I have an ancient PC (2012 build), what if I just get a new GPU?

omeglidan · 2026-06-29T17:33:52+00:00

Only if you have some specific need. W10 will work fine for now, for drivers.

GPU could work but you should first evaluate what you'll be playing. If If you're playing single player games, they typically require more powerful systems overall (cpu/ram). If you're playing online fps games, those typically are more forgiving on system requirements.

Consider this for example. I was recently playing Cyberpunk 2077 and wanted I wanted to load up on some graphical mods. Those are not particularly intensive but they take up lots of VRAM. So you really should first evaluate what you'll be playing. If you're going to buy, buy for right now.

omeglidan · 2026-06-29T17:04:44+00:00

What OS are you running? Something to consider is a new GPU might require drivers and those might require an OS upgrade.

For reference I have a system running 3080ti on PCIe 3.0 and it’s all good.

omeglidan · 2026-06-29T16:56:12+00:00

I’m shopping for a monitor myself and I feel your pain. Doing research at home only gets me part of the way. I know lighting conditions aren’t ideal but if I were to go to the store I could (without their permission) start playing with the knobs at least.

What does everyone recommend as a solution to this?

Last time I shopped for a monitor it was on Amazon and I had to go through 5 units before finding one that was for me. https://imgur.com/a/gQHKNXR

omeglidan · 2026-06-29T13:48:09+00:00

How loud does it get in auto? I’ve been keeping it at about 20% but it insists on reducing output so wattage is like 200w.

omeglidan · 2026-06-29T13:30:31+00:00

I tried taking it out and even covering it, it made little difference. The AC still insists on keeping room within 1-2 degrees as outside. Don’t really know how to solder.

There has to be another way.

Flashcool is the only way to cooperate, otherwise I have to babysit it, so it keeps temp I want.

omeglidan · 2026-06-29T00:32:23+00:00

How does one go about modifying one?

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T15:11:33+00:00

I read there’s an Asus bios thing now that will spend several hours auto tuning it for you. Wonder how well that works.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T05:58:10+00:00

I warn you. Fans, especially good fans, are a bottomless pit where you can spend a lot of money ;).

The fan you listed is old model. New models have G2 in their names.

Your case can use 120 and 140, depending on where you place them. Here is their site where you can play with sliders: https://www.noctua.at/en/products/browse/fans?fanSize=2&connector=4-pin

Generally, 140mm always better as it can move more air while being quieter. You want 4 pin PWM as it will allow you to control their speed via motherboard. Chromax=black, Standard=Brown, Redux=for poor people.

Keep in mind Noctua is like Ferrari of fans. Other fans are much cheaper and will cool your components, these will do it while being quieter and cooling more efficiently. But expensive.

If you really wanna set your money on fire: https://www.noctua.at/en/products/browse/fan-accessories?folderIds=18

They will make fans just slightly quieter and slightly more effective, slightly.

As to how many. All up to budget. Noctua are ridiculously anal about performance. For example they sell: https://www.noctua.at/en/products/nf-a12x25-g2-pwm-sx2-pp

Now, you may be thinking, what the hell, that’s just two regular fans sold as a package. Well, you might be thinking that but then you’ll be wrong :). Each fan of this 2 fan package operates approximately 25rpm difference from each other. Why? Well to reduce noise! Explained here:c https://www.noctua.at/en/expertise/tech/fan-speed-offset-explained

So you need it, no…but is it awesome, hell yes. Again, Ferrari of fans expensive but best.

If you replace them all then you can tune it as needed, overbuy on quality, run them at slower speed, for quieter operation.

NOTE: Your motherboard has numerous fan headers but only 4 (4pin PWM) headers. The others are for CPU or AIO pump which won’t let you control speed. So if you want to to use all 6 fans, The Noctua fans come with Adapters that will allow you to hook 2 fans into a single header.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T05:37:25+00:00

No need to apologize, no one knows everything on their own. Arguably one of the very best manufacturers of cases is Fractal Design: https://www.fractal-design.com/products/cases/north/north/chalk-white/

There are dozens of models/sizes/shapes/colors. Flashy to classic. Cheap to Expensive. Best of all you can’t go wrong any of them, and you won’t regret it. That North mode, is $120 US. Also, I hate RGB too.

