PC gaming. - The Bear and Badger

isanbard

Pesky Pageturn..

Subbax dropped this li'l ol' list of funzies!

Bunch of Humble Bundle stuff going free

A Hat in Time
Hearts of Iron IV
Blackwake
Portal Knights
Forts
Titan Quest Anniversary + Ragnarok DLC
Shiness: The Lightning Kingdom
Interplanetary Enhanced Edition

I've heard some things about Hat in Time Subba? I'll give that a tickle if it's in excess? Ta!

Portal Knights looks swish as well. Don't wanna grab all the picks mind. I'll grab it if it's going spare!

Subbax

I've sent you a PM with the code for A Hat in Time.

I'll give anyone else who wants Portal Knights until Monday to shout, otherwise it's also yours. Have fun!

isanbard

Thanks Subba! Downloading now. You da Man!

hunk

So, the latest w10 update broke Nvidia Optimus. After much troubleshooting it comes down to reinstalling the video drivers. That was an afternoon well spent, thanks Microsoft!

AJ

That isn't the first thing you do when you have video card problems? Are you new to PC gaming or something?

GurtTractor

I've found that Nvidia drivers need regular reinstalling, quite the pain in the bum.

hunk

Nevermind, just checked the temps and the machine is running way too hot.
60-70 C with just a few firefox tabs open. Not good. Must be the weather lol.

Machine probably needs a fresh repaste and a serious dustoff. Not surprising after 7 years of service.

GurtTractor

Aye, it's a little unfortunate that most people aren't aware that computers do actually need some TLC every now and then. The number of machines and graphics cards that have been chucked aside that probably just needed a good air dust and some new thermal paste is kinda sad. Really sucks how hard it is to get into some of these things now too, Apple really suck for their crazy screws they need you to deal with, and I recall there's a machine or two that are basically just glued together.

If there's a vent on something for airflow, then at some point it will need a clean

I can't always be bothered though tbf, depending on how much I care about the machine I may just leave it until it gets desperate.

Kow

When I was moving the pc recently I opened it up to have a check inside. I blew the dust out and nearly choked on the cloud that emerged.

isanbard

I can't believe our Gurt doesn't attend to his fans nightly... it would just be wrong in my mind. Does. Not. Compute.

Kow

Groupies?

isanbard

I'm sure he is a popular chap. How he deals with his fanbase is up to him.

GurtTractor

I do get dust filter anxiety, every few days I am compelled to peer into the front panel space with a headtorch and see if I feel it needs a quick clean. Needs a little shakeout now actually. I try and haul it down and give it a full dustoff every month or so, on my main machine anyway, laptops and such I leave for much longer. I should dust and service my Cambridge Audio amp about now too.

isanbard

Thatta boy.

hunk

They really should design laptops to be easier to maintain. Easy access to ssd, ram, WiFi card, CPU/GPU and fan should really be a must. Now if I just want to clean the fan of my Asus I have to totally dismember my laptop and rip out the motherboard to just get access to the fan.
For a repaste that would be understandable but for cleaning the fans??

AJ

I've never cleaned any PC I didn't build myself (and barely those I did) and they've all been fine. Anyway, sacrificing ease of maintenance for portability is the right thing to do most of the time.

hunk

After a lot of troubleshooting I found out it was the latest windows update (last tuesday) hating on my nVidia gpu.
Optimus giving black screens when kicking in, the pc running hotter than normal. The screen blacking out before I can even see an error message. No bsod for some reason though.
Downgraded my nvidia experience gpu driver to the windows update one and presto, the nvidia gpu and optimus function as normal again. Temps are normal again as well.

Seriously, wtf microsoft?
Do they not test w10 stable updates before release anymore?

hunk

Just reinstalled directX and the pc now runs magnificently swish. Optimus performs as normal after extended testing.
A w10 update broke my directX install and gpu driver :-(

Not cool microsoft, not cool...

GurtTractor

Hmm, yep looks like it's Windows Reinstall day for me, weird slowdown, errors, BSODs all over the place.

Nuke from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

AJ

You know what I used to find needing a complete rebuild meant? That it was six months since my last complete rebuild.

isanbard

GurtTractor wrote:

Hmm, yep looks like it's Windows Reinstall day for me, weird slowdown, errors, BSODs all over the place. Nuke from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

I went through that too recently and it turned out to be a duff stick of RAM. Passed most the easy tests but very much failed the memtest86 thing.

Sent it back to the vendor (Scan in this case) and they pretty swiftly sent me a replacement.

Just a thought.

mrsmr2

GurtTractor wrote:

Hmm, yep looks like it's Windows Reinstall day for me, weird slowdown, errors, BSODs all over the place. Nuke from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

Upgrade to W7 or 8.1. No more problems.

GurtTractor

isanbard wrote:

GurtTractor wrote:

Hmm, yep looks like it's Windows Reinstall day for me, weird slowdown, errors, BSODs all over the place. Nuke from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

I went through that too recently and it turned out to be a duff stick of RAM. Passed most the easy tests but very much failed the memtest86 thing. Sent it back to the vendor (Scan in this case) and they pretty swiftly sent me a replacement. Just a thought.

Aye I should check mine really, I've been using them for a good few years now, so I don't think they are at fault. That said I'm often trying strange overclocks too, so it's more likely to be that....

GurtTractor

For those that aren't aware, WinDirStat is a very excellent tool for seeing what the actual fuck is taking up all your drive space.

Paul the sparky

Does anyone find the time to play any games in between all the updates/reinstalls/dusting etc?

If so, has anyone played Escape from Tarkov?

Unlikely

Any suggestions as to why my laptop fan(s) go batshit mental while the laptop is idle? Disk/CPU usage is minimal but periodically the fans crank up and stay in jet engine mode until I give it a nudge.

I am aware this query is pretty vague.

AJ

Did you leave it in the sun?

GurtTractor

Unlikely wrote:

Any suggestions as to why my laptop fan(s) go batshit mental while the laptop is idle? Disk/CPU usage is minimal but periodically the fans crank up and stay in jet engine mode until I give it a nudge. I am aware this query is pretty vague.

Download HWiNFO (the installer link), install and run it ticking the "sensors only" box when it starts up. You should be able to see your CPU temp in there, possibly the fan RPM too. Right click on things and you can show a graph too, helpful with pinpointing when something happens.

It may be that the heatsink has worked loose or the TIM has gone to shit over time. Hopefully it's an easy model to open up and service, as that's probably what you'll want to do.

I have a syringe of Noctua NT H1 thermal paste lying around here somewhere which I could perhaps post cheaply for those who want to repaste the odd machine. If you have many machines to sort out it's probably worth buying some though.

mrsmr2

Try opening task manager, sort the Processes by CPU (descending) and see if anything jumps to the top at the time the fans start.

WorKid

GurtTractor wrote:

For those that aren't aware, WinDirStat is a very excellent tool for seeing what the actual fuck is taking up all your drive space.

Makes me wonder why the default windows one is still so utterly utterly useless, so many decades later.

Howdy, Stranger!

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