My Eight year old PC "died", soooo....

[FJ5]

Windows had been struggling with an update on my PC for a long (the latest feature update never succeeds and it had now been complaining that it was going to keep trying at every opportunity as it was dangerously open to infection or whatever...). So, after again failing three times or so, it reboots... and hits "Press DEL or F2 to enter UEFI BIOS"... and... nothing.

Hm. So I switched my keyboard from the monitor/hub it's normally plugged into directly into an old USB 2 port on the motherboard to give it the best chance, pushed the off button, switched the PSU off, unplugged the network card and rebooted.

No better... In fact, after about 30 seconds (maybe more) it turned itself off. I tried again later in the day (having left it powered off). Same again.

Now... I've had a few suggestions I've yet to try:
- try a different keyboard (this one seems to work okay with this Chromebook and my work laptop, just not my PC)
- try plugging in a recovery drive
- try switching the CMOS battery

I'm tending more to giving up on the machine - it's had quite a lot of care and attention lately, so I'm starting to feel it's past its best. Which lead to this...

3XS Audio Workstation Pro - Sofa Sounds - £2038.86

• 1xLN110974DLR & Sofa Sounds Artist Workstation
• 1xLN1246423XS Fractal Design Define 7 Black Solid Mid Tower Chassis 3x 140mm Fans USB 3.1 Type-C E-ATX/ATX/mAT
• 1xLN120069ASUS AMD ProArt X570-Creator WiFi AMD X570 ATX Motherboard
• 1xLN111444AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16 Core AM4 CPU/Processor Retail
• 1xLN103875Corsair Vengeance LPX Black 64GB (2x32GB) 3600MHz DDR4 Dual Channel Memory Kit, AMD Ryzen Optimised
• 1xLN119800Samsung 980 PRO 1TB M.2 PCIe 4.0 Gen4 NVMe SSD/Solid State Drive
• 1xLN90662MSI NVIDIA GeForce GT 1030 2GB 2GHD4 Low Profile OC Graphics Card
• 2xLN127405be quiet! 140mm Silent Wings 4 PWM Fan
• 1xLN1154993XS be quiet! DARK ROCK PRO 4
• 1xLN1144313XS be quiet! STRAIGHT POWER 11 PLATINUM 650W
• 1xLN118270*3XS* Windows 11 Pro High End DPK MUP-00005

So I'm open to all opinions.

I have this set-up (almost). I didn’t opt for the exact sofa-sounds spec as I wanted a better graphics card & more M.2 storage. I also added a Thunderbolt card.

In summary, it’s a very powerful set-up, even the most demanding of projects haven’t come close to taxing the CPU.

Pete at 3XS is also incredibly helpful & knowledgeable.

[VitaminD]

I'm still somewhat leary about NVME and SSDs though so I'd like a conventional HDD as backup of song projects and the like though.

Why? There is so much less to go wrong with an SSD.

More generally, f**k that's a lot of money to spend on a computer just for music! I'd much rather spend a quarter as much, four times more often.

I find when they do go wrong, they tend to go very wrong very fast. Namely in the controller. Some of the newer designs seem to go read-only though when they're toast, so maybe the newer ones are improved on providing 'warnings' after writes are cooked and the drive is about to totally fail.

But I'm not up for a debate as it becomes tedious and time consuming as everyone has their preference, which is why I hesitated to respond. Like Mac vs PC. A lot of time can be spent debating something that in the end will not have a conclusion.

I still use SSDs, but I also back up to spinning platters (which are otherwise unpowered and safely stored away). I have many HDDs that are 20 or 30 years old that still power on and are functional. Maybe SSDs will take over my backup process in time, but that time isn't proven for me yet.

[BONES]

But when do they go wrong? I've had several HDD failures over the years but SSDs seem to me to be absolutely bulletproof. I'll take no moving parts every time.

[jamcat]

Some of the newer designs seem to go read-only though when they're toast, so maybe the newer ones are improved on providing 'warnings' after writes are cooked and the drive is about to totally fail.

Speaking of SSDs being cooked, it's been found that subjecting dead NAND cells to high heat (800° C) resets them back to a like-new state.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/flash ... 19491.html

[_leras]

I would add more disks. And go Asus with Intel - though that's more for guaranteed UAD card compatibility.

Unless you use a lot of samples 32Gb should be enough.

Looks like a great machine, shouldn't break a sweat.

[glokraw]

You might try a linux live dvd, burn the iso where you can,
boot using the early-boot menu, and see if anything comes alive.

A good modern one is AVLinux, iso download at

http://www.bandshed.net/

Good luck, and happy tune-carving, in any case!

[pljones]

It doesn't boot that far.

[Debutante]

... looking at a new build myself, the only thing I thought was overkill was the motherboard. A TUF gamer as suggested could work as well and shave ~100 off the price. I can buy two of those PCs here for that much money. Not even kidding. Those European prices are insane. i priced my 7950x build at just under CAD$1900 ...1,132.97 GBP. .insane!!

..and why "better" graphics? For music the build suggestion should be adequate...?

[soulata]

Pc years = dog years.

8 years is fine.

Nice new setup btw!