Built my current PC a few months ago and basically since week one it would randomly shut off maybe once or twice a week. No blue screen, no warning, just instantly dead and then it would boot back up normally.

I reseated the RAM, reseated the GPU, checked temps, ran memtest, stressed the CPU and GPU for hours, reset BIOS, changed outlets, pretty much everything I could think of. Couldn't reproduce it on purpose.

Yesterday it shut off while I wasn't even using it.

I had just lowered my standing desk.

Turns out I routed the PSU cable through the cable tray under the desk when I built everything. When the desk went up it was pulling the cable just slightly tighter every time, and apparently over the last few months it had slowly worked itself loose from the back of the PSU. Not enough to look unplugged, just enough that moving the desk sometimes killed the connection.

Rerouted it with a ton of slack and haven't been able to make it shut off since.

I spent 3 months troubleshooting my PC when apparently I needed to troubleshoot the furniture.

Minimum in a way I can:

Enough VRAM to set textures to high(second to the highest)/ultra(max)

Can comfortably turn down settings(shadows, reflections, folliage/vegetation, LoD, clouds, volumetric fog, RT quality, global illumination) from ultra to low-medium-high to maintain desired 60 fps, especially if the visual difference is too small for the performance hit.

Enable FSR4 Quality-Balance/DLSS 4 to achieve base 60 fps+Enough VRAM for Frame Gen for visually smooth experience.

2560x1440P

I've had the same CPU and cooler in my main PC for a little over two years now. Temps are basically where they were when I first built it, so I've never had a reason to take the cooler off.

I keep seeing people recommend changing the thermal paste every couple of years though, and I'm not really convinced there's much point in doing it just because some time has passed.

I would have thought the paste would only really become an issue if the temperatures started creeping up, the cooler got removed, or something else changed. Otherwise you're just breaking a perfectly good mount to replace something that seems to be working fine.

Curious what you guys actually do with your own builds. Do you replace it periodically as part of maintenance, or just leave it alone until there's a reason to mess with it?

Saw these HDDs on Aliexpress. Can't lie, the price is pretty tempting. What's the catch with them? If I do buy one, what tests should I do to find out the actual quality?

I am fairly new to PC and am upgrading my PC from a Radeon VII 16 GB to an RTX 4090 with a Ryzen 7 7300x3d and 32 GB DDR5 ram. I currently play story games and competitive games like RDR 2 and CS2. Would a 4K OLED be worth the money, or should I get a 2K OLED

Finished rebuilding my PC recently and immediately started getting random black screens under load. Sometimes after 10 minutes, sometimes after an hour.

Every time I opened the case to troubleshoot it, everything worked perfectly. Stress tests, games, benchmarks, no crashes at all.

I'd put the glass panel back on, move the PC under my desk, and eventually it would happen again.

After way too much troubleshooting I finally noticed my GPU power cable sticks out pretty far from the card. The side panel was pressing against it just enough to slightly pull the connector sideways.

Not enough to unplug it. Not enough to notice looking through the glass. Just enough to apparently ruin my week.

Moved the cable, gave it more room and suddenly the PC has been completely fine.

So yeah, apparently taking the side panel off was technically fixing my computer every single time and I somehow never connected those two things.

Good evening, I have around a 2300-2400$ budget for a new Gaming PC, what specs would you recommend? So far this is what I considered buying.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D — 8-Core, 4.2 GHz

CPU Cooler: ID-COOLING SE-224-XTS — 70 CFM

Motherboard: ASRock B850M Pro RS WiFi White — Micro ATX, AM5

RAM: Silicon Power Value Gaming — 32 GB (2×16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30

Storage: Acer Predator GM7000 — 2 TB M.2 NVMe PCIe 4.0

GPU: Gigabyte GAMING OC Radeon RX 9070 XT — 16 GB

Case: Thermaltake View 270 Plus TG ARGB — ATX Mid Tower

Power Supply: ASUS Prime AP-850G — 850W, 80+ Gold, Fully Modular

Operating System: None selected

Monitor: None selected

I've only built one PC so far, and when I finished it I enabled XMP because I figured there wasn't much reason to leave the RAM running below the speed I paid for.

What I'm less clear on is whether XMP or EXPO is actually considered overclocking. The RAM is sold with that speed on the box, so I've always thought of it as basically the intended way to run the kit. But I've also read that the CPU's memory controller may still be running outside its official specifications.

