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You'd be surprised how many people run older gear sometimes. And nah, I understand that there's certain things older stuff just can't do. But in this particular instance, we're talking about even first gen Ryzen and older i5's and i7's that are still absolutely capable today. Even the FX 8 cores aged quite well and keep right up there with Haswell i5's and i7's now. I completely understand that Socket 939 is ancient. But the stuff that they're knocking out with Windows 11 really isn't. Believe it or not, a LOT of people are still on Sandy Bridge and FX era equipment still and happy with it and the cutoff for "proper" hardware on 11 is much MUCH newer than either of those. I was just arguing, to a certain extent, that honestly ANY quad core CPU, even a Q6600 or Phenom 9850 SHOULD have absolutely zero problems doing "daily tasks". Even instructions sets, most of the missing instructions are app specific anyway on Windows 10 (anything that'd be a bother). What I mean is, if you're missing instruction sets you need, you already know you're missing them. RDR2 and Crysis Remastered for example won't launch on older CPU's. But yet I can run my Phenom 9850 and Q9550 rigs on Win10 just fine. There's nothing really different under the hood for Win11, so why can't they run 11 too? EDIT: Talking history a little. Windows XP for example came out in 2002. 10 years prior, in 1992, what did we have? 386 or 486 CPU's right? You can install XP to those. Works fine. Slow, yes. But works. Vista, you can install on a Pentium 2, that was a 10 year difference too. Again, I wouldn't do it but you can. There's no reason to be cutting off hardware, especially stuff that absolutely is more than capable to run the OS.

Yup, its right in the name of it. Athlon64 x2. It was "CMPXCHG16b". Whatever that was is the reason why in that particular case. Some people claim Win10 x64 works but you need a USB 2.0 flash drive or use the ODD to install with. I'm not sure, I wasn't able to get it to work at all. But again, was just an example. My 939 dual core is more powerful than a 10th gen Celeron is. If I'm not using apps that require the missing instructions, there's no reason it shouldn't install the OS at least. At least IMO anyway.

That could be as well, yeah. And I think I might be using the wrong word. IIRC the last bank I worked at called it an "incentive program". Basically the thought would be so many x% of RMA's end up being perfectly fine the customer just didn't want so they can resell those. Which that in and of itself is fine. If the RMA tech gets so many % of that type of RMA they'd get a bonus on their check or something. IF, huge IF there, IF that was the case (or similar), I could see how an incentive program would cause an employee to pull shady RMA tactics so they get their bonus. And no, it wouldn't be JUST their RMA program with an incentive program, it'd be across the entire business. Customer service would probably get x% of their surveys need to be 5 eggs or something maybe to get their bonus. Things like that. All just examples, but its the general idea behind it. Incentive programs are pretty common, and if they're written a certain way they absolutely can cause an employee to do illegal things just to get their little "bonus" on their paycheck. I could tell you stories that'd make your blood boil after working in the banking industry for 4 years of how incentive programs "help" lol.

Of course, I understand that. But take for example the Socket 939, this is a problem I ran into recently actually. 32bit Windows 10 works perfectly fine on a Socket 939 dual core. Runs great with a SSD in the system. Seriously, just as good or faster than my son's Celery dual core laptop (10th gen). But 64bit Windows 10, there's some instruction set its missing. Obviously its not a core function of the OS otherwise 32bit wouldn't work too. That's all I'm getting at, is that it almost seems as if SOME of these limitations are arbitrary and mostly just to coax people into upgrading hardware. By all means if you're browsing the internet in 2022, have a quad core, SSD, and at least 8GB of RAM. That's generally a pretty safe "bare minimum" requirement today with how multi-threaded everything is. But they're still releasing dual cores (or were recently anyway). If older systems are just as capable hardware wise, just old, I don't see a reason why it shouldn't work with a modern OS. So why would Microsoft "warn users" if their hardware is old? Just seems like adding extra bloat into the OS that really doesn't need to be there, and disabling of systems that really don't NEED to be disabled.

Did you watch the LTT video by chance? He brings up a very good point about potential "perks" the employees might strive for in the company. He didn't know for sure since he doesn't work there, but its a very valid point for businesses like Newegg. I know banks and call centers both have incentives once you meet certain metrics every pay period. It's very possible the employees might have certain metrics they need to meet every day or week or whatever. And those metrics COULD cause an employee to do shady things just to get his measly $50 bonus on his check or whatever it may be. It could also be company policy. I doubt that though because anything actual policy is in writing, and if they had what they did in writing......man oh man the lawsuits they'd face. So I doubt its actual company policy directly. It COULD just be a random rogue employee doing this type of thing. But again, that's doubtful too since that employee "should" be fired pretty quickly if newegg actually cared about their customers and their policies and incentive programs weren't pushing for certain behaviors. I dunno for sure though obviously. Either way, its clear that this has been a regular problem and their business is tanking due to them catching GamersNexus with it and the story getting so much publicity. Maybe GamersNexus can talk some sense into Newegg and fix whatever is causing this. I can certainly hope (we all can).

