What's your latest tech purchase?

[dont whant to set it"']

Would one belive I bought a high end , brand new graphics card for about a night out worth of dosh? , (your night out dosh mileage may vary because no specific theme is set /in other words, cheap as chips).

 

[lexluthermiester]

Would one belive I bought a high end , brand new graphics card for about a night out worth of dosh? , (your night out dosh mileage may vary because no specific theme is set /in other words, cheap as chips).

That was/is a beautiful thing.

 

[freeagent]

It’s not really a piece of tech but.. my mom came over a few weeks ago, and while we were enjoying a puff down in the cave, I was scrolling through some GN vids and my mom wanted to watch the disappointment build lol. So we watched it. She enjoyed the video and now loves Steve.. and she bought me a shirt for my birthday that just passed.. I like it

I know my socks are dirty, I just got home from work. Today I was on a lathe and she was juicy.

 

[Mussels]

This will make my cables look better.
View attachment 233006

My last extensions caught fire and melted

I will always tell anyone with a 30 series GPU (or wattage equivalent) to just. fucking. dont.

Just make sure the extension cables won't melt like the ones @Mussels used once.

Oh hey, i got beaten to it


Long term, i want to get replacement cables for my PSU as well... but it's got a little bit of coil whine and a little bit of a stinky smell so i wonder if its on the way out, and should just consider a new PSU with better stock cables.
The USB-connected features of the PSU i wanted when i bought it are a a sham, as corsair admitted the wattage measurements are a guess and not meant to be accurate (i was seeing 50-100W discrepancies vs the wall measurements, at idle)

 

[Deleted member 24505]

My last extensions caught fire and melted

I will always tell anyone with a 30 series GPU (or wattage equivalent) to just. fucking. dont.


Oh hey, i got beaten to it


Long term, i want to get replacement cables for my PSU as well... but it's got a little bit of coil whine and a little bit of a stinky smell so i wonder if its on the way out, and should just consider a new PSU with better stock cables.
The USB-connected features of the PSU i wanted when i bought it are a a sham, as corsair admitted the wattage measurements are a guess and not meant to be accurate (i was seeing 50-100W discrepancies vs the wall measurements, at idle)

I don't have a 30 series GPU so should be ok. Your 3090 must have some power draw though.

 

[Mussels]

I don't have a 30 series GPU so should be ok. Your 3090 must have some power draw though.

The burning occured while mining, but also while heavily undervolted and underclocked (00W power draw over 2x8 pin)
It was a slow decline as i assume they overheated and slowly warped until one part got thinner, and then it escalated

I've used velcro cable ties to make the stock cables look nicer, but i do miss those ARGB shinies
(If i had the money, i'd get replacement cables, new ARGB cables, and move the lights to the new sleeved cables)

 

[Deleted member 24505]

The burning occured while mining, but also while heavily undervolted and underclocked love:00W power draw over 2x8 pin)
It was a slow decline as i assume they overheated and slowly warped until one part got thinner, and then it escalated

I've used velcro cable ties to make the stock cables look nicer, but i do miss those ARGB shinies
(If i had the money, i'd get replacement cables, new ARGB cables, and move the lights to the new sleeved cables)

If my PSU had a non captive ATX 24 pin i would buy a set of Corsair cables.

 

[plastiscɧ]

 

[GamerGuy]

Got a new monitor mounted overhead lamp to use when I don't wanna use the light in my room, does white and warm light so I don't strain my eyes unnecessarily. I had to mod it a little to get it to mount on my monitor as the bezel on my monitor is rather thin. Oh yeah, though you can't see it clearly, I've also gotten a new oversized mousepad to protect the surface of my recently acquired desk

A closer look at the new keycaps on my old keyboard (Ducky Shine 4 Fire 69)

 

[PLAfiller]

Got a new monitor mounted overhead lamp to use when I don't wanna use the light in my room, does white and warm light so I don't strain my eyes unnecessarily.

I've always wanted one of those monitor lights...some day....as the song goes I think it's worth it. Congratz on the purchase.

