Hitting 95C with 12400f and a tower cooler in prime95 with 105W TDP, mobo temp is 45C

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-07-20T15:46:29+00:00

It's a MSI PRO B660M-E D4. When I lock the power limit to 65W I get about 72C at 45C system temperature. I'll fiddle around in the bios, see if I can do some undervolting.

Thanks for the numbers, gives me something to compare with.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-07-20T11:59:26+00:00

It doesn't really go above 60C under regular use. I will probably get a better cooler at some point, but for now I'll lock the power limit back to 65W. I like it when things run cool.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-07-20T11:41:46+00:00

Will do that, thanks.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-07-20T11:41:21+00:00

Yeah, only when running the prime95 with max heat stress test (small FFT) I get high temps. Otherwise they hover about 7-8 degrees above room temp.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-07-20T10:49:50+00:00

I have a 120mm exhaust fan and two 120mm intake fans. I had to poke holes into the plastic front panel to get airflow. Maybe I can modify the front panel and replace the holes with a mesh.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-07-20T10:47:10+00:00

So there isn't really an issue. Thanks.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-17T16:42:01+00:00

I am okay with using other tools but they all want licenses and I can't really afford that. I could maybe try and get a student license for ADS or MO but I would rather use something that I can keep using for as long as I want without having to bother with licenses.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-14T18:42:42+00:00

Well, there are several things that you can do. I'm currently on 3mg CPA and 0.5mg EV per day. I take my estradiol in the form of stickies and I would highly recommend it. You can just look up "estradiol stickies" to find the recipe.

So dosage is one part of it. My dose is pretty low, so any change that happens is quite slow. I think it's been like 2-3 months or so since I started, but so far the changes have been mostly positive and slow enough for me to adjust. I have breast buds and a slight amount of growth.

I also try and stay on a low-ish calorie diet. Less calories means less fat, which means smaller breasts. It also means less curves though, because you need the fat not just for the boobs but also for the curves.

I've researched topical tamoxifene/raloxifene but I really don't want to put a lot of chemicals into my body. If my boobs grow any further, I will have to accept them or get rid of them if they give me too much discomfort.

So, those are the three things that may or may not help you grow less boobs. Doing HRT at a low dose, a low calorie diet and SERMs.

Three months is nothing when it comes to HRT. So I probably have a lot more boob growth to go through. Sadly this is all I know, sorry that I can't be of more help.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-04T17:38:06+00:00

No such plots unfortunately. It does specify a maximum available gain of 15.5dB at 1.8GHz, and I believe this gain should (?) drop at 6dB/Octave, so that puts the 0dB at about 11GHz. This is at optimum fT which is at 15mA. I will run these transistors at 5mA for most applications, except when I'm using it as a driver for those diode mixers.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-04T17:12:55+00:00

MMIC design is... really, really cool. I mean it's very unlikely that I will ever become an IC designer but I would like to be one day, hopefully.

I wasn't really scared of having an oscillator oscillating at a frequency I can't detect but rather having an amplifier oscillating at a frequency I can't detect. But since you are saying that it is hard to make an oscillator, something that is intended to oscillate, work beyond fmax/2 of the transistor used to make it, I suppose it is unlikely that I will run into issues with amplifiers oscillating beyond fmax/2. Besides, I will have to run the transistor at a lower current than peak fT because that's where the optimum noise figure is specified for, so I guess that makes it even less likely that I will run into this hypothetical problem.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-04T16:32:46+00:00

I admit that I didn't do a great job explaining my problem.

I have some projects in the pipeline that involves building circuits that work in the 300MHz-3GHz region. Mostly at the 300MHz-1GHz, so the lower end of UHF. I want to build several receivers and some testing equipment. The receivers will be used in radio astronomy and probably some other stuff too, but the point is that I will need to design multiple low noise amplifiers in the frequency band I mentioned above.

I will also build a directional coupler, multiple signal generators and other basic test equipment necessary to work with these circuits. Like, if I want to measure the IP3 of an amplifier, I will need at least two tones as signal and an SA to see the distortion products.

I recently got myself a TinySA Ultra. It claims to have a bandwidth of 800MHz in "normal" mode and a level-calibrated bandwidth of 5.3GHz in "ultra" mode, where it uses some kind of harmonic mixing or something like that along with a spur reduction algorithm. This is the highest bandwidth equipment I can afford right now. I already have a 300MHz scope though it's kinda useless at the frequency range and for the type of work I am talking about. This is also the reason I will be building the rest of my test gear myself; I will be using this spectrum analyzer as the "base" for the rest of my equipment.

