Maintaining my computer

Hello everyone. Thank you so much for taking the time, providing me with great tips and information on how to upgrade and maintain my computer I really appreciate it. Always learning something new about the computer. It's an interesting process.
I am making progress with the computer. I transferred everything over to the Corsair Obsidian 650D case. All of the cables have been managed so the inside of the case looks clean. I purchased the Hyper 212 Evo cooler and I ran into a problem earlier. I have 4 ram sticks in the motherboard but there was a clearance issue between the CPU fan and the heatsinks on the Corsair Vengeance Ram. Would it be safe to raise the fan on the Hyper212 Evo so there won't be a clearance issue with the RAM? Would I be losing any cooling from this cooler if I raise the fan up?
Another problem that I ran into with the case, when I boot up the computer, the top 200mm fan moves very slowly. I wonder if there could be a problem with the motor in the top case fan. Also, the front fan won't spin. Only the back fan works. First, I tried connecting the case fans to the case fan headers but that did not work and then I tried connecting the fans to the motherboard but that did not work. This case has not been used in over a year. Could it be possible that the case fans are faulty? If they are, how difficult would it be to replace the top and front case fans?

I applied the arctic silver on the CPU and installed the cooler onto the CPU. I was looking at the manual and following some videos and I think there may be more than one way of installing this cooler onto the AMD processors. I did not use the phillips head wrench tool that came in the box. That tool can be used to tighten down the standoffs. Instead, I used my own phillips head screw driver making sure that the standoff was screwed into the motherboard but I did not screw it down too tightly. The connection seems good though. The bracket was a little difficult to screw into the standoff so I had to use some force. After I booted the computer, the cooler worked. Nice and quiet fans.

For now, would it be safe to use the computer with all the doors open until next week since the front fan on the case seems to be dead and the top fan is not working the way it should. My rear fan works and I think the Hyper 212 Evo will keep the CPU cool. If it's safe to use the computer, I'll only use it for about an hour or so. Sometime next week, I'll see into finding replacement fans for the top of the case and the front of the case.

Looking at the case specs at Corsair, the problem you are having with the fans might be the fan controller kit that handles the fan speeds.

They offer a replacement part "Obsidian Series 650D fan controller kit" for $9.99, and there is a list of retailers that carry the part on that same page.
http://www.corsair.com/en-us/obsidian-series-650d-fan-controller-kit

They also have the 200mm fans for $14.99, same thing with the retailers list
With that case you also have the option of replacing the top 200mm fan with one of the Corsair 100i Sealed CPU Liquid Cooling dual fan, I have an 80i for my iCore7 because the location of the DDR4 slots is very close to the CPU and the fit of a regular fan covered the RAM slots, the 80i does not need that much space and sits over only the CPU. It might be an option you would like to look at.

Thank you everyone for giving me great suggestions and tips on transferring everything over to the new case. I really appreciate it I got the computer up and running about four days ago. A little bit of trial and error with the CPU cooler and the top and front case fans but that's the fun part of the process, seeing what works and what doesn't work. I purchased two new fans to replace the 200mm fans already in the case. I think my fan controller might have been faulty so my fans are now getting their power from the motherboard. So far, my CPU is running at 30-31 degrees Celsius with the new cooler and the temps for the inside of my computer are cooler than my Zalman Z9 case. I look forward to learning about overclocking and cable management next. Since my CPU is running in the low 30's, perhaps I can overclock it between 3.7 and 4.0 Ghz. My main goal is to hit 3.8 Ghz. Since this CPU is unlocked, I was going to overclock by only changing the multiplier instead of touching the voltage settings. I was going to use MSI Afterburner and overclock the GTX 570 between 825 and 900 Mhz. The GTX 570 has a stock speed of 732Mhz. My next upgrade in the winter will be a 512GB SSD drive and possibly Windows 10. Below are my new specs and new pictures of the computer build.

For the overclock, would there be anything that I really have to run to test stability. I have heard of different programs such as Prime95 but have no experience with the program or running stability tests for the processor. Probably not a wise decision to mess around with it though. So far, I monitor the stability of the CPU by running Trainz and a couple of other programs at the same time and reading the temperatures displayed in HW monitor. I only adjusted the CPU clock ratio in the BIOS. So far, at 3.7 Ghz on the AMD Phenom II x4 965 Black Edition processor and the Hyper 212 Evo in my system, I get a maximum of 50 degrees Celsius with Trainz 2010 and ITunes running at the same time. Later on or tomorrow, I'm going to see if I can get it to 3.8 Ghz.




