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The New Coffee Room

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  3. Tell me about building a PC

Tell me about building a PC

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  • L Loki

    I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

    markM Offline
    markM Offline
    mark
    wrote on last edited by
    #58

    @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

    I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

    If you can put up with all the crap-ware that is installed on commercial builds.

    George KG 1 Reply Last reply
    • markM mark

      @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

      I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

      If you can put up with all the crap-ware that is installed on commercial builds.

      George KG Offline
      George KG Offline
      George K
      wrote on last edited by
      #59

      @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

      @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

      I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

      If you can put up with all the crap-ware that is installed on commercial builds.

      Can't you get rid of it by just reformatting the drive and reinstalling the OS?

      "Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08

      The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.

      markM 1 Reply Last reply
      • George KG George K

        @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

        @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

        I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

        If you can put up with all the crap-ware that is installed on commercial builds.

        Can't you get rid of it by just reformatting the drive and reinstalling the OS?

        markM Offline
        markM Offline
        mark
        wrote on last edited by mark
        #60

        @George-K said in Tell me about building a PC:

        @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

        @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

        I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

        If you can put up with all the crap-ware that is installed on commercial builds.

        Can't you get rid of it by just reformatting the drive and reinstalling the OS?

        Typically, they don't come with install disks anymore. Even when they did, they were HP or Dell or insert your brand name here, install disks that just reloaded the crap on installation. lol

        George KG 1 Reply Last reply
        • markM mark

          @George-K said in Tell me about building a PC:

          @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

          @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

          I’m beginning to wonder if all I want is the most basic desktop that I should just buy it? Could be cheaper?

          If you can put up with all the crap-ware that is installed on commercial builds.

          Can't you get rid of it by just reformatting the drive and reinstalling the OS?

          Typically, they don't come with install disks anymore. Even when they did, they were HP or Dell or insert your brand name here, install disks that just reloaded the crap on installation. lol

          George KG Offline
          George KG Offline
          George K
          wrote on last edited by George K
          #61

          @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

          @George-K said in Tell me about building a PC:

          Can't you get rid of it by just reformatting the drive and reinstalling the OS?

          Typically, they don't come with install disks anymore. Even when they did, they were HP or Dell or insert your brand name here, install disks that just reloaded the crap on installation. lol

          Get a Mac...

          Apple has an "Internet recovery" option. By booting the Mac while holding a keystroke combo (Command, Option, R) it boots from the internet and you can re-install a "clean" MacOS.

          Useful.

          "Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08

          The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.

          1 Reply Last reply
          • L Loki

            Jon

            Let us know what you bought/buying?

            Going to build for very basic email and web access use in public space in our house.

            Embarrased to say that current is still on old windows and it is starting to concern me.

            jon-nycJ Offline
            jon-nycJ Offline
            jon-nyc
            wrote on last edited by
            #62

            @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

            Jon

            Let us know what you bought/buying?

            Didn't move on it yet. The problem is the boy's computer is in the kitchen (which is nice so we always know what he's up to) and where it sits is not a convenient place for a traditional computer with a chassis and separate monitor etc.

            Currently it's an all-in-one and a small one at that so it fits fine.

            Not sure what we're going to do. He would love to move his PC to his room but I'm not ready for that. Maybe I could find a way to make the chassis setup fit in situ.

            You were warned.

            KlausK Doctor PhibesD 2 Replies Last reply
            • jon-nycJ jon-nyc

              @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

              Jon

              Let us know what you bought/buying?

              Didn't move on it yet. The problem is the boy's computer is in the kitchen (which is nice so we always know what he's up to) and where it sits is not a convenient place for a traditional computer with a chassis and separate monitor etc.

              Currently it's an all-in-one and a small one at that so it fits fine.

              Not sure what we're going to do. He would love to move his PC to his room but I'm not ready for that. Maybe I could find a way to make the chassis setup fit in situ.

              KlausK Offline
              KlausK Offline
              Klaus
              wrote on last edited by Klaus
              #63

              @jon-nyc take a look at the "Mini-ITX" form factor. You can home-build very small PCs that fit very nicely on a desk or under a display. You'd still have a separate display and associated cables, but PCs don't need to be in a "midi tower" or the like anymore. A mini ITX PC can be as small as a Mac Mini, if you use the right chassis, and it can be very quiet if you use passive cooling.

              jon-nycJ 1 Reply Last reply
              • jon-nycJ jon-nyc

                @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

                Jon

                Let us know what you bought/buying?

                Didn't move on it yet. The problem is the boy's computer is in the kitchen (which is nice so we always know what he's up to) and where it sits is not a convenient place for a traditional computer with a chassis and separate monitor etc.