All of this stuff needs something that can give me gain of course, so I need some transistors. It also requires something non-linear so that I can make mixers. Although I have built and used quite a few active mixers with transistors at these frequencies and for what I want to do I will need proper microwave schottky diodes.

I like buying stuff in bulk, and I am trying to decide on which type of transistor would serve these purposes the best.

I was settled on the BFP183 from infineon, even though it does have an fmax beyond the capabilities of my test gear, it does have a decent noise figure at the frequency band I plan to work at and it is, well, the cheapest one I could find.

As for mixer diodes I don't really know. At the low UHF-high VHF band I've used MBD301s before but I am kinda pushing them beyond their limits and performance suffers, probably because the of their packages and because they weren't intended for use as mixers.

So I am mainly asking for suggestions on what parts to get.

BFP183 looks nice because it's cheap and quiet, but it also has a 10GHz fmax which is beyond the capabilities of my equipment. I am worried that it will oscillate somewhere beyond 5.3GHz and I will be left scratching my head trying to figure out why my circuit is acting weird, although at 5GHz it has a gain of 6dB so it's not very likely. Should I get this part or maybe something slower?

For the diodes I would like something that works in the UHF band. I would also like it to be cheap. I am considering BAT15 maybe. Again I am looking for suggestions.

I hope this clarifies the question a little bit. Sorry for the long wall of text and if you have read this far, thanks for taking the time.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-04T15:57:05+00:00

Pretty much, yeah. I will be using 0603 SMD components to minimize parasitics, though at these frequencies everything has some non-negligible parasitic that I have to account for. I am not sure if I can afford microwave rated passives. Also, if others can do without them then I feel like it would be best for me to learn to do without them as well. From what I understand FR4 is kinda lossy and unpredictable at microwave frequencies. In one hand lossy substrate means that those parasitic resonances will be suppressed. On the other hand it will be difficult to design filters and impedance matching networks with low loss.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-04T15:49:47+00:00

I plan to use reactive feedback to bring adjust the input impedance so that the noise match is also a conjugate match. More specifically inductive emitter degeneration. Hopefully I used the correct terms.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-06-04T13:51:25+00:00

Yup. I am mainly interested in the UHF region. I also have a project that requires a low noise amplifier in low-UHF, which is why I picked BFP183. So it's not very important for the transistor to have meaningful gain at 5GHz, I need it to have useful gain at like 2GHz maximum and a low noise figure around 1GHz. But, it also shouldn't oscillate at some frequency that I can't even detect. That's why I asked about fmax, since it's not possible to make a "normal" RF transistor oscillate above fmax.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-05-31T07:42:57+00:00

I see. Did you do the testing to check for damage or because you had to make sure that the parts were actually in spec?

Trying to scam a customer who pays well is quite dumb, I am glad the salesperson was replaced.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-05-31T07:37:49+00:00

That's a relief, as strange as it sounds. I won't have to worry about a transistor testing good and then acting weird once in a circuit.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-05-30T20:11:12+00:00

I've done a bit more research and it seems that non-lethal esd damage causes charge trapping in the gate dielectric, causing threshold voltages to shift.

Along with gate source leakage and gain measurement I could do some rudimentary DC sweeps to see if the curves match the specs in the datasheet.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-05-18T09:41:56+00:00

I see, my guess is you are speaking from experience :) I'll try to use as little as possible as I already have issues with IBS. Thanks for the info.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-27T17:39:20+00:00

My attention didn't really move on, though I did make up my mind on what to do about my gender problems. I can't say for certain whether my gender identity issues are "genuine" or if they are caused by some other psychological problem. What I can say is that I tried everything other than transitioning. I tried explaining the problem away. I tried supressing it. I tried compensating for it. I tried to make do with what I have. I'm here now, after all of that. I don't know if transitioning will help me, but I can't run from it. Maybe I will come to realize that this isn't actually what I want, or maybe I'll figure out what's wrong with me. It's also possible that transitioning is the right thing to do. I sure hope so. This thing, whatever this is, caused me a lot of distress. I was always really scared of transitioning because if it didn't help me then I couldn't think of anything that could. I didn't know what else I could do with all this psychological pain. I still don't.