Case: Corsair Obsidian 650D
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-UD3-970 ATZ
Power Supply: Ultra LSP limited edition 700w
CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965 BE @ 3.4Ghz
Memory: 32GB Vengeance DDR3 in Quad Channel (only 16GB recognizable since I'm using Windows 7 Home Premium)
GPU: EVGA GTX 570
Cooler: Coolermaster Hyper 212 EVO

Very nice and congratulations!

Those sealed grommets and big empty space in the back really helps run those wires out of the way. I have the larger case, but the interior is similar, except I have a big "shelf" with an additional fan above the power supply, as well as, top fans, a back case fan, and one on the hard drive cage, with options to place two more if needed.

John

Thank you JCitron. Most definitely. I'm so glad the case has these routing holes to group and tie down the cables. That sounds like a nice system you have. Corsair makes very nice cases. The more open space and fans, the better the cooling. I originally had a drive bay in front of the front fan but I removed it for a little more airflow.

Good evening everyone. I am having a big debate about operating systems. Lately, I saw a couple of reviews on Windows 10 and so far it looks great. To me, it's like a combination of Windows 7 and WIndows 8.1. I also heard that it comes with DirectX12 which should be an improvement over DirectX11 in graphics performance and computations. It should also be a free upgrade since I am using Windows 7.

I am currently using Trainz 2010 to build the Major Tri State Area but I would like to know if it would be good to upgrade to Windows 10. Would Trainz 2010 run better in Windows 10 compared to Windows 7 and would Trainz 2010 along with my GTX 570 card be able to utilize DirectX12? At first, I thought to myself, you can't beat the price of free but then I thought, if my Trainz computer with Windows 7 currently works just fine, then what is the point of upgrading to Windows 10? As a Computer Engineering student, I believe that it is a good idea to stay current with technology but I also believe that if it's not broken, don't fix it and the newest or latest technology may not be the best option to go with. Trying to make the best out of what I have. Can I please get some opinions on what might be the best operating system to use? To me, Windows 7 is still a great operating system and it still has alot of life and support left and I think if I get an SSD for Trainz 2010, then I should see even quicker load times and smoother gameplay.

If I was upgrading to Windows 10, would it be alright to just perform an upgrade for now and then in a couple of months or when I have more time around the winter, perform a clean install. I don't know about burning or installing OS's to discs. At anypoint, would it be possible to reinstall Windows 7 using my Windows 7 disc or using a USB flash drive to install Windows 10 onto?

Earlier this evening, I attempted to install Windows 10 but I got this error, 80240020. Would anyone know why I may be getting this error message. I am not really sure why my Windows 10 upgrade failed. For now, I am working on backing up Trainz 2010 and all my important documents, along with cleaning my PC and making sure all my drivers are up to date. Out of curiosity, would anyone know how Trainz 2010 performs in Windows 10. If it runs in Windows 10, how does the performance compare to Windows 7, is it a step up in terms of performance and smooth gameplay.

Google it........... http://winsupersite.com/windows-10/how-fix-80240020-windows-10-installation-error

I have the upgrade ready for download. I think I had to wait. I think the error had to do with the large amount of Windows 10 downloads taking place on the Microsoft Server, since thousands or millions of people are in the process of upgrading. From what I was reading on the site, Windows 10 will be released in waves to accommodate the large number of downloads taking place.

I am going to download Windows 10 on Sunday. I made sure to back up all of my data and the Major Tri State Project to a portable hard drive just in case anything goes wrong. Quick question, after upgrading to Windows 10, would it best to create a Windows 10 installation on a bootable dvd or on a bootable flash drive? Which one would be the best option and how would I go about creating a bootable dvd or bootable flash drive?

malikrthr said:

I am going to download Windows 10 on Sunday. I made sure to back up all of my data and the Major Tri State Project to a portable hard drive just in case anything goes wrong. Quick question, after upgrading to Windows 10, would it best to create a Windows 10 installation on a bootable dvd or on a bootable flash drive? Which one would be the best option and how would I go about creating a bootable dvd or bootable flash drive?

Click to expand...

Backups are a good thing.

I put my .ISO image on a DVD. I downloaded the image using their Make Media program, or whatever it's called, but I couldn't get the burn part to work so I used ImageBurn to create the bootable DVD. The ISO image contains all the files necessary for booting so all you need to do is just image the ISO to a DVD.

Here's Image Burn's link:

http://imgburn.com/

Be careful when you install so not to get anything you don't want. The last bundle came with Google Toolbar, FYI. The program is pretty straight forward to use and I've used it for ages.

