Ultimate PC Configuration - Q4 2019

It's that time of year again and I want to share some of the latest in PC hardware tech which will most likely break the average person's bank account and make them burdened by debt, or at least be temporarily broke. However, I'm going to follow-up this post with something new though. Later on the post will be titled the Budget-PC Configuration Q4 and will focus on a budget without going over $1500 dollars.

Now onward to the goods. Here's an expert enthusiast hardware configuration for an Extreme Performance Gaming PC with some of the most current and best rated hardware components. Keep in mind that this kind of build is not necessarily affordable. It is a straight forward fantasy build meant to show off some of the most current and state-of-the-art PC components:

Computer case:

Corsair Obsidan 100D Premium with Commander Pro Lighting System

=   $ 700.00

Motherboard (MOBO):

ASUS Republic Of Gamers RAMPAGE VI EXTREME Omega w/ DDR4 4266, 7.1 Audio, Quad M.2

=  $ 1,060.00

Power supply (PSU):

EVGA SuperNOVA T2 Titanium Series 1600W Modular Power Supply

=   $ 710.00

Processor (CPU):

Intel Core i9-9980XE Extreme Unlocked Processor with 18 Cores / 36 Threads

=    $ 2,800.00

CPU Cooler:

ASUS Republic Of Gamers Ryujin 360 All In One Liquid CPU Cooler w/ OLED Color Screen=  $ 400.00 

Memory (RAM):

G.Skill Trident Z 128GB DDR4 3733MHz CL17 Dual Channel Kits (8 x 16GB)

=    $ 1,480.00

Video card (GPU):

Nvidia GeForce RTX TITAN 24GB PCI-E w/ HDMI, Triple DP, USB-C

=   $ 3,500.00

Storage 1 (SSD for Windows OS):

Western Digital Black SN750 NVMe SSD M.2 PCI-E x4, 2TB

=   $ 680.00

Storage 2 (HDD for non OS files):

Seagate 16TB IronWolf HDD, SATA III w/ 256MB Cache

= $700.00

Monitor Display:

ASUS ROG Swift PG65UQ 65-inch 4K UHD HDR Gaming Monitor w/ G-SYNC

=  $ 6,000.00

APPROXIMATE GRAND TOTAL = $ 18,030.00

Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) FAQ

Q) What is Wi-Fi 6?
A) The emerging IEEE Wi-Fi 6 standard is the latest step in a
journey of nonstop innovation. It builds on the strengths of
802.11ac while adding flexibility and scalability that lets new
and existing networks power next-generation applications.
IEEE Wi-Fi 6 couples the freedom and high speed of Gigabit
Ethernet wireless with the reliability and predictability we find in
licensed radio.


Q) What additional features can I expect from Wi-Fi 6?
A) Cisco, along with other vendors, has been working with the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) on
the Wi-Fi 6 standard. When ratified, Wi-Fi 6 will build on
the success of 802.11ac, delivering a better experience in
typical environments and more predictable performance for
advanced applications such as 4K or 8K video; high-density,
high-definition collaboration apps; all-wireless offices; and
the Internet of Things (IoT). Wi-Fi 6 will drive Wi-Fi toward the
future as the growth of wireless continues.


Q) How is Wi-Fi 6 different from 802.11ax?
A) The Wi-Fi Alliance has started a campaign to use the term “Wi-Fi
6” when referring to the IEEE 802.11ax standard, indicating the
sixth generation of Wi-Fi. The goal is to simplify the marketing
message to better position Wi-Fi relative to the Third Generation
Partnership Project (3GPP) standards used in cellular
(such as 5G).


Q) Will Wi-Fi 6 be backward compatible with 802.11a,
802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11n, and 802.11ac?
A) In Wi-Fi 6, all devices must also support all the mandatory
802.11a, b, g, n, and ac modes of operation. This ensures
that Wi-Fi 6 Access Points (APs) and clients are backward
compatible with legacy APs and clients.


Q) Will Wi-Fi 6 be allowed in all countries and
regulatory domains?
A) All countries and regulatory domains that allow 802.11n and
802.11ac will also allow Wi-Fi 6.


