Question 2023 upgrade...

[BoomerD]

Because of all the problems I've been having with my current PC, i7-9700K/32gb Corsair DDR4/EVGA 3070 GPU, Seasonic Focus 750 PSU, I'm looking to MAYBE upgrade later this month.

I will re-use one of my 2 cases, either an IBuyPower POS mid-tower case, or an ancient Coolermaster HAF 932 which will require new case fans and the addition of a USB 3. front panel. The Coolermaster, being a MUCH larger case will give me much more room for expansion, would allow me to use a Noctua air cooler, but if I go with an AIO, then I'm limited to a 240mm unit same as the IPB case.

So...I just added the Corsair RAM a month ago, I could go with a 12th gen Intel CPU and keep that, but if I go with a 13th gen, then I might have to buy DDR5. (but depending on the motherboard, I MIGHT have to do with a 12th gen CPU.)

Recommendations for CPU/Motherboard? I'd prefer to stay with the "flagship" model of whichever generation I get. No I5 or I7 models unless the performance is so much better than the I9 variant.

I DO NOT need storage...I have a couple of good (1TB WD Black and 2 TB Seagate) spinner HDD's, 2 240GB SSD's, a 1TB NVMe and a 2TB NVMe.

I know we have lots of AMD supporters here, but my VERY LIMITED experience with AMD/ATi has been...disappointing to say the least. (most of those were FAR from being flagship models of CPU or GPU with the exception of the X850XT PE GPU I bought some 15 years ago.) As such, I'd prefer only Intel processor recommendations.

Thanks.

EDIT: This will be used for gaming, (mostly older FPS shooters) surfing and watching videos. No video encoding, no graphics work other than games. No CAD or anything similar.

EDIT.2
Turns out, both Z690 and Z790 boards are available in DDR4 and DDR5.

Now then, I'vever built with MSI. I seem to remember that about 20 years ago they were considered bottom tier. Don't know if that's changed. I've pretty much only ever used ASUS in my builds, but have been looking at Gigabyte as well...HOWEVER, the "exploding PSU" debacle from this past year has me second guessing that.

 

[BoomerD]

Parts have started to arrive! So far, I have the CPU, motherboard, CPU contact frame, and cooler. Waiting for the SSD that will be my boot drive. (so far, using an NVMe drive as boot drive hasn't been as impressive as I had hoped. Lots of weird laggy issues. (Might not be the NVMe drive...since the existing mobo is dying)
The MSI Z690 Tomahawk DDR4 motherboard is a HEAVY bastage! I was surprised at the weight of the thing. The SSD should arrive tomorrow so I will be able to start the build. (I have to finish the inversion of the Dark Base Pro 900 Rev.2 case. (swaps the glass door to the right side...real PITA process)

 

[igor_kavinski]

Parts have started to arrive! So far, I have the CPU, motherboard, CPU contact frame, and cooler.

You could install everything now, boot from Win10 bootable flash drive and see if it loads fine. May also be able to do memory diagnostics from the Repair Computer option in Win10 setup (don't remember for sure if it's there, though). May have to flash BIOS first.

 

[In2Photos]

Parts have started to arrive! So far, I have the CPU, motherboard, CPU contact frame, and cooler. Waiting for the SSD that will be my boot drive. (so far, using an NVMe drive as boot drive hasn't been as impressive as I had hoped. Lots of weird laggy issues. (Might not be the NVMe drive...since the existing mobo is dying)
The MSI Z690 Tomahawk DDR4 motherboard is a HEAVY bastage! I was surprised at the weight of the thing. The SSD should arrive tomorrow so I will be able to start the build. (I have to finish the inversion of the Dark Base Pro 900 Rev.2 case. (swaps the glass door to the right side...real PITA process)

My experience with NVME drives has been the opposite. Program launch time compared to SATA drives is snappier by far. Games load so much faster.

Don't forget to build outside of the case and test everything first!

 

[BoomerD]

My experience with NVME drives has been the opposite. Program launch time compared to SATA drives is snappier by far. Games load so much faster.

Don't forget to build outside of the case and test everything first!