 

[plastiscɧ]

It’s not really a piece of tech but.. my mom came over a few weeks ago, and while we were enjoying a puff down in the cave, I was scrolling through some GN vids and my mom wanted to watch the disappointment build lol. So we watched it. She enjoyed the video and now loves Steve.. and she bought me a shirt for my birthday that just passed.. I like it

View attachment 233040
View attachment 233042

I know my socks are dirty, I just got home from work. Today I was on a lathe and she was juicy.

lel mate; if u ask me -- the problems of millions of guys on this earth were solved if their wifes would buy them black socks and underwear....
kek

 

[dgianstefani]

RTX 3080ti FE, fucker runs hot, gonna put under a Heatkiller V WB in my loop - wish Optimus made an FE block...

 

[MachineLearning]

[ 56k warning ]

Got a basically brand-new FireGL V8600!! In the world of hardware, there is at least one benefit to being quite young: I was 6 when this card came out, so it wasn't like I was purchasing tech left and right like now... All of this older hardware is new to me. Hell, I didn't even know GDDR4 existed until a year or two ago. So when I see old tech on eBay or anywhere else, such as this beautiful card from 15 years ago, it's a fantastic opportunity to grab something interesting and novel, and a brilliant learning opportunity. I don't care about how badly it runs current games, I want to collect, restore, and overclock just about everything. After overclocking LGA775, 1156, 1155, 1366, AM3, and AM4, you learn how tech progresses over time, which builds genuine understanding of what you're doing... And there is always so much more learning to be done.

One thing I found to be odd / interesting is that, despite this being a V8600 and not a FireGL V8650, there are still thermal pads on the backplate. I understand that GDDR6 especially benefits from cooling on both sides of the PCB, but does this also hold true for GDDR4 (i.e. is it flip-chip BGA)? If not, I guess they used a 100% identically assembled cooler (down to the thermal pads) as the 2GB V8650. I would have thought it'd save them a few pennies by not adding these, if they are not thermally necessary.

You can barely see that Sammy print on the GDDR4
For this card, I only replaced the VRM thermal pad (totally dry and flaky) with an Arctic APT2560 0.5mm pad, and repasted with MX-4. The GDDR4 pads I left alone, as none were torn and all were squishy. Plus there are approximately 30 million of them on the board, and I don't have 1mm thick thermal pads on hand yet.

Also I think I'm some sort of dunce, because I completely forgot to take pics of the full front PCB. Oh well, here's the lowest resolution photo in the entire world:

[image from Vogons]

 

[kapone32]

[ 56k warning ]

Got a basically brand-new FireGL V8600!! In the world of hardware, there is at least one benefit to being quite young: I was 6 when this card came out, so it wasn't like I was purchasing tech left and right like now... All of this older hardware is new to me. Hell, I didn't even know GDDR4 existed until a year or two ago. So when I see old tech on eBay or anywhere else, such as this beautiful card from 15 years ago, it's a fantastic opportunity to grab something interesting and novel, and a brilliant learning opportunity. I don't care about how badly it runs current games, I want to collect, restore, and overclock just about everything. After overclocking LGA775, 1156, 1155, 1366, AM3, and AM4, you learn how tech progresses over time, which builds genuine understanding of what you're doing... And there is always so much more learning to be done.

View attachment 233123
View attachment 233124
View attachment 233125
View attachment 233126
View attachment 233127

One thing I found to be odd / interesting is that, despite this being a V8600 and not a FireGL V8650, there are still thermal pads on the backplate. I understand that GDDR6 especially benefits from cooling on both sides of the PCB, but does this also hold true for GDDR4 (i.e. is it flip-chip BGA)? If not, I guess they used a 100% identically assembled cooler (down to the thermal pads) as the 2GB V8650. I would have thought it'd save them a few pennies by not adding these, if they are not thermally necessary.

View attachment 233129
View attachment 233130

You can barely see that Sammy print on the GDDR4
For this card, I only replaced the VRM thermal pad (totally dry and flaky) with an Arctic APT2560 0.5mm pad, and repasted with MX-4. The GDDR4 pads I left alone, as none were torn and all were squishy. Plus there are approximately 30 million of them on the board, and I don't have 1mm thick thermal pads on hand yet.

