The "Quick Questions That Don't Deserve A Thread"...Thread. v5 - Hardware & Software

Are 21:9 monitors worthwhile? I've been using a 20 inch 900p for too long. The LG 29 inch 2560x1080 appeals to me because it's huge and all the games I play will run fine on it. Should I go for it?

[QUOTE=~Kiwi~v2;47099544]Do you have DDR2 or DDR3 memory currently? If so how much.[/QUOTE] 6GB DDR3 memory.

[QUOTE=Swebonny;47099859]6GB DDR3 memory.[/QUOTE] Intel i5s are the best all-around gaming processor.

That looks really neat. Thanks!

[QUOTE=Original User;47099853]Are 21:9 monitors worthwhile? I've been using a 20 inch 900p for too long. The LG 29 inch 2560x1080 appeals to me because it's huge and all the games I play will run fine on it. Should I go for it?[/QUOTE] They're pretty great, but not always as much for gaming. Now that I've got my 27" 2560x1440 I strongly prefer that for 90% of games. The 21:9 is top notch for productivity though. I can have so much data on it. Plus 2560x1080 usually isn't any cheaper than a 2560x1440 unless you're buying from Phrozen.

Is it possible to buy the 2.3 modmic or not? Been thinking about upgrading from this shitty back up mic.

[QUOTE={TFS} Rock Su;47100053]Is it possible to buy the 2.3 modmic or not? Been thinking about upgrading from this shitty back up mic.[/QUOTE] Any reason for the 2.3 as opposed to the 4.0? AFAIK, the 2.3 is no longer in production.

Hey, I have a server running Linux Ubuntu, I have terminal access to it. I also have domain name purchased, I am running my website on that server and all works good, but: Is there any quick and easy way to setup proxy service on my server without fucking up my website? Like create a subdomain like: proxy.myhost.com and when I enter that address it would have address field which I enter and I get redirected to the website I entered and be able to browse it without any script limitations or glitches BUT using servers IP instead of mine, is that possible? I've tried using free proxy services but they are shit (probably because they are being used by thousands at same time).

[QUOTE=Levelog;47100021]They're pretty great, but not always as much for gaming. Now that I've got my 27" 2560x1440 I strongly prefer that for 90% of games. The 21:9 is top notch for productivity though. I can have so much data on it. Plus 2560x1080 usually isn't any cheaper than a 2560x1440 unless you're buying from Phrozen.[/QUOTE] I don't really wanna get 1440p yet though. 2560x1080 will have better performance and use less VRAM. I know that when I eventually upgrade from that monitor, I'll still have it for secondary things like work.

[QUOTE=Original User;47100379]I don't really wanna get 1440p yet though. 2560x1080 will have better performance and use less VRAM. I know that when I eventually upgrade from that monitor, I'll still have it for secondary things like work.[/QUOTE] Yeah 1440p@96Hz is hitting my 4gb 680 hard.

Hey guys, my first stop by here, so forgive me for being new to some of you all. Quick two questions for everyone: I'm looking to upgrade my CPU in the near future from an i7 920 @2.67 (not Overclocked). If I upgraded to an i7-4790k, would I need to upgrade my cooling/motherboard/PSU? Also, what kind of performance increase would I likely notice if I were to keep the same setup with just replacing the CPU, roughly? Current specs per Speccy: [quote]Summary: Operating System Windows 7 Professional 64-bit CPU Intel Core i7 920 @ 2.67GHz 51 °C Bloomfield 45nm Technology RAM 9.00GB Triple-Channel DDR3 @ 531MHz (7-7-7-19) Motherboard PEGATRON CORPORATION TRUCKEE (CPU 1) 52 °C Graphics Acer V223W (1680x1050@59Hz) Acer V223W (1680x1050@59Hz) 2047MB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 Ti BOOST (EVGA) 37 °C Storage 1863GB Seagate ST2000DM001-1CH164 (SATA) 39 °C Optical Drives hp CDDVDW TS-H653R Audio Realtek High Definition Audio[/quote]

[QUOTE=mastoner20;47100656]Hey guys, my first stop by here, so forgive me for being new to some of you all. Quick two questions for everyone: I'm looking to upgrade my CPU in the near future from an i7 920 @2.67 (not Overclocked). If I upgraded to an i7-4790k, would I need to upgrade my cooling/motherboard/PSU? Also, what kind of performance increase would I likely notice if I were to keep the same setup with just replacing the CPU, roughly? Current specs per Speccy:[/QUOTE] You would have to replace the CPU and motherboard together, as the 920 is about 2 sockets behind at this point. It looks like you have an HP prebuilt so it would be a matter of building a new PC. Although a lot of those parts would transfer over easy, so you really only absolutely NEED to buy a new CPU/Motherboard and most likely a case and PSU if you want. Any reason you feel you need to replace the 920? The upgrade would be noticeable, but you need to ask if its worth the few hundred dollar investment. If your wondering about gaming performance, you may be better off buying a new GPU, as a 650 Ti is not being bottlenecked by a i7 920.