Q) When will Wi-Fi 6 be ratified (when will the standard
be finalized)?
A) The IEEE is currently scheduled to ratify the Wi-Fi 6 amendment in
the last quarter of 2019. The Wi-Fi Alliance has a similar timeline
for a Wi-Fi 6 certification. The latest official estimate for ratification
is always available at the 802 IEEE website in the “RevCom and
Standards Board Final or Continuous Process Approval” column.


Q) Are my current mobile/client devices that use Wi-Fi 6
supported? When will mobile devices support Wi-Fi 6?
A) There aren’t any mobile devices currently on the market that support
Wi-Fi 6. Cisco expects that there will be some clients starting in
early 2019. However, the market will not see large numbers of mobile
devices supporting Wi-Fi 6 until well into the second half of 2019 and
potentially even 2020. Keep in mind that you need an access point
that supports Wi-Fi 6 clients in order to realize the benefits of this
new standard.


References: Cisco Public (2019, April 30) Cisco Catalyst 9100 and Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax)
Customer FAQ

Some of my older posts on Wi-Fi:
http://phreshnewmedia.blogspot.com/2018/05/80211ax-wi-fi-is-coming.html
http://phreshnewmedia.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-top-5-mistakes-that-people-make.html
http://phreshnewmedia.blogspot.com/2016/10/walt-jimenez-wi-fi-surveyor.html
http://phreshnewmedia.blogspot.com/2015/11/extending-wi-fi-home-part1.html
http://phreshnewmedia.blogspot.com/2015/12/extending-wi-fi-home-part-2.html

Download Videos Free Off Of YouTube In 2019

This is my first post of 2019 and it is a good one. Anyone reading this may have already found a way to save their favorite videos and music off of YouTube but these ones I'm going to list will make it really easy for you in case you haven't.

There's quite a few sites, applications, and plugins that can be installed on your computer that will enable you to download videos and music from YouTube. I'm only going to list some of the websites that will do it for you so that it is completely free and the easiest method.

What all of these sites have in common is that you can just copy the URL from YouTube, then paste it into the search bar of these websites, and then it will give you options to save it in the format of your choosing.

1.) VidPaw (https://www.vidpaw.com)

2.) TubeNinja (https://www.tubeninja.net)

3.) SaveFrom (https://en.savefrom.net)

4.) YouTubNow (https://www.youtubnow.com)

5.) FetchTube (https://www.fetchtube.com)

6.) YouTubeMonkey (http://youtubemonkey.com)

That's it for now. Send me a private message if you have any questions comments or suggestions.

Tired Of Whiney Gamers and Looking For Real Reviews

I’m so sick and tired of whiney gamers that complain about everything about a new game they are playing. 99% of the time they are just overbearing and complain way too much about a game that they can’t even imagine programming or developing themselves. While I do believe it is important to have an honest personal opinion about things, I don’t think that people should preach criticism when they themselves can’t even create what they are talking about. That goes for certain hypocritical video game review sites and YouTubers as well. What they are saying is simply an opinion. It should not be taken as an authentic fact that applies globally.

When I look for a review of a video game, I try to look for the opinion of other game developers to see what his/her insightful point of view is. Often he/she will have a better opinion and will have a much broader viewpoint with constructional criticism.

If you are looking to online forums, YouTube or other sources of game reviews, where the gamers are the complainers, all you are going to get are whiney little babies that complain of what they didn’t get out of the game. Those types of gamers need to take a minute to focus on what he/she did get out of the game and why it was enjoyable.

If the problem is a serious glitch then, yes it should be brought to light so that the developers can patch it. If it is just ridiculous negative banter of why you couldn’t get this certain item, or how you wish this certain mechanic of the game was like another game, I just automatically tune-out of what this type of gamer is even saying because it just doesn’t matter to me. If you don’t like a game, don’t play it and shut-up! It’s that easy. If you are going to focus on the bad and none of the good, then your review and opinion is garbage to me. An impartial mind, can see both good and bad.

