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I've got a few questions i need help with. Any advice is appreciated 
1) Does anyone know of a reliable and safe way of removing graphics drivers without using a driver sweeper? Is it enough to uninstall?
2) What kind of specs do i need to stream on 720p (mostly WorldOfTanks, but also Starcraft II on medium graphics and some non-taxing indie games)?
3) How often should i remove dust off my computer to avoid risks? What are the risks of too much dust?
4) Is there any danger if i have my power supply outside the computer case? (i bought a kinda shitty case where if my graphics card is over 11 inches it won't fit because of the PSU, and when i got gifted a HD 4870 it just wouldn't fit).
5) Last time i switched graphics, windows wouldn't start up so i ended up disconnecting for like five minutes and when reconnected windows showed the startup recovery screen (Windows couldn't recover startup... everything was fine after). Do i have anything to worry about if that happens? How can i avoid it in the future?
Thanks in advance for anything you can help me with!
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
Gumbi, h100i is nosier (from what i know)
If you're not concerned about noise (which would make h100i an option without limiting fans some, perhaps) then why not pick up a silver arrow extreme? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-099-TR
if you are, then nh-d14, silver arrow with other fans and i'd guess the dark rock pro 2 are all extremely quiet (even without the intake i'm gonna add for my blower gpu, the loudest component in my rig is my seagate barracuda when it's spun up and you can't even hear the cpu over the either the gpu or hard drive, it doesn't even spin at idle a lot of the time for example, turning on and off at it's min speed of 600rpm, probably averaging 100rpm or so)
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On June 16 2013 13:51 Cyro wrote:Gumbi, h100i is nosier (from what i know) If you're not concerned about noise (which would make h100i an option without limiting fans some, perhaps) then why not pick up a silver arrow extreme? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-099-TRif you are, then nh-d14, silver arrow with other fans and i'd guess the dark rock pro 2 are all extremely quiet (even without the intake i'm gonna add for my blower gpu, the loudest component in my rig is my seagate barracuda when it's spun up and you can't even hear the cpu over the either the gpu or hard drive, it doesn't even spin at idle a lot of the time for example, turning on and off at it's min speed of 600rpm, probably averaging 100rpm or so)
100rpm? i think blowing air on it would cool it better then that :p
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
it doesn't need cooling ;p case airflow pins cpu below the 30's at idle pretty much without any of the cpu fans spinning
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On June 16 2013 14:15 Cyro wrote:
it doesn't need cooling ;p case airflow pins cpu below the 30's at idle pretty much without any of the cpu fans spinning
what case is it? seems pretty nice
didn't even know it was possible for a fan to spin so slowly
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
On June 16 2013 14:17 Rachnar wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 14:15 Cyro wrote:
it doesn't need cooling ;p case airflow pins cpu below the 30's at idle pretty much without any of the cpu fans spinning what case is it? seems pretty nice didn't even know it was possible for a fan to spin so slowly
Xigmatek Utgard
And they don't spin, they turn "on" and start to spin up to 600rpm and then shut down moments later with light load, and that's with only the top fan spinning til i replace the other one and add more. Pretty awesome that you can fit a silver arrow with 3x fans up there
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Hello! I survived another year of teaching high school biology – I'd like to treat myself to something special this summer. I'd like a computer I could play Starcraft 2 on in such a way as to enjoy its potentially beautiful graphics. I would also like to be able to run BioShock Infinite at fairly high gfx as well.
I've some experience with swapping out parts and I have installed an OS (it was a while ago, but still) so I want to try my hand at building my own.
Thanks for your help!
I've answered the questions below:
What is your budget?
My budget is about $700 – I don't need a new monitor.
What is your resolution?
I game with a resolution of 1280x720.
What are you using it for?
Mostly I'd use this computer for gaming, but I'd like it to be capable of quickly running programs like Open Office and such. I also watch movies on it, if that's important.
What is your upgrade cycle?
I'd probably upgrade the computer in 2 years.
When do you plan on building it?
I'd like to build it now! : )
Do you plan on overclocking?
No, thanks.
Do you need an Operating System?
Yes, I'd like Window's 7.
Do you plan to add a second GPU for SLI or Crossfire?
No.
Where are you buying your parts from?
I have a MicroCenter fairly close to me, so if that's a good place I'll go there.
Edit: Did some research and changed my budget.
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
+ Show Spoiler +On June 16 2013 15:33 BorealisD wrote:
Hello! I survived another year of teaching high school biology – I'd like to treat myself to something special this summer. I'd like a computer I could play Starcraft 2 on in such a way as to enjoy its potentially beautiful graphics. I would also like to be able to run BioShock Infinite at fairly high gfx as well.
I've some experience with swapping out parts and I have installed an OS (it was a while ago, but still) so I want to try my hand at building my own.
Thanks for your help!
I've answered the questions below:
What is your budget?
My budget is about $700 – I don't need a new monitor.
What is your resolution?
I game with a resolution of 1280x720.
What are you using it for?
Mostly I'd use this computer for gaming, but I'd like it to be capable of quickly running programs like Open Office and such. I also watch movies on it, if that's important.
What is your upgrade cycle?
I'd probably upgrade the computer in 2 years.
When do you plan on building it?
I'd like to build it now! : )
Do you plan on overclocking?
No, thanks.
Do you need an Operating System?
Yes, I'd like Window's 7.
Do you plan to add a second GPU for SLI or Crossfire?
No.
Where are you buying your parts from?
I have a MicroCenter fairly close to me, so if that's a good place I'll go there.
Edit: Did some research and changed my budget.
Hey, you should probably get a 1920x1080 monitor. They're not too expensive and it's kinda a big deal to have 2.5x as many pixels on the screen, your current monitor being 1280x720 would probably be significantly smaller, too. You could get an i5 + motherboard pretty cheap at microcenter; GPU wise it's probably best to grab a 7790 (far cry blood dragon and bioshock infinite free with it) or a 7850 (more powerful, far cry 3 blood dragon, bioshock infinite and tomb raider free with it)
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
Also guys, i couldn't set 3.5ghz because ud3h bios even though it says x35, 3.5ghz right there after you set it, somehow decides to boot into x25 2.5ghz (gg ud3h), so i benched with 3.6:
3.6 to 4.5ghz on Haswell
25% increase in frequency
37.5% increase in minimums
27% increase in averages
^Both numbers from 1600mhz 10-10-10-28 RAM and stock uncore.
This will also probably be of interest here:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/t5zm2Km.png)
This benchmark is very consistent, i've ran it twice consecutively and got the same results down to a fraction of a % on more than a few occasions - just gotta be careful for sc2 stuttering and ruining numbers. Turns out actually to go a minute without stuttering and freezing for a second, you have to run the benchmark like 5 times very often, even with everything cached
When i have a higher overclock stable i'l try to bench something like 4.7ghz +2200/2400 RAM against those stock numbers. It should be pretty funny 
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On June 16 2013 13:51 Cyro wrote:Gumbi, h100i is nosier (from what i know) If you're not concerned about noise (which would make h100i an option without limiting fans some, perhaps) then why not pick up a silver arrow extreme? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-099-TRif you are, then nh-d14, silver arrow with other fans and i'd guess the dark rock pro 2 are all extremely quiet (even without the intake i'm gonna add for my blower gpu, the loudest component in my rig is my seagate barracuda when it's spun up and you can't even hear the cpu over the either the gpu or hard drive, it doesn't even spin at idle a lot of the time for example, turning on and off at it's min speed of 600rpm, probably averaging 100rpm or so)
The DRP2 has almost the exact same performance as the TR SB-E, but is a tad quieter. It depends on the best deal I get I suppose. Do OCUK have free shipping? The best offer I had on the DRP2 was 56 pounds free delivery to Ireland.
I do want to get high end performance, I'm spending money on other components and don't mind splashing. My CM Hyper 212+ cost me 22 euro now almost 3 years ago, so it served me well.
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On June 16 2013 21:48 Gumbi wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 13:51 Cyro wrote:Gumbi, h100i is nosier (from what i know) If you're not concerned about noise (which would make h100i an option without limiting fans some, perhaps) then why not pick up a silver arrow extreme? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-099-TRif you are, then nh-d14, silver arrow with other fans and i'd guess the dark rock pro 2 are all extremely quiet (even without the intake i'm gonna add for my blower gpu, the loudest component in my rig is my seagate barracuda when it's spun up and you can't even hear the cpu over the either the gpu or hard drive, it doesn't even spin at idle a lot of the time for example, turning on and off at it's min speed of 600rpm, probably averaging 100rpm or so) The DRP2 has almost the exact same performance as the TR SB-E (neither is ahead), but is a tad quieter. It depends on the best deal I get I suppose. Do OCUK have free shipping? The best offer I had on the DRP2 was 56 pounds free delivery to Ireland. I do want to get high end performance, I'm spending money on other components and don't mind splashing. My CM Hyper 212+ cost me 22 euro now almost 3 years ago, so it served me well.
