RussR

I'm not sure there's a risk - I don't know if i'd be relying on an insurance policy from your UPS company check your home insurance, and add your PC to it and mention it's on a UPS i think the benefits of having one outweighs anything else

There's a windows based BIOS update tool, but I've had bad experiences. Persisting with the m-flash tool is the way to go

I ended up buying the ASUS PG279Q

I've finally bought my rig and I pickup the parts tomorrow. At the same time i'm going to replace my old 24" Dell monitor. Trying to decide between the LG 34UM58-P and the Acer XB270H-G as they're both the same price. LG - 34", bigger screen, higher resolution, but 60Hz (it says 75Hz on the site but that's only with freesync active apparently - i have a 1070) Acer 27" - smaller screen, 1080p so lower resolution, but g-sync and 144Hz. I'm going to use my PC for BF1, Forza Horizon 3, and a few other games. I'm also going to do video editing and some CAD work. I feel like the 34" would be nice, and i could use the space and resolution - i'm concerned it'll be an issue during online games though With this in mind, what monitor should i buy and why?

I'd prefer to win the Razer Blade Stealth. I'm in the process of moving out of my IT management job into a more creative job, and i'd need a good portable workstation for video editing on the road, as well as designing flyers and 3D models. I will also buy the Razer Core later so i can game on my laptop! roses are red blade stealth is leet i'd prefer my graphics discrete (and external in a Razer Cube)

I was until recently running Windows 10 on a Radeon 5770.... You'd be crazy not to update to Windows 10, a 6 month old operating system will have far better support for processor architecture and hardware than a 4 year old one

He mentioned in one of his videos where they replaced the core Cisco router with Netgear due to not having anyone who knows a lot about Cisco IOS, and not wanting to learn. Cisco Meraki is a good (but not cheap) alternative to learning IOS, and is a 'single pane of glass' admin for everything, but really commercial grade hardware I found earlier TP-Link routers were cheap due to the chipset they used, and some of them had gigabit ports included, but the chipset wasn't powerful enough to handle gigabit throughput. I use an old Netgear with DD-WRT on it at home

around $3000 AUD (which is roughly where the combination of those bits come to)

back in my day, that's what hard drives actually sounded like. (they really did though...) I wouldn't really worry at all - make sure your data is backed up and keep on trucking. Loading up some diagnostic tools and doing some testing will quickly tell you the drive condition. I'd checkout Seagate Seatools or Western Digital Lifeguard and you'll soon know if it has an issue. (Seagate Seatools will work with any brand of drive, whereas i'm pretty sure WD Lifeguard needs a Western Digital disk) Seagate Seatools: http://www.seagate.com/au/en/support/downloads/item/seatools-win-master/ Western Digital Lifeguard: http://supportdownloads.wdc.com/downloads.aspx

at I store I worked in, we had a lady call up who'd had her computer for a while but wanted to send an email she was wondering how to get the @ symbol in an email when we told her 'shift + 2' she responded with... and i quote... "I thought that gave you a capital 2" we laughed about that for years.

Back when the AMD Athlon MP was brand new (I shudder to think how long ago this was) I snapped a tab off a ZIF socket on an ASUS server board. Fortunately it was replaced under warranty due to a manufacturing fault, but i was worried about it for days as I was straight out of school and i would've been paying that thing off for months. I also remember getting a Radeon 9600XT with a diode loose in the packaging with the card, could never find where it went and it gave me years of good service - turns out it wasn't needed after all!

