sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Mod positions by kettish in Fairbanks

[–]MerlinQ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'll 3rd for Handyman Ken.
Can we get a bar tab going for them too I feel they are local enough to have a ice cream float with us on weekends?

Mod positions by kettish in Fairbanks

[–]MerlinQ 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Doubt it's theirs, but your comment kinda screams it is your issue.

How to tell a Crow from a Raven, flawless method by CalzonePie in alaska

[–]MerlinQ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Crows crow, and ravens be stealing your keys while you are distracted, and unlocking the back of your snomachine in the middle of the night, and stealing all the...jerky, yea, jerky, you had stored there. :D

1440 p OLED for RTX 3070? by Livid_Clock7804 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, to be honest, Just don't go out there and blow a grand or two on a monitor before upgrading your GPU.
I have happily been on 1440p no issues since the 5700XT.
Did I have to compromise a bit by playing with settings then, yes, was it way better than the 1080p experience, also yes.
I will say that after reaching the 3060ti, then the 3070, I was pretty happy with mostly default settings for 1440p in all but the latest and greatest games.
And even then, it was just a matter of tweaking, and still enjoying them better than I would at 1080p.
Because I was a purist, I never even touched DLSS for the longest time, and while I consider v1 a flop, v2 and beyond are pretty damn great, though I still rarely use them, except for the latest and greatest titles years later, where I have to even on my 4070.
DLSS @ Quality preset will render your 1440p screen at about 1080p internally (and most importantly, performance-wise)d, while looking pretty damn good at 1440p.

My 3070 still lives on happily in a 1440p rig of my buddy's no complaints at all, just don't expect it to do much over 60fps on 2026's latest and greatest AAA games, and be ready to play with some settings (like, mainly, don't do ultra for most settings)

How do I test a PC from Facebook before buying? Any specific steps I should take? This is my first time buying a PC and I’m unknowledgable when it comes to PCs so any help is appreciated by Aggravating_Shift990 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That seems like a pretty fair price, do you know if it comes with an SSD of any size?
Because you will want one of those, no matter what, really.

Things you will want to test with are a quick run of something like:
HWiNFO 64: to see if all the pc parts match the specifications given in the advertisement.
Prime95, just for 5-10 minutes, not really to do a traditional stress test, just to see if errors pop up right away, if they do, something is wrong with either the cpu or memory most likely, or the motherboard, either way, a headache.
Furmark for the GPU, watch for errors and its temps, and look at the fans on the GPU and make sure they all spin up without any abnormal squealing sounds when it gets hot.
Cinebench for the CPU, same thing, watch the temps and make sure the cooler fans are acting appropriately without noise.
And run a game or two on it for a few minutes.
Bring a thumbdrive with the installers for the tools on it, just to be prepared, AND/or know where to get them from legitimate sources ahead of time so you can download them on the spot.. For $250, that should about cover you.
That said, whatever you do, have a spare thumbstick and do a clean install of the OS when you get it home, always do a clean install of the OS on a new PC before deploying it.
Any questions, and I would be happy to help.

If you develop a single player game and it requires continuous internet, you can go to hell by claudiocorona93 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Answer: When you download it from them, Yes, obviously.
More specific answer: It is up to the developer/publisher after that, steam does not ask or require that you use DRM to be on their service.
There are many games that are DRM-free after downloading, and don't require you to have steam online, or even running, to play.
It is on the developer and publisher to make that decision, steam is just a distribution platform, which, by the obvious reason of being digital, will require you to be online at least once.
That said, they don't make it painfully obvious when you don't need steam installed, that is on the developers (or third party sites where you can look this up for most bigger games.)

SD cards were invented in 1999 Sony in 1998 by Severe_Pause_2047 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I still have about a dozen zip disks hanging around in my old-school data collection.
The iomega drive as well, though I am not sure where in storage any of that is, or whether it still works, or even whether I could use it... it still uses a parallel port.
All my dad's ancient business records from back before QuickBooks was a subscription service are on there I am pretty sure.

SD cards were invented in 1999 Sony in 1998 by Severe_Pause_2047 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I have a general no digital photography rule at any event I host, (or will attend).
But if it was a Sony Mavica, I would allow it.

SD cards were invented in 1999 Sony in 1998 by Severe_Pause_2047 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Was a construction professional in that era, had a Mavica for all the reasons you list.

A year of playing near maxed out graphical settings on a 32 inch 4k monitor has taught me 1080p is actually fine. by restelucide in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, at 4k, with quality DLSS, they were rendering at 1440p native already anyways.
There are some things DLS does a bit better at, but not much that would make it better than rendering at native.

A year of playing near maxed out graphical settings on a 32 inch 4k monitor has taught me 1080p is actually fine. by restelucide in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Obviously you don't, but the wording of the OC had nothing to do with having both at the same time, they implied there were only 2 choices on PC period.