Also I think I'm some sort of dunce, because I completely forgot to take pics of the full front PCB. Oh well, here's the lowest resolution photo in the entire world:

View attachment 233131[image from Vogons]

That is a ridiculous number of RAM chips! Imagine a modern card with that many chips. That would be like 32GB on a 6800XT.

 

[MachineLearning]

That is a ridiculous number of RAM chips! Imagine a modern card with that many chips. That would be like 32GB on a 6800XT.

Right? Honestly, I'm extremely thankful those pads were okay, that's gotta be painstaking.

Alright, ""quick"" V8600 update!

Above is stock settings in FurMark, it tops out at just about 60.5°C.

All full-system power measurements are readouts from a Kill-A-Watt P3. Case ambient temperature was kept at about 25°C, measured by motherboard's onboard sensor. I used a custom fan profile, as I don't mind the noise and wanted good thermal headroom, and this was kept identical between stock / OC tests. At stock, full-system power consumption was 275-280W during FurMark.

The max stable OC I was able to get, without touching any voltages whatsoever (so 1.2v constant vcore) was 840MHz core, 1000MHz memory. Anything higher on the core eventually caused a crash in FurMark, and anything higher on the memory resulted in negative scaling. Whereas 840C / 1000M produced near-constant 45FPS FurMark with the above settings, 840C / 1050M produced 43-44FPS. When overclocked, total system power consumption was 300-305W. Max temperature observed was 65°C (not the run above). Unlike newer GPUs, this card absolutely hates to have its clocks changed by >15MHz during FurMark, it completely locks up the system if you do so. However closing / restarting FurMark in between clock changes solves this hurdle. I was very concerned at first when everything locked up going from 688-700MHz core w/ memory untouched. 850C / 1000M is borderline stable - probably benchable, but FurMark eventually crashes after 2 minutes, and performance is still 45FPS. 850C / 950M is stable but worse than 840C / 1000M.

Performance improvement
FurMark: 37FPS -> 45FPS, +21.6%
Unigine Heaven total score: 612 -> 741, +21.1%

Woah! Just look at the difference in minimum FPS, that's a 264% increase!

I cannot overstate how huge this thing is. Seems to be about identical in length to my reference HD5970, to the point where in the P300A I had to mount one of the intake fans on the outside of the case (and even then, the card has to go in at a 45° angle). Also, I had to take out one multiple screws just so it could slide in the PCIe slot... same as with the HD5970. Screwholes circled below (one is DVI nut).

Side note to anyone looking for one of the most cost-effective coolers out there, the Thermalright PA120 in these pics is like $42 on Amazon US and kicks butt. Keeps this 2600k below 70° (typical 65°C) in P95 at my current settings. Here's an impression of the sheer size, it's maybe a few centimeters from the front fan.

Test system specs:
i7-2600k @ 4.5GHz, 1.35v
Kingston HyperX DDR3 2x8GB @ 1866MHz, CL10-11-10-30-243-2T [XMP]
ASUS P8Z68-V Pro / Gen3
MX500 1TB SSD
Seasonic Focus GM-650
Qualcomm-Atheros a/b/g/n add-in card, which adds marginally to power consumption.

...Are there still active ATI threads I can clog up? I've really become a big posthumous fan; although I don't have all that many ATI cards (yet) I love the ones I do have. BIOS modding is trivial with TPU's fantastic tools and DB, and I've got some fun cards like a HD5970, a couple HD5870's and HD5670's, plus a HD4870x2 on the way. I want to give them some attention and love again plus I like doing these write-ups, maybe a bit too much... I am so sorry for the length of this

 

[lexluthermiester]

Right? Honestly, I'm extremely thankful those pads were okay, that's gotta be painstaking.

I would take that back plate off and leave it off as it's not doing anything useful with an absence of RAM on that side of the card and it's weighing down the card enough to cause a bit of visible sag/droop. Also, those missing screw posts are generic. Find a cheap card, any card with two post, doesn't need to be a video card, on ebay or a local thrift shop or even tech shop if it's cheap. A tech shop might even give you a pair from a dead card if they like you!

 

[MachineLearning]

I would take that back plate off and leave it off as it's doing anything useful with an absence of RAM on that side of the card and it's weight down the card enough to cause a bit of visible sag/droop. Also, those missing screw posts are generic. Find a cheap card, any card with two post, doesn't need to be a video card, on ebay or a local thrift shop or even tech shop if it's cheap. A tech shop might even give you a pair from a dead card if they like you!

