it's pulling in outside air nicely and I wipe away a circle of dust from the mesh in front of the intake fan at *least* once a day.

My temps are so good. So low.. I saw videos where the experts were saying to remove the top mesh, but, I won't do it. There's plenty of ventilation *with* the mesh, and, dust does have a way of .. falling. If you're running a super super hot rig in a questionably cool room (or live in a plastic bubble and have no dust) ... then.. yeah.. sure, take the mesh off, I guess, but I have never even been tempted to due to the mesh lets plenty of air through while catching lots of dust.

Cool and dust free and having space to work in are the top things I look for in a case and this one has all that. I have no problems recommending it! I use a full atx motherboard in it with a GTX 1660 and the only drives are PCIE SSD. There is tons of empty space to work in and the wiring routed easily and neatly.

It's also a solidly built unit. The removable front panel is plastic, but, the mesh on its face is a not flimsy metal, making the front cover not so flimsy even though its got plastic. The rest is all steel and tempered glass. The paint job on mine is thick and well done and the glass fits straight and firm. I didn't know if I'd like glass 'holding in all that heat' but I do like having it now that I've been using it awhile - it's been easy to work with and I can watch my MB's diag lights on boot if I want to, and, easily get a visual on all the fans if I want.

The hottest part of the year probably came and went, here, and I never had even the slightest problems with case temps as I have in the past.

Anyway, yay. I cannot recommend this thing enough. I thought that I'd found a major flaw in it the first time I went to blow out the video card - it is harder to get to with an air-duster than I'm used to.. Then, I learned how to bend the lil air duster straw into place (duh) and noticed that no dust came out of my video card even when the fans were whirring from my air can spray.. *that* was impressive. I'm used to seeing a grey cloud appear whenever I do that.

I have not tried to get to my PSU with a duster just due to .. well.. I think the fan hardly ever, if ever, runs, and, it's so well protected from dust (moreso than the fairly dustless video card fans)... I just haven't even bothered yet. This time of year I used to blow my old PSU out .. weekly, at least, after I had one choke and die on dust. Big difference.

This thing will probably pay for itself in saved air duster, the first year (lol). So cool running.. Looks nice. Solidly built. Plenty of room to work in and run cables/wires. Not a bad price, either. I think I paid $60 delivered.

[Xev]

Would I get a Logitech G602 mouse again..? Hmm.. I had a really hard time adjusting to it after getting used to a Logitech MMO mouse (which is a very good gaming mouse too). I blame this on the MMO mouse due to it .. trains your hand and fingers differently than the standard Logitech gaming mouse.

Anyway, now that I'm used to it - it's ... about what I've become used to with past gaming mice.

I miss rechargeable batteries! Batteries that recharge...in the mouse. The G700 had a small square one that was great to use. I had several of them. If I ever let them all die by accident somehow, I could plug in the cord on the mouse and recharge the battery while I played (corded style).

Which brings us to the most remarkable thing about this mouse. If you can't have a rechargeable battery... the G602 has the next best thing. My first batteries (that were included - 2 Duracell AA OEMs and they are heavy but I have no idea how they compare to store-bought) just died, yesterday. 74 days after I got the mouse and used it daily. The mouse will also run on only 1 battery... for those times when your mouse dies (I got 'Down to 5%' warnings, daily, for like a week or so before it died) and you can only find 1 AA in the junk drawer.

Better yet get rechargeable AA's and 'never' (close enough) run out of batteries. I had a recharger ordered with this order but there was a billing problem (I think I ran out of cash...lol).

Anyway, 74 days on cordless mouse batteries is a new record for me by far so I thought I'd share  : )

Oh, and, I always run it in the hi-res/gaming mode - it has a battery saving mode that I tried, once, but, the pointer movement is different so I had to get used to 2 different pointer movements depending on what mode the mouse was in, which, was unacceptable, so, I left it in gaming mode and still did pretty well.

[Xev]

OK, so, how many months have I had this thing running? And I just cleaned it for the 3rd time. This is a chore normally done at least once a week this time of year. The thing I really can't get over, is, the thing I thought was the 'hidden problem'. The video card. I never, ever, ever ever ever, had a video card so dust-free. The first time I tried to get to it with a can of air and realized it wasn't going to be a straight shot.. I thought the placement was going to be a problem, but, wow. The brass heat pipes .. shine. Dust free. I didn't hardly see anything come out of the fans when I got them to spinning with the air cans.

Unlike video, the processor has your average placement and fan setup. However, it too, barely had any dust.

The intake fan was the dirtiest thing and the exhaust fan blades got a cleaning too but weren't nearly as dusty. The mesh in the front of the case where the intake fan is really does a great job of catching the majority of dust. It's been weeks since I cleaned the case out last, but, I clean the mesh at *least* once a day. We've had 1 rain here in months and my PC sits close to an often used door to the outdoors. It gets dusty.

Anyway, yay. Pretty impressive. I never saw anything like it. I mean, I always get cheap cases normally, but this one was only 60 bucks (still pretty cheap) and wow what a difference. I'm sold on mesh and I'm sold on fans that blow in reverse before they start working (I think the GPU and CPU fans both do that) - as long as that extra work doesn't make them fail extra fast.

Dust free PC's last way longer and run way better. So. Dust free, it's a good thing. Worthy of a yay.