Holford

Thank you for the comprehensive list - I admittedly forgot to use PartPicker to confirm compatibility of my components, and am genuinely grateful for your suggestions. Thanks @brob!

That's genuinely useful, thank you! I hadn't come across this model from MSI in my research.

Hello again, fellow TechTippians! I'm back with my second build in 2 years, and my first build since moving to the USA. As part of my larger Project: Kingdom series of builds (more on that later), I'm building a HTPC & Couch Gaming PC for use in my living room. For context purposes, the rig will be running on a 4K TV (Model: Sharp N6100U), and in the future will be connected to a (as yet to be determined) wired surround speaker system. The machine's main purposes will be; running games in Steam Big Picture mode (1080p at 60fps), and connecting to our Plex Media Server on the local network (4K & 1080p content playback). THE RIG In the current configuration of parts, the full specs include: CPU Intel i3 7100 (3.9 GHz) (Amazon US) Motherboard MSI B150I Gaming Pro AC Mini-ITX (Amazon US) RAM Corsair Vengeance LPX 8Gb (2 X 4Gb) DDR4 2800MHz (Amazon US) GPU ZOTAC GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Mini (Amazon US) Case Silverstone SG13B (Amazon US) Storage Samsung 850 EVO 500GB 2.5-Inch SATA III SSD (Amazon US) PSU EVGA Supernova G1 650W Power Supply (Amazon US) Cooling Noctua L-Type Premium Quiet CPU Cooler NH-L9x65 (Amazon US) THE BUDGET At a maximum, I'm looking at spending no more than $500-600 on all equipment. I already have the case (due to the dimensions of where the machine is going to be placed, this case was my only real option), and already have the SSD on hand. THE NEXT STEPS So I turn this proposed build over to you, LTT forum goers. I'm open to feedback on components choices, suggestions on ways to improve upon the parts I've already got on hand, and any advice on building / maintaining HTPC rigs in general. That's all for now guys - catch you next time!

I did this recently myself - checkout my experience / advice here:

I ran a few Rust servers using a similar subscription service to the one described above by @Dark. The main sticking point for me, beyond hardware cost & bespoke setup of VMs, was the ultimate POWER cost. A server with moderate power requirements, running 24/7 may incur significantly higher charges on your Electricity Bills. Are you looking to run private servers, or ones open to the public?

My Cooler Master Mastercase Pro 5 - survived international shipping, components coming loose, a PSU knocking around in it, and the box it came in turned out to be super resilient as shipping material (with some Black Packing Wrap) on its own.

Oh totally - the AIO Water Cooler has been the only thing to give me pause for thought. So far (we're 2 months into the Rig being used again for daily work) it's shown no signs in either performance drop or physical leaks that anything's gone awry. CPU temps have been consistent with pre-shipping numbers, and I've been checking the internals every couple of weeks, in case I can spot any signs of leaks. Given my next rig planned is a server style one (akin to Linus' recent Personal Rig), I'm grateful that I'm now stateside for the foreseeable future too. Would NOT want to ship that overseas...

Thank you! - and you hit the nail on the head with your comments. These are definitely all things I learned along the way. I had found a number of wooden boxes that would've fit the Mastercase's original box, but the thing that held me back from all of them was it moved my shipping costs from $190 up to $300-500 depending on courier & insurance coverage. I didn't take a photo of the finished products (I swore I did, but after scouring my Camera Roll, no joy!), but suffice to say it was covered in Black Shipping Wrap (about 10-15 layers of coating), copious amounts of Fragile Shipping tape (until you all but couldn't see the black wrap anymore), and the insides filled to-the-brim with ESD packing peanuts! Glad you found this an interesting tale - and thank you for commenting too!

I've noticed this as well, but more steeply with products like Monitors. A Samsung Curved 1080p monitor that I purchased for $220 in November is now $349... Brand new, from Best Buy.

So I work in a 'high-end technology store' which is oft frequented by people (not always of the older generation, but quite commonly so) who have a somewhat limited grasp on technical terms. I had one such encounter with a person that wanted to get a new computer because they were given a lower-end MacBook Air a few years ago, and found they were running out of space constantly. He was adamant that he need a machine with, "at least `12 or 16". I turned to them, perplexed for a moment, and clarified, "Oh, that's the RAM. That doesn't affect storage." Thinking the matter was settled, I indicated to them a system with a 512GB SSD & 8GB of RAM. They then turn to me and re-iterate, "Oh no! That doesn't have enough! See *points to the Info Pane* it only has 8!" Needless to say we do this dance several more times before they finally 'understand' what I was trying to explain to them. Another fun day in technology sales.

