Trying for a father's day upgrade...

I'm sure it will. Even the IGP in my 4'ish year old i7 4470 worked fine for browsing/video while I was waiting for a new PSU. I've got one of the previous generation Intel NUC i3's acting as a HTPC and that never had any problems playing high bitrate video through Kodi either.

 

Unless you're going for 4k HDR content then you'll be fine.

 

OOOH! If the GT 710 with only 2GB can provide smooth viddy playback then the upgrade total is down to $404.13 and I get the 2x8GB of ram.

 

Should I push my luck for another $40? My case is getting pretty sad looking....

http://www.microcenter.com/product/468563/PC-K5WX_Steel_Windowed_ATX_Mid-Tower_Case_-_Black

Ugh, nevermind. Just noticed how little room for viddy cards there is in there.

I don't need a new case, f-it!

 

"only" 2GB RAM on low end graphics card?

no big pb, I think a 512MB would be enough if that still existed. In fact you have twice the memory than some other GT 710s and it will run quite a few games (somewhat ressembles the Nintendo Switch GPU with some missing efficiency as it's a gen older)

If you really want to know this card decodes 4K H264 in hardware, but VP9 codec or other will give work to the CPU instead.

 

But will not work with Netflix 4k just FYI

 

Ok, what's a good current low-end card that supports most forms of hardware playback acceleration? I think that's what I'm looking for.

Can't play with it today, I'm trying to save my wife $300 on pool repairs and get it open for her on her day off tomorrow. I have to do it anyways, so I figure a positive attitude is the best way forward.

 

There are two, RX 550 and GT1030. Kind of "premium" for such a role (there will also be yet another codec in the near future, AV1, which I would assume they do not support. But there might be such "codec fatigue" that I don't know if it's very relevant compared to VP9 and H265)

Maybe the R5 1600 is enough of a beast (yet at 65 watts) to be good enough for 1080p60 and 4k30?

 

The R5 1600 will be paired with an R9 390X, I plan to steal it from my wife.

 

The 1030 is available on newegg. About 80 dollars... is that too much?

 

Pretty sure everything is too much right now. I got lectured yesterday because I "keep buying things on Amazon!" and was instructed to not spend any monies on anything without permissions.

I checked my amazon history and she is correct, I HAVE been buying a lot of things on it lately. I started my "spending spree" on June 10th when I ordered the new filter baskets and bits for the pool filter that I had her approval for. Then on the 11th I went all nuts and ordered a new telescopic pole for our pool since ours broke along with a vacuum head and skimmer head since neither of those had survived either. She knew and approved of these things, she wants her pool open!

Then on June 15th I went and bought a new pump for the hot tub after too much searching to find one to replace ours at half the price, again approved.

Now I also did order a set of lug nut locks for her jeep ($20) and bits to make a secure hood lock for it ($8) along with an indulgence of $29 for some professional grade pesticide that is pet and plant friendly but still illegal in New York because it is effective more than 3 weeks. (I hate ants, the kids/wife hate spiders, and this shit is even supposed to kill mosquitoes!) It's an 8oz bottle, but you mix a 1/2oz with a gallon of water so it's 16 gallons of great pesticide that I'm going to use to try and keep the bugs around the pool/house under control.

So no upgrade for me for a while, I've resigned myself to that fate. I've spent the better part of too many days stressing on how to wire the new different pump to the old existing system, and I ended up today making a home made continuity tester just to figure all the wiring out and then said "FUCK IT!" and wired it my own way and fixed it. Finally got to pump out the hot tub, power wash it, hand scrub it down with CLR, rinse it out, and finally tie it all back in with the pool. It's been all I've been focusing on besides gardening/yard work/house work for weeks now, and while I should feel a great sense of satisfaction I also have a bit of resentment at not only having to do all the work on the pool but also getting blamed for spending too much money on it. (I saved us $600 by finding and installing that pump myself, and it's something I've never done and was happy I could pull off)

Here, enjoy what I've achieved the whole time thinking "And this is why I don't get a computer upgrade" whenever I was working on it.

 

Ooops, problems uploading files. Here?

http://i.imgur.com/UO1dS8U.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/bHi5wRh.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/y61Sq6y.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/7trOulX.jpg

Damn, can't even cut and paste right. Gotta do some stuff still, happy travels!

