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The new computer is alive! It's up and running, and basically fully functional. I've got Windows 11 installed, and I'm even using OBS on it to record the video related to this article. Coming from older hardware circa 2015 or 2016, this thing is fast. There are a few things I want to talk about, some adjustments I made, and some challenges I faced along the way. Heatsink Decisions and Thermal Mass I was initially planning to do some testing with a smaller Thermalright heatsink. But, in the end, I prioritized finishing the build. The reality is, when you're comparing a 90mm heatsink to a 120mm one, the larger one simply has more thermal mass. The larger heatsink installed. I was only able to attach one of the 120mm fans. For a CPU like the AMD Ryzen 9900x, that extra thermal mass should help avoid throttling as much. I wasn't able to fit two fans on the larger heatsink due to placement issues. I might try to attach another fan eventually, but for now, the single 120m...

In my previous video, I had a bit of a disaster, I destroyed the USB 3.0 connector on my PC case. It's a cheap Fractal Focus case, so there are issues. While attempting to swap the connector to a different header on the motherboard (for better cable routing with another device), things went south, and I ended up ruining the connector on my case! The broken USB 3.0 case connector, the blue part, and the motherboard header separated. Thankfully, the motherboard itself is fine. I was really worried for a bit there, but after testing, it seems like the motherboard's USB 3.0 headers are still working fine. That's a huge relief!  Be Careful with USB 3.0 Headers! This whole experience was a reminder to be extra careful with those USB 3.0 motherboard header connectors. They can be surprisingly fragile. It seems like the cheap case connector was the main culprit. There's a visible physical difference. A comparison of the cheap Fractal Focus case connector versus another connecto...

I recently started a new PC build, and while it's mostly been going okay, I've run into a couple of snags that I thought I'd share. These are the kinds of things that remind you that building a PC isn't always as simple as building with Legos, as I have said and some others might say.  I made some... interesting choices. For example, I initially went with a ~90mm heatsink for the AMD Ryzen 9900x CPU due to size concerns around the socket and the depth of the case. I realized pretty quickly that a 120mm would probably be better, at least for keeping things quiet. The smaller one's good enough to get things up and running, though. The start of showing the new PC build with the parts listed. Close up showing of the CPU fan and heatsink. Everything functions. So far. But then the big problem of my own making. The USB 3.0 Header Issue The biggest issue I encountered was with the USB 3.0 header for the case. I'm using a Fractal Design Focus G, which is a pretty budget...

Around Black Friday 2024 I purchased most of the components for a new PC build. My old system, sporting an Intel i7-6700 from around 2015, has been a reliable workhorse, but it's showing its age for creative tasks like video editing. I did throw in an RTX 4060 8GB back in March of 2024. At the time, there weren’t a lot of other appealing options that supported hardware based AV1 encode/decode, but it did hold me over for a while in the old PC.  The video covers this topic in more detail. This website article is a summary of the video. I used AI tools to analyze and summarize what was said. I've heavily edited the text because it's not good at following my usual tone and word choices, but there's still a bit of it where I sound more dramatic than I'd normally be.  The RTX 4060 GPU I carried over from my old build. Anyway, the shipping experience has been... an adventure. And not the good kind! Let's dive into the mess.  MSI's online store needs help with thei...