Post your setup!

[sheridanm962]

Only change I've made is I now have a nice Thermaltake case instead of a crappy tiny case that I hacked up to fit my big Graphics Card.

Also have some more fans, still runs quiet

[BTGBullseye]

Ok, so... Final build specs of the system, which I am using right now...

 

Monitor: MSI Optix MAG241C - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824475017 - $200

Case: Antec P5 - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129239 - $60

PSU: Rosewill CAPSTONE 750M - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182264 - $75

Motherboard: ASRock B450M Steel Legend - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157868 - $90

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2400G - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819113480 - $140

RAM: G.SKILL Flare X (for AMD) 16GB DDR4-3200 16-18-18-38 - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820232767 - $90

NVMe: HP EX900 1TB - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820326786 - $120

 

I think I won the silicon lottery with this CPU... It's benchmarking about 5% higher than it should without overclocking. It's also housing the second best Vega 11 ever benchmarked by any decent benchmarking site I can find. (and that appears to be exclusively because I'm not using 3200 ram with 14-14-14 timings) Also, this is exclusively using the stock cooler, not an aftermarket.

 

Here's my benchmark. (the second one, from after I fixed some RAM timing issues)

https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/17008147

 

[EDIT] I've reduced the voltage and overclocking of the Vega 11 until I can get an aftermarket cooler... Seems after about 30 minutes of gaming, it overheats and crashes the system. Even with my reduced settings, I still have to take the side panel off to keep it cool.

Edited May 18, 2019 by BTGBullseye (see edit history)

[BTGBullseye]

Here's a rundown of a few different things you may not be considering, and some explanations for some of your questions.

 

1. Curved screens. They are increasingly common for computer monitors because they significantly reduce eye strain, don't cost more than a flat screen, and with very few exceptions, are servicing a single person seated at the ideal distance centered on the screen. I myself was opposed to using a curved screen until I actually got one, and realized just how much easier it is on the eyes, and how non-distracting it is. The curves used are so slight that the sharpest is a 1500R, meaning the curve aligns with that of a circle with a radius of 1500mm. (just under 60 inches radius, or 10 feet diameter) If that's just too sharp for you, try the 1800R panels. (about 71 inches radius, or 12 foot diameter) Something to think about.

 

2. TN panels. TN, or Twisted Nematic, has the fastest natural response and refresh times available. Of course, that is irrelevant when the other panel types can match it closely enough that no human can ever tell the difference. TN also sucks at literally everything else except for being cheap. Washed out colors, and backlighting bleed plagues this technology. Only use this if you need an ultra cheap FPS competitive screen for e-sports.

 

3. VA panels. VA, or Vertical Alignment, has the absolute best color reproduction of any LCD panel. With the newer technologies, can easily get to 144Hz refresh and 1ms response times. (both are at the limits of human perception) It slightly more expensive than TN, but far superior in every way. Minimal backlight bleed, very dark blacks, viewing from an angle does bleach the colors, but almost imperceptibly. This is considered to be the ideal between price and performance, as you get the best of TN's performance with almost none of its drawbacks, plus an image quality on-par or superior to the cheap IPS panels. ***If using for anything but industry-specific professional scenarios, this is the panel to get.***

 

4. IPS panels. IPS, or In-Plane Switching, right now has 2 things going for it... The best black colors, and the least viewing angle color distortion of LCD displays. They suck at performance, their colors are better than TN, but worse than VA, and they're very expensive for a decent panel. IPS is for if you absolutely need an HDR display, and aren't all that concerned about cost, color accuracy, or response times. (the worst ghosting will happen with IPS)

 

5. LED panels. These displays are very rare in computer displays, but are common in phones with organic LEDs. (OLED/AMOLED) These are the only screen that has perfect blacks, no color distortion at any angle, and can have perfect color reproduction. The downside is, the blues fade in about 2 years, the screen is extremely prone to burn-in, (when an item like the start button stays in the same spot, it'll leave a ghost image of it there forever after just a few months) and the response/refresh rates are atrocious. QLEDs (LEDs using inorganic metal instead of organic compounds) are aiming to solve the burn-in problem somewhat, but so far have merely pushed it back to about 5 years before the blues fade too much. These displays are expensive beyond belief, especially for as low of a lifespan as they have. Unless you're wanting to spend several thousand dollars every 2 years, and don't care about response times or refresh rates, don't bother with these.

 

I hope this was informative. Newer technologies may change this info, but for right now and the foreseeable future, this is the state of display technology.

Edited May 21, 2019 by BTGBullseye (see edit history)

[BTGBullseye]

Unless you're viewing it at 150° or more of an angle, the curve won't significantly affect your viewing on any modern curved monitor. That would be the equivalent of a 1:2 screen ratio when viewing.

