Tech Things You Dont Know But Are Too Afraid To Ask.

[Morfy]

Don't repair what's not broken mentality?

[FireFox]

Don't repair what's not broken mentality?

 

I like it, the whole world needs to live by those words.

[911^NEmeSis]

I like it, the whole world needs to live by those words.

But shouldn't we improve things that can be improved? Why be at one level when we could be at another, higher better one?

[target39]

But shouldn't we improve things that can be improved? Why be at one level when we could be at another, higher better one?

Because there is a high risk of making it even worse.

[911^NEmeSis]

Because there is a high risk of making it even worse.

But you would never know unless you did it. :P

[Morfy]

True dat^^

[target39]

But you would never know unless you did it. :P

Okay, pretend you had just spent $4000 to have a 4 way SLI GTX Titan setup. You wanted even more power, so you overclocked it, whilst overvolting it, damaging all of the cards. Now you are out thousands of dollars, just because you wanted something to perform better, that was already good enough before.

[FireFox]

But shouldn't we improve things that can be improved? Why be at one level when we could be at another, higher better one?

 

A lot of 'improving' What I've seen it's worse, I'm all for improving but by definition it means moving forward and not backwards.

 

If anyone from the UK has any dealings with the jobcentre+ you'll know what I mean lol

[MG2R]

Is there a reason BIOS chips on motherboards are so archaic looking?

I mean, I know there's a very good possibility that you will have to replace it eventually, but still. They look like they are from the 80's (I know because I have a motherboard and RAM from the 80's).

These chips are designed, machines have been built, streamlined processes have been thought out. As long as everyhting works and they get away by making the same chip over and over again, the chips get near to free ;)

 

Also, "the design" is a standard DIP, nothing eighties about that. A lot of chips are built that way.

[Fetzie]

What does PLL overvoltage do, and why can it make CPU overclocks more stable?

[FireFox]

What does PLL overvoltage do, and why can it make CPU overclocks more stable?

 

Because it adds alittle more juice to chip or something

[Dudenstein]

Can I upgrade my motherboard without having to reinstall windows? hahaha 

[FireFox]

Can I upgrade my motherboard without having to reinstall windows? hahaha 

 

NO YOU CAN'T, THAT'LL DISPLEASE THE GODS lol

[Godlygamer23]

Can I upgrade my motherboard without having to reinstall windows?

Yes. If you're staying with a particular platform, you may have an activation problem. If you're moving from Intel to AMD or AMD to Intel, you will need to reinstall Windows.

[Glenwing]

Can I upgrade my motherboard without having to reinstall windows? hahaha 

 

It usually causes problems.  Fresh install is recommended.

[fishymamba]

Can I upgrade my motherboard without having to reinstall windows? hahaha 

 

I did it with windows 8. Windows 8 automatically detected new hardware and installed the correct drivers. Works great!

[MG2R]

What does PLL overvoltage do, and why can it make CPU overclocks more stable?

PLL stands for Phase Locked Loop and is part of the clock distribution system in a CPU. The clock in a CPU runs a given frequency (4.2GHz for example). This frequency is derived from the base clock by multiplying that base clock with a given number (the multiplier you set in the BIOS). The PLL makes sure that this higher frequency is phase locked to the base clock, meaning that the two clocks are in sync with eachother (see figure below). If this is not the case, all the digital signals going to and from the CPU would be misinterpreted by the rest of the system (a bit that GPU receives now, could be the bit should've received a clock cycle sooner).

 

This figure shows the base clock (top) and the CPU clock (bottom). In this example, the multiplier would be two.

 

Usually this piece of hardware has a set voltage it works at (Vpll). For extreme overclocking, it can sometimes be beneficial to overvolt, for the same reason a CPU gets more stable when you give it more voltage. On the other hand, overvolting it might make it unstable as well and actually make you overclock less. If you don't know what it is, you should probably just leave it as it is.

[crocski]

I did some research last week actually on the first question because i was quite curious what it was all about. I was always seeing those numbers. What I got from that was the lowest the timings and cas latency and faster the RAM, the more expensive it is too.

 

 

I have tried over and over to understand SSD caching but to no avail. I think I have seen the techquickie video about it. I still haven't digested it. 

 

Thats my question. :D

[Tr33]

is xbox one gona be better than gaming PCs?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

just kidding ofc..

[Koori]

is xbox one gona be better than gaming PCs?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

just kidding ofc..

To be honest, it could be a Yes :D

[Tr33]

To be honest, it could be a Yes :D

Get outta here! :P

[Morfy]

To be honest, it could be a Yes :D

Blasfemy!!! Well, it depends what you understand by gaming, but i think 500$ PC will be better, having the fact that you can multitask by there side.

[Koori]

Blasfemy!!! Well, it depends what you understand by gaming, but i think 500$ PC will be better, having the fact that you can multitask by there side.

>:

True that multitasking is more important.But for a $500 I think consoles are better at that price point ONLY. I feel that consoles are being priced SLIGHTLY lower only than PC at the price point.

I SUPPORT PC over CONSOLES. So yeah!

[Fetzie]

PLL stands for Phase Locked Loop and is part of the clock distribution system in a CPU. The clock in a CPU runs a given frequency (4.2GHz for example). This frequency is derived from the base clock by multiplying that base clock with a given number (the multiplier you set in the BIOS). The PLL makes sure that this higher frequency is phase locked to the base clock, meaning that the two clocks are in sync with eachother (see figure below). If this is not the case, all the digital signals going to and from the CPU would be misinterpreted by the rest of the system (a bit that GPU receives now, could be the bit should've received a clock cycle sooner).

 

<image snipped>

This figure shows the base clock (top) and the CPU clock (bottom). In this example, the multiplier would be two.

 

Usually this piece of hardware has a set voltage it works at (Vpll). For extreme overclocking, it can sometimes be beneficial to overvolt, for the same reason a CPU gets more stable when you give it more voltage. On the other hand, overvolting it might make it unstable as well and actually make you overclock less. If you don't know what it is, you should probably just leave it as it is.

Thanks for that explanation!

So part of the "instability" of an overclock is the other devices being given data or instructions when they're not expecting them (either too early or too late), and PLL stops that happening by making sure that (in my case) exactly 45 CPU "ticks" happen for every 1 base clock "tick"?

[MG2R]

Thanks for that explanation!

So part of the "instability" of an overclock is the other devices being given data or instructions when they're not expecting them (either too early or too late), and PLL stops that happening by making sure that (in my case) exactly 45 CPU "ticks" happen for every 1 base clock "tick"?

The PLL isn't only necessary for overclocking, it is always necessary ;)

 

Phase locking doesn't mean making sure there is x amount of ticks for every base clock tick. Phase locking makes sure the ticks have there flanks synchronised (see the dotted lines in the picture).

 

Part of the instability of an overclock can be because the PLL can't properly "lock on" the CPU clock to the base clock. In such a case, it might help to overvolt it. If that happens (no lock-on), there will be indeed issues with components getting or sending data and instructions on the wrong time.

 

Hope that clears it up :)