QOTW: Which PC components are you looking to upgrade in 2018?

[Wh00pS]

GPU
500g SSD
A set of studio monitors.

[QuorTek]

Not sure any of the grand companies really have to offer anything of proper value.

[Saracen]

Intel is the worst hit by far it seems.

Indeed it does.

But, and I say this with the caveat that all analogies only go so far .... suppose you were buying a new car, with a 6 cylinder engine. Two possible manufacturers, one with a design flaw meaning only 4 cylinders work, and the other where only 5 work.

Would you buy either, unless you had to? Would you accept a sort-of engine management patch?

Or would you wait until one, or both, had an engine that consistently ran on ALL cylinders?

That's all I'm saying. I don't need to buy right now, so I won't until one or both have fixed the actual problem, not come up with a gum-and-sellotape workaround.

Aye, they're trying to muddy the waters but AMD don't look to be suffering Meltdown at least.

So intel Meltdown and possible Spectre, AMD just possibly Spectre. Spectre needs software fixes anyway so i'd go with the newer architecture of Ryzen/Ryzen 2 if at all this year.

That sound about right?

It does to me. With emphasis on "if at all this year".

[Waylander53]

I need a near silent PC, my current rig (5 years old) is still pretty good (Intel i7 3770k and 16GB DDR3) and I replaced the GPU with a Nvidia 1050ti last year. However it makes more noise than I can stand. I am not that confident in changing hardware myself (will do graphics card, memory and disks) but I may have to think about replacing my PSU and case fans to see if I can make a difference !!

[adidan]

I used to try and make my pc as quiet as possible and yet it was never quiet enough.

Buying some relatively good headphones, well good enough to block external noise anyway, solved my problems.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Indeed it does.

But, and I say this with the caveat that all analogies only go so far .... suppose you were buying a new car, with a 6 cylinder engine. Two possible manufacturers, one with a design flaw meaning only 4 cylinders work, and the other where only 5 work.

Would you buy either, unless you had to? Would you accept a sort-of engine management patch?

Or would you wait until one, or both, had an engine that consistently ran on ALL cylinders?

That's all I'm saying. I don't need to buy right now, so I won't until one or both have fixed the actual problem, not come up with a gum-and-sellotape workaround.

It does to me. With emphasis on "if at all this year".

My main concern is the patch is only going to be tested on newer systems not older ones and there are indications it will actually effect older systems worse especially with games based on older engines.

At the same time the price fixing with RAM prices,etc is really starting to get off-putting.

For me I am seeing hobbies like hifi and photography being far better value long-term now.

[spacein_vader]

My main concern is the patch is only going to be tested on newer systems not older ones and there are indications it will actually effect older systems worse especially with games based on older engines.

At the same time the price fixing with RAM prices,etc is really starting to get off-putting.

For me I am seeing hobbies like hifi and photography being far better value long-term now.

Christ. If PCs have become worse value for money than Hifi we really are in the poo.

[Saracen]

My main concern is the patch is only going to be tested on newer systems not older ones and there are indications it will actually effect older systems worse especially with games based on older engines.

At the same time the price fixing with RAM prices,etc is really starting to get off-putting.

For me I am seeing hobbies like hifi and photography being far better value long-term now.

I take spacein_vader's point .... hifi and photography aren't cheap, at least as soon as you get beyond relatively basic kit.

But, spacein-vader, I'd stress Cat's "long term" value point. Buy a high-end lens, it'll likely last years, decades, even a lifetime. Similarly hifi. I bought, for instance, Stax Electrostatic headphones in , I don't know, late 70s or early 80s. And a Mitchell turntable about the sane time. I'm still using both now, some 35-40 years later.

The Apple IIe I bought about the same time, however .... well, I still have it and it still works, but it's a curio, close to a museum exhibit. In terms of giving me useful service, it ceased being competitive in the mid-80s, at the latest.

Yet, that Apple system cost me a LOT more than those Stax phones and Mitchell T/T put together while replacing the Mitchell and Stax today would set me back something like £5-6k.

The "long term" value is determined, in my opinion, more by useful lifetime than up-front cost.

[Saracen]

My main concern is the patch is only going to be tested on newer systems not older ones and there are indications it will actually effect older systems worse especially with games based on older engines.

