Posts by fadedorca66

Of course it doesn't work anymore 😬

I guess you're looking at a 750 Ti, R7 265, or an R9 270 now

Nothing much, just pulled the motherboard out of the case. I'm gonna try to boot it on my desk with the bare minimum setup, I guess.

I guess you could just grab the cheapest i5 with a socket 1150 (so an i5-4***) and one 8GB stick of RAM, just so you aren't totally stuck if you decide to upgrade later.

It's actually pretty solid. Don't let those MHz/GHz numbers trip you up too much; they aren't really the best way to measure actual performance anyway.

Roger Mitchell4 said:So, pre-built setups are totally off the table?

Is there seriously zero chance a pre-built actually works?

Not a single one.

With one option, you get a junk motherboard, a weak GPU, and a trash power supply.
The second option gives you a mediocre motherboard and graphics card.
And the third one? It’s just a total disaster. 😁

Is it actually any good?

Yeah, it's huge, but you end up getting way worse components for the same price. It’s a total rip-off, I guess.

HD7770, you can probably snag one for about five bucks

If you go the Intel route, the cost is pretty much on par with AMD (the cheapest i5 is around $433, and you can probably snag a motherboard for about 400-$167). You don't really need anything fancy since Intel chips have lower TDP, so even an i7 would run fine on a $100 board.

FX8320 vs i5: well, the FX-8320 has 8 cores (doesn't mean much right now, I guess, but we'll see in a few years), but the FX-8320 runs hotter and pulls more power. Plus, that stock cooler for the FX-8320 is pretty loud, though you can overclock it—but then again, the Intel overclocking options usually end up costing more.

That’s exactly why you’re getting the Yeti Tundra. If she claims even that one isn't any good, then she clearly doesn't know 😬

(People tried telling me the same thing about the cooling performance, but honestly, it's a total steal)

Jose Martin96 said:I probably won't mess with overclocking. I can't really afford a new CPU if this one fries, and honestly, it’s doing alright for me right now. It used to keep jumping into some energy-saving mode on its own, but I fixed that in the BIOS settings so it's fine now. I think I'll just grab one of those R7 250 cards—going new just for the warranty, I guess—and if the power supply holds up, then great. If not, I might pick up that recommended unit since the price is decent, but I'd rather not swap things out unless I have to. Thanks.

Interesting thought, but I guess your processor is more likely to die from a bad power supply than from overclocking. 😁

Just watch out so they don't sell you an R7 250 with DDR3 memory, because that thing is way slower than the DDR5 version. You definitely want to look for DDR5. Might even be worth stretching the budget for a 250X if you can.

Maybe grab a used $133 HD7770 and dump the rest into a decent power supply. God knows when this thing might finally kick the bucket

If they’ve already got an SSD, I guess it might not be worth throwing $150 at some old RAM

I mean, honestly, it’s probably not worth it even for a new CPU unless you snag an absolute steal.

Just grab a Western Digital instead; at least you can toss that into a new build later on.

I mean, honestly, this processor is probably faster than that quad-core Sempron in most scenarios anyway. Plus, you actually have an upgrade path here, which you definitely don't get with that Sempron stuff.

Not really worth it. I'd just go with 2x4GB RAM instead, since APUs basically live and die by dual channel speeds and memory bandwidth.
And yeah, you definitely need one. Mine was running crazy hot with the stock cooler and sounded like a jet engine taking off.

Scroll down a bit, why's it labeled caution?

Kimberly Gomez34 said:It just occurred to me that a friend of a friend who ran a small business—handling things like cash registers and tax compliance—actually filmed a Windows demo— $100 if I recall correctly
.

If only it were just about putting in the work. You lose at least two hours, maybe even more sometimes.

Larry Ortiz5 said:Honestly, I used to charge by the $67. Why on earth is it so expensive? You’ve got the Windows installation, then activation, followed by all those Windows updates, plus hunting down drivers and getting essential software installed. The whole process drags on for three or four hours—man, Windows updates just eat up so much time. I'm not the kind of person who's going to just break a Windows setup and walk out, only to have them call me back later as a "returning customer" complaining about what isn't working. Either you do the job right from the start and stay patient, or don't bother doing it at all.

A buddy of mine handles this perfectly—just wipes the C: drive and runs the installer without any drivers or anything. All you end up with is a recycle bin on the desktop. 🤣

You can probably find 500GB for $117, and anything 1TB from $133 up isn't even that much more expensive

Honestly, what's the point? You'll maybe get an extra 800MHz out of that CPU, but even then, it's probably not enough to run FM or anything similar since it's just ancient. And don't even get me started on AC—it won't run, period. It’s just too old...

Instead of blowing your cash on an external drive, I'd say just grab a decent 1TB internal drive. At least you can actually reuse it when you upgrade your other parts later.

After that, your only real move is to buy everything else new or used, depending on how much you're willing to shell out.

For example, check this out. For $300 plus the cost of a new drive, you'd have a setup fast enough to actually make you happy:

1 x Asrock H81M-VG4, Intel Socket 1150
1 x DDR3 4GB (1x4GB) Crucial, 1600MHz CL11
1 x Intel Celeron G1820 (2.70GHz,512KB,2MB,54 W,1150) Box

$292