mao91

Since my PC lays sideways in my rack I thought I’d add a new power button. 
 
I used stepping bits to get the hole to the perfect size to screw in the button’s shaft and wired it up to a spare set of power sw and power led wires I had laying around. Looks great and had a very satisfying click.
 
 

Since my PC lays sideways in my rack I thought I’d add a new power button. 
 
I used stepping bits to get the hole to the perfect size to screw in the button’s shaft and wired it up to a spare set of power sw and power led wires I had laying around. Looks great and had a very satisfying click.
 
 

FTFY. And no. Just the plastic shrouds. The hardware itself is fine.

Focusrite Scarlett Solo ($100)
Yamaha HS7s ($319ea) (get a pair)
Yamaha HS8S ($469)
2x 1/4" TRS to XLR cables (scarlett solo > sub) Set x-over and sub-speaker vol balance.
2x XLR cables from sub to HS7s. 

This will fit your budget.

For extra sauce, use Sonarworks w/ their RTA mic to calibrate your listening spot for pretty damn flat reference. Should give you about as close to full reference as you can get without going five digits. Note: Sonarworks will try to auto calculate speaker distance and listening distance. You may need to use a tape measure to get more accurate and make some adjustments to their values during the measurement process.

Source: am audio engineer.

Those proprietary phone connectors were really dumb, but every manufacturer had patented their own connector, micro usb was an upgrade even though those were fragile and the cheap cables never stayed connected.

A thread.
 
I’ll start: Forgoing SATA connectors and just directly soldering a mini USB 2.0 header to a hard drive.
 

A thread.
 
I’ll start: Forgoing SATA connectors and just directly soldering a mini USB 2.0 header to a hard drive.
 

Vinyl is desirable because it’s fully analog and is the general standard people think of when someone mentions “vintage.” Vinyl is a very imperfect media and has minute but noticeable flaws that many find desirable (namely, that vinyl scratching sound). Vinyl can sound better or worse depending on the quality of the press, the condition of the record itself, the quality of the needle, the quality of the electronics in the machine, etc. Two of the same record on the same machine can sound just ever so slightly different if you listen extremely carefully. See the above reasons for why. Vinyl is difficult to master for vs digital because of the way the physical material responds to different frequencies. This is why a lot of classic rock has been remastered for modern radio and digital storage.
 
Digital has different tiers of quality. Most people today would think of mp3, but CDs are also digital. CDs are typically 1411kbps, 44.1kHz, and stereo. CDs will largely sound the same across the board. They’re read with a laser and are decided to your stereo. This means really the only audio quality between cd listening boils down to your sound system. 
 
MP3 was created because it’s a viable way to store a lot of music on a small space. When early MP3 players came out, the idea of storing 100 songs on something the size of a large lighter was profound. MP3 compression became popular for storage purposes but introduced the artifacts people from 2004-2008 knew well (and people who listen to Spotify today *cough*). MP3 can be 44.1kHz or 48kHz, and can range from 96kbps all the way to 320kbps. 
 
WAV is considered lossless. It can be 44.1kHz, 48kHz, 96kHz, or 192kHz, and bit rates can vary wildly. Tidal HiFi streams WAV 44.1kHz 1411kbps CD quality. 
 
OGG is a digital format that isn’t popular anymore. 
 
FLAC is popular among audiophiles and engineers. It can get to be clearer than WAV, thanks to more effective encoding. It can also use considerably more storage than other digital formats.
 
Back to analog: Tape is often overlooked, but it IS fully analog. There is a resurgence of tape enthusiasts. This is cool for a few reasons: 1. Tape has a flatter frequency response vs vinyl, so it’s easier to master for and can typically sound clearer. 2. Tape is more portable than vinyl and uses a smaller footprint. 3. Tape can do neat things to sound depending on the type. But (as those of us who grew up during the 90s remember well, hitting that record button to capture our favorite songs from radio) tape needs to be cared for. Most modern studios will either print a mix to tape before mastering, or use tape emulation (like myself) to add a bit of “old school sound” to a recording.
 