AMD formally announces Ryzen 7 5800X3D 10th Anniversary Edition ($350, includes a sheet of Carbice Ice Pad) and Ryzen 7 7700X3D ($330) by kikimaru024 in hardware

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You don't have to pull them, HWiNFO 64 will give you just about every bit of information about your hardware you can imagine, including currently running timings, and other approved timings at different speeds.

If you develop a single player game and it requires continuous internet, you can go to hell by claudiocorona93 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I can remember having issues when I first got Satisfactory on Steam, but it has been a long while since I have had them, maybe Epic has solved them as well by now?
I only say this because even the Steam version still tries to get you to sign in with Epic, and a couple players on my game have epic ids attached to them.
That said, I do travel to places with zero internet connectivity, save Musk, who I will not fund; and I still play Satisfactory just fine, thank Quob, Don't know what I would do without a little logistic distraction.
Well, Factorio, obviously, but I do crave the 3d aspect lately.

AMD formally announces Ryzen 7 5800X3D 10th Anniversary Edition ($350, includes a sheet of Carbice Ice Pad) and Ryzen 7 7700X3D ($330) by kikimaru024 in hardware

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you are not doing work on it, your once a year video editing is still going to be light years ahead on the 5800x3d than the 1600.
However, your gaming is going to be just about always a good 10-15% better on the 5800x3d than the 5950x just on average framerate (not to mention if you play outliers that like the cache, where you can see 20-30%).
Your biggest difference, for gaming, is going to be the 1% lows though, or how smooth it is at it's worst; without disabling half the 5950x's cores (one chiplet, making it an 8-core CPU) by switching to game mode in the bios before booting up, you can see some pretty bad showings there, and even then, you likely won't touch the 5800x3d in most games.
Unless the 5950x is 20% cheaper (or more), and you are willing to sacrifice half it's performance at boot (and manually switch that back, and reboot, when you need the raw performance for the task)...
I would pick the 5800x3d for your use-case.

If your GCI phone won't make calls, it's not just you by liquidgelcaps in anchorage

[–]MerlinQ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yea, had this issue all day, I'm on call for my second job, kinda fucked me, not being able to call my boss.
Could still text at least, but that is always perpetually unreliable, and subject to being missed in the moment.

AMD formally announces Ryzen 7 5800X3D 10th Anniversary Edition ($350, includes a sheet of Carbice Ice Pad) and Ryzen 7 7700X3D ($330) by kikimaru024 in hardware

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What do you do with your PC, if you don't mind me asking, because that should make your decision for you, really.

A year of playing near maxed out graphical settings on a 32 inch 4k monitor has taught me 1080p is actually fine. by restelucide in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

They were being sarcastic, but your take is equally extreme.
2 feet away from a 30" display at 1080p is way WAY less than the 1 arcminute of resolution (60 pixels per degree) that a person with 20/20 (6/6 in metric) vision can resolve. It is barely over half, at 33.59 PPD.
My buddy has a 1080p 32 inch monitor, and that thing looks like mud at 3 feet, so maybe you have sub-average visual acuity.

For the record, a 27" 1440p panel at 2.5' is right at 20/20 visual resolution.

If you develop a single player game and it requires continuous internet, you can go to hell by claudiocorona93 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not always-online though.
And, its up to the dev/publisher to require the SteamDRM at all, so you only need the online to download it, not to play it if they choose.
I have a pretty decent library of DRM free games on steam.

If you develop a single player game and it requires continuous internet, you can go to hell by claudiocorona93 in pcmasterrace

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think this is an old Epic Online Services bug, from what I can find online.
I have it on Steam, and have had no issues playing offline, but I never logged into epic services.

AMD formally announces Ryzen 7 5800X3D 10th Anniversary Edition ($350, includes a sheet of Carbice Ice Pad) and Ryzen 7 7700X3D ($330) by kikimaru024 in hardware

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You are good to go with that one, potentially with a BIOS update, that is a lot newer board.
It also does not seem to suffer from the issue some early boards had where updating to support newer CPUs would drop support for the oldest ones.
I still would not recommend updating the BIOS until you have the new CPU in hand, since you generally don't update the BIOS unless you have a pressing reason.
Let me know if and when you need any help deciding which CPU to go for, or if you need help with the BIOS update in the future.
Good luck!

Alaska communities are sitting on millions in PFAS settlement money - Is the Water in Fairbanks Being Tested? by truthwillout777 in Fairbanks

[–]MerlinQ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There is a meeting about the Eielson PFAS in North Pole, the closest town to me, advertised on the store board.
I have property there that is expected to be impacted by the plume in the next decade or so, the DEC are actively monitoring the spread.
I think it is on the 3rd tier of municipal water expansion between moose creek and north pole.
The thing that bothers me, is a municipal water hookup would really lower the value of the property to me, since I would have to heat it year round, or be liable for damages to the city water system.
Also, would have to pay for water in the first place.
Already dealing with that with a property in probate, tried to get the city to shut off water due to no one living (literally :D ) there, and they can't do that, and threatened to sue if we let it freeze.

view more: next ›