                Currently it's an all-in-one and a small one at that so it fits fine.

                Not sure what we're going to do. He would love to move his PC to his room but I'm not ready for that. Maybe I could find a way to make the chassis setup fit in situ.

                Doctor PhibesD Offline
                Doctor PhibesD Offline
                Doctor Phibes
                wrote on last edited by
                #64

                @jon-nyc said in Tell me about building a PC:

                @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

                Jon

                Let us know what you bought/buying?

                Didn't move on it yet. The problem is the boy's computer is in the kitchen (which is nice so we always know what he's up to) and where it sits is not a convenient place for a traditional computer with a chassis and separate monitor etc.

                Currently it's an all-in-one and a small one at that so it fits fine.

                Not sure what we're going to do. He would love to move his PC to his room but I'm not ready for that. Maybe I could find a way to make the chassis setup fit in situ.

                alt text

                Go on. You know you want to. Never mind all this 'Buy a Mac' bullshit.

                I was only joking

                1 Reply Last reply
                • KlausK Klaus

                  @jon-nyc take a look at the "Mini-ITX" form factor. You can home-build very small PCs that fit very nicely on a desk or under a display. You'd still have a separate display and associated cables, but PCs don't need to be in a "midi tower" or the like anymore. A mini ITX PC can be as small as a Mac Mini, if you use the right chassis, and it can be very quiet if you use passive cooling.

                  jon-nycJ Offline
                  jon-nycJ Offline
                  jon-nyc
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #65

                  @Klaus said in Tell me about building a PC:

                  @jon-nyc take a look at the "Mini-ITX" form factor. You can home-build very small PCs that fit very nicely on a desk or under a display. You'd still have a separate display and associated cables, but PCs don't need to be in a "midi tower" or the like anymore. A mini ITX PC can be as small as a Mac Mini, if you use the right chassis, and it can be very quiet if you use passive cooling.

                  I'll check it out

                  You were warned.

                  1 Reply Last reply
                  • markM Offline
                    markM Offline
                    mark
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #66

                    I 99% sure have my build finalized and I was able to trim the cost to $3,316.00 for the components and $325 for a 4 year no cost replacement on most of the components. The power supply has a 10 year warranty.

                    After researching the best processor specifically for audio recording/mixing the winner of that contest is the Intel Core i9-10900 Comet Lake 10-Core 2.8 GHz It even beat out the 3.7 Ghz model and every other processor including the 64 core $4,000 AMD Threadripper, in single core / thread performance. The processor is only $587 and is the most significant factor in bringing my cost down. The motherboard also brought the price down.

                    During my research, I found out that audio production, while definitely taking advantage of multi-cores, requires very fast single thread performance and there is no getting around that. It's why a $500 processor can best a $4,000 processor in this very specific task. Other factors come into play like what is interrupting the processor and vying for time and power in competition with the audio processing. That can include system devices like memory, video, network, etc. Motherboards needs to be up to the task and the gaming motherboards seem to be the motherboards accepted as best for this task.

                    New Build:
                    Intel Core i9-10900 Comet Lake 10-Core/20-Thread 2.8 GHz (Able to be overclocked to 4.9 Ghz)
                    ASUS ROG MAXIMUS XII HERO (WI-FI) LGA 1200 (Intel 10th Gen) Intel Z490 (WiFi 6) SATA 6Gb/s ATX Intel Motherboard
                    G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 128GB (4 x 32GB) 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 3200 (PC4 25600) Desktop Memory
                    ZOTAC GAMING GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER Triple Fan 8GB GDDR6 256-bit 15.5 Gbps Gaming Graphics Card
                    Sabrent 2TB ROCKET NVMe PCIe M.2 2280 Internal SSD High Performance Solid State Drive
                    LG Black 12X BD-ROM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-ROM SATA Internal Blu-ray Burner
                    Seasonic FOCUS GX-1000, 1000W 80+ Gold, Full-Modular Power Supply
                    be quiet! Dark Base Pro 900 Black rev. 2 Full Tower ATX Case
                    Arctic Silver Arcticlean Thermal material Remover & Surface Purifier
                    Arctic Silver 5 High-Density Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound
                    Optical Quantum 25 GB 6X BD-R Blu-ray Recordable Media 10 Pack

                    For a monitor I am going to buy a 43" TCL 4K UDH TV and give it go. If I don't like it I will get the LG 38WN75C-B 38-Inch Class 21:9 Curved UltraWide QHD+ (3840 x 1600) IPS Display with HDR 10

                    alt text
                    https://www.newegg.com/p/0JC-000D-00B06?Description=LG 38WN75C-B&cm_re=LG_38WN75C-B--0JC-000D-00B06--Product

                    1 Reply Last reply
                    • L Offline
                      L Offline
                      Loki
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #67

                      I was able to upgrade free to Windows 10 via Microsoft download. How about that. No money and importantly no decisions to be made.