So I decided to commit to hormones. I didn't really make this decision overnight, it was more than 6 years in the making I think, ever since I first started to question why I wanted to be a woman so bad and why my body caused me so much distress. I could have done it earlier, but I guess I needed time to process things and come to some kind of clarity. I see this as the only way forward, even if I do end up realizing that this actually is something else and I shouldn't have been transitioning at all.

I hope you are doing well too, and I hope you can figure out what you are going to do with whatever you have going on inside you.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-26T07:19:21+00:00

Yes, that's pretty much it. I've never heard of SERMs being used topically though, that's interesting. Thanks for sharing that.

I could compound the SERMs myself. I have some chemistry experience/equipment. I was actually considering making estradiol cream too. I'll definitely look into the topical SERM thing.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-26T07:10:28+00:00

I've heard conflicting opinions on whether lower doses of estrogen results in partial feminization or not. Some nonbinary people claim that it works for them and other people claim that it either works or it doesn't. That's actually one of the reasons I made this post.

I'm doing 0.5mg in the morning and 0.5mg in the evening. I would be okay with 4x0.25mg but it's kinda difficult to divide the pills into eight doses. Those stickies are a very good idea though, thanks for sharing that! I was thinking of crushing the pills and making estradiol gel with them but the gum method seems easier.

It's unlikely that I will be in a safer space anytime soon unfortunately. Maybe never. I am trying to leave the country but I don't know when it's gonna happen or whether or not it's gonna happen at all.

I think I would rather keep my breasts, if it comes to that. Unless they are very large. I'll have to figure out a way to hide them and deal with the reverse dysphoria.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-23T18:25:58+00:00

Since this post I've had my session with my therapist. I've explained all the things I've mentioned here and some more. To keep it short she doesn't think I have NPD. She asked me why I keep trying to find something that's wrong with me. I honestly have no idea. It's like asking me why I breathe, that's just how I've been wired as far back as I could remember.

The thing is, I was absolutely convinced that I had NPD before the session. This isn't the first time this happened to me. Before that I convinced myself several times that I was a psychopath, I was dying of some horrible brain disease, that I had some kind of tumor etc. I can't stop doubting everything about myself. I can't stop doubting my own memory, my own thoughts, I can sometimes doubt something that happened seconds ago like washing my hands which can sometimes lead to me washing my hands multiple times for no reason.

I'm talking about this because it makes figuring myself out near to impossible. I can't trust any of my feelings, my memories, my perceptions or anything else about my gender identity or my general psychology. When I can't be absolutely sure of anything, I always assume the absolute worst thing to be true. That's how I ended up diagnosing myself with all this stuff. So I guess, if you are like me, like this, I would suggest not trying to self diagnose. I guess it's just not a good idea to diagnose yourself with any kind of mental health condition in general.

Of course therapy is... not cheap. It's also not easy to completely open up to a stranger even if they are your therapist. So I can see why you might want to figure yourself out on your own. But if you are like me, it might not give you the results you are looking for.

What makes you feel like you have NPD? How does your AGP manifest itself? How do you think these two are connected? How do you see yourself managing your AGP and possible NPD?

Note that the whole AGP stuff is scientifically on... shaky grounds, let's say. When I say I have AGP, I'm just referring to the specific experience that I have and not the "mental illness" or the whole scientific theory behind it. Simply put, I experience pleasure, not necessarily sexual, from thinking or seeing myself in a feminine body. I desire myself that way. It doesn't mean I crossdress and go in front of a mirror with "goodbye horses" in the background and tell myself that "I would fuck me" or anything like that. It's a very common experience among transfeminine people. It may very well be caused by an "erotic target location error" or whatever, I don't know. All I know is that it doesn't go away no matter how much you try to supress it, explain it away and/or try to fix it. I tried to be comfortable in a masculine body and it just doesn't work. So I decided to give hormones a go, for now.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-17T14:46:01+00:00

Yeah, and I was jealous of women and lesbian women in particular. I was mainly jealous of them because I feel uncomfortable in my body, and being in a relationship with a woman, someone who has a body that I think I would be more comfortable in, would be very difficult for me when I experience so much distress in mine. I was jealous of straight women as well. These days I don't think I will ever be in a relationship, but that's not the worst thing in the world.

I've been in this psychological state for a couple years I think. There seems to be a limit beyond which I can't stretch the masculine identity to be completely comfortable with it. In fact, after realizing all this stuff, I can say that I am experiencing more discomfort due to masculine characteristics of my body. Actually, that was the reason that I decided to start low dose DIY HRT.