Fortunately, the Dark Base Pro 900 Rev.2 has a removeable motherboard tray with silicone feet on it so I can do just that. My only concern will be the AIO cooler...trying to wrangle the tray and board back into position with the radiator/fans still attached. We'll see...and once I get everything installed, I'll wipe and reformat the NVMe drives and reinstall Windows on the Gen4 drive and see how that works.

One thing I don't like...and took me by surprise, (I should have known...I've watched several videos on the process...and it makes perfect sense since the board is reversed.) is that when I swap sides with the door in the case, I'm inverting the motherboard tray...so everything is upside down. (Gosh, I hope all the elecktricikals don't drain out!) That will put the GPU near the top of the case.

 

[BoomerD]

Welp...inverting the case/,motherboard didn't work. In the highest position, it was too high to allow me to mount the AIO radiator, in the lower position, the bottom (actually the top since it's upside down) was hidden behind the PSU, no way to plug anything in...like 8 pin cpu cables, water pump, etc...so, tore the case apart, put it back to its original (left door) config.
The Arctic Liquid Freezer II pump base was a tight fit...but it fit. (barely)

I have some tweaking to do on a few little things...have a few cables from the front IO panel that I don't know where they go...and they're not in the manual, so I will call be quiet! tomorrow.

To my great surprise, <knock on wood> the build fired right up and into BIOS. (no windows install yet)

changed the RAM to XMP...

This took WAY longer than it should have...mostly because of the invert/revert crap with the case...but also because I haven't done a fresh build in...12 years. Things have changed a bit since then. ( the basics are the same, but still...the last time I did this, AIO coolers were pretty much a brand new thing.

I screwed up though...I pulled the NVMe drives from my old rig...and in doing so, removed the windows install with them. Tried to reinstall windows from a USB drive, but it wouldn't work for some reason...I was just too tired to screw with it any more. i'll get it straightened out tomorrow. Since I still need to harvest files, pics, and documents from the drives still in the old rig before I wipe them, I'll probably just connect them to the new system, get what I want out of them, wipe them, reinstall windows, and put them back in the old case.

 

[igor_kavinski]

To my great surprise, <knock on wood> the build fired right up and into BIOS. (no windows install yet)

It's always surprising when that happens, right?

So you didn't have to update BIOS and the mobo came with a BIOS supporting 13th gen?

Did the display come on immediately or did you have to wait 30 secs for something to show up?

 

[BoomerD]

It's always surprising when that happens, right?

So you didn't have to update BIOS and the mobo came with a BIOS supporting 13th gen?

Did the display come on immediately or did you have to wait 30 secs for something to show up?

Flashed the BIOS before I installed CPU or RAM. MSI included a little USB drive. Had an old BIOS on it, so I moved it to the desktop, downloaded the most recent BIOS, installed that. It was surprisingly easy.

 

[igor_kavinski]

It was surprisingly easy.

What about the memory training delay? Was there any?

 

[BoomerD]

What about the memory training delay? Was there any?

I don't remember...

like I said...booted right into BIOS. Clicked the XMP button, exited BIOS and saved the change, came back up with the new speed setting.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Hope to see your stock settings scores for Geekbench 5, Rapydmark at High and MemMaxx2!

 

[In2Photos]

Congrats on getting the build up and running! If you share some pics of the front panel IO we might be able to direct you.

What about the memory training delay? Was there any?

He's using ddr4 so I wouldn't expect any delays.

 

[igor_kavinski]

He's using ddr4 so I wouldn't expect any delays.

I encountered a very perceptible delay on the ASUS H610M mobo. Could be the mobo. Maybe.

 

[BoomerD]

Congrats on getting the build up and running! If you share some pics of the front panel IO we might be able to direct you.


He's using ddr4 so I wouldn't expect any delays.

I suspect the ones I can' t properly identify are for the USC C charging port, the fan controller switch, the LED switch, and...?
I easily found the various USB cables, audio connector, on/off switch, HDD light, etc, and even the cable for what I THINK is power to the built-in Qi charger.

 

[BoomerD]

Hope to see your stock settings scores for Geekbench 5, Rapydmark at High and MemMaxx2!

I don't generally benchmark test...but maybe.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I don't generally benchmark test...but maybe.