At the same time the price fixing with RAM prices,etc is really starting to get off-putting.

For me I am seeing hobbies like hifi and photography being far better value long-term now.

Agreed. Partly for the reasons in my last post. Hifi and photography are, no doubt, expensive, but there's a difference between cost and value.

But for me, it's more than that. I used to get a buzz just from keeping up with technology. I wanted the latest, greatest, newest, fastest, because it was exciting. I spent a some weeks "playing with" (i.e. testing and previewing) HP's first colour laser printer, months before it was released. There were TWO in the country at the time, and one was sitting in my home office. I was using a CD burner when the hardware/software combo was £4k, and blank discs were £15 EACH.

I travelled the world, met with Bill Gates, had dinner with Lexmark's CEO, got invited to a party by IBM's CEO, had trips round code-locked dev labs at Apple, and with product managers to CEOs from Europe to the US to Asia.

It was a genuinely exciting time. I was right there, on the cutting edge, and often "in ths know" well before the public, of the digital revolution. By 'eck, was it fun.

But now, each new release (with a few exceptions) is just ho-hum. Which is why I don't go out of my way looking for review work and most of my writing is fiction. I get about as much buzz from a new graphics card as I do if Spear and Jackson release a new garden fork in new colours. All I really care about is whether it digs better, quicker or easier holes.

So while a PC is to me, as utilitarian as a garden tool, photo kit and hifi are about me enjoying music or expressing myself artistically. The value, to me, is inexpressibly higher.

[spacein_vader]

I take spacein_vader's point .... hifi and photography aren't cheap, at least as soon as you get beyond relatively basic kit.

But, spacein-vader, I'd stress Cat's "long term" value point. Buy a high-end lens, it'll likely last years, decades, even a lifetime. Similarly hifi. I bought, for instance, Stax Electrostatic headphones in , I don't know, late 70s or early 80s. And a Mitchell turntable about the sane time. I'm still using both now, some 35-40 years later.

The Apple IIe I bought about the same time, however .... well, I still have it and it still works, but it's a curio, close to a museum exhibit. In terms of giving me useful service, it ceased being competitive in the mid-80s, at the latest.

Yet, that Apple system cost me a LOT more than those Stax phones and Mitchell T/T put together while replacing the Mitchell and Stax today would set me back something like £5-6k.

The "long term" value is determined, in my opinion, more by useful lifetime than up-front cost.

My point was more that both computing and Hifi (I know nothing of photography so didn't mention it,) seem to have head down an unpalatable path in the past few years. In Hifi's case I mean the "audiophile" snake oil that leads to 'directional' ethernet cables at £100+ a metre and other products that cannot measurably improve sound quality while regularly changing standards & interconnects ensures speedy obsolescence.

On the PC side performance improvements on the CPU side have been as minimal as Intel can get away with until Ryzen, nvidia managed to redefine performance classes of GPU up one price point & both RAM & storage markets show signs of price collusion. The same changing standards & interconnects for obsolescence abound here too.

In both markets the manufacturers are aided & abetted by complicit reviewers who dare not criticise too much lest they are cut off from new product launches. In Hifi they use terms like "sound feels fuller" rather than subject kit to double blind testing which would likely show no improvement. In the PC space selective use of benchmarks cherry picked to suit achieve similar purposes.

[Saracen]

Any hobby that has adherents with a significant disposable income will likely have expensive landmines to avoid, but care and research can help avoid them.

As for complicit reviewers, I have no experience of hifi reviewing. I do have some in the photo sector, and a LOT in the computing sector. In 20 years, I've never been offered an inducement to slant a review, and while editors may occasionally change phrases, and also sonetimes trim length, I've never in thousands of articles had an editor change my basic conclusion.

The closest I've come is a time or two when a review has been highly negative, I've had editorial/legal meetings to ensure I can stand up negative comments. That is do I have extensive testing notes (yes), photo's of hardware issues (yes, again), records of benchmarks used (sure do) and results achieved (yup, in detail, and retested where controversial). So, while I've been asked if I can back up a negative review, every single one was then published.

No company has ever asked for favours or offered inducements, and no editor has ever amended the substance of or conclusions about, reviews.

My reviews have ALWAYS, without exception, reflected my genuine opinion, and nobody has even tried to change it.

