Section31

Looks interesting but budget priority means probably i will get upcoming GPU (5090 probably) and New PSU first.  CPU/Mobo/Ram year after. Then caselabs replacement year after - gives plenty of time for caselabs revival to sort out its situation.

@neurotix You just need to keep it simple as i said. Just aim to pickup hand me downs/freebie keyboards.

There is lot less risk of damage due to customs checking stuff if international shipping involved. Not the first time somebody keyboard got destroyed because customs sent an drill bit through it during inspection. When you are getting the said freebie item you will still have to do what your diagram shows (most people will leave foam/pcb separate and daughterboard from the board) and you just have to follow the instructions on configuration you want and install the hotswap switches. I am always foamless and go plateless if its an option now. 

The actual way of sourcing the stuff is like PC parts sourcing nowadays.  It's kind of global sourcing with multiple options to save and lot of air freight/sea freight involved maybe. All in the name of getting things faster and cheaper. I wouldn't do for warranty reasons/heavy weight and watercooling parts are better off just paying shipping versus having your luggage space occupied by waterparts.

1 hour ago, neurotix said:

If you have any boards you don't need, I'll take them, and some tactile switches to put in

Actually there may be one but it's pretty far out lol. It's currently on loan to my friend while he wait for the Geon F1-8X-V2 GB to arrive (its 10-12months) so probably anywhere from Q1 to Q2 2025 to be fulfilled. By then i may have found something else to replace it. It's an Grey Studio Aero75 in Coffee Brown Ano.

Though you are better off just buying something like :

TKD Cycle 8: 150USD Mark

and Geon F1-8X-FE instead (plastic version of Geon F1-8X): 100USD

All that matters is the word hand me downs/freebies lol.

21 hours ago, GanjaSMK said:

Man I looked at stuff for about a week. I am rethinking myself now into two options, not for much other than simplicity. 

 

That MORA rad (which I'm sure has made it's rounds already in the WC community) definitely seems to be the best option for the actual performance side of it; that said it is massive.  Either that or a AIO 420; - less maintenance all around I suppose. 

 

Along with finding out I'll need extra parts on hand (no issue there), I am curious to know if a custom loop is really worth the "hassle" (if you will) of obtaining "highest possible performance" outside of extreme options beyond water.  I'm not here to break any records, rather was curious if putting a spare chip under water might produce better clocking results due to ability to crank vcore (somewhat). 

 

I am not trying to talk myself out of it, I am trying to find my vantage point between "this makes sense" and "nope, this doesn't". 

Its an fun project just try to get as many freebies/hand me downs as possible from the watercooling community to reduce your overall costs. 

@GanjaSMK Honestly in the current market wait for watercooling enuthiast to upgrade and pick up there hand me downs for cheap to free even. 

While my project got delayed and am still working out final budgets, I should have large amounts of waterparts plus pc parts to give away over next 2-3years. Including the caselabs s8 case.

I just committed to giving away my watercool cpu iv intel block when i swap over to optimus intel sig v3. I might have an aquacomputer ultitube d5 (no pump) too depending on how the situation with planned singularity computer compact dual d5 distro plate goes.

Brand doesn’t really matter now just what fits your budget though solution the market kind of changed. Even the world of fans have changed lot of cheap good 120 and soon next gen 140mm that are on par with phantek t30. Even the china brands have really closed up the gap including price wise that you can’t go wrong with them.

At the current rate, too many switches released on daily basis (with the current trend being magnetic hall effect switches). Same situation with keycaps and more vendors carrying less and less.  Also running more and more sales to offload inventory. You can find GMK sets now for bargain basement prices. There's almost no point to buying the amazon keycaps to be honest. That and too many people entered the hobby and now have too much excess and they are leaving completely and downsizing at minimum. So many bargain available now.

I literally gave away for free an Matrix 8xv 3.0 (Mcflurry), Promise Bespoke (Red) and Neo70 (Blue) just recently as part of my own downsizing effort to make room for new stuff.

The bottom has been reached for custom with Neo and it various competitors releasing aluminum chassis with nice colors/quality control and multiple mounting options (plateless/o-ring/gasket) and foam/no-foam. All layout being covered too - eventually Neo full size is coming in near future too. All around 100-150USD Range. Then there's the upcoming Geon F1-8X-FE which will be under 100usd but have the sound/feel of the alumiunum/brass internal weight F1-8X TKL

46 minutes ago, neurotix said:

Linear eh? We don't like your kind around here.

I have tactile too just haven't rotated them in yet lol. KncKeys Black Jackets (JWK), Green Jackets (Tescee), UWE Chocolate (Tescee) and  Haimu Silent Linear (Red Color). Actually may add an future tactile from the likes of HMX.

