Random Technology Questions

[Sombra]

PC is just big boy lego. Seriously though build it yourself, you'll save bullsh*t assembly fees and learn alot along the way plus later on youll know how to upgrade/repair said system. I think the worst part the first time is thermal paste and even then it's easy. Just make sure you get the right parts and make sure to ground yourself and it'll be fine.

[GIRR]

I forgot I had this bookmarked, do you think this is a good setup? Some youtuber I used to follow has this.

http://astore.amazon.com/thez03-20?node=1&page=1

[Andreaz1]

Don't know about the US but here the 980 is considered quite poor value, an R9 390X gives similar performance for less money.

 

I think the PSU is an old model and is only bronze certified, there are many better Gold certified models out there today.

 

I'd rather go Intel if you have that kind of a budget.

[Sombra]

Yeah for that price going Intel is a better option. If you aren't too concerned about the case or mobo you cou could get a cheaper case and a Asus/MSI mATX board and that'd allow you to have a 4790k/r9 390x (4790 is probably overkill lol)

 

We'd need a proper budget though since that was mostly just guesswork estimating you're spending around 1k on the rig itself but the 4790/390X is $744 on newegg.

[yoječ]

Yeah, definitely switch to Intel, even if you'd have to get GTX970/R9-390 instead of GTX980. It doesn't have to be an i7 - i5-6600k (or i5-6500 if you're not keen on OC) would suffice. You'll be much better off than sticking with AMD CPUs.

Edited January 23, 2016 by yojc

[GIRR]

I actually don't have a budget in mind. I just recently got a new job, so I'm trying to get an idea what it's going to take. I actually went to the site Xidax.com and nearly cried when I saw how much a high end computer would cost.

[sivispacem]

Eh? A 6500, decent motherboard and 16GB of DDR4 is well under £400. That's cheap. I spent £640 in total on the components for my X99 upgrade and I consider that to have been pretty good value.

[Andreaz1]

I actually don't have a budget in mind. I just recently got a new job, so I'm trying to get an idea what it's going to take. I actually went to the site Xidax.com and nearly cried when I saw how much a high end computer would cost.

"High end" can mean a lot of different thing depending on what you want to do with the PC and what kind of monitor you have/want to get.

 

I recommend PC Part Picker which has lots of guides and part lists that you can check out: https://pcpartpicker.com/

 

Feel free to start a thread of your own if you want more detailed recommendations tailored to your needs.

Edited January 23, 2016 by Andreaz1

[GIRR]

Thanks for your help everyone.

[EvilKin]

Hey guys, wondering if you could help out with something.

I have a HD camcorder and I am trying to reduce the file size of the videos I have taken without reducing the quality a whole heap. Are the any programs that anyone may be able to recommend.

 

At the moment the file size is huge. 685MB for about a 4 minute clip

 

Thanks

[Sombra]

Depends what you're going to compress it down for. Are you just archiving them or making a video or something like that?

[sivispacem]

So, do I buy a second GTX970 now or do I just wait for Pascal and replace my existing one?

[yoječ]

I'd definitely wait.

[sivispacem]

That's my current thinking.

[Andreaz1]

Waiting is the only thing that makes sense unless you feel like your current 970 is hopelessly lagging behind, which it really shouldn't. Even then I feel like a selling it and getting a 980Ti makes more sense than two 970's.

Edited January 29, 2016 by Andreaz1

[sivispacem]

Selling a 970 and buying a 980Ti would cost me about £400-£450, buying a second 970 would cost me about £250 so there's a pretty big difference in costs there. But muddling along with my 970 for 9 months is no real chore and it makes it all the more likely that I'll be buying a 980 equivilent next time round.

[EvilKin]

Depends what you're going to compress it down for. Are you just archiving them or making a video or something like that?

Main reason is space. I use it a lot and I will run out of room on my computer very quickly.

[Giantsgiants]

I have a Samsung plasma TV that's about 10 years old, and it won't turn on. What it does is that it makes an initial clicking sound. Then it makes a higher pitched clicking sound and sounds like it's shutting off. It then makes a clicking noise every 15 or so seconds.

 

Any idea on what may be causing the issue?

[DEALUX]

Are high capacity HDDs (over 2 TB) unreliable as people say or is there nothing to worry about?

[yoječ]

To be honest, I'd stick to 1TB drives for the time being if reliability is your main concern.

[gajrajgchouhan]

^^Why they (2 TB HDDs) are considered unreliable ?

[sivispacem]

I think it's got something to do with squeezing double the number of platters into the same physical space.

[yoječ]

Yeah, pretty much. More platters and more heads equals more moving parts that are likely to fail.

 

I think there aren't any consumer HDDs that use platters bigger than 1TB, although I recall seeing a 1.5TB platter HDD on some website, though that was probably just an engineering sample, not a retail product.

[Sombra]

 

Depends what you're going to compress it down for. Are you just archiving them or making a video or something like that?

Main reason is space. I use it a lot and I will run out of room on my computer very quickly.

 

 

sh*t just seen this, I use Handbrake to size down FRAPS recordings that I need to upload to YT real quick.

 

First screen is the Fraps uncompressed .avi at 1680x1050 and the second is compressed with HandBrake to a 1280x720 .mp4

 

 

 

Uncompressed is 544MB compressed is 16.4MB; just needed to share the stunt spot with a friend so here's the vid also.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F36HLjsQAW4&feature=youtu.be

[Andreaz1]

Well yeah, FRAPS footage isn't compressed at all which is why it's so huge. I only record very rarely but I started using Nvidia's Shadowplay which is a lot better and hardly uses any hardware resources.

[Sombra]

Yeah it was just a very basic example since I had nothing else to compress down. If EvilKin wanted he could look up the settings that are used for DVDRip compressions which would presumably work well with camera footage.

[gajrajgchouhan]

@Blaze What settings do you use in HandBrake to compress that video ?

[Sombra]

I just used the standard Windows Phone setting. If I was going to actually compress it for storage or whatever I'd make a different template but that was just to share a stunt spot with a friend

[Ai®a©ob®a]

You're TV died and went to TV heaven, It's time for a new one

[Red Hat]

You're TV died and went to TV heaven, It's time for a new one

How can you be so sure it went to TV heaven?