 

Sorry about the long whiny post, I was having a REALLY bad day. I have just been busting my ass around the house and yard lately and they've needed it since they were neglected for a week or two due to my finger injury. After I got the stitches out about 5 days ago I got to start cleaning and stuff again, and I've been pretty much doing it non-stop since and it's sort of harshed my mellow a bit.

I do apologize for coming across as a screaming lunatic, I really do love my wife and get why she does the things she does so it's cool...it's just sometimes it takes me a while to come to terms with it.

It scares me a bit to admit it, but I think I'm a little addicted to PC gaming and get stressed without it. That stress is weird and manifests in strange and NOT GOOD ways for me. Usually rage flashes, (which are nothing, no one even knows I have them anymore. Got 'em under control well over a decade ago, when the kids came I changed a LOT of my behaviors), and bad driving. The driving was starting to worry me. I found myself doing about 120mph+ down the highway weaving in and out of traffic not because I needed to get somewhere quickly but just because I really missed driving like that, like I do in games.

I came home and installed Saints Row 2 right away and spent a few hours playing it and felt like a huge weight was lifted from me.

I think I just need to make sure to game occassionally for the escapism, it's good for me.

Sorry again for the rant, thanks for all the help/suggestions/putting up with me.

 

And tonight I had the joy of spilling my coke all over my keyboard/mouse/computer. Dove under the desk with a box of kleenex pulling the power cable as I started catching any drips falling for the PC. Once that was safe, I rinsed out my beloved mechanical keyboard which had been drenched in cola and cleaned up my mouse. The keyboard will be drying for a few days before i try anything, but after cleaning up all the mess and digging up my old Razer Lycosa I heard the happiest damned noise when she gave me tone and booted.

She might be old, she might be retrograding a lot lately, but DAMNED if she doesn't keep going for me. Love my girl Bubbles!

 

So, did you end up getting an upgrade and what's your current setup?

Somewhat relieved you did come to terms with the reckless driving, without incident.

Sorry for the lack of sympathy but it sounds outrageous for an outsider that you were driving like that in the real world to compensate for your lack of playing computer games.

 

Absolutely not on any upgrades. Still running a Phenom II 965, 12GB DDR3, and a 1GB Palit 9800 GTX.

Agree on the driving. I do tend to drive fast, but I am also insanely careful when I do...but even for me that was pushing crazy. I've been trying to slow it down in general and getting better, but it takes some time to re-adjust.

 

Quick update on my keyboard spill. Tried it today and it was a total fail, my beloved Velocifire VM01 is dead.

 

Digi 120 in a jeep and weaving is madness. I just bought a recertified HP desktop from newegg for like 130 for my parents. I had a hexcore old amd chip computer I gave them, but it died and I had no parts to be sure what the problem was plus it was vista x32 and they needed x64 so it was as cheap to buy entire computer as the windows update. It is surprisingly decent too. As fast as 2500k plus apu.

 

Totally agreed, I don't even think our Jeep can do 120....it's speedometer only goes up to 100mph!

I was in my car, a 2010 Infinity M35X. She's very much designed to be comfortable at those speeds and her speedometer goes to 160mph. Just got new rubber on her and I keep her in top shape mechanically, had her for almost 5 years now and tend to think I'm pretty confident in her capabilities and got a feel for what she can and can't do.

I'm trying like hell to slow down, I won't let myself go over 90mph for any reason right now and I'm trying to keep it under 85mph. (85mph is pretty much highway speed out here, truth. It's a 65mph zone, but the fast lane averages about 80-85mph) Not for any reason other than there really isn't any reason for me to drive so crazy except that I enjoy it, but that's not a good reason to put myself and others at greater risk so I'm working on it.

But no, I didn't do it in the Jeep! ROFL!



The one in the middle is the kid's car we're working on Josie. Fine mechanically, all legal, just cleaning up her interior and reblackening her and stuff now...actually tons of fun!

 

I drive much more slowly today than ever. Partly because a reckless driver trying to beat a yellow did bad things to me and partly because driving a minivan with hand controls is a bit sketchy, especially when you take a turn at speed without any trunk control. I really miss my 370z but I'd need a four point harness and an auto transmission to drive it today...Not to mention a place to stow my wheelchair. Lol.