 

Vinyl is desirable because it’s fully analog and is the general standard people think of when someone mentions “vintage.” Vinyl is a very imperfect media and has minute but noticeable flaws that many find desirable (namely, that vinyl scratching sound). Vinyl can sound better or worse depending on the quality of the press, the condition of the record itself, the quality of the needle, the quality of the electronics in the machine, etc. Two of the same record on the same machine can sound just ever so slightly different if you listen extremely carefully. See the above reasons for why. Vinyl is difficult to master for vs digital because of the way the physical material responds to different frequencies. This is why a lot of classic rock has been remastered for modern radio and digital storage.
 
Digital has different tiers of quality. Most people today would think of mp3, but CDs are also digital. CDs are typically 1411kbps, 44.1kHz, and stereo. CDs will largely sound the same across the board. They’re read with a laser and are decided to your stereo. This means really the only audio quality between cd listening boils down to your sound system. 
 
MP3 was created because it’s a viable way to store a lot of music on a small space. When early MP3 players came out, the idea of storing 100 songs on something the size of a large lighter was profound. MP3 compression became popular for storage purposes but introduced the artifacts people from 2004-2008 knew well (and people who listen to Spotify today *cough*). MP3 can be 44.1kHz or 48kHz, and can range from 96kbps all the way to 320kbps. 
 
WAV is considered lossless. It can be 44.1kHz, 48kHz, 96kHz, or 192kHz, and bit rates can vary wildly. Tidal HiFi streams WAV 44.1kHz 1411kbps CD quality. 
 
OGG is a digital format that isn’t popular anymore. 
 
FLAC is popular among audiophiles and engineers. It can get to be clearer than WAV, thanks to more effective encoding. It can also use considerably more storage than other digital formats.
 
Back to analog: Tape is often overlooked, but it IS fully analog. There is a resurgence of tape enthusiasts. This is cool for a few reasons: 1. Tape has a flatter frequency response vs vinyl, so it’s easier to master for and can typically sound clearer. 2. Tape is more portable than vinyl and uses a smaller footprint. 3. Tape can do neat things to sound depending on the type. But (as those of us who grew up during the 90s remember well, hitting that record button to capture our favorite songs from radio) tape needs to be cared for. Most modern studios will either print a mix to tape before mastering, or use tape emulation (like myself) to add a bit of “old school sound” to a recording.
 
 

Toshiba laptop with Win95, still boots.  Also has external floppy drive, docking station.  touchmouse still works.

Powered down, removed ssd cache drive, powered back up, logged in, everything seems to be present and accounted for. No missing directories. How strange, not sure what the whole issue was, but I'm indifferent toward the situation. Considering I have an immediate use for the SSD as well in a more mission-critical RAID1 that I've been wanting to do, I can consider this case closed. Thanks for helping me understand some of the terminology and how to navigate the UnRAID UI. 

That's another tech realization I've made. The cheapest piece of tech you have is the one you've already paid for. Sure, I could go out and pay $25k for a new car that gets about 35-40mpg, but my current car gets about 25mpg and that's just a lot of gas that I could burn before I'll ever reach the point where the new car would save me money. 

Drivers for your specific device.
They don't all use the same touchscreen, the same fingerprint reader, the same audio chipset, etc... Some may use the same, but then use a device specific toggle to enable some feature that isn't available in another...
 
A PC can look for these online.
 
On mobile... The OS just isn't built to look for device drivers online. I wish it were, since that would increase the longevity of our phones a HELL of a lot more... But I'm sure you can guess why no manufacturer wants that. 

Lol I use my old X99 system as a NAS and probably will for as long as I can regardless of power costs

But yikes on 1500VA/900W. I want that 2000VA(or 2200VA)/1500W cap for extended runtime during outage. I have a 1500VA/900W now and I can tell you, if it WAS sinewave and I had everything hooked up to it, it would maybe give me 3 minutes of runtime during an outage. Advertised runtime numbers are based on fresh-off-the-line batteries, so they're always a lie.
 
Also for my needs, I can fairly easily use a 5-20 to standard outlet plug adapter, since my entire room does not pull 20A and I doubt the UPS itself does either.

Well then, X63 it is then. I think paired with my Noctua NF-A14s I should be able to get a solid noise-to-performance ratio.