Hello again, fellow TechTippians! So a little over a year ago, I posted this question to the forums "How to ship my Rig (Moving from the UK to USA)". Well, it's a year later. I've moved from London to Austin. My Personal Rig has come with me - and boy did I learn a few things about shipping computers internationally along the way... First of all, I want to stress something: @wolfsbane3083 had the best answer to my original question. However, due to budget constraints, time, and locally available resources, I had to go with a sliughtly different solution. That all said, i wanted to share my experience with you all, lest some other poor soul out there has to go through the same thing I did. THE RIG So the machine I was shipping was housed in a Cooler Master Mastercase Pro 5 body. Full specs include: CPU Intel i5 4960k Quad Core CPU Motherboard Asus Z97-PRO Gamer S1150 Z97 ATX RAM Kingston HyperX Savage 2400MHz (4x8gb - 32GB) GPU (x2) MSI NVIDIA GTX 970 Gaming Twin Frozr Case Cooler Master Mastercase Pro 5 Storage (x1) Intel 535 240GB SSD, (x1) Samsung Evo 240GB SSD, (x2) WD Black 4TB HDD PSU EVGA SuperNOVA 750W PC Power Supply Cooling Corsair Hydro Series H110i GT 280mm Extreme Performance All-In-One Liquid CPU Cooler THE BUDGET Due to the expense of everything else with this move (I think I spent culmatively $8000 on Visa fees, Processing fees, Flights, Medical Exams, and more) I had to limit my shipping costs as much as possible. Overall, I had approximately $200 to spend on shipping. THE SOLUTION So how did I send it? It boiled down to a few stages: Deconstruction: I removed the HDDs and SSDs, along with my two Graphics Cards, and the WiFi antennas, from the rig prior to packing. I also put back into the case the original rear PCI-e shrouds. Packing: I used the box that came with my Cooler Master Mastercase Pro 5 case (as well as the original foam packing), filling the outside & inside of the case and box with ESD safe packing peanuts. Preparation: I placed the graphics card into their original ESD wrappers & retail boxes, and the HDDs and SSDs into a foam-lined steel carry case. These boxes all then were packed into my checked luggage. Shipping: Using the courier DPD in the UK, I paid approximately $180 for shipping & insurance (guaranteeing me reimbursement for damage done to the components at retail price) and taking it by hand to one of their depots. THE OUTCOME The rig arrived approximately 3 days after I did (taking 5 days overall). The box it arrived in was... frankly... destroyed. In hindsight, I could've definitely done with purchasing another box to place the case's box into, and attaching it to a flat wooden pallett. Unfortunately for cost (the side & weight of this would've moved me from consumer to commercial shipping costs, which were almost twice the amount I paid) I wasn't able to do this. Upon arrival, there were a few... concerning things that I noticed. Two of my RAM modules had become unlocked and gotten stuck between various other parts of the case They were otherwise undamaged, and are still recognised & used by my system without incident. The power-supply came loose from the case's bracket & the screw became lodged underneath the PSU's body This was the most notable damage to my system, as the actual PSU chassis has become slightly dented and damaged from moving around within the body of the case, during its journey. There were also things that didn't go wrong, and seem unaffected by their transatlantic journey: The CPU & All-in-one Water Cooler remained in place, undamaged, and tightened to the case Due to a lack of suitable box to place the Corsair H110i GT AIO Water-Cooler in for shipping, I was forced to leave it in the system. There has been no damage, or drop in performance. The original box that came with the Cooler Master Mastercase Pro 5 case is very resilient I switched from a Corsair Air 540 to the Mastercase Pro 5 about 6 months prior to my move, in small part because of Cooler Master's legendary packing materials. I was not disappointed. Okay guys, that my 'guide' to moving internationally. There are lots of mistakes I made (that hopefully someone else can learn from), and plenty of things I discovered along the way. If you're about to go through a similar move, and want any advice or want to ask any questions, please feel free to hit me up. Also checkout the original thread that was linked at the start of this post, as there are lots of useful tips in there from people who have actually worked in the shipping industry. That's all for now guys - catch you next time!

Rig Name - Red ShiftCPU - Intel Quad-Core i5 4690K (3.50GHz)GPU - Nvidia GTX 970 (MSI Twin Frozr)RAM - 32GB HyperX Savage (DDR3 2400Mhz)Score - 7.1 (High)

I'm on a modded server, with a focus on resource generation multipliers based on experience points. I tried making some allies before, but ended up having half turn on me, and destroy the other half (and their bases, and my base) when I was offline! Thought it was safer to go with a water base, and an underwater bridge to get to it (that, and about 7 layers of armoured walls and doors between me and the outside, haha). Haven't found any blueprints for the auto-turrets yet though...

So I've been getting into Rust recently (largely because of my sincere love of 'maker' games, and being significantly let down by 'The Forest'). I did a play-through of it fairly recently, and absolutely love the way the game makes use of resources and in-game mechanics, to let the player make some really unique and cool bases. So today, as it was the first time I hadn't been collectively swarmed by people who had seemingly been playing non-stop for three days, I actually got to make a pretty cool base! I wanted to share these (pretty freaking beautiful) screenshots of my recent creation with you guys, and find out if there are any fellow 'Rusters' on here? That's all for now - let me know what you guys think of my base building, and if you've had any other 'fun' experiences with fellow players on Rust! - Justin

I was thinking about the Corsair AX1200i. I've been seeing good reviews for it, and it's 80 Plus Platinum rated. Thoughts?