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
On June 16 2013 21:48 Gumbi wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 13:51 Cyro wrote:Gumbi, h100i is nosier (from what i know) If you're not concerned about noise (which would make h100i an option without limiting fans some, perhaps) then why not pick up a silver arrow extreme? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-099-TRif you are, then nh-d14, silver arrow with other fans and i'd guess the dark rock pro 2 are all extremely quiet (even without the intake i'm gonna add for my blower gpu, the loudest component in my rig is my seagate barracuda when it's spun up and you can't even hear the cpu over the either the gpu or hard drive, it doesn't even spin at idle a lot of the time for example, turning on and off at it's min speed of 600rpm, probably averaging 100rpm or so) The DRP2 has almost the exact same performance as the TR SB-E, but is a tad quieter. It depends on the best deal I get I suppose. Do OCUK have free shipping? The best offer I had on the DRP2 was 56 pounds free delivery to Ireland. I do want to get high end performance, I'm spending money on other components and don't mind splashing. My CM Hyper 212+ cost me 22 euro now almost 3 years ago, so it served me well.
What are you comparing performance to? There's something like three editions of the silver arrow. There's at least the regular, the special edition and the extreme, using different fan setups. The fans on my SE are really quiet (i considered getting a ty-143 for push-pull-pull or pull-pull-pull, but i'l probably get a 150 just to laugh at noise even more) like so quiet with just the ty-147's, it's not even a factor. I'm pretty sure it can passive cool overclocked cpu no problem at all on idle and light load with pwm or low voltage on case fans, and at full load, it's really quiet. Like, GPU pinned at full load for long enough for it to heat up (i didn't get intake directly across from it yet and it's a blower) or hard drive spinning up are so much louder than my silver arrow, it's quite funny to me
I think OCUK has free delivery to their forum members or something, not sure though. That £56 seems like a pretty good deal with shipping included.
My SE was £50 with VAT, but i got it without the 20% VAT and didn't have to pay shipping because already ordering other stuff at the same time, so it was ~£41.5 shipped or something like that
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On June 16 2013 21:48 Gumbi wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 13:51 Cyro wrote:Gumbi, h100i is nosier (from what i know) If you're not concerned about noise (which would make h100i an option without limiting fans some, perhaps) then why not pick up a silver arrow extreme? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-099-TRif you are, then nh-d14, silver arrow with other fans and i'd guess the dark rock pro 2 are all extremely quiet (even without the intake i'm gonna add for my blower gpu, the loudest component in my rig is my seagate barracuda when it's spun up and you can't even hear the cpu over the either the gpu or hard drive, it doesn't even spin at idle a lot of the time for example, turning on and off at it's min speed of 600rpm, probably averaging 100rpm or so) The DRP2 has almost the exact same performance as the TR SB-E, but is a tad quieter. It depends on the best deal I get I suppose. Do OCUK have free shipping? The best offer I had on the DRP2 was 56 pounds free delivery to Ireland. I do want to get high end performance, I'm spending money on other components and don't mind splashing. My CM Hyper 212+ cost me 22 euro now almost 3 years ago, so it served me well.
As you are looking at the air coolers mainly because of noise, I think you should also look at single tower coolers. You might get the Noctua NH-U14S at a similar price to the DRP2. There's a Thermalright Archon SB-E X2 with two fans for 57 pounds at amazon.co.uk. With its two fans, that might be a very good deal as you could perhaps use one of the fans somewhere else in your case (though it might not fit as it's 140 mm with 120 mm mounting holes).
Both those single tower coolers seem to be at least as good as the NH-D14 at stock configuration, perhaps simply because the NH-D14 is old and the engineers learned something new over the years. If you are interested in the single tower coolers, you have to be careful to research if they fit in your case. They don't necessarily use less metal than the dual-tower coolers. This makes them very high in comparison.
I thought going for the DRP2 sounded suspicious, but it seems I remembered reviews of the original Dark Rock Pro C1. That one wasn't that good. The DRP2 seems to have very good performance from what comparisons I could find. I still think it's a bit suspicious that its fans are so small in comparison to other coolers.
I'd suggest against something crazy like the Extreme variant of the Silver Arrow SB-E. To get access to its full performance, you'll pay by being tortured with its noise. I also don't know if it can even beat the H100i you can get for 60 pounds from that dude you know.
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Any updates on how the mobile Haswell/4th gen. I7 and I5s are doing for DotA2 and SC2?
4700MQ
4800MQ
4900MQ
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The water cooler was for 60 EURO  I'm looking for performance as well as quietness.
The DRP2 has some of the best passive cooling ability, this might be why it can perform equivalently with potentially less effective fans.
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I'm going to have a look at other reviews. That cooler is a step down from the nh-d14, right? And the DRP2 has been shown to edge the nh-d14 in other reviews I've seen.
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No, it's a step up... I don't know the reason. I think the NH-D14's design is just too old and needs an update.
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
Well, all of the tests i have seen with the u14s beating nh-d14 etc are with both coolers around 60-70c - does anyone have tests showing them in the high 80's to low 90's?
I'm a little skeptical of it being better - but then again it's more expensive than the silver arrow extreme.
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EPT