[QUOTE=Demache;47100747]You would have to replace the CPU and motherboard together, as the 920 is about 2 sockets behind at this point. It looks like you have an HP prebuilt so it would be a matter of building a new PC. Although a lot of those parts would transfer over easy, so you really only absolutely NEED to buy a new CPU/Motherboard and most likely a case and PSU if you want. Any reason you feel you need to replace the 920? The upgrade would be noticeable, but you need to ask if its worth the few hundred dollar investment. If your wondering about gaming performance, you may be better off buying a new GPU, as a 650 Ti is not being bottlenecked by a i7 920.[/QUOTE] As you mentioned, it's a prebuilt HP that I've had for almost seven years now. The only replacement I've done to it is replace the original GT 220 with the 650 TiB. I'm looking to simply update the computer slowly to try to pick up, knowing I'm quite a few generations behind on quite a few of the components. I picked up the GTX this time last year for $100 and noticed a tremendous increase over the 220 and figured I'm probably about due for a MB/CPU upgrade. My budget right now is about $500 total for both components if they're both in need of replacing.

[QUOTE=mastoner20;47100765]As you mentioned, it's a prebuilt HP that I've had for almost seven years now. The only replacement I've done to it is replace the original GT 220 with the 650 TiB. I'm looking to simply update the computer slowly to try to pick up, knowing I'm quite a few generations behind on quite a few of the components. I picked up the GTX this time last year for $100 and noticed a tremendous increase over the 220 and figured I'm probably about due for a MB/CPU upgrade. My budget right now is about $500 total for both components if they're both in need of replacing.[/QUOTE] Well at this point, it wouldn't be just an upgrade, it would be at the point of major overhaul, as you would have to ditch a lot of the HP specific components. You would essentially be building a new PC, as you have to buy a new CPU/Motherboard, case, and possibly a PSU. Which might be sort of hard to meet your $500 budget, as the 4790k is nearly $350 on its own. The reason why I pointed out upgrading the GTX, is because that's most likely the bottleneck as far as gaming is concerned. Its a great value card, don't get me wrong, but its still a budget oriented card. It would be significantly cheaper to upgrade that. Unfortunately, I don't know the Nvidia naming scheme as well as AMD's so I can't give a good suggestion that isn't way unbalanced and expensive if you prefer to stay with Nvidia. I mean, if you can make the CPU/Motherboard upgrade fit your budget, go for it. Neither way is really wrong, as you are going to see a significant boost either way.

[QUOTE=Swebonny;47099443]It's time for me to change my ancient CPU, an AMD 550 BE from like 2009. Been limiting a lot in games like ARMA 3 and Planetside 2. I've been looking at AMD CPUs but I've kept getting suggestions to get an Intel one instead. So I'm wondering what CPU I should get? As for the motherboard I'd prefer the cheapest one possible, unless there's a reason to get more expensive ones. Spending limit is around 400-500 USD.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Swebonny;47099859]6GB DDR3 memory.[/QUOTE]What graphics card are you using? If your graphics card is outdated then you may have to upgrade it since it could be a bottleneck to the upgrades. What computer case are you using? You'll need to check its dimensions and what motherboard form factor it's compatible with. I noticed you listed your budget in USD yet your post flag states you're Sweden. What country are you located in exactly? Since you listed your budget in USD I'll make a list with that instead. If you don't want to bother with overclocking then you could save yourself some cash and get this for a total of under $300: [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/ZxxTP6[/url] CPU Cooler: [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA4UF2DZ6565&cm_re=cryorig_h7-_-9SIA4UF2DZ6565-_-Product]Cyrorig H7[/url] Notes: - Since you listed a 400-500 USD budget you could easily put in a [url=http://pcpartpicker.com/part/samsung-internal-hard-drive-mz75e250bam]250GB Samsung 850 EVO SSD for $108[/url]. It'll make a significant upgrade to your PC. - If your memory is 1.65V then I wouldn't worry too much since Haswell can take it. - If your hard drive is around 5 years of age then I would recommend on replacing it. - If your PSU is around 5 years of age or outside of its warranty then I strongly recommend on replacing it. - You don't necessarily need an aftermarket cooler on a stock clocked CPU. It still do recommend it though since it will generally be all around quieter than the stock heatsink. The Cryorig H7 I listed is something I would now recommend as a replacement for the Hyper 212 EVO. - Again, if your GPU is outdated then you might need to replace it with something more recent.