You guys do realize that an old school Socket 939 dual core or a Core 2 Duo is just as powerful still today as SOME lower end SKU CPU's such as Atoms and the like right? Didn't we just all do a CPUz bench off to show similar results to that? So why are there arbitrary restrictions causing even THOSE machines to stop functioning on modern OS's when they're just as powerful or more than stuff that IS supported? From a BUSINESS point of view, they're in it to make money. Period. Why would they waste thousands of dollars on new equipment every year like Microsoft is basically saying? Seriously....first gen Ryzen isn't supported. That's just a few years old, and there's ZERO functionality reasons as to why it shouldn't be allowed on Win11. There is absolutely no reason for them to cut their backwards compatibility on hardware, period. That's Window's whole selling point. I understand not using a single core CPU in 2022, I mean duh lol. But any dual core ever made SHOULD be capable of running Windows 10 since it allows Celeron dual cores to run. Windows 11, I could understand maybe dropping dual core CPU support out and keeping quad cores all active, but they're not even doing that. You have to have what is it, 2nd gen Ryzen or 10th or 11th gen Intel? But even if a business IS still using Windows XP today in 2022.....so what? If the machines are offline use machines, or connected to some internal network only kinda deal, I mean there's quite a few reasons why a business would still use old hardware. Heck, my dad's steel shop still has a few Win98 and XP systems running their machines, and that's only because newer computers CAN'T run their machines without complicated adapters and software work arounds.

I'll listen to what they have to say. I'm still going to choose to buy my parts elsewhere until they straighten up over there though. Seems like ever since they put in that marketplace thing to compete with Amazon, they've REALLY turned downhill. It's almost as if they see their vendors doing shady things, so they think they too can get away with it or something, I dunno. I'm still SUPER curious to hear their explanation to HOW that mix up even happened. Watched the LTT video about that scandal the other night, and yeah.....doesn't seem like there's too terribly many possibilities on how that happened. It really almost sounds as if it was purposeful, maybe not by newegg themselves but maybe an employee just trying to meet deadlines or reach certain "perks" in the job or something. Either way, they need to fix it ASAP or they're going to go the way of Future Shop or TigerDirect soon.

Snakecharmed nailed it above, but I'll go ahead and use a common example. A LOT of people buy their sub / bass packages at Walmart or BestBuy for their cars. When they pickup their car equipment there, the most common package would be a Kicker subwoofer and some form of a 2 channel amplifier. The amp is capable of, let's say 100w RMS x2 or bridged at 200w x1 RMS. They take that 200w RMS, and try to power a 400w RMS subwoofer. It doesn't output "enough" sound for them, so they'll crank the gain knob and the bass boost knob to compensate. (Gain is NOT a volume control, and bass boost should always be 0). As a result of cranking the knobs, it introduces clipping. Clipping, is when you take the input signal, and amplify it to the point where its cutting off the sine waves that make up the music. Take a look at this example sine wave below. This is a GOOD example. The left is a clean signal. The right is a "clipped" signal. In order for your speakers to function, subwoofers included (and priority with clipping since you can't hear it), they need to move backwards and forwards. Obviously. What a lot of people don't understand is that movement is supposed to be very smooth and continuous. It moves forward on the upwards part of the sine wave, and the speaker will suck inwards on the bottom part of the wave. When you "clip" the wave so its flat on the top and bottom, what you're doing is FORCING your speaker to stay stationary with power going through it at the top and bottom of that wave (forward or inward to the speaker). That stationary power flowing through the coil will cause HEAT. It can clip for just a fraction of a second and it can do this, it doesn't have to be a long period of time. Heat will melt your coils and cause the speaker to blow. If you're giving the speaker a CLEAN signal (not clipped), the speaker continuously moves forward and backward and never gets "stuck" in one spot or the other for too long with power applied. The movement of the speaker also causes a cooling effect for the coil and glue. If its stuck out for 1/2 a second, that's 1/2 a second where its not getting any active cooling. This is why its okay to overpower your speakers, but never a "good idea" to underpower your speakers. You can underpower so long as you keep the signal clean, but as soon as you start introducing clipping and distortion, that's when it damages things. This is also why I stated earlier to NEVER boost frequencies, but instead lower the rest.