The reason for a DVD is USB sticks tend to get overwritten a bit too often and the problem is someone, including you, might grab that USB stick in a pinch if you need to copy a file. Having the DVD means the disk won't get overwritten.

John

Good evening everyone. I upgraded my computer to Windows 10. It took around an hour and a half to complete the upgrade. So far, Windows 10 looks nice but I was so used to using Windows 7. It's gonna take some time for me to get used to this new Windows OS and it's interface, navigating around. I have never really used Windows 8 so in a way, it's mostly new to me with tiles and extra apps. I do notice that the time to boot up has been cut in half compared to Windows 7 which is good but I don't see any improvements as far as performance in Trainz 2010. I also notice that every couple of seconds, the taskbar flickers. Probably my system has to get used to operating with Windows 10. From what I heard, Windows 10 home edition is supposed to have a max ram limit of 128GB. I have 32GB of RAM installed on my motherboard but Windows 10 home only sees 16GB usable RAM I gotta give new things a chance, I'm going to give Windows 10 a test run for 2 weeks to see if I really like it. I was so used to Windows 7. From what I heard, there is an option somewhere to revert back to Windows 7 but you only have up to 30 days to revert back to the older OS.

Good evening everyone. Lately, I have been saving up for some more computer upgrades to get the best out of Trainz 2010 in Windows 10. So far, my boot time is 30 seconds with everything on my 1TB Seagate Barracuda 7200rpm hard drive. Even though Windows 10 comes with Direct X12, I don't really notice any performance increases in Trainz 2010. The stutter is still there when there are lots of detail on the map. I am thinking about upgrading to an SSD for Trainz 2010 to eliminate the stutter as much as possible.

Which would be the best route to go with. Install Trainz 2010 on an SSD and keep Windows 10, music, pictures and documents on the 1TB HDD that I'm already using. Or would it be better to purchase an identical 1TB 7200rpm HDD specifically for Trainz 2010 and keep Windows 10, music, pictures and documents on my current 1TB 7200rpm HDD. My budget is $200. I have 130GB in Trainz content so far. Everything in my computer is fast but my main goal is to get rid of the stutter in Trainz 2010. Would anyone know of 512GB or 500GB SSD's that are the best bang for the buck. I have been looking at newegg and microcent at the prices of different SSD's. I have also compared read and write speeds and I think, the higher the read and write speed, the better the SSD would eliminate stutter in Trainz 2010. From what I have found so far, the Crucial SSD's seem to be great. Below are a couple of SSD's at a good price. Which one would be the best to eliminate stutters in Trainz 2010 or would they perform pretty much the same?

Crucial MX200 500GB 2.5" SSD ($179.99)

Samsung 850 EVO 500GB 2.5" SSD ($169.99)

Mushkin Ehnanced Reactor 512GB 2.5" SSD ($174.99)

I am curious, is Trainz 2010 really compatible with Windows 10. I had no problems with Windows 7 but when I use Trainz 2010 in Windows 10, I notice, sometimes, the simulator freezes and doesn't respond when loading the route and there are times that the sim would lag and freeze in surveyor with Windows 10. I have performed two data base repairs in the last 3 days. What can I do to solve this problem?

malikrthr said:

I am curious, is Trainz 2010 really compatible with Windows 10. I had no problems with Windows 7 but when I use Trainz 2010 in Windows 10, I notice, sometimes, the simulator freezes and doesn't respond when loading the route and there are times that the sim would lag and freeze in surveyor with Windows 10. I have performed two data base repairs in the last 3 days. What can I do to solve this problem?

Click to expand...

Guessing you haven't installed DirectX9c.

I think Direct X9c is installed. Before, I think part of the problem was I had Itunes and Trainz opened at the same time. I don't think Windows 10 likes both of them opened at the same time. I have monitored Trainz 2010 in Windows 10 this weekend and its running good now. First, I ran a quick database repair and got rid of any faulty assets in the content manager. After that, I ran an antivirus and malware scan followed by a disk defragment and now it's running smoothly.

Make sure that the openGl option wasn't selected.

I would upgrade the video card to at least a GTX780Ti if you can. The GTX980 and its family are the cream of the crop with the 780ti coming in second place being the older hardware. Soon the 980s will be replaced with even faster hardware, which will relegate them to the less expensive second place where the 780 series is today so this is something to consider.

Even though I am not familiar with the AMD processors so I can't comment directly on those, the rest of the hardware should be fine.

John