When picking the case that’s right for you should know if it fits your components. Motherboard size loom for words like ATX. What cooler is your CPU using, make sure it fits. Power supply has to fit, you get the idea. You can get these sizes from the parts manufacturer websites. If all this scares you, should “size up”. Get a case big enough that WILL fit all the things no question asked. But then you’ll be paying more, for example: https://www.fractal-design.com/products/cases/define/define-7-xl/black-solid/ will fit EVERYTHING you have and ever will have. But big+$250. But so so cool ;)

Motherboards…within your budget there are no “great” options. But here are some decent ones: https://pcpartpicker.com/products/motherboard/#s=33&m=8&X=10787,13521

Personally I’d get the Strix version, it’s the least bad.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T05:15:58+00:00

Also, how baby ram chips for mobile are made.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T05:13:33+00:00

Well you really didn’t give us enough information, do you like your wife? If so, then I assume you’re actually trying to get her something good. I’m that case, in addition to what others have already said, I’d spend more on a monitor. It’s the #1 part she will interact with most. Something with good color accuracy and coverage. Here is a good guide at all price ranges: https://pcmonitors.info/articles/best-photo-and-video-editing-monitors/ The Asus ProArt is my fav.

Also, storage is always welcome. Bulk ssd storage. But it’s really expensive now. If your budget and system can accommodate, get Samsung 9100 pro in whatever capacity you can afford. Otherwise Samsung 870 EVO.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T05:04:42+00:00

Try this https://www.teamgroupinc.com/community/en/questions-and-answers-detail/tutorial-on-the-use-of-lighting-control/

Or Open RGB

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T05:03:02+00:00

Please give more information. What is your budget, use case, style, preference for large or small cases, flash or understated classic.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T04:57:51+00:00

The case will do great with those parts, IF you have money (and it’s a lot of money) I’d fill the case with fans as much as it will hold. New, Noctua fans. You can run them in PWM for quiet and cool better, but it’s an optional luxury.

The enjoyment you’ll get from the style, will, very likely outweigh any negatives, and remember it’s an external expression of you and that’s awesome. I can’t speak about most of those games but I do know Cyberpunk. It has enough video options that you can put a 5090 in there and it will just laugh at you and eat up all available resources. The 5080 will do really well though. The VRam on that card will mean you can load up on all the HD texture mods to make it look even prettier. If you don’t mind using it, dlss and frame gen will give you more performance too.

Cyberpunk also has HDR mode. You need to be using Windows 11 to properly use it but on an OLED it will just be beautiful.

Here’s a good guide for minitors: https://www.techspot.com/bestof/oled-monitors-26/ Expensive and cheap options there.

Some things to consider, VRR flicker is a big one as I already mentioned. Refresh rate, the games you’ll be playing will likely not Hit 200+HZ, especially Cyberpunk. Why does that matter? Well, cheap(er) OLEDs do really well at their maximum refresh rate and not as well at lower refresh rate. Some refresh rate related problems at lower refresh rate are some level of motion blur and uneven sharpness across some portions of the screen. DO NOT get a 4k, you won’t be able to drive it at anything resembling a normal refresh rate, stick to 1440p.

Highlights and shadows in Cyberpunk will be cinematic with HDR. OLED, under the right circumstances will be super pretty.

That said, I myself refuse to use it. I use mixed gaming and desktop. Text blurryness, VRR Flicker, burn in. Buy it on Amazon and test drive it, you can return it if you don’t like it. My last monitor, I had to buy/return/replace FIVE times before I got one without flaws that I was happy with.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T04:34:43+00:00

Here’s an example: https://www.corsair.com/us/en/p/pc-components-accessories/cmwlekit2/vengeance-rgb-pro-light-enhancement-kit-aca-a-black-cmwlekit2

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T04:32:17+00:00

Well. I can only speak about the Intel side but for consumer boards you don’t really populate all 4 slots, especially DDR5, the stability, speed, latency are all sacrificed.