wow, that was quick. If I go the 5820K am I limiting myself for later "upgradability"? (although I think the only time I've ever upgraded a CPU was when one died so maybe it's not an issue afterall) with the price differences here (Australia) with the GTX980 @ $725 AUD vs GTX970 @ $470 AUD both in ASUS branding I was thinking the 970 is better bang for buck, and i could maybe add another later? and with the PSU being overkill, I'm used to ye olden days of 'no name' 450W ATX PSU's where it was luck of the draw if your PSU would even pump that sort of power out. I guess I could drop it back but there wasn't a huge saving, and maybe adding another 970 later would be an option then? Also, I'm in Australia so that's why I didn't really use Parts Picker first up - http://au.pcpartpicker.com/p/WZGjt6 from my quick look through I think my pricing will be comparable even if i buy from the one place Unfortunately component prices don't really translate even with the USD/AUD conversion. I've been mostly using www.staticice.com.au for price comparisons, but I've settled on a local retailer that seems to be fairly competetive on price and i've dealt with them in the past. Thanks for the quick replies

okay, so after having my E8400 humming along at 3.6GHz for quite a while it finally died tonight. I've been thinking about replacing it for a while, and now i have an excuse. I've been out of the PC game for about 5 years now (changed jobs) so i'd really appreciate some hints/advice on some of the hardware i'm considering. I want something i'll get a few years out of, with decent 'all round' punch for a bit of video editing, programming and a little gaming. I've previously had all sorts of brands of bits, but I really like ASUS and I ended up liking their black/white boards so that's going to be an aesthetic I'll go for I'm a long time reader (and LTT fan), but first time poster. Below is a list of bits i'm looking at: CPU & Motherboard: Intel Core i7 6700K Quad Core LGA 1151 4GHz Unlocked CPU Processor & ASUS Z170 Deluxe LGA1151 ATX Motherboard OR Intel Core i7 5820K Haswell-E 6-Core LGA 2011-3 3.3GHz CPU Processor & ASUS X99-Pro/USB3.1 LGA2011-3 ATX Motherboard Storage: BOOT & OS - Samsung 1TB 3D V-NAND mSATA R/W(Max) 540MB/s/520MB/s 97K/88K IOPS DATA - Seagate ST4000DX001 DESKTOP SSHD 4TB SATA 6GB/s NCQ NAND 8GB 64MB HYBRID Power Supply: Corsair 850W CS850M Gold Power Supply CMPSU-CS850M Video Card: ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Turbo OC 4GB Video Card RAM: Kingston 32GB (4x8) HX426C15FBK4/3 22666MHz DDR3 CL15 DIMM HyperX FURY DDR4 Black Cooling Options: Water Cooling 'Ready to Run': Video Card - NZXT Kraken G10 GPU Bracket White Video Card - NZXT Kraken X31 Water Cooler CPU - Corsair Hydro Series H110i GTX 280mm AIO Liquid CPU Cooler OR Water Cooling 'Custom' Alphacool VPP655 12V D5 Variable Speed Pump XSPC AX360 Triple Fan Radiator (White) V2. EK-RES X3 250 - White EK Full Cover EK-FC970 GTX Backplate Nickel EK Supremacy EVO White Edition CPU Waterblock EK hoses and fittings to suit Coolant OR Air Cooling: CPU - Arctic Freezer i32 Video Card - Stock ASUS 'Turbo' Cooler Case: NZXT H440 Mid Tower Case White OR NZXT S340 Mid Tower Case White OS: i've already got Windows 10 As you can see i'm trying to decide on case/cooling and CPU - I have a few questions on the above setup: 1. Architecture - I'll be sticking with Intel, should I go the faster LGA2011, or the newer LGA1151? and what will be the 'real world' differences? I notice the 2011 benches better but that can sometimes be unrealistic for the real world? Both are similarly priced (obviously I'll need to change the RAM if i end up with the LGA2011) 2. Cooling - Should I go straight into liquid cooling, and is it better to get a custom setup like an EK or a Swiftech? I've had liquid coolers (one of the first Zalmann Reserators attached to a P4) before so i'm familiar with the risks and setup procedure, and I have a taste for overclocking and really want to get the most performance out of my hardware? 3. Cooling - If i go with custom liquid cooling, what coolant should i run? I used to run Redline Water Wetter and Distilled water in my Zalmann for years and it worked fine.. 4. Case - I like the LED lighting of the H440 and the PSU basement, but i like the no ODD design of the S430? Only sticking point is that it needs to be white to match the rest of the components - I feel like i'm going to be limited by the S430 (and i love those LED's on the H440 too!) Thanks everyone for your help in advance!