Buying a New Computer + A Sad Story

[jacob]

Yesterday I learned about fan-curve hysteresis. Apparently, the fan was set up as a bang-bang controller to go on at T>50C and switch off at T<50C with the result that it was pulsing regularly for 1 second every five seconds at T~50C(*). Wirr........Wirr.......Wirr. Weird that this was the default setup. Even weirder that there was an easy way to fix it if only you knew how, thanks google.

(*) I set the computer up with rivatuner and MSI afterburner to show various CPU and GPU data in the corner of the screen so I'll have a good idea/feel for how it's affected by different environmental temperatures.

[Tyler9000]

I'm a stickler for PC noise and prioritize silent builds, so thermal optimization has always been an interest. I recommend Fan Control for controlling every fan in your system and HWiNFO for monitoring every sensor. They're both free and very powerful.

Pulsing fans on CPUs are definitely annoying. Hysteresis is an easy fix. Fan Control can also do fancy things like control a fan using a rolling temperature average rather than an instantaneous value. And for modern CPUs designed to run hot, I've found that an AIO liquid cooler does a better job of managing spikes compared to air coolers. But that's probably overkill for your needs.

[jacob]

Here's what I ended up with (shipping included, tax not included):

• Dell Optiplex 7020MT with an i7-4790 CPU ($105 used)
• HP 512GB 2.5" SSD ($30 new)
• 4x4GB Crucial Ballistix Sport ($7 used)
• ASUS Geforce GTX 1060 OC Dual-fan 6GB ($115 used)
• MSI MAG A550Bronze PSU ($50 new)
• 24pin->8pin optiplex power adapter ($15 new)

Total: $322

Steam (a gaming platform) recently did a hardware survey. It turns out that the above is actually rather middle of the pack (relative to other steam users) and not the barely adequate slowboat I presumed it was. I'm glad I didn't spend $1,000+ on a new computer.