To everybody saying that businesses and the like need to upgrade, I have a question. Why would a business NEED to upgrade? If a Core 2 Duo can do what the business needs the system to do, why would the business want to waste the money, potentially thousands or hundreds of thousands? I mean most business uses are web based, office based, or other such lite usage. Why would a business want to waste money when a business is in it to make profit? Don't get me wrong, where upgrading makes sense by all means upgrade.

1% or below is where you want to be. 10% is pretty bad. THD = Total Harmonic Distortion. Less distortion means cleaner sound. More distortion means more likely to blow equipment. It CAN also cause hearing loss if at loud levels.

The gorge is always a beautiful site. If you end up through Central WA pm me and you can come hang out with me and my kiddo for the day. I'll bring some magic legal smoke to share.

You know what's funny? I started making it all patriotic in 2019 when I bought it. Before all this political stuff got so mainstream. I always build my cars with a theme in mind.

-_- Yeah, they REALLY don't want you to use those older systems that still work. Make sure you get in line to buy your next new Intel / AMD rig just in time for Windows 11 folks! These arbitrary requirements make absolutely no sense. There's absolutely no reason any CPU should be knocked out from any of these OS's when older CPU's are usually stronger than stuff they're allowing to be used (like Atoms vs say a Q6600).

Yeah I'm having a hard time understanding where the rear channels are going too. If that corner over there on the right side of your desk is an INSULATED corner (outside corner of the house), that'd be where I'd put the z5500 sub. I'll bet if you move it there, on the floor, you wouldn't need the z625 set at all for the extra "oomph". You can try firing it INTO the corner. However big the port is in inches or centimeters, keep the entire enclosure at LEAST that distance away from whatever wall its firing into, more if you can (don't go too much, play with that distance). You can also try firing the port towards you away from the wall. Basically a 90* flip every time starting with the port firing backwards into whatever wall or corner, move it, test it, try again. The port is where the noise is coming from. If its firing downward then nevermind, won't matter lol. But if you play with the 4 different directions it can face, in THAT corner (assuming its a good corner), I'll bet you'll find a super sweet spot and have a new love for the z5500 sub. It still won't get low low, but it'll come more to life. And I'll bet, at that point, you'd be more willing to lose the z625 set out of the equation. Do that and get your front left and right put in the right spots, try out 2.1 mode to start, and see how you like how that sounds. If you do, place the other 3 speakers properly and go from there. Having them all in a basically mono configuration bouncing off the wall behind your monitor like that is only adding fill, not detail. Details are how you get the music to come alive.

If you can get them properly spaced out, and intend to use the z5500 set, then by all means....go for a sound card for the fine tuning. If you're happy with it, a sound card will help. If you DO end up using both sets, make sure the speakers are placed in the same locations as closely together as possible. You'll end up with what, 2 front lefts, 2 front rights, and then a center and 2 surrounds. So on your desktop it'll be: FLFL C FR FR And then the surrounds above you like you mentioned left and right. Your surrounds SHOULD be parallel with your front left and right's too, just behind you. It is a tad better if you have like 4-6 ft between the left and right as well at a desk (varies depending on listening position). The further apart your left and rights are, the "wider" the sound stage will be. Go too wide and it doesn't sound right. Get too close together and you can't tell left vs right (becomes mono). If you're still after more, you know where we are. I'd hate to send you down the audio rabbit hole if you can't hear the difference anyway, don't care, or don't want the increased expense while you're building it up.

I hate to be the one to break it to you mate, but you don't exactly have the layout to do 5.1 or 7.1 with your desk in that location. You'd have speakers right in that area right in front of the couch, blocking the walkway there. 5.1 you need 2 speakers behind you Left and Right. 7.1 you need 4 behind you (well, 2 to your sides and 2 behind you). Sounds like you're going more after music and having a "fun" place to chill with some tunes to me. I'd strongly consider a decent 2.1 set. 2 speakers can easily fill a room with sound, and 1 good subwoofer can do the same as well. Also, most music is recorded in stereo anyway, so surround is just adding effects that the artist never intended to be there. Added bonus, easier to find proper locations evenly spaced for just 2 speakers left and right.

Very well put. Yup, the manufacturer's lie. I mean I guess they weren't lying since they state its at 10% THD, but 10% THD will kill your speakers REAL quick. THD = Total Harmonic Distortion. Distortion aka "clipping" is what kills speakers, not power alone (usually). You can get comfortable listening levels with just 1w at a desk if you have things tuned properly and are using efficient drivers. A subwoofer can be comfortable listening levels with as little as like 20-25w so long as its efficient. Take a tube amp vs a Class D digital amp for a good example. Tube amp puts out say 12w RMS per channel, and the Class D puts out 45w per channel. Guess what? The cleanliness of the Tube amp's sound COULD get just as loud as the 45w of Class D (all depends on the amps in question of course). As I said previously, there's a LOT of things to take into consideration with audio. But the basics are ACTUAL RMS power and resistance. Trying to keep at or under 1% THD is also important within your power range, as that's what will keep your sound clean, and it will NOT kill speakers.

I always think honesty is the best policy. So yes, if a company came flat out and stated, "we're raising our prices because we can", that says EXACTLY the same thing as "there's contamination (that's probably already resolved) so we're going to raise our prices because of that". They're blame shifting and being dishonest. I absolutely WOULD respect a company more if they were just blatant with what they're doing. I may not like the price increase, but I'd respect the honesty and transparency. ASSUMING we're right and they're doing this just for an excuse to raise the prices, yes it would've been a LOT more honest of WD and them to say, "Due to the current rising costs on everything, we are going to have to raise our prices on NAND products too". That's not too difficult. They'd get backlash, sure. But at least they're honest about their intentions. Keep in mind, I DO understand certain circumstances might arrise that cause certain products to go up in cost. I understood the flood price increase for the first few weeks. Just as I "would normally" have understood this one if it wasn't just the same crisis on repeat. This is where the transparency and honesty comes in.

Wish I could say the same. Last time I tried Linux, probably within the last year or so, it was a great experience. It just still wasn't QUITE there yet. Several games still didn't work, I still couldn't map a network drive without command line, and RDP doesn't work as smoothly on Linux obviously since RDP is Windows proprietary. I could overlook some of the games if the networking was a little easier and there was a decent RDP system in place to remote in with a desktop like experience that RDP provides. I've tried others like Teamviewer, and the experience just isn't the same.

Yes, you're seeing less than 200w RMS total as is right now. Power isn't everything, but it helps you get there. Speaker and amplifier manufacturers severely overrate their equipment power handling and output. Almost all of the cheaper manufacturers do. It gets fun when you start getting equipment that's underrated. Example, the Dayton Ultimax subs I mentioned earlier, they're rated at somewhere around 500-600w RMS each sub. I've sent approximately 2700w RMS to a pair of the 10's and they lived fine. Now, take a look at the Kicker subs again. (Note, they actually do sound pretty good). 400w RMS on a Kicker 12" sub is about all it'll take, and that's exactly what its rated for. You try to shove 500 or 600w down the Kicker, it'll smoke itself.

I read what you had written as rude after previous bad feelings. My apologies. We did go over all of this on page 1 though. Edited that part out.

There's a lot to go through with it, you look at the size, power ratings, frequency response, proper enclosure sizes, and the T/S specs can tell you a lot about a specific driver. It's been a while since I've shopped for subwoofers properly living in an apartment, but those are good things to research first. The T/S specs is the big one, I forget which one it is but one of them will tell you if a driver is best suited for a sealed enclosure or a ported enclosure. To answer your second question, moving air is moving air. I've used "house subs" in the car before and vice versa. The biggest difference is the resistance, car speakers in general are 4ohm and home speakers are generally 8ohm. A lot of subwoofers are 4ohm anyway though even in a house setup. The biggest thing when shopping for anything audio is power, followed by the resistance and recommendations on the amp. If you have 100w RMS @ 4ohm and you put in an 8ohm speaker, you'll only have approximately 50w RMS available instead of the full 100 (rough estimate). I recommended a sound card as my first recommendation here. The problem here isn't the source though since he's using optical. The problem is that he's looking to upgrade the z5500 + z625 set. As I've stated SEVERAL TIMES OVER in this very thread, yes a sound card WILL give some missing features to the Logitech sets, however all you're doing is replacing one DAC for another. And if YOUR receiver is lacking subwoofer crossover controls, that's on you. Every mainstream receiver released in probably the last 15+ years, from reputable brands has that very basic feature. There's only 2 controls you "need" for a subwoofer. That is gain and crossover. If you're bass boosting, you're doing it wrong mate......that's generally a sign you need a different sub and possibly more power. Also a good way to blow speakers.

There's soooooo many better options than Kicker even for car audio. Go look up the Dayton Ultimax. That's just one example. Many of them.

Geee, imagine that.

Dude, BeamNG is my favorite game!!! LOL I didn't seem to have any problems with my FX rig playing it at 1080p. I didn't spawn a whole bunch of stuff either though. At 4k, yeah it would be strained. My Ryzen 3600 struggles at 5120x1440.