 

Just a question... What do you consider "tacky" about the MSI screen? It's is very similar to those in appearance, but without the giant bezels. It also has a higher brightness (300 cd/m2 vs 280 cd/m2) and better color range (95% NTSC vs 80% NTSC) than both for a similar price. (though it is a 1500R display instead of 1800R)

 

As for having the correct perspective, you're going to get a LOT more accurate with a curved display, unless you're designing for a flat sign of some sort. Curved panels are very much more popular than flat for digital use apart from phones.

 

Since you're looking for graphics work, color accuracy is much higher on the list of "mandatory things that you must have" than perfect perspective during creation. Look for an HDR monitor for that kind of work, not a low-end gaming monitor. If it doesn't have a native 10-bit panel, you're hindered for graphics work. Graphics work also doesn't need 144Hz or fast response times, so unless you're looking for an all-rounder, (very expensive) you don't need to worry about those aspects at all.

 

Something like this would be a good starting point for graphic design... (but I wouldn't recommend gaming on it) https://www.newegg.com/axm-2768-27-qhd/p/15Z-00MH-00006

[BTGBullseye]

Update!

 

I just got a Deepcool Gammaxx 400 to keep my CPU/GPU temps down. I can now go to full overclocking on my GPU without it shutting down from overheating!

 

Benchmark: https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/17161067 (second best GPU benchmark available, but he has better RAM and is OCing the CPU as well on a Mini-ITX)

Edited May 24, 2019 by BTGBullseye (see edit history)

[BTGBullseye]

Another update... Officially the #1 iGPU in the world. (current OC is 1650MHz @ 1.275v) And it doesn't even go above 85°c.

 

https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/17286868

Edited May 30, 2019 by BTGBullseye (see edit history)

[sheridanm962]

I've finally went ahead with my ghetto GPU cooling solution by cable tying two case fans onto my R9 390.

My case is windowed, but I don't care about fancy LEDs and RGB nonsense.

[Luis]

11 hours ago, sheridanm962 said:

I've finally went ahead with my ghetto GPU cooling solution by cable tying two case fans onto my R9 390.

My case is windowed, but I don't care about fancy LEDs and RGB nonsense.

Nice. Are the temps OK? I'd guess two case fans are way better than the included ones on the GPU heatsink. I've seen people do this and it looks rad to me as a DYI PC Enthusiast. 

[BTGBullseye]

On 6/2/2019 at 6:06 AM, sheridanm962 said:

I've finally went ahead with my ghetto GPU cooling solution by cable tying two case fans onto my R9 390.

My case is windowed, but I don't care about fancy LEDs and RGB nonsense.

Take a picture, we want to see it!

[sheridanm962]

23 hours ago, BTGBullseye said:

Take a picture, we want to see it!

Bit dusty, but meh. I've given this thing a "blow job" so many times, I feel dirty myself.

 

 

On 6/3/2019 at 11:29 AM, Luis said:

Nice. Are the temps OK? I'd guess two case fans are way better than the included ones on the GPU heatsink. I've seen people do this and it looks rad to me as a DYI PC Enthusiast. 

Temperatures are better. Given this card is naturally hot even in normal conditions... 

Undervolted it's 28C idle and around 80-84C maximum on load.

This card would crash over 95C, the biggest problem with one of the fans dying meant that even the VRAM would fry itself after a while.
Would be nice to settle for an RX series GPU given the fact that it's similar in both VRAM and performance, just more efficient and less hot lol

EDIT: Gotta mention the spaghetti... It's non modular. I've had this 750W PSU for about 4 years now.

Edited June 4, 2019 by sheridanm962 (see edit history)

[BTGBullseye]

Nice! I'll put up some pictures of my system later today after I get the new case fans, that way you can be jealous.

 

[EDIT] Or not, because the shipping method the seller used sucks. (they've had it in my town for 2 days, but haven't delivered it yet, and it was due today)

Edited June 4, 2019 by BTGBullseye (see edit history)

[Luis]

I'll definitely be jealous. My system is looking so ugly. I had some issues with one of my hard drives after an unexpected shutdown and opened the case to disconnect my data HDD and only keep the SSD connected. I dusted it off mainly to lower temps but man, I really need to invest in some decent looking fans.

My current fans are random, some non-functional and look ugly being all different. I have a 120mm Corsair SP Blue on the back, a 140mm blue LED bitfenix (that for some reason doesn't work) at the bottom and the original exhaust CM fan next to the bitfenix as an intake. The front blue LED 120mm that is supposed to be able to be turned on and off only has 1 remaining LED that lights up and barely spins because of debris buildup.  My dream is to get a mini itx motherboard and a nice itx case to fit it all in but since it works fine as it is now I don't prioritize it.  The GPU is never over 70C and neither is the CPU. 