True! And without the backplate, it would be a bit more manageable in terms of length. I'm not going to keep it in this system long-term, but if I were, I'd definitely either do as you suggested or grab a cheap support bracket. Now that you mention it I can't stop staring at it

I totally made this unclear initially: I had to take out all of those screws circled in that photo myself, mainly because Phanteks uses a weird expansion slot brace / bracket. You can barely see it in that photo, but basically: a lot of reference ATI cards especially have those 2 screws up top their bracket, but they aren't flush with the metal (and can't be screwed down further to be flush). This bumps against a superfluous metal tab running along the entire length of the expansion slots, which in turn prevents the card from fully inserting into the PCIe slot. I'd rather not marr the case if I can avoid it, and this isn't an issue for most cards. As for the DVI nut, that totally prohibits the card from even entering the PCIe slot - but once the card is installed, can be reattached. Unfortunately, that stupid Phanteks metal tab stops the two smaller screws up top from being reinstalled - not too big of a problem, just another screw bag to keep track of. So I've (luckily) got them, they just can't be on the card for now.

 

[Mussels]

View attachment 233105View attachment 233106View attachment 233107

I love my silent wings, so i really want those in the future

 

[AlwaysHope]

Got sick of low speed case fans I had sitting around from previous builds not moving enough CFM through my system when it's gaming or benching & replaced all of them today with 6 x 140mm Cryorig HP fans + my first USB 3.2 thumb drive for other stuff ! Also an additional 4 pin fan cable splitter just in case.


Imo, Cryorig is an underestimated brand out there on the market, well worth having a look at their range of products.

 

[80-watt Hamster]

Got sick of low speed case fans I had sitting around from previous builds not moving enough CFM through my system when it's gaming or benching & replaced all of them today with 6 x 140mm Cryorig HP fans + my first USB 3.2 thumb drive for other stuff ! Also an additional 4 pin fan cable splitter just in case.
View attachment 233208

Imo, Cryorig is an underestimated brand out there on the market, well worth having a look at their range of products.

I have 2 Cryorig products (C7, M9i), and they've been great. But pricing and availability in the US is terrible.

 

[AlwaysHope]

I have 2 Cryorig products (C7, M9i), and they've been great. But pricing and availability in the US is terrible.

Over here in Australia, their pricing is quite competitive, not sure what's going on over there in the great USA? Those fans I bought have potential up to 128 CFM @ 1850rpm, max 38 dba & for $15 AUD each, they were great bargain imo!

 

[MachineLearning]

I have 2 Cryorig products (C7, M9i), and they've been great. But pricing and availability in the US is terrible.

I feel like Thermalright is probably a close parallel in the US, they're typically priced extremely competitively. I've fallen in love with the Peerless Assassin PA120, the black version looks amazing and they're really cost-effective. Their universal mounting kit isn't horribly expensive, and can fit nearly all of their products because many use common mounting. ID-Cooling is another great one of course, SE-224-XT is so good.

I will take this moment to shout out one of the dumbest mounting systems, be quiet!'s, which I see you and I both have to deal with Okay it's not the worst thing in the world, but at least on the Dark Rock Pro 4 it sucks because:
- Screws aren't captive so they're nice and easy to lose
- that stupid bar you have to get aligned without picking up with a magnetic screwdriver
- That metal top plate... my god. It's impossible to get the larger middle fan out without taking out my GPU so it could exit, even in the P500A with lots of headroom. Which you absolutely must do to unscrew the cooler, which has to be done through tiny holes at the top, very hard to see with a black cooler (Le Grand Macho did this concept way better if you must screw through the center). Before I intentionally took the retention clip off, the cooler was too close to the card's backplate, and adding another layer is the M.2 slot + heatsink right next to the PCIe retention clip, so it's extremely hard to depress... if that top plate (which looks beautiful - but is functionally useless) didn't exist, this all would be avoided.
- fan clips are a waste of steel, there's no lip on the part that attaches to the cooler so when you take fans off you feel like you're bending the clip horribly. On top of this the black paint scratches off extremely easily due to you scraping the clips across the fins, by design, because you can't lift the fan clips when installing them.