[QUOTE=Demache;47100890]Well at this point, it wouldn't be just an upgrade, it would be at the point of major overhaul, as you would have to ditch a lot of the HP specific components. You would essentially be building a new PC, as you have to buy a new CPU/Motherboard, case, and possibly a PSU. Which might be sort of hard to meet your $500 budget, as the 4790k is nearly $350 on its own. The reason why I pointed out upgrading the GTX, is because that's most likely the bottleneck as far as gaming is concerned. Its a great value card, don't get me wrong, but its still a budget oriented card. It would be significantly cheaper to upgrade that. Unfortunately, I don't know the Nvidia naming scheme as well as AMD's so I can't give a good suggestion that isn't way unbalanced and expensive if you prefer to stay with Nvidia. I mean, if you can make the CPU/Motherboard upgrade fit your budget, go for it. Neither way is really wrong, as you are going to see a significant boost either way.[/QUOTE] Forgive my ignorance, never actually built a computer myself before, but why would I need a new case? Motherboard, CPU, and PSU I get, but what makes this particular case not useable in upgrading a MB/CPU combo?

I see. I appreciate the help, guys!

[QUOTE=~Kiwi~v2;47101036]Most likely HP has a proprietary case/motherboard which means it's only going to fit for that model only, it isn't part of the ATX standard.[/QUOTE] I'm going to give HP credit that they actually use a fairly standard ATX motherboard and mounts. But you will still have a big issue getting the power button and status LED's hooked up as they are usually part of a single nonstandard connector, as opposed to standalone cases that have each connector split apart to accommodate any motherboard. And that's not including any front panel USB and audio connectors. If you were a crafty motherfucker, you could probably make it work, but considering you have never built a PC from the ground up, you would be best off saving yourself from the hassle. Usually retrofitting OEM PC cases to accept newer motherboard and components is a project in and of itself.

The prebuilt's a Pavilion e9290f if it helps at all.

[QUOTE=~Kiwi~v2;47101119]I dunno I've some HP prebuilts come as non standard but I guess again that's down to the model.[/QUOTE] Most of the mATX and ATX towers I've seen are pretty standard. But small form factor PCs are a crapshoot. But even still like I mentioned, getting everything hooked up is a guaranteed issue. Dell is especially awful about this. A lot of them put front panel USB, power, LEDs and audio in one ribbon cable. Only way you could figure those out is with a multimeter if you knew what you were doing.

[QUOTE=mastoner20;47100765]As you mentioned, it's a prebuilt HP that I've had for almost seven years now. The only replacement I've done to it is replace the original GT 220 with the 650 TiB. I'm looking to simply update the computer slowly to try to pick up, knowing I'm quite a few generations behind on quite a few of the components. I picked up the GTX this time last year for $100 and noticed a tremendous increase over the 220 and figured I'm probably about due for a MB/CPU upgrade. My budget right now is about $500 total for both components if they're both in need of replacing.[/QUOTE] Continuing to making upgrades to it would be a waste of money. Considering its age it's likely there's nearly nothing worthwhile to carry over (aside from your $100 GTX card which I'm guessing could be the GTX 750?). You would also need a new PSU (and RAM if it's not DDR3). How graphically demanding do you want games to be and at what screen resolutions? If you already have a GTX750 then you can build a fairly basic gaming computer with your $500 budget. [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/xvbC99[/url] Don't expect to run recent demanding games at 1080p 60+fps on high settings though.

[QUOTE=mastoner20;47101128]The prebuilt's a Pavilion e9290f if it helps at all.[/QUOTE] It looks like its a pretty standard mATX motherboard. So the motherboard would pretty much bolt right in (the I/O shield, is a big maybe). Most of the connectors look standard like USB and Audio, which is good. The power button and LED header isn't (which is to be expected). If you knew what you were doing you could probably make an adapter easily but if you don't have experience with it, don't bother.

