2 hours ago, Aspman said:

 

I caved and upped the ram to 16Gb. Save faffing around later try to get compatible stuff.

 

You need it....I built my 7i, 8 core, 3.6GHz a couple of years back...on a Gigabyte Z97MX gaming board...mainly for photo editing & because the board is built better of longevity.....I fitted 16Gb matched dual channel DDR3 666MHz ram.....Photo shop can easy take 25 to 30%....

 

 

But Windows 10 when it does a big update I have seen the Ram usage hit just over 50%!!......no wonder lesser machines crash when people do updates...

6 minutes ago, fabdavrav said:

But Windows 10 when it does a big update I have seen the Ram usage hit just over 50%!!......no wonder lesser machines crash when people do updates...

 

The little i3 I build has really soldiered on well and I really think it was excellent value. But Windows updates more than anything else are just becoming a real PITA. Any time Windows decides to run the update service it cripples the PC. And the little i3 can handle Elite without any big issues (with a Radeon 6850).

 

Even having an SSD makes no difference to Windows Update Service. Still sucks the life out of it.

25 minutes ago, Aspman said:

 

The little i3 I build has really soldiered on well and I really think it was excellent value. But Windows updates more than anything else are just becoming a real PITA. Any time Windows decides to run the update service it cripples the PC. And the little i3 can handle Elite without any big issues (with a Radeon 6850).

 

Even having an SSD makes no difference to Windows Update Service. Still sucks the life out of it.

 

My old Dell laptop which I use as a back up & for VCDS is a T4500 dual core Pentium 2.3GHz.....with 8GB of DDR2 dual channel 399MHz ram....& a SanDisk SSD...running Win 10...still does ok, so far windows 10 update hasn't crashed it....but it does max out the CPU....

MS seem to learning though my VM machine didn't have enough disk space for the update to download and install. So the installer asks to add a addition usb thumbdrive of at least 14gb to complete the update - it did take all night to update over a very slow usb 2.

Lesson to be learned - Never start gutting a PC after 8pm

 

Still it fired up first time (no beep codes) and after a bit of crashing it actually got going.

 

Except Windows had to reinstall itself, ok expected that so I'd bought a cheap W10 key and backedup my stuff.

 

So windows comes back up with personal files but all the MS crud switched back on and reinstalled. Ok reinstate my backup....

....

...

It's not even an option.

 

Ok and Windows is no longer activated. No problem have a key....

....

...

...

"You key has been used before" *** ******** **** **** ***!!!!!!!

 

Help with activation... clicky, clicky

"Have you just changed your hardware"... Why yes I have...

Windows is now activated. Woot

 

Not even sure which key it's activated on.

 

Office has gone too. I've got legit Office 2010 but not sure where the download is, I was thinking of getting a cheap O365 license anyway.

 

Steam is coming back up, luckily the steam backups work fine.

 

GFX card arrived today so I'll plonk that in, turn the CPU cooler round (one mistake, put it in wrong way up so the blower is going the wrong way. And double check the mobo drivers etc.

Just ordered an Asus monitor. The HD samsung telly I've been using for years doesn't like the new PC for some reason I have to fettle the screen every time or it crops all 4 edges. I can correct but it doesn't hold the settings.

 

Was looking at some monster 30" plus monitors then realised the ones at work are only 20" and are fine so I got a decent 24" (no 4k or owt crazy).

Windows keys- try https://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder

Lessons to learn- do as i do after a few HDD crashes. Buy a small HDD ,and install highest order OS on one partion. Create store on the other and save al you might want to save on this partition. What I do with both windows and office is to store ( if possble) both the ISO file and the burnt file to disc ,and include the key. ADD any other programs you might want to save. THEN take HDD and sit it on shelf, not connected to PC. So when ,either ransom man comes calling, or HDD goes belly up, then you still have a copy of everything important. Don't forget to add the new stuff every so often to complete your backup.