What anybody does with copy I'm not involved in I've no idea but I will ssy this. Any reviewer is only as good as their reputation, and the PC press is quite a small group. Everybody tends to know most everybody else. If I got caught biasing a review just once, word would go editor to editor with the efficiency oc wildfire among dry brushwood and I could kiss my journalistic career goodbye as I watched it burn.

I get commissions because I turn in good copy, needing little or no eciting, of good quality, on brief, to length and by the deadline, EVERY TIME. Jerk editors about and they don't use you much, if at all.

[loccothan]

GPU most likely
And i need 32GB 3400> RAM for my RIG...

[booprince14]

I NEED A NEW GPU SOO BAD !! I want to play latest game at high settings without lag T_T my current GPU is not cutting it !!! Throw a ryzen processor in the process !! it will help alot !!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Christ. If PCs have become worse value for money than Hifi we really are in the poo.

I take spacein_vader's point .... hifi and photography aren't cheap, at least as soon as you get beyond relatively basic kit.

But, spacein-vader, I'd stress Cat's "long term" value point. Buy a high-end lens, it'll likely last years, decades, even a lifetime. Similarly hifi. I bought, for instance, Stax Electrostatic headphones in , I don't know, late 70s or early 80s. And a Mitchell turntable about the sane time. I'm still using both now, some 35-40 years later.

The Apple IIe I bought about the same time, however .... well, I still have it and it still works, but it's a curio, close to a museum exhibit. In terms of giving me useful service, it ceased being competitive in the mid-80s, at the latest.

Yet, that Apple system cost me a LOT more than those Stax phones and Mitchell T/T put together while replacing the Mitchell and Stax today would set me back something like £5-6k.

The "long term" value is determined, in my opinion, more by useful lifetime than up-front cost.

Agreed. Partly for the reasons in my last post. Hifi and photography are, no doubt, expensive, but there's a difference between cost and value.

But for me, it's more than that. I used to get a buzz just from keeping up with technology. I wanted the latest, greatest, newest, fastest, because it was exciting. I spent a some weeks "playing with" (i.e. testing and previewing) HP's first colour laser printer, months before it was released. There were TWO in the country at the time, and one was sitting in my home office. I was using a CD burner when the hardware/software combo was £4k, and blank discs were £15 EACH.

I travelled the world, met with Bill Gates, had dinner with Lexmark's CEO, got invited to a party by IBM's CEO, had trips round code-locked dev labs at Apple, and with product managers to CEOs from Europe to the US to Asia.

It was a genuinely exciting time. I was right there, on the cutting edge, and often "in ths know" well before the public, of the digital revolution. By 'eck, was it fun.

But now, each new release (with a few exceptions) is just ho-hum. Which is why I don't go out of my way looking for review work and most of my writing is fiction. I get about as much buzz from a new graphics card as I do if Spear and Jackson release a new garden fork in new colours. All I really care about is whether it digs better, quicker or easier holes.

So while a PC is to me, as utilitarian as a garden tool, photo kit and hifi are about me enjoying music or expressing myself artistically. The value, to me, is inexpressibly higher.

My point was more that both computing and Hifi (I know nothing of photography so didn't mention it,) seem to have head down an unpalatable path in the past few years. In Hifi's case I mean the "audiophile" snake oil that leads to 'directional' ethernet cables at £100+ a metre and other products that cannot measurably improve sound quality while regularly changing standards & interconnects ensures speedy obsolescence.

On the PC side performance improvements on the CPU side have been as minimal as Intel can get away with until Ryzen, nvidia managed to redefine performance classes of GPU up one price point & both RAM & storage markets show signs of price collusion. The same changing standards & interconnects for obsolescence abound here too.

In both markets the manufacturers are aided & abetted by complicit reviewers who dare not criticise too much lest they are cut off from new product launches. In Hifi they use terms like "sound feels fuller" rather than subject kit to double blind testing which would likely show no improvement. In the PC space selective use of benchmarks cherry picked to suit achieve similar purposes.