[QUOTE=Triot;47101165]Continuing to making upgrades to it would be a waste of money. Considering its age it's likely there's nearly nothing worthwhile to carry over (aside from your $100 GTX card which I'm guessing could be the GTX 750?). You would also need a new PSU (and RAM if it's not DDR3). How graphically demanding do you want games to be and at what screen resolutions? If you already have a GTX750 then you can build a fairly basic gaming computer with your $500 budget. [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/xvbC99[/url] Don't expect to run recent demanding games at 1080p 60+fps on high settings though.[/QUOTE] Right now I'm using a GTX 650 Ti Boost as stated. I'm playing older games like Skyrim, Metro 2033, and more strategy games like the Civ and Total War series. Right now I'm playing Skryim and Metro max settings at about 60 and 45 average FPS respectively. Civ V and Beyond Earth play at about 45 as well on high settings and Rome II plays between 35 and 65 on Medium High settings depending on AI on screen. Day Z and ArmA II are more demanding on middle-high settings at around 25 to 45 FPS, again, depending on where on the map and AI on screen. I'm playing on two ACER V2223Ws @ 1650x1080 (59hz), though in almost all games it's just my one monitor, not both. I'm generally not playing the newest titles on my desktop.

[QUOTE=Triot;47101165]Continuing to making upgrades to it would be a waste of money. Considering its age it's likely there's nearly nothing worthwhile to carry over (aside from your $100 GTX card which I'm guessing could be the GTX 750?). You would also need a new PSU (and RAM if it's not DDR3). How graphically demanding do you want games to be and at what screen resolutions? If you already have a GTX750 then you can build a fairly basic gaming computer with your $500 budget. [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/xvbC99[/url] Don't expect to run recent demanding games at 1080p 60+fps on high settings though.[/QUOTE] He currently has a 650 Ti Boost. Most of the components would transfer over but yeah at this point replacing the CPU/Motherboard is pretty much gutting and making a new build. However, he should probably aim a little higher than a Haswell i3. Its not a ton better than the 920 except in single threaded performance obviously. I would suggest he settle with a Haswell i5, then he can at least retain the quad core aspect, and just reuse components from his previous PC. Like the DVD drive and RAM as it is at least DDR3 to save some cash.

[QUOTE=Demache;47101236]It looks like its a pretty standard mATX motherboard. So the motherboard would pretty much bolt right in (the I/O shield, is a big maybe). Most of the connectors look standard like USB and Audio, which is good. The power button and LED header isn't (which is to be expected). If you knew what you were doing you could probably make an adapter easily but if you don't have experience with it, don't bother.[/QUOTE] Let's be honest here, it's a 7 year old prebuilt HP case. [url=http://pcpartpicker.com/part/cooler-master-case-nse200kkn1]A better case can be had for just $35.[/url] Edit: [QUOTE=Demache;47101278]He currently has a 650 Ti Boost. Most of the components would transfer over but yeah at this point replacing the CPU/Motherboard is pretty much gutting and making a new build. However, he should probably aim a little higher than a Haswell i3. Its not a ton better than the 920 except in single threaded performance obviously. I would suggest he settle with a Haswell i5, then he can at least retain the quad core aspect, and just reuse components from his previous PC. Like the DVD drive and RAM as it is at least DDR3 to save some cash.[/QUOTE] Oops. I completely missed his post regarding his current specs. I kind of generally agree then.

[QUOTE=Hamsteronfire;47098783]trying to get to grips with Atom right now it's definitely what I've been looking for, and I love the interface the question is, is it even possible to execute/run code? I've had a look at the packages available on the site and whilst there are some run/build packages, they're either geared towards OSX and use hashbangs (which I'm unsure how to implement) can anyone point me towards setting up Atom to execute code, or failing that, recommending me an alternative programme similar in design to Atom I want to programme in C, Python and Ruby if that helps?[/QUOTE] Anything?

Could someone tell me a good free program to rip a file/video from a cd/dvd and burn it onto other cd's or dvd's? Friend has a family video on DVD and wants to put the file onto his computer then burn it to other DVD's for family.

[QUOTE=SuperHoboMan;47101963]Could someone tell me a good free program to rip a file/video from a cd/dvd and burn it onto other cd's or dvd's? Friend has a family video on DVD and wants to put the file onto his computer then burn it to other DVD's for family.[/QUOTE] If the only thing he wants to do is make copies, he can use something like ImgBurn to rip an ISO to the hard drive and then burn it it. It will make identical copies without needing to reencode.

Trying to enable quicksync but failing. My PC setup is: i5 2500k @4.3 MSI GTX970 4G MSI Z77A-GD80 (MS-7757) I have done everything, enabled the iGPU, tried the fake monitor trick, tried VirtuMVP and my PC still won't let me use QuickSync. Any ideas?

[QUOTE=Worre;47102958]Trying to enable quicksync but failing. My PC setup is: i5 2500k @4.3 MSI GTX970 4G MSI Z77A-GD80 (MS-7757) I have done everything, enabled the iGPU, tried the fake monitor trick, tried VirtuMVP and my PC still won't let me use QuickSync. Any ideas?[/QUOTE] Have you tried connecting an actual monitor to the motherboard?