It looks pretty... but I will not buy a be quiet! cooler again unless they fix most or all of these small issues, and even then I'd rather buy Thermalright or Noctua. rant over

 

[ThaiTaffy]

So I bought a rs485 to WiFi module for my solar charge controller which as it was from China took a few weeks to deliver and not exactly cheap, turns out it only works with proprietary software and I now need to make my own. Best bit about the new system It cost pennies as I have most of the tech already fitted next to the controller switching solenoid valves for the sprinkler system. Just need to wait for this to be delivered.

 

[80-watt Hamster]

Over here in Australia, their pricing is quite competitive, not sure what's going on over there in the great USA? Those fans I bought have potential up to 128 CFM @ 1850rpm, max 38 dba & for $15 AUD each, they were great bargain imo!

It used to be good here. You could buy M9a/i for 20 bucks all day every day for awhile, and that thing punches way above its weight/price class IMO. C7 was $40, but you could find it for $30 if you were patient. H7 has a great rep, and at its original $50 RRP was a solid contender from everything I've read. All of it's practically unobtanium now. But it's hard to complain. We're spoiled over here in almost every other regard.

I feel like Thermalright is probably a close parallel in the US, they're typically priced extremely competitively. I've fallen in love with the Peerless Assassin PA120, the black version looks amazing and they're really cost-effective. Their universal mounting kit isn't horribly expensive, and can fit nearly all of their products because many use common mounting. ID-Cooling is another great one of course, SE-224-XT is so good.

I will take this moment to shout out one of the dumbest mounting systems, be quiet!'s, which I see you and I both have to deal with Okay it's not the worst thing in the world, but at least on the Dark Rock Pro 4 it sucks because:
- Screws aren't captive so they're nice and easy to lose
- that stupid bar you have to get aligned without picking up with a magnetic screwdriver
- That metal top plate... my god. It's impossible to get the larger middle fan out without taking out my GPU so it could exit, even in the P500A with lots of headroom. Which you absolutely must do to unscrew the cooler, which has to be done through tiny holes at the top, very hard to see with a black cooler (Le Grand Macho did this concept way better if you must screw through the center). Before I intentionally took the retention clip off, the cooler was too close to the card's backplate, and adding another layer is the M.2 slot + heatsink right next to the PCIe retention clip, so it's extremely hard to depress... if that top plate (which looks beautiful - but is functionally useless) didn't exist, this all would be avoided.
- fan clips are a waste of steel, there's no lip on the part that attaches to the cooler so when you take fans off you feel like you're bending the clip horribly. On top of this the black paint scratches off extremely easily due to you scraping the clips across the fins, by design, because you can't lift the fan clips when installing them.

It looks pretty... but I will not buy a be quiet! cooler again unless they fix most or all of these small issues, and even then I'd rather buy Thermalright or Noctua. rant over

Def eyeing TR for the next time I'm cooler shopping. Spec'ed out a True Spirit 120 for a friend's platform upgrade. We'll see how she fares with it on her 11600K.

</OT>

 

[MachineLearning]

It used to be good here. You could buy M9a/i for 20 bucks all day every day for awhile, and that thing punches way above its weight/price class IMO. C7 was $40, but you could find it for $30 if you were patient. H7 has a great rep, and at its original $50 RRP was a solid contender from everything I've read. All of it's practically unobtanium now. But it's hard to complain. We're spoiled over here in almost every other regard.



Def eyeing TR for the next time I'm cooler shopping. Spec'ed out a True Spirit 120 for a friend's platform upgrade. We'll see how she fares with it on her 11600K.

</OT>

Oh, yeah - I just checked that one, that fan rotor looks great. There's a Plus version which adds a fan, on Amazon US for some reason it's $30, vs $40 for the non-Plus. That's a headscratcher, but anyway, keep an eye out for that variant! The Assassin Spirit might be available even cheaper if you can find a good deal, usually runs =<$30. Thermalright TBK mount fits all coolers I mentioned and is a godsend if you mess with LGA1366 often and don't have spare coolers for it, not many new coolers come with that bracket (or I'm too picky lol)