 

I plan to be able to move to another country by the end of the year and at this point, I think it will be better to invest in a good mini ITX case and motherboard and sell my old CM 690II basic and mobo. That will probably also mean investing in a good little heatsink as the Hyper 212X is not small by any means. It bugs me that ITX also sometimes implies getting an SFX power supply. :l 

If anybody has suggestions for a good mini ITX case that might fit into a large suitcase I'm all ears. The Dr.Zaber Sentry is beautiful but a bit expensive for my taste. I want the case to be affordable especially considering I might have to get a new CPU heatsink, motherboard, new power supply and maybe even new storage as not all small cases have support for a clunky 3.5' HDD. Bonus points if it fits an optical unit. 

The SilverStone Technology Tek Raven Z Evolution look pretty cool as it is one of the few that does fit a standard power supply. It doesn't support a 3.5' HDD but storage is not as expensive. 

 

 

[sheridanm962]

I usually get 2.5" drives out of broken laptops. One of them I have is 1TB

[BTGBullseye]

49 minutes ago, sheridanm962 said:

I usually get 2.5" drives out of broken laptops. One of them I have is 1TB

Yup. I used my 500GB laptop drives for storage all the time... Surprisingly useful.

 

FYI, mini ITX is usually about triple the price for a motherboard than any other form factor. Micro ATX is usually the cheapest, and is the next smallest. I'd suggest a thin case for a Micro ATX board personally. (they're usually not very expensive, and not that much bigger than mini ITX)

[Luis]

Hey  

I hadn't taken that into consideration. Looking at the boards my local store has, they have a mini itx and a micro atx board of the same price. But the mini itx is much more barebones. One is B360 and the other one B365M. I personally do not mind since my i5 8400 does not support overclocking. I currently have a Z370 one because it's what came with the bundle I bought. 

 

These are the two avaliable ones: 

ASROCK B360M-ITX-AC

 

and 
ASROCK B365M PHANTOM GAMING 4

 

The B365M lacks USB 3.1 and onboard wifi but those aren't features I'm particularly attracted to. It has a better audio codec though.. I think I'll follow your advice and look for slim micro ATX cases for that mobo. I'm not fond of asrock as back in the Core 2 Duo days I had a G13 and G41 motherboard die on me and they were both asrock but I haven't heard of issues with their boards in years. 
 

[BTGBullseye]

The newer Asrock stuff seems to be of remarkably good quality. Asrock used to be just the shitty versions of the ASUS boards, now they're beating out much of the ASUS stuff, and at a lower price.

[Luis]

There's been a little update in my rig. I bought 16gb of G.Skill Ripjaws at 3000Mhz that replace my 8GB of Kingston FuryX at 2133. 

 

I ran a benchmark before putting the new kit in and there are some improvements but it seems I wasn't as bottlenecked by the single-channel 8gb at 2133 as I thought I was. 

 

 

This was with the 8GB :

 

 

And this is with the 16gb:

 

 

I also got 2 more FPS in Half-Life 2: Lost Coast's benchmark. I know I could have seen a bigger difference by benchmarking the memory itself or CPU-heavy applications but didn't feel like downloading more stuff.  I will report if I see more stability in gameplay in PUBG. I re-did mi cable management and connected a fan that was disconnected. That may be why there is a slight reduction in the temperatures. Also for some reason I had a hard time gettiong my motherboard to boot with these at 3000 Mhz. CPU-Z shows that the memory is running fine at 3000Mhz but the biuos for some reason states that these are 2133 sticks running at 3000mhz. 

[sheridanm962]

Some games and simulators (BeamNG.Drive etc) need 16GB of RAM to run normally. I've run into issues when playing and putting in an extra 8GB helped a lot.

[Luis]

2 hours ago, sheridanm962 said:

Some games and simulators (BeamNG.Drive etc) need 16GB of RAM to run normally. I've run into issues when playing and putting in an extra 8GB helped a lot.

I actually just tested PUBG and even though I do not have exact benchmarks the game did feel a lot smoother. My FPS in the different maps tended to hover around 90-100-110 FPS and it is now at over 110 all the time fluctuating between 110 and 130 and even 140 sometimes. The difference is very, very noticeable. The extra smoothness makes the game a bit more responsive. I'm a happy man now. 

[BTGBullseye]

FYI, the reason the sticks are shown as 2133 is because that's exactly what they are... That 3000 is what they are rated to overclock to, but they are natively a 2133 stick. (my 3200 sticks are native 2133 as well)

 

Your system isn't that far off from mine for performance, apart from you having a dedicated GPU already. (I'm having to save up for a Vega 56 for mine)

Edited June 13, 2019 by BTGBullseye (see edit history)