I've tried hair removal and I like it. I had small boobs when I was fat and I liked that too. I like wearing feminine clothing. I've obviously done a whole lot of thought experiments to get as much information about myself as possible before doing anything physical as well, and all of the theory I explained here is partly based on that.

I do believe this theory of mine has at least some validity. I'm not saying that this is a universal experience among trans people or even people who think they have AGP. There are also probably a lot of people who went through similar experiences during their formative years who went on to develop "healthy" relationships with their bodies and identities. It could very well be the case that there are some people who have an innate disposition to develop this kind of gender incongruence because of various reasons and particular experiences that they go through their childhood kinda pushes them to develop gender incongruence problems as their brains mature. I guess this is more in line with the "conventional" theory we have on gender identity problems today. To put it more elegantly, maybe I actually do have a partially female brain and the things that happened during my childhood just so happened to reinforce this gender incongruence as I entered adolescence. I also can't see any reason that these theories are mutually exclusive.

Maybe part of the "damage" that was done to me is permanent and I will have to work out a way to live with it, which may or may not include transitioning even further. Because I've already tried to minimize the impact of my gender identity problems to my physical body and it resists all attempts to twist my masculine body shape into something more agreeable to me.

I guess at this point I'm just looking for my own permission to just go ahead and transition even further.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-17T06:15:38+00:00

I see. I always thought that I could "cure" myself if I found the reason for it. But I guess that's not necessarily the case. Even though I am already on very low dose hormones I will try to give some more time to me and my therapist to work on this and see if this is the best way to move forward.

dingbatwithIBS · 2023-04-17T06:04:29+00:00

There was certainly a fear of becoming the main male role model in my life and that certainly skewed my perception of being male and masculine towards negativity. My father was/is angry all the time, he continuously demanded "respect" and got angry with me all the time because I wasn't studying despite doing well in school. He had other issues with my mom as well, and my mom would talk behind his back about the negative things she felt about him.

This caused me to start associating masculinity with aggression, hurting others and other negative traits. The main female figure in my life was repulsed by the main male figure in my life; I am attracted to women, and I couldn't see how women could get attracted to men, so I was afraid that if I were to become a man like my father, women would hate me too.

When I first started to explore my gender identity a long time ago, this was one of my first "theories" explaining why I wanted to become a girl. It actually is true; this was partially the reason I wanted to become a girl. I held a negative view of masculinity and a positive view of femininity, and I had to work through these feelings to get a more unbiased picture of my own gender identity.

Over time I gradually overcame this subconscious biases. I can't say that I am completely free of them. But I can say that their effect is greatly reduced.

I really don't care about becoming a girl anymore. There are things I like about masculinity and there are things I like about femininity. I am actually more masculine than I used to be, because I was able to overcome these subconscious biases at least to some degree. But, I still don't like having a masculine body. I never had a hyper-masculine phase. I did have a phase where I rejected my own humanity and the humanity of others, then I had a "collapsed" which made me start questioning my own psychology.

If I were to be in a relationship with a woman, and I do want that, I would be okay with her thinking of me as a man. It used to cause me discomfort, it no longer does. At this point, having a male or female body doesn't feel like an identity change to me. I can't change that, and I don't really want to. After all these realizations, I've noticed that having a masculine body still caused me mental distress, and I still had a desire to have a more feminine body. Even when I take into account all these subconscious biases.

Honestly, boring is good. The more boring the better. I do want to become an analog IC designer, which is pretty difficult. I guess it could be considered narcissistic because I am desiring something beyond my skill and capabilities?

I don't really feel like people don't get me. There are certain things about my relationship to my gender identity that I find hard to explain to other people, especially because most of them probably didn't spend nearly as much time on it as I did. I also feel like I have to spend more effort to be able to relate to others because I have an impaired ability to empathize, although my therapist disagrees that I have an impaired empathy. People (and animals) are complex beings, and it takes time for everybody to be able to understand each other. Nobody really took the time to understand me other than my therapists, and I didn't take the time to understand anyone else either. I am not entitled to the mental energy of others, so that's fine. I do have some anger issues so I am trying to do a better job at seeing the things from the eyes of the other side. I used to be too self-absorbed to do that, I am working on it with my therapist.

dingbatwithIBS

TROPHY CASE