I am actually interested in the upcoming APU for laptops. I view them as the ultimate successor to my 4800h/rtx2060. Been looking to go IGP and dump the dGPU and appears we are getting there. 

2 hours ago, Sir Beregond said:

I agree. The only difference is I don't think they'll try to launch a 5060 8GB. I think they'll try to hold out for the higher density memory chips into 2025 before launching those cards. If they can get 3GB modules, then even a 128-bit card can have 12GB.

Well the 5090 will mark my return to the PC building side (from my vacation exodus on the custom keeb side). 

Blue (Matrix Navi) - DMK In Former Days, Clackbit Linear

Silver (Neson Nico) - GMK Earthtone, JWK Hoshizora Linear

Blue (Geon 722) - GMK Stargaze, IV Works Darkmoon Linear Switches

Red (Owlabs Evolv) - KAM Outline, Gateron Summertime V1 LInear

I just ordered/following coming too: Matrix 8xv 3.3 (Olive), Geon F1-8X-V2 (Burgundy), Gok Lily (Taupe) and have Werkone (Space Cherry but may reano it).

I still have a ton of other switches to use.

These are my keyboards. Will be pausing as I reallocate funds to PC side rebuild based off future Intel CPU and 5090.

On 13/03/2024 at 15:11, neurotix said:

 

Yeah, I think those clear or semi-translucent keycaps are probably not PBT and maybe not even ABS. I've never used ones like that before, but am unsurprised to hear that they break.

 

I'll mention again that I have a set of YMDK keycaps that are PBT and I've had them since 2019 at least, possibly earlier. They held up well and none of them broke. Using blue O-Rings on them as well.

 

XVX is also a good keycap brand. Though, they seem to go by a couple different names, unsurprisingly for a Chinese company on Amazon.

 

https://www.amazon.com/stores/HITIME/page/808737FD-D838-4E23-A2A5-526F35EDB949?ref_=ast_bln

 

You'll see them referred to as XVX, SDYZ, and on their store page I linked, Hitime.

 

This link should go directly to keycaps:

 

https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/983981B9-9351-42A7-B369-F5129824FA50?ingress=2&visitId=1e1d6486-0797-4b83-b737-4f4805c456a1&ref_=ast_bln

 

Just search for XVX keycaps on Amazon and you'll see a ton of options. I've used XVX as well as YMDK. Here's my last board with two tone retro themed XVX PBT keycaps.

 

 

 

xvx has its own site too.

The best deals are the china drop shipping and china vendors now. Shipping is 4-15usd using epacket small parcels (under 2kg).

Switches everyone after the hmx, bsun, cheap switches that can be bought off unikeys (its an chinese dropshipper with sales staff based in canada). Clickclack.io is the us version. Cheap good switches stock that don’t need lubing.

If your spending 200-250usd, you can buy neo/qk and cycle with keycaps included. Boards that have wireless, rgb and multiple mounting (gasket,top,oring) and can be plate (many options with foam or not) or plateless. Its pretty close to the expensive stuff and great colors too. Expected though as there premium brands are big names in custom scene.

That is good news. Hopefully the people up top for the rest get it and reverse the heavy monetization trend going on. 

Not good optics nonetheless. Less choice is never good.  Though for me I gave away the bulk of the bluray/vcd movies. Also find don’t rewatch movies now.  Nothing really worth keeping with digital distribution. 

My media tastes are changing too, not into hollywood/western media as much. Much more difficult to find something you really want to see both plot wise and artists wise. 

10 minutes ago, cscoder4ever said:

Subscriptions here we come! and I will not partake.

Easy for gamers but already part of the business community for while. Generally my work place pays yearly fees for latest version. However not very well programmed software with few options (all owned by same parent company)

Caseware (one desktop, one laptop per license but we install it on two staff desktop)

Sage50 - Yearly renewal but it has offline activation still. Needed for updated latest payroll cheques to clients employee/staff

Quickbooks - Yearly One copy only as its one user only. Most of our clients use Sage 50

Office 365 - as stated

Cantax T1/T2/FM (Changing to other product in one-two year) - one desktop/laptop per user but again we just install on two desktop 

Adobe PDF - Important/essential staff are given subscriptions 

Antivirus/VPN - Bitdefender/Kasperky- Higher level staff get the paid ones. Basic get free ones

11 hours ago, UltraMega said:

As I already stated, office 2021 comes in 3 versions. Only the student version does not come with outlook. You can buy it directly from Microsoft. Not hard to find. One drive is a free feature built into windows.