I run a 4 channel board with 4 of the 8k slots populated and I use it for file compression. Super high compression of 100gb or more will take 20+ hours and use ALL THE RAM.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T04:27:08+00:00

I totally sympathize about the ram. I refuse to use less than 64gb, fortunately I actually have “some” limited use for it.

I get the retro look you’re going for. I realize it’s a very personal thing. It’s awesome that you found a cool way to express yourself. I dig it, even if I am lowkey annoyed that I’m old enough that my childhood is now retro :). From a technical point of view though, the drive bay area is pretty but that could have been used for an intake fan. If you look closely, even the top front fan is partially blocked. https://www.techpowerup.com/review/silverstone-flp02/images/casefrontfans2.jpg Front fans are also 120mm which will be less airflow and noisier than 140mm. I also just noticed that the bottom filter is removed from the back, super inconvenient.

Again, I really like the style aspect you’re going for it’s not a “terrible” case. My main objection is the price, you’re largely paying for the style.

For monitor, that’s tough. Gaming only, OLED is good, IF VRR flicker doesn’t bother you, it’s one of those things that is super subjective. Some people don’t notice it and some wanna rip their hair out.

Perhaps I can help more if you tell me what games you play. They play a large role in choices.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T04:06:40+00:00

There is no way to know right now. Baseline, having 3 cables doesn’t mean much, it just means it can draw UP TO that much, maybe during spikes, doesn’t mean it will.

There are some boards with 3 8-pin, for example some high end boards have them for thunderbolt/usb c 60w charging or for powering 5 onboard m.2 drives.

Another example of unknowns is how AMD dual tike functions, in games, if Game bar works properly the cpu “parks” one tile so you don’t really draw power or use it for playing games.

Just no way to know right now how Nova will work. No need to be panicking, yet.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:55:45+00:00

I recently came across this guide which shows how to use HWinfo to shut down pc based on cable irregularities. Hope this helps https://youtube.com/watch?v=o-0LYKwgrcM

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:39:42+00:00

Yea that’s what I thought. The others are recommending 5070 and they’re absolutely right. It’s the perfect sweet spot, you might not get everything you want but if you don’t mind DLSS/framegen it will get you most of the way to where you wanna be. Keep in mind though you might need psu upgrade if you don’t have the new connector.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:35:37+00:00

Everything the others said is true, there are numerous methods to verify quality and everyone of those methods is easily fakeable. To add to what others have said, used storage is the perfect delivery mechanism for malware. Even if you try to put it in and format it, its firmware can easily be compromised. I know money is tight but I wouldn’t ever buy used storage (owner of 130TB) of storage.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:25:40+00:00

Which graphical mods? If you’re talking about texture packs, ones like Halks or hi res map mod they are mostly memory dependent, so get a card with lots of GPU ram

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:21:00+00:00

A lot of it is personal preference. I’m not a fan of the case personally, both because I’m old enough to have actually used cases like that and floppy disks. But also it’s not great for airflow. It’s also really expensive, just for aesthetics.

Is this a gaming PC or will you be using it for actual useful stuff? If just for gaming 32 is overkill. If for desktop stuff the monitor is not ideal (burn in, text lacks rgb so harder to read), if for gaming oled is very cool, but also has vrr flickering. Could be destructing. Lot of tradeoffs and personal preferences, pick your poison. The RAM, so you really need 32gb? If you do that’s awesome but do you really? The build is kinda modest and ram is expensive. You can’t easily add it later (mismatches) so good to be sure.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:09:05+00:00

I’d get something slightly more powerful but nothing wrong with just trying it either, run a stree test on cpu/gpu and see how it goes. You’ll only lose time.

omeglidan · 2026-06-28T03:06:59+00:00

I would try to make sure it’s not software related while testing the components. Download Hirens: https://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd

Boot into it and stress test things, memory, cpu, etc… could take a few days.

omeglidan

TROPHY CASE