heck my daily driver is a 3rd gen intel based dell optiