Sexy Hardware Close-Up Pic Clubhouse.

[Fouquin]

 

[freeagent]

 

[madness777]

 

[aQi]

 

[sam_86314]

Socket G2 Intel Core i3-2310M

 

[madness777]

Just had this come in today! Another big piece to my small collection
It won't be difficult to identify for the one with the real hawk eyes!

 

[RealNeil]

64GB of 4400MHz. RAM for one of the beasts.

 

[sam_86314]

Macro shot of an overheating chip on my old MacBook Pro.

Wouldn't be an Apple product without something overheating to the point of melting...

Not entirely sure what that chip does, but the computer still works fine.

 

[stinger608]

Not entirely sure what that chip does, but the computer still works fine.

I looked it up and it states that it is "HDMI/DVI level shifter" ??????
LOL, not sure what that is to be honest.

 

[DR4G00N]

Not entirely sure what that chip does, but the computer still works fine.

Should be the chip handling DP/Thunderbolt display output.

 

[Valantar]

Macro shot of an overheating chip on my old MacBook Pro.

Wouldn't be an Apple product without something overheating to the point of melting...

Not entirely sure what that chip does, but the computer still works fine.

Kind of hard to tell from the photo, but is that a glob of solder on the chip, or has it blown a hole through itself? I can't tell if that thing is convex or concave. Either way: Louis Rossman should have that fixed in no time, along with some well-placed ...words... for Apple.

 

[sam_86314]

Kind of hard to tell from the photo, but is that a glob of solder on the chip, or has it blown a hole through itself? I can't tell if that thing is convex or concave. Either way: Louis Rossman should have that fixed in no time, along with some well-placed ...words... for Apple.

There's a piece of plastic on the bottom panel of the laptop that I guess is supposed to prevent the SMD components from shorting on it. I think that mark is either a hole in the chip, or that plastic layer melted onto it.

The laptop still works fine, idling at 70C like any good Apple laptop... We've had it for nine years and it's gotten plenty of use.

 

[madness777]

GTX 680 Classified and Lightning

 

[HammerON]

 

[Mussels]

RGB ram anyone? tricky to get the focus right

 

[witkazy]

I really hope it ain't going wind up to be Clockwork Lemon

 

[tabascosauz]

Finally decided to liberate my XPS 9370 from Dell's clearly horrible cement-like factory thermal paste job after a freak firmware tried to set my laptop on fire. The paste was pre-applied to the heatsink contact plate in a square patch that's twice as thick as AMD's stock cooler paste, and is near-impossible to remove without seriously hard scrubbing with a Q-tip, even after liberally soaking in 99% alcohol.

 

[Athlonite]

@ tabascosauz I find that when it's like that I'll use an old blunt (less likely to dig in) razor scraper makes a tedious job real quick

 

[Secret Rival]

RGB ram anyone? tricky to get the focus right

I have the same problem, probably could use a course on proper pic settings for the bright RGB. Very happy with these Royal Z 32GBx2.

 

[emissary42]

 

[Valantar]

I have the same problem, probably could use a course on proper pic settings for the bright RGB. Very happy with these Royal Z 32GBx2.

Here's a quick (edit: not so quick, sorry!) rundown:
The most important thing would be for your camera to have sufficient dynamic range to not burn out the RGB while still capturing some detail in the non-lit parts of the image - you are after all trying to take a picture consisting of both a light source and other things around it that are typically quite dark (most components are black). Try to balance the ambient lighting so that you can reach your desired look - whether that is a stark contrast or clearly visible components but with vibrant RGB too. If adding external lighting, avoid shining it directly at things - bounce the light off a white wall, piece of paper or something else that will diffuse the light - that way you can avoid burnt-out specular highlights and overly plastic-y looking shots. If you're struggling to get your focus right while using autofocus, you likely need more ambient lighting - the higher the contrast of the scene, the more difficult it will be for the AF algorithm to find something to latch onto. If that makes your scene too bright, set your focus manually (even most phones these days support this) with extra lighting added, then turn it off before taking the shot. Whatever you do, don't use your camera/phone's built-in flash.

Of course even a high end camera in an unevenly lit setting would likely require some editing, lifting the shadows to bring back details that would otherwise be invisible, possibly bringing down the highlights to make the lights look more vibrant and less washed out. If you have access to Lightroom that makes this trivial, but even free editors can handle this relatively easily. Good HDR modes also handle this type of stuff decently - and some are really good - but leave you zero control of the shot after the fact. Shoot raw, not jpeg - shooting jpeg means you are discarding tons of data in the image, so you'll lose a lot of valuable dynamic range by shooting jpeg. Again, most phones today allow some form of raw capture (mostly DNG - which requires a lot of space, but works fine).

As for camera settings: as low as you can for ISO (base camera ISO lifted in post in a half-decent editor has less noise than an unedited higher ISO shot) with no (or as little as possible) in-camera noise reduction. If you're getting a too noisy shot, drop your ISO, then increase your shutter speed and/or add lighting to compensate. For a still of a non-moving subject, shutter speed is essentially irrelevant - pick whatever gives you the desired exposure. Expose for the highlights in the image - still image compression favors shadow detail, so you can almost always bring details back from a seemingly underexposed shot, while a burnt-out highlight will never be anything but white.

Use a tripod to get your framing right. If you want pretty defocus effects you also need a wide (low number) aperture (and remember that aperture is relative to the size of the sensor, so for example f1.8 on a tiny phone sensor does not produce even close to the shallow depth of field of a f1.8 lens for an APS-C or full-frame DSLR/ILC sensor). Depth of field is also dependent on the absolute focusing distance, so it's easier to get a shallow depth of field if close to your subject. A "normal" focal length (~40-75mm) will likely look better than a wide angle (20-35mm), but don't go full telephoto (>75mm) as that'll make for a very dense photo with the background "squeezed" in behind the subject. Ultrawides (<20mm) should be avoided unless it's a very deliberate creative decision, as they add significant distortion - but if used correctly, they can look really cool. This is also of course down to how you want to frame your subject and compose your image. Also note that if you're shooting with a phone camera with multiple sensors, the main sensor likely has (far) better image quality than the secondary ones.

And last but not least, be mindful of the composition of your image. Make sure that every element in the shot is placed where it is intentionally, and make an effort to avoid things that mess up your composition. Lots of good component shots are ruined by not bothering to move a cable out of the way or other small stuff.

The above photo from @emissary42 is an excellent showcase of a well balanced shot: there's plenty of contrast but nothing is too bright or too dark; the focus is set perfectly so that the text is sharp and focus falls off nicely while still making the rest of the important parts of the shot visible; noise is controlled; and the framing feels just right - there's no doubt where they want me to look, nothing extraneous in the shot, and the intention of the photographer comes through clearly. Avoiding burnt-out specular highlight on the metal parts is particularly well done. Of course there's no RGB or other light sources in the shot complicating this, but it's still a very nice shot.

 

[Secret Rival]

Here's a quick (edit: not so quick, sorry!) rundown:

That is great, thank you for taking time to explain, Valantar. Really appreciated!
I will take your advice for sure, maybe soon I'll have a decent shot.

 

[Secret Rival]

Tweaked a few settings, the bright RBG light isn't burning as bright, looks much better. Good advice, Valantar!

 

[sneekypeet]

As a guy who takes a lot of RGB images, it is tough not to get hotspots in some of the lighting. You are really close, but you may want to add a bit of lighting to help offset the vast differences in lighting. Would eliminate some of that noise as well I think.

This is one of my better attempts over the years.

 

[Secret Rival]

I'm using my Samsung phone potato - it is the A-20.
I think i'd like to get a decent camera with more settings.
What are opinions on a good camera, either dedicated or phone combo?
Thank you,sneekypeet, I am going to try to experiment with some lighting variances.
I'm so knocked out by the RGB, especially the Thermaltake Quads, I want to get some
Hi Def shots. I like the one above because you can see the mesh in between the fan blades.
I want to get more shots like that but better quality!