I'll let you in on a little secret: nobody who builds PCs actually likes Windows 10. We just love hardware customization. For my work, if I could run MacOS on a custom hardware configuration, I absolutely would, as it would open up a whole world of outboard hardware possibilities. Unfortunately, my choices are limited because the audio production industry, generally speaking, worships Apple. Still, I refuse to pay those kinds of prices. 
I was very anti-apple for a long, long time. Then, in 2017, when I needed a smartphone for work, a local store was giving away the new base model iPhone 7. I really was looking at a Galaxy, but free was free. Used that for a few years and now am up to the iPhone 11. I know Samsung puts out better hardware (except the camera for some reason) but now with the whole Google vs. Apple controversy showing Apple actually caring more about user privacy than Google, I'm sticking with Apple for privacy reasons.
 
 
Ooof. I remember when 256GB RAM and a Pentium 4 processor (the first Pentium 4 processor, in the 90s, not the Pentiums that came out in the 2000s) and playing games like Road Rash, Uprising, Age of Empires (the first one), Diablo (also the first one), etc. were all the rage. Then I remember my dad bringing home a 256MB flash drive saying it was going to be the future. He said "eventually you'll be able to store everything you love on something the size of a fingernail, just you watch." I thought he was crazy. I remember my first MP3 player could hold a massive ~100 songs, ran on a single AA battery, and could last at least most of the day, and thinking, "It'll never get better than this." 

 

This is the way.

I'll let you in on a little secret: nobody who builds PCs actually likes Windows 10. We just love hardware customization. For my work, if I could run MacOS on a custom hardware configuration, I absolutely would, as it would open up a whole world of outboard hardware possibilities. Unfortunately, my choices are limited because the audio production industry, generally speaking, worships Apple. Still, I refuse to pay those kinds of prices. 
I was very anti-apple for a long, long time. Then, in 2017, when I needed a smartphone for work, a local store was giving away the new base model iPhone 7. I really was looking at a Galaxy, but free was free. Used that for a few years and now am up to the iPhone 11. I know Samsung puts out better hardware (except the camera for some reason) but now with the whole Google vs. Apple controversy showing Apple actually caring more about user privacy than Google, I'm sticking with Apple for privacy reasons.
 
 
Ooof. I remember when 256GB RAM and a Pentium 4 processor (the first Pentium 4 processor, in the 90s, not the Pentiums that came out in the 2000s) and playing games like Road Rash, Uprising, Age of Empires (the first one), Diablo (also the first one), etc. were all the rage. Then I remember my dad bringing home a 256MB flash drive saying it was going to be the future. He said "eventually you'll be able to store everything you love on something the size of a fingernail, just you watch." I thought he was crazy. I remember my first MP3 player could hold a massive ~100 songs, ran on a single AA battery, and could last at least most of the day, and thinking, "It'll never get better than this." 

 

This is the way.

RTX 2080 TI ...😂

Imagine using an AIO
 
 
- This post is made by Noctua gang.

Disclaimer: I don't know how it legally works where you live.
 
You may be responsible for actually running the connection. If the cable line is buried, you will need to run a trench and bury it deep enough. Regardless of if it is buried or elevated, because the city owns the property beyond your sidewalk and the cable company owns the neighborhood box, you will have to work with both parties to get a line run to your house. It can be done, but it will require a bit of coordination.

Ergonomics is your highest priority? MX Master 3, no question about it. I can't even think of a competing product. 

I think both companies offer plenty of cores and threads. Compared to my current 6-core 12-thread, anything higher is an upgrade by at least 33%. 
 
IPCs are pretty solid. I am curious how Zen3 will pan out. There really are no performance reviews for my workload, so it's difficult to gauge. 
 
Frequency is certainly important. My 5820k is currently overclocked to 4.4GHz and has definitely shown me a real-world performance improvement over the stock 3.2GHz. (I attribute its longevity at this frequency to my NH-D15). If I'm remembering correctly, isn't 9th gen the first to regularly boost to 5.0Ghz since 4th gen? 
 
I'm not worried about upgrading my CPU in the same motherboard, as the incremental performance increase from one generation to the next is not enough for me to justify upgrading that quickly. I genuinely prefer to wait at least 5 years between upgrades. Features like PCIe lanes and bandwidth are pretty important to me, so if Zen3 can close the performance gap (or get close enough, say within 5%) of 10th gen, and the price is competitive, then that's most likely what I'll go with.

I am also waiting to see what Zen3 yields. If raw horsepower is competitive with Z490 or even Z390 at a competitive price point, I'll probably jump on it to get both the raw CPU power and the future-minded amount of PCIe bandwidth that I want.

First we should see if the waste heat dumped by these into the water wont have a negative effect on ocean life forms....