                      1 Reply Last reply
                      • 89th8 Offline
                        89th8 Offline
                        89th
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #68

                        Mark... DROOL

                        1 Reply Last reply
                        • RainmanR Offline
                          RainmanR Offline
                          Rainman
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #69

                          That's beyond cool, Mark!
                          I really respect the research you have done, to come up with a computer that can do what you want to do, instead of just buying the most expensive components and hoping that price = quality. That is unfortunately, what I tend to do.

                          Music-related software certainly does eat up memory. The issue is latency of course. Those milliseconds add up, and can make things more than frustrating. No big deal for small ensemble, but unmanageable for large. Impressive that you have thought through all of these potential frustrations.

                          When will you have the unveiling? Have you started the build, or are you waiting for all the components?

                          markM 2 Replies Last reply
                          • RainmanR Rainman

                            That's beyond cool, Mark!
                            I really respect the research you have done, to come up with a computer that can do what you want to do, instead of just buying the most expensive components and hoping that price = quality. That is unfortunately, what I tend to do.

                            Music-related software certainly does eat up memory. The issue is latency of course. Those milliseconds add up, and can make things more than frustrating. No big deal for small ensemble, but unmanageable for large. Impressive that you have thought through all of these potential frustrations.

                            When will you have the unveiling? Have you started the build, or are you waiting for all the components?

                            markM Offline
                            markM Offline
                            mark
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #70

                            @Rainman Waiting for approval from the CFO. 😉

                            L 1 Reply Last reply
                            • markM mark

                              @Rainman Waiting for approval from the CFO. 😉

                              L Offline
                              L Offline
                              Loki
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #71

                              @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

                              @Rainman Waiting for approval from the CFO. 😉

                              Why would your CFO stop approving now?😂

                              markM 1 Reply Last reply
                              • L Loki

                                @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

                                @Rainman Waiting for approval from the CFO. 😉

                                Why would your CFO stop approving now?😂

                                markM Offline
                                markM Offline
                                mark
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #72

                                @Loki said in Tell me about building a PC:

                                @mark said in Tell me about building a PC:

                                @Rainman Waiting for approval from the CFO. 😉

                                Why would your CFO stop approving now?😂

                                Well, I actually have approval to build two of them. One will be sans video card, for the CFO. He doesn't do any gaming or anything outside of normal business tasks. We're really just waiting for the funds to arrive.

                                1 Reply Last reply
                                • markM Offline
                                  markM Offline
                                  mark
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #73

                                  The price does include Windows 10 Professional 64bit.

                                  1 Reply Last reply
                                  • RainmanR Rainman

                                    That's beyond cool, Mark!
                                    I really respect the research you have done, to come up with a computer that can do what you want to do, instead of just buying the most expensive components and hoping that price = quality. That is unfortunately, what I tend to do.

                                    Music-related software certainly does eat up memory. The issue is latency of course. Those milliseconds add up, and can make things more than frustrating. No big deal for small ensemble, but unmanageable for large. Impressive that you have thought through all of these potential frustrations.

                                    When will you have the unveiling? Have you started the build, or are you waiting for all the components?

                                    markM Offline
                                    markM Offline
                                    mark
                                    wrote on last edited by mark
                                    #74

                                    @Rainman said in Tell me about building a PC:

                                    That's beyond cool, Mark!
                                    I really respect the research you have done, to come up with a computer that can do what you want to do, instead of just buying the most expensive components and hoping that price = quality. That is unfortunately, what I tend to do.

                                    Music-related software certainly does eat up memory. The issue is latency of course. Those milliseconds add up, and can make things more than frustrating. No big deal for small ensemble, but unmanageable for large. Impressive that you have thought through all of these potential frustrations.

                                    This video is a great explanation of latency.

                                    Link to video

                                    1 Reply Last reply
                                    • brendaB Offline
                                      brendaB Offline
                                      brenda
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #75

                                      Mark, I thought your CFO was your wife. 😄

                                      X 1 Reply Last reply
                                      • brendaB brenda

                                        Mark, I thought your CFO was your wife. 😄

                                        X Online
                                        X Online
                                        xenon
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #76

                                        @brenda said in Tell me about building a PC:

                                        Mark, I thought your CFO was your wife. 😄

                                        You're not the only one 🙂

                                        bachophileB 1 Reply Last reply
                                        • markM Offline
                                          markM Offline
                                          mark
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #77

                                          The CFO is my business partner, who just happens to be my brother.

                                          1 Reply Last reply
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