If you've got a suggestion for one, I'll totally check it out! This is a bit of a learning curve for me, so I'm completely open to suggestions Looking to purchase all the stuff in the USA, likely September time.

Hey guys, Looking at building a home rendering server in fall, and need some suggestions on Power Supplies. The rack-mounted system will be running three MSI GTX 980ti in SLI, running off an Asus P9D LGA1150 Server-Grade motherboard, with an Intel Xeon E3 1230V3 Haswell CPU, as well as eight WD Red NAS 4TB HDDs, and four Intel 535 Series SSDs (all fitted into a NORCO RPC-4116 4U Rack Mount chassis). I've been looking at a couple of Silverstone and EVGA options, but wanted some insight into something that is more tried-and-tested with these types of server configurations. I've also been looking at the APC Smart-UPS RM SMT1500RM2U as a good bang-for-buck UPS solution for the system. I don't have an overall budget at the moment as this build is fairly far off, but wanted to see what you guys could suggest. I will be moving from London, England to Austin, Texas before I actually start this build, so any insight as well into the North American PC Component market would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Justin

If I'm going to do any sort of stretch gaming session (which normally ends up being a 4-5 hour run on Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion, with the awesome Sins of the Prophets mod) it boils down to: Large Thermos of coffee (usually a home-made extra strong latte) Big ol' bowl of grapes and cucumber Maybe some thin-baked crisps

Hey guys, So in the coming months, my wife and I are moving from London, England to Austin, Texas. While super excited about the move (hurrah for relatively cheaper tech!), I'm more than mildly concerned about the shipping of my current rig. You can see the pictures of the internals over in the link in my sig, but the crux of it is as such: Corsair Air 540 Case Corsair H110i GT Water Cooler MSI GTX 970 Twin Frozr GPU x1 WD Green drive, x1 WD Black drive x1 Intel 535 SSD, x1 Samsung EVO 850 SSD My two main thoughts at the moment are to either send this rig over in pieces (I've most of the original components boxes), or to pack the chasis with cardboard and non-conductive padding, and ship it over as is (with the HDDs in some sort of shock proof box separately). Like I said, I'm at a loss here, and any advice would be amazing! Cheers all, Justin

THE PICTURES So I guess I should show off the finished product! There are no pictures of my complete Desk setup, as I'm in the process of actually making a custom desk for my computer and camera gear, but below are some glam shots of the internals & cable management... THE PARTS The parts actually changed a fair amount through the process of this build, due to one reason or the other (though typically it was finding parts going a lot cheaper than I thought they would be...). As it stands, the final parts used in the RIG are as follows: CPU: Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor CPU Cooler: Corsair H110i GT 113.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler Motherboard: Asus Z97 PRO GAMER ATX LGA1150 Motherboard Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Red 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory Storage: Intel 535 Series 240GB SSD , and a Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" SSD Storage: WD Black 1TB 3.5" Internal HDD, and a WD Green 2TB 3.5" Internal HDD Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 970 4GB Twin Frozr Video Card Case: Corsair Air 540 Cube Airflow ATX Case Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro OEM (64-bit) While not included in this parts list, I am also going to be making use of the Corsair Sleeved PSU & SATA Cable bundle (in the red/black colour scheme) for my main cabling needs. THE REST So it's finished! The first full build I've done in many many years. Thanks for checking out this build log. I have others planned in the future (including a home server rack based solution for my wife & I, inspired by Linus' current setup), as well as some other custom projects in mind. That's all for now. Catch you next time!

Been up and down for me all day, and been waaaaay sub-par download speeds, compared to all my other services

If you have another media device (Android TV, Xbox One, etc) that can handle the Plex App (and export above 720p), I'd recommend sticking with it. I run Plex (with Plex Pass) for media streaming in full 1080p quality, at 20mb/sec over my home network, without issue via my Xbox One. This includes MKV and MP4, with hard and soft coded subtitle content playing without issue, even with live transcoding of content.

First version, Grid

Hi guys, So as my entire rig is on a bit of a (rapidly more stretched) budget, I couldn't go for a more expensive motherboard that had as many fan connectors as I needed. My rig will have 5 fans, but only 2 ports on the mobo. Looking around, I saw the NZXT Grid V2, and it seemed perfect. Minor issue... not in stock anywhere in my country, and I can't spend £40 on shipping a £20 fan controller. So the older version is the only one I've come across that seems to do the job. Has anyone used it? Anyone had any issues with it? Should I be aware of any major limitations (other than not being to control fan speed)? Thanks all!