Often I just skip the bullshit and go straight to the review numbers so that I don’t have to sit through painful reviews that could potentially ruin a really good game. I go to www.gamerankings.com and just look up the name of the game and the average percentage it got. I have been using GameRankings for nearly 20 years ever since 1999 when it first launched and I find it way more accurate than other websites. Other review websites try to emulate the same thing but get ruined by negative gamers like www.metacritic.com . The word CRITIC is in the name for god’s sake. F#*% OFF!!

Ultimate PC Configuration - Q4 2018

Some time has gone by and I've only made one Blog post in the last six months. I've had alot of things going on. One thing is for sure though, and that's Moore's Law is going strong and there's new hardware to be discovered. I usually pick Intel Processor's but the new 2nd generation AMD Ryzen Threadripper blows Intel's i9 chip out of the water this year and is amazing and actually slightly cheaper.

Here's an expert enthusiast hardware configuration for an Extreme Performance Gaming PC with some of the most current and best rated hardware components. Keep in mind that this kind of build is not necessarily affordable. It is a fantasy build meant to show off some of the most current and state-of-the-art PC components:

Computer case:
Thermaltake View 91 Tempered Glass RGB w/ Amazon Alexa voice control.
=   $ 550.00

Motherboard (MOBO):
MSi MEG X399 Creation w/ DDR4 , 7.1 Audio, Triple M.2, Dual Gig LAN, Triple SLI
=  $ 670.00

Power supply (PSU):
ThermaltakeToughpower iRGB PLUS Platinum 1200W
=   $ 350.00

 Processor (CPU):
AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990WX 32-Core Processor Socket TR4
=    $ 2,500.00

CPU Cooler:
Cooler Master Wraith Ripper for Socket TR4
=  $ 170.00 

Memory (RAM):
G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 64GB DDR4 3200MHz Quad Channel Kit (4 x 16GB)
=    $ 1140.00

 Video card (GPU):
Gigabyte AORUS GeForce RTX 2080 Ti XTREME 11GB Overclocked 1770 MHz
=   $ 1750.00

 Storage 1 (SSD for Windows OS):
Samsung 970 PRO NVMe M.2 PCIe x4 SSD, 2TB Solid State Drive (3500 MB/s)
=   $ 880.00

Storage 2 (HDD for non OS files):
Seagate 14TB BarraCuda Pro HDD, SATA III w/ 256MB Cache
= $750.00

Monitor Display:
Acer Predator X27 27-inch 4K UHD HDR 144Hz G-Sync, IPS
=  $ 2,800.00

GRAND TOTAL APPROXIMATE COST = $ 11,560.00

That covers the core basic components needed to build a kick-ass PC Gaming rig. I don't cover the extra peripherals such as keyboards, mice, speakers, or headsets etc. There's such a diverse range of add-ons that it just comes down to your own preference. However with the base components, it is usually easier to determine what is the best and newest.
Ready for a throwback? Check out my previous blog articles on Ultimate PC Configurations.

Ultimate PC Configuration - Q1 2018

Ultimate PC Configuration - Spring 2017

Ultimate PC Configuration - Summer 2016 

Ultimate PC Configuration - Spring 2016

Ultimate PC Configuration - Fall 2015 

Ultimate PC Configuration - May 2015

Marvel Cinematic Universe Movie Chronology 2018

I'm a big fan of Marvel comics and all their super heroes and super villains. I have Spider-Man and Venom comics dating back from when I was just 10 years old and have been a fan of Marvel ever since. Remember the X-Men cartoons from the 90's?

Have you ever wondered what the order is for all of the different Marvel Hero movies and series are?

Following this paragraph is a list of the MCU movies that I've compiled into chronological order. Certain Marvel movies and series made by Fox studios are excluded from this list. The X-Men, Wolverine, Deadpool and Venom movies would be some examples. They are very important and iconic within the original Marvel Comics Universe but the movie equivalents of MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) are not quite as accurate to source material as fans would like. When it comes to converting them to the big screen, Hollywood movie company politics tend to influence and change writing to be different from the original source material and stories.