I don't consider myself a "hifi expert" but one of my family designed and built their own speakers,etc and I have gone to hifi shows and listened to some very expensive and esoteric stuff so I do have some knowledge in the area. Not everything in hifi is snake oil,since there is a design aspect which is based on engineering and research work which has been done in the past by people from the BBC and NHK,etc. Quite a few of the well known companies started from hobbyist roots or the said engineers,and in fact some of the speaker companies would do small orders for specific parts for fellow hobbyists(!). The issue with the snake oil only really started once many of the older hands left and either newer members of the family or younger people took over.

OTH,it also means it takes a lot to generally impress me,and when I look at certain designs,I can quickly tell whether they are actually trying to pose or actually trying to do something useful. This is why when I actually go to shows I try to go in without doing much research.

I remember recently going to a show and listening to a very high end headphone,amp and CD player combo which cost £120000. Except me(and my mate who tends to also be quite grounded when it comes to hifi),were not impressed. Yet,there was one relatively innocuous company manned by one bloke,who had a pair of phones which cost "only" £1500 and yet sounded better using the output from our own phones and a little battery operated amp which came with the headphone than loads of more expensive models,and it was the same when I listened to them again at another show. OFC,I probably wouldn't even spend that much on headphones. The same goes with speakers, and I have done all sorts of little tests yonks ago with cables,which seem to match up with what you expect(things like length and thickness make more of a difference than exotic rubbish),etc.

If anything I would argue Cambridge Audio pound for pound make great sound stuff,and are actually very hard to beat in terms of value for money!

But the Elephant in the room is that once you have a hifi you like the sound of,its something that can easily last 20 to 30 years,especially if you can service when things like capacitors,etc start going. Things like my Grado SR125 headphones have lasted me over a decade. A few years I downgraded to an older amp,which is 20 years old and still sounds perfectly fine. I use an SACD/CD player from 2004(IIRC).

This has been compounded by the biggest innovation in modern hifi in the last 20 years - digital amplification,which means you can have compact and powerful amplifiers built into speakers,at a relatively low cost,and the expansion of cheap computing devices which can do most of the processing. Then if you don't mind going secondhand you can some decent sounding kit for not much money - I was lucky to pick up a pair of PMC DB1 speakers for under £50. They are over a decade old,but they sound fantastic.

Hence,OFC many of these companies will try to find alternate revenue streams,so this is why a lot of this snake oil has started to grow in the last 20 years or so. They need to find ways for people to upgrade or buy new stuff from them.

To a lesser degree its the same with cameras when it comes to companies trying to get repeat purchases since most people only tend to change cameras and lenses,due to reliability issues,loss,breakage or when the system is underperforming in terms of functionality,image quality or even convenience. However,if the camera still does the job people will most likely still stick with it anyway,hence companies really can't do much to force you to upgrade.

Even digital camera bodies which have a much shorter lifespan than film ones,can easily last 4 to 5 years,or even longer. Lenses,OTH,have lifespans measured in decades. Even my D600 which I got when it was a current model,is years old,and the two most commonly used lenses I have on it are between 15 to 25 years old. Sure newer lenses,have better AF,and possibly better coatings but both of them have great flare resistance and do proper sunstars so I can live with it.

Now compare that with a smartphone or many computer parts. Why do you see me moan at high end smartphones on Hexus to the chagrin of many?? The lifespan is terribad on them,when compare to decentish prosumer compact and cheaper phone which will probably last as long in practice and still do a solid job. You are starting to see more and more snake oil and dubious marketing with phones too.

Things like monitors do last - my last one was 11 years old when I replaced it,but by comparison many PC parts don't last anywhere as long in terms of usefulness,since it is very easy to force changes in software which makes it obsolete or underperform quickly. This would not be an issue if it wasn't for the fact many PC parts seem to be going up massively in price way past inflation,etc,are obsolete within a few years and the performance jumps seem to be getting smaller and smaller at more popular tiers,since companies have quietly added more tiers to their product ranges.

Then OFC you have the fact that computers and smartphones don't hold their value very well either outside some situations like coin mining.

This means for me in terms of money spent over a certain time period(say a decade),I consider computers probably more expensive as a hobby than my other ones.

[Korrorra]

Maybe a new AMD cpu upgrade if the CPU can get 4.8 GHz on air and 5 GHz on water .

[Korrorra]

I also was thinking of a new PSU and a new pc case mid tower. So far the cases are less than amazing.