 

I understand your point of view, you think Microsoft wants to eventually eliminate single purchase software sales and go full subscription. I maintain that you have not shown any evidence of that happening, purely your own skepticism. 

 

Again, not saying it will never happen but for now I see no evidence of it. I don't take the mere existence of subscription options as evidence that other options are being eliminated when that has not happened. 

Office has focused on subscription model. I think it’s mostly business oriented professional who use outlook now. Its not best piece of software now. They don’t like change. The amount of headaches i get from staff dealing with its bug/sudden new features can get annoying.

My office was using office 2003/2007 till recently when we shifted bulk of them to office 365.

Business users liked the old versions because you could buy one copy (pre-online activation) and install it on all the office’s pc. It just isn’t safe anymore.

They still do the offline activation for any business software that still allows it. Whatever you can save on software users licenses is huge.

The office staff all want adobe pro pdf but my boss doesn’t want to pay so we endup using the readers with free offline alternatives like pdf fill basic to fill up the holes.

It would be nice of we went back to pre dlc business models for game where all additional content was always free and focus is less on esports/tournament. Only expansion were extra and they had lot more content to justify it. Mod Support was also much better in the day, some epic mods were made for games like simcity 4 among things. Too much cheating on multiplayer, lot of bad attitude players.

However I enjoyed the cheating in single player games (i am more single player gamer even in the past). Generally used trainers. I used to spend time doing xml editing on gal civ3, sins of an solar empire even civilization game editing to speed up the game building up phase. Mass effect and Borderlands 1/2 save game editing. Then there was fun times where i spent every day trading/cloning expensive cars on gt5 to my various psn accounts.

2 hours ago, Sir Beregond said:

I do wonder about quality going forward, but got a source regarding discontinuations? First I am hearing of that.

OCN Mayhem Thread. Also go browse the mayhem uk store and you can see products no longer there. Notice there's no more white concentrate options anymore.

4 hours ago, ciarlatano said:

 

I could see avoiding XTR for the moment (and certainly would), but why in the world would anyone avoid X1, XT-1, Blitz, etc? I'm won't be avoiding any of these and will continue to recommend them since they are best in class.

If you can get existing stock of course but new owner apparently discontinued lot of the existing lineup with no replacement in sight. They stopped making the clear versions as example. 

Just an general concern that quality control will go downhill too with these new owners. I do see the original owner/creator leaving at somepoint when things aren’t going smooth (and they have cashed out). 

26 minutes ago, Avacado said:

 

I actually own this saw. Was bought for acrylic. Make sure you don't get 16mm tubing as it will NOT cut clean through (Leaves about 2-3mm uncut.) Would need 10 or 13mm tubing for it to be able to cut through.

 

Great point. I used it on 14mm and it was fine

1 minute ago, J7SC_Orion said:

 

...haven't specifically cut acrylic tubing with it but I've used the Dremel tool with great results on other acrylic bits (and of course copper tubing, other metals and other plastics). It makes very clean cuts...

Dremel works well too. Hacksaw/Mitre doesn't make straight cuts unless you have an actual workshop area with proper clamping gear etc. The make shift plastic ones you can buy at home depot, etc aren't very good.

2 minutes ago, Sir Beregond said:

Noted...

 

Hoping to maybe take this build out of hiatus come February and get a few orders in.

This item is reccomended if your in US.  Reddit was useful for something. I got another brand since can't get this in Canada.

2 in. Mini Bench Top Cut-Off Saw

WWW.HARBORFREIGHT.COM

---

2 in. Bench Top Cut-Off Saw

Just now, Sir Beregond said:

 

 

Ah, I missed that tab. Thank you both!

Also see my response to Avocado. One of those arts&craft mini saws is really useful for acrylic cutting.

2 hours ago, Avacado said:

Agree with Section31.

 

In my experience, acrylic has a clarity that PETG does not offer. It has a higher thermal threshold of coolant before deformity. It does come in more variety and is overall more sturdy to build with over PETG. The downside is it has to be sawed, not cut. Making mistakes on length leads to more time intensive fixes over just cutting. Bending acrylic is harder as well as it requires a higher temperature than PETG before becoming pliable. Deformities in acrylic are harder to fix, as are re-heating previous bends. 

 

The result usually ends the same, but you may spend an extra 5-15 minutes per tube bend/run with acrylic. 

 

Also, last time I bought tubing over a year ago, acrylic was more expensive. 

I had to buy an arts & craft saw in the end. It was easiest way to cut the acrylic. Hacksaw and Mitre Box was lot more work and tiring.