Is that before or after you trip over your beer keg, break your neck and become completely paralyzed . Just make sure the window is closed when playing VR.

Good point Peltz.

Is VR sodomy legal in Texas?

lol... The state of Texas does not admit to VR being a thing yet. Also, Jesus rode a triceratops.

So while making some decisions on this new PC (and working a new laptop without a VGA port for work), I realized that my current monitor is

1) very old
2) Only has a VGA port

I don't actually know this, as most of my PC friends are back in Belgium and I don't see their PC's, but I'm guessing modern PC systems now use HDMI cables to carry the visual data? Can anyone confirm this or not.

I wonder if there is a big difference in visual quality - probably not that much. But VGA should restrict me way more than HDMI for some things, theoretically speaking.

So...are today's systems using HDMI cables for the monitors? If not, is it worth the difference? My monitor may be old, but it's a decent size and works rather well. Monitors aren't so expensive, but I need to know if it's worth it before buying a new one. I can just get a VGA to HDMI adapter for my work laptop if it's not a big deal.

When you order your ssd, make sure you order an adapter of 2,5" to 3,5" coz there's nowhere to attach that little fucker. I always forget this (about to drive to the local store as i write this).

Most modern cases (for several years) feature a place to screw the SSDs into. My current case has two spots on the back of the motherboard tray. The one we built for Shiny had one on the bottom of the case. But yea, you may need an adapter. Of course, they don't vibrate, since they have no moving parts. Just setting them on top of things works if you need to do that.

Regarding your monitor, there are a bunch of ports. VGA is the old one, as you know. Also fairly old known is DVI. Newer stuff is HDMI and the newest is DisplayPort. The biggest differences are... VGA is analog, the rest are digital. The rest support higher resolutions and higher refresh rates. If you want to go 4k, you need a newer HDMI or DisplayPort adapter. HDMI and DisplayPort also carry audio, where VGA and DVI are video only. My graphics card I just bough came with 1 DVI port, 1 HDMI port, and 2 or 3 DisplayPort ports.

Should you upgrade? No. Every one of those ports has adapters to make them compatible with VGA. If you're happy with your monitor, there's no need to upgrade. If and when you do decide to upgrade your monitor, though, you'll want to make sure it supports the newer cable types.

Thanks for the input!

So there isn't any quality lost when using an HDMI to VGA adapter? Or not much anyway. Yeah, I don't necessarily want to play shit in 4k yet.

No quality loss that you would notice. It wouldn't work well for higher refresh rates or higher resolutions, though. Since VGA is analog, it'll work for any resolution (presumably), but you'll start seeing a loss in signal clarity.

If/when you upgrade to a 1440p display running at 144hz, you'll want to use a digital connection. 1080p is pretty played out at this point. You may be surprised how much better higher resolutions and refresh rates really are.

So...WTF disclaimer

I was taking out the (new) PSU from my old pc so I can put it aside and put it in my new PC. Same for my HD. While I was at it, I figured I'd give it the old college try one more time - you never know. As you recall I couldn't even get a light to switch on or a fan to move before. It was dead.

So I strip it to the bare minimum...take out the optical drives, take out the HD, take out the graphics card. Just PSU, MOBO, CPU and RAM. I power it up and...it FUCKING WORKS. WTFfffff.

It gets better. I figure...well let's link up the HD again and see if that is causing the issues (somehow). Still works. Then I'm like, fuck it, put the GPU back in and link up my monitor.

It boots like a dream...says something like 'previous system message: CMOS battery failure' (as you recall I'd switched out the battery before but to no avail). Then it reboots automatically into Windows. Everything looks normal.

Seriously...what the shit. WHAT. THE. SHIT. It's now running in the other room and going fine. But how? Why? What! I guess there must have been a faulty connection somewhere...but how on earth would I have fixed that by taking out peripheral parts and reinstalling them?! I don't know man, I don't know. Maybe I am a wizard or something.

I still want to get a new PC...but obviously my plans are a lot less urgent now. Provided it doesn't suddenly die again next time I boot it up. Wanna bet it won't budge when I actually screw everything into place and close the case? D-:

Hahaha thanks Peltz

Screwed everything back together and it's working...kinda. It all seems to be back to normal, except one thing: the network capacity.

After an hour of updating BIOS, chipset drivers and network drivers it still won't work and gives me a generic "Device stopped working - error 10" message. It's beginning to look like the network capacity of the motherboard is fried (which would kinda make sense).

Looks like I may have to buy a dedicated network card, but they're cheap and I got plenty of spare PCIE slots. So for now I'm still laptop-only for internet, but I should be able to get the old pc back up to speed.

Picked up a simple pcie ethernet card for 5 euros, slotted it in, lan works again. So basically, everything works like it did before. Still don't know how, but hey. Not complaining.

Since I am now self-employed I can claim back vat on a new pc if I buy one though, so I'm still seriously considering buying one very soon.

lol, congratulations. Something along those lines happened to my last pc. It started blue screening and stuff a lot, with errors about USB. And if I plugged anything into certain USB ports, the machine would instantly power off like it had a short circuit. Seems one of the USB controllers on the motherboard died. Once I disabled that controller in the BIOS, the PC worked fine. With the exception that some of the USB ports on the back of the PC no longer worked, of course.

Anyway, component failure on the motherboard is usually a bad sign. No telling what's going to fail next. But you never know. It may keep running for years without further issue.

Yeah, I'm gonna buy a new system anyway. There's just a bit less urgency now.

So, I put in my order for a new pc. It's not nearly a Satis-level monster, but it should do the job just fine for some high-end gaming. Went for 16 GB ram, a GTX1060 GPU (6GB), a decent to good processor and a motherboard that has USB 3.1 ports (real USB 3.1). Went for a pretty average case but Coolermaster is a good brand in my experience. 500 GB SSD As primary HD too, with a 1 TB storage HD.

Thinking of buying a second monitor and/or a Steam link now to complement my new system.

CPU: Intel CORE i5 S1151 BOX 6400
Motherboard: MSI B150A Gaming Pro
RAM: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB DDR4 2400MHZ
Primary HD: Samsung 850 EVO 500GB (SSD)
Secondary HD: Toshiba 1TB DT01ACA 7200rpm 3.5'
GPU: Asus 6GB GTX1060 Turbo
Power Supply: NOX HUMMER 650W Modular M650
Case: Coolermaster Force 500

I ordered it assembled and they still have to order some parts, so it'll take a while before I get the system. But with my old PC back in the line of duty I can wait a little bit longer.