It would be a great service for the community. Someone may come across your benchmarks and hardware configuration and decide that they wanna go for the same.

 

[BoomerD]

It would be a great service for the community. Someone may come across your benchmarks and hardware configuration and decide that they wanna go for the same.

You must have me mistaken for some community-minded individual...



We'll see. I have a sh*t ton of work to do before I get to that point.

 

[BoomerD]

Dammit...I forgot today is MLK DAY. No one is open. Case stuff will have to wait till tomorrow.

 

[BoomerD]

So...my old rig. Keeps saying "no operating system found," and a Windows recovery/install USB drive won't work because...no operating system found...unless I want to lose all my files.

Gonna have to connect the drive to my new PC, harvest everything out of it that I want to keep, then try again.

I DID boot into Windows with the new rig using the Windows already on the NVMe drive. WAY faster than it was in the old rig. (gen4 on PCIe-4 instead of 3)
Finally got the system to recognize the new drives I installed...once I get the SSD from the old system re-Windowed, I'll clean up the NVMe drives and reinstall a new copy of Windows. (Can't sell the old PC with the same OS I'm using, can I? I mean, I CAN, but I'd have to give the buyer the password to the MS account. Right?) I've already bought a Windows 10 disk and opened it...so I might as well use it.

 

[igor_kavinski]

(Can't sell the old PC with the same OS I'm using, can I? I mean, I CAN, but I'd have to give the buyer the password to the MS account. Right?)

If you RESET the OS, everything will be deleted and then you can make some dummy account on the old PC so the buyer may login. The OS license should be tied to your old mobo so should activate automatically without logging in with your email account.

 

[BoomerD]

If you RESET the OS, everything will be deleted and then you can make some dummy account on the old PC so the buyer may login. The OS license should be tied to your old mobo so should activate automatically without logging in with your email account.

<phew> That's what I thought...but I've never sold one before. (believe it or not) I've kept all my HDDs every time I finished with a PC. (I think I still have an old WD 80GB PATA drive in the garage...maybe even a VERY OLD Bigfoot PATA 4GB drive from the 90's)

 

[BoomerD]

Hit a snag...sort of. One of the SSD's I want to save is from a Windows 7 machine. I can get into the drive in the old machine, but if I connect it to the new machine, it fails to boot. I either get "starting automatic repair" then the screen goes black...or the MSI boot logo hangs with the spinning dots...and that's as far as I can get. I want to get in, format the drive and use it in my wife's Dell.

 

[In2Photos]

Hit a snag...sort of. One of the SSD's I want to save is from a Windows 7 machine. I can get into the drive in the old machine, but if I connect it to the new machine, it fails to boot. I either get "starting automatic repair" then the screen goes black...or the MSI boot logo hangs with the spinning dots...and that's as far as I can get. I want to get in, format the drive and use it in my wife's Dell.

Sounds like the boot order is looking at the Win 7 SSD first. Check that in the BIOS. Otherwise you could try using a USB enclosure and connecting it after you boot into the new PC.

 

[BoomerD]

Sounds like the boot order is looking at the Win 7 SSD first. Check that in the BIOS. Otherwise you could try using a USB enclosure and connecting it after you boot into the new PC.

Yeah, I suspect the OS installs are competing for the BIOS.
Hmm ..I do have an ODD enclosure..

Your suggestion about an enclosure was BRILLIANT! While the one I have is made for ODDs, the basics are the same...it's saving me a ton of time. It worked great for the problematic SSD...and is working fine for HDDs as well. THANKS!

 

[In2Photos]

Yeah, I suspect the OS installs are competing for the BIOS.
Hmm ..I do have an ODD enclosure..

Alternatively you could use a USB stick to boot into a disk partition program, or even the Windows installer, and format the drive there.

 

[Tech Junky]

Yeah, I suspect the OS installs are competing for the BIOS.

It's probably more of the W7 being MBR and not UEFI/GPT.

It's a quick conversion if you slap it in the old system.

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Then the issue becomes boot selections if neither Windows knew about the other it won't really dual boot unless you tinker with things like running a Linux boot USB and then use grub to enable dual boot as an option. Going this route though might involve more advanced options you might not be able to stomach if you're not familiar with how it works in Linux.