I've had no stability issues with it, so this isn't really a problem I'm trying to fix. I'm mostly wondering how people here think about the terminology and whether there's any practical reason to treat XMP/EXPO differently from the advertised stock settings.

Is it technically overclocking even though the memory kit is rated for it, or is that distinction not very important in practice?

Games are starting to struggle a bit in 4k even in 1440p. Got a 3080ti, worth it?

Update: ended up getting it, was $1400 from micro center, gigabyte windforce oc

It will have a ryzen 5 5500, 8gb ddr 4 ram (yes I know 16 gigs is better but we are still in a ram crsis) ,Rx580,500gb HHD, 600watt psu.

Hello everyone, bit of a silly question but am I able to bring my old SSD storage (1 SATA, 2 M.2) to my new build just fine? I know one of the M.2 is my boot drive. Wondering if there will be any issues ill run into.

Hi everyone,

About 5 years ago I bought my PC which has the below specs, running Windows 11 Pro (of which I did a clean install a week or so ago):

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X
• GPU: EVGA RTX 3080 FTW3 ULTRA GAMING
• Motherboard: ASUS TUF GAMING X570-PRO (WI-FI)
• Total Memory Size: 32 GBytes DDR4
• SSD1: Samsung SSD 980 PRO 1TB
• SSD2: WDC WDS200T2B0C-00PXH0

I currently have two main monitors:

• Monitor Name (Manuf): ZOWIE XL LCD - for competitive shooters and general PC use
• Monitor Name (Manuf): AW3423DWF - for all other games

I started to notice that most newer games required me to lower the graphics settings to medium or even low sometimes (Blood of the Dawnwalker, Mortal Shell 2, Tarkov - I know this one is not new, but it used to run great like 4 years ago and it does not run great now - etc.) to get a stable 60+ FPS.

I'd appreciate advice and suggestions on what should I focus on upgrading. I read a couple of posts praising the RX 9070 XT, but I am not sure whether a GPU upgrade would be the right thing to upgrade first and even then, I am not sure what GPU should I pick.

Thanks in advance!

Was looking for something in an old flash drive and found a spreadsheet from a 2002 build of mine. This is from August of 2002 and from what I remember, pretty high end specs for the time. Total cost was just over $1600. Lot of money for a kid in his early 20's.

Can't paste the image so I'll post the list instead.

Hello, I’m from Sweden and I'm looking for the best CPU and GPU combo upgrade for a total budget of $700–$800 USD.
Current Specs & Details:
CPU: i3-6100
GPU: GTX 1050 2GB
RAM: 32GB DDR4 (I want to keep this, so the new CPU GPU combo HAS to support DDR4)
Monitor: 1440p
Use-case: Currently playing mainly CS2, Minecraft and some light editing and multitasking nothing extreme though, but I want to start playing demanding story/single-player games in 1440p once I upgrade.
Questions & Local Pricing (Sweden):
Is the i5-14600KF paired with an RX 9060 XT 16GB the best value combo I can get on DDR4 within this budget?
Prices in Sweden right now:
i5-14600KF: ~$250 USD
RX 9060 XT 16GB: ~$500–$600 USD
Are there better alternative CPU/GPU combos for DDR4 within $700–$800?

Have 16GB at 4400MT/s (which, if my math is correct, is 2200mHz). I can get another 16GB at 2400mHz for about $50. I’m not replacing them, but rather adding them to get 32GB total to my setup. I know that they will slow down to the slowest stick, but honestly, I think it’s worth it, at least until I can find better for cheap on marketplace. Should I get this, or not?

Since I was never wealthy but really wanted to swap from my old laptop, I decided to build a PC out of random FB marketplace and junkyard items. My goal was to make a PC as cheap as possible with specific games I wanted to play. (the Fallout series, Dishonored, other games from roughly 2013-2020 and some indie titles)

What I managed to get for roughly 150 USD:

-Motherboard: Asus H-97M-E

-CPU: i5 4690K

-GPU: Palit GTX 1060 6GB dual

-RAM: 16GB (2x8) Hyperx DDR3

-SSD-s: Kingston 120GB and Samsung 250GB

-HDD: Hitachi 500GB

-PSU: 700W Chieftech A-80

-Case: Mars Gaming MC Vortex

-Case fans: 5 of some Ventaris 120mm fans

My question is what can I upgrade without swapping the motherboard? Will the CPU bottleneck any better GPU-s?

Also, I don't intend to play recent releases or games with relatively high hardware requirements.

Thanks to everyone in advance!

I'm currently using the Turtle Beach Atlas Air headset. I chose it after consulting reviews, including some one-star ratings. I initially didn't realize it used Velcro to tighten the headset—who thought that was a good idea?!

To summarize, the headset was falling apart, but since I purchased a 3-year warranty from Amazon, I was able to get a replacement. Unfortunately, the replacement Atlas Air they sent me was also faulty. I tried contacting their support page, but I haven't received a response.

I'm reaching out for help. What's the best solution right now? I don't have a lot of cash to spend on an "amazing" headset. My siblings are using a headset along with a separate high-quality mic. Should I go that route, or should I just get an affordable gaming headset with a warranty?

guys i've been struggling with my wukong's graphic setting. my fps stucked at 50fps. how can i do to make it 60fps or above

im using
1. ryzen 5 5500 3.6ghz
2. RX 6700 XT 12gb
3. SSd 1tb 3.0 M.2

My lovely gaming PC from 9 years ago is finally starting to grind to a halt. I’ve run into some boot issues, and will be trying to reinstall windows 10 onto a new M.2 drive as we suspect my old SSD might be causing issues.

I have been thinking of upgrading for a while now. If I do go down the route of buying a bunch of new parts, what from my current build can I salvage, and what realistically do I need to just get brand new?

My goal is to run new AAA titles at high frame rates. Essentially what my PC was capable of back in the day, as I’ve been avoiding high settings on new games for a while now. I did pay a fair bit for my old build, but from what I have heard, prices are pretty crazy these days. I don’t need absolute top of the line if it will still get high frames on high settings (as in if +10% performance is double the price then I’ll take the cheaper option). My gaming monitor is 1440p 165hz, I have a secondary 4K 60hz.

What should I be looking to replace and what should I keep? I’m currently running windows 10 but will want to upgrade to 11. I already have all the peripherals and do a lot of sim racing recently. Buying in Australia.

Thanks in advance everyone!

My current build:

[PCPartPicker Part List](https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/8LF9tC)

So It's my first time installing an nvme ssd and it's size is 2280. The problem is that I can't find my motherboards box that has the extra m.2 screw and the thing you put on before the m.2 screw. But my motherboard has a heatsink that's 22110 size and it has its screw. Can I just use the heatsink itself as the thing holding the ssd down instead of a dedicated m.2 screw for the ssd? This will be something temporary and I will add a m.2 screw in it when I get it.

Hello!

I just moved into a new place and my PC room only has 2 outlets close to my equipment. I want to buy a surge protector/power strip and was hoping someone could help confirm my math to ease my mind.

In quick summary, I will have my PC, 3 monitors, a desk lamp, & subwoofer + 2 speakers for now. I may add in an additional lamp as there are no ceiling lights. In total I estimate 1,150W at max draw.

Here’s a breakdown of where that’s coming from:

1. [PSU PowerSpec PS 650BSM]: 650W max
2. [Z623 Speaker System/Subwoofer]: 400W max
3. [Acer VG270 sbmiipx]: 48W max
4. [HP EliteDisplay E231]: 36W max
5. [ASUS VG249q]: 16W max
6. Arcadia Collection AF38651 Lamp: Depends on bulb (TBD)

Total = 1,150W (@110V this should be 10.45A max. I know 120V is standard but I prefer 110V when calculating current to give a little headroom.)

From my research, the Belkin 12-outlet 3,780J surge protector/power strip is very common, but I haven’t seen anyone push it up to 1,150W before. I know it’s still well below the 1,875W limit but I feel crazy plugging in so much stuff into one device, especially the subwoofer & PC.

Can anyone confirm I am calculating this right? Does anyone else draw >1,000W, and if so, what do you use as a surge protector/powerstrip?

Thanks for the support!

pc

Hello,

I have a B550 Gaming Gen3 mother board and i was wondering what is the best way to upgrade storage capacity (i am pretty sure there is only one SSD port)

For context my SSD curently is 464 Go and clearly it isn't enough for today so I want to see what I can buy to upgrade it.

I admit i am not a expert of the field so if you need some info just ask and i will try to find it.