MCU Chronological Order:
    Iron Man (2008)
    Iron Man 2 (2010)
    The Incredible Hulk (2008)
    Thor (2011)
    Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
    Marvel's The Avengers (2012)
    Iron Man 3 (2013)
    Thor: The Dark World (2013)
    Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
    Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)
    Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
    Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 1 (2013)
    Daredevil Season 1 (2015)
    Avengers: Age of Ultron (2014)
    Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 2 (2014)
    Jessica Jones Season 1 (2015)
    Ant-Man (2015)
    Daredevil Season 2 (2016)
    Doctor Strange (2016)
    Luke Cage Season 1 (2016)
    Captain America: Civil War (2016)
    Black Panther (2018)
    Agent Carter Seasons 1 and 2 (2015-16)
    Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Seasons 3 and 4 (2015-16)
    Iron Fist Season 1 (2017)
    The Defenders Season 1 (2017)
    The Punisher Season 1 (2017)
    Jessica Jones Season 2 (2018)
    Luke Cage Season 2 (2018)
    Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 5 (2018)
    Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
    Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
    Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
    Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)
    Captain Marvel (2019, to be released)

802.11ax Wi-Fi is Coming

802.11AX is coming and is set to be the next big consumer wide Wi-Fi standard. Wireless 802.11AX is looking to bring some exciting improvements to your Wi-Fi experience starting with speed. If you look at the spec on paper you might notice that the maximum theoretical speed for the previous standard, Wireless AC Wave 2 is 866 megabits per second for a single stream and then only 1201 megabits per second for wireless AX so it's higher but not a nearly the six-fold increase like when we went from N to AC but that is actually okay.

The theoretical maximum speeds for Wi-Fi are notoriously inaccurate anyway and real world performance can vary widely depending on range, obstacles, other signals in the air and the quality of your access point and your device.

To address this, Wireless AX aims to improve efficiency in a number of ways to give you consistently higher real world speeds than what you get with AC. Perhaps the biggest change is a feature called OFDMA (Orthognoal Frequency Division Multiple Access). What it does is chop up each wireless channel into many smaller partial channels which allows up to 30 different gadgets to talk to the access point at once over a single channel.

           

Even though these sub channels are smaller than the main channel the access point gets more flexibility allowing it to allocate bandwidth to each device based on its data needs. This should increase performance overall. OFDMA also works in tandem with multi-user MIMO. Multi-user MIMO allows an access point to address multiple devices simultaneously instead of one at a time sequentially. While multi-user MIMO was introduced for consumers with last-gen wireless-AC, wireless AX improves on it. Not only by allowing 8 simultaneous streams instead of just 4 but also by enabling it for both uploads and downloads.

Uploading photos or streaming video from a crowded area like a trade show or a concert venue with Wireless AX support should get a fair bit easier. Another cool feature is the addition of BSS color. BSS color is an identifier that is attached to each data chunk or frame to indicate what wireless network it came from. Access points typically wait to transmit if there's already another frame flying through the air. With BSS color an AP can tell which frames are coming from other networks and ignore them as long as they're below threshold of weakness to prevent interference. This should help avoid unnecessary slowdowns.

If all these improvements aren't enough Wireless AX can utilize both 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands with tech companies currently trying to get even more spectrum in the 6 gigahertz range allocated to Wi-Fi.

For your battery powered devices it supports yet another new feature called target wake-up time that allows gadgets to negotiate how often and for how long they will need to transmit or receive data. This allows the Wi-Fi transponder to sleep when transmission isn't necessary which should help to preserve precious battery life once AX devices are available.

The first devices to have 802.11AX will be routers as usual with earlybird network vendors like Asus planning mid 2018 launches. Since the new standard is backwards compatible you could make the Wi-Fi upgrade early if you wanted to.

As for client devices the word on the street is that phones and laptops will probably start hitting the consumer market sometime in 2019.


References: Sebastion, L. & Martin, J. (2018, February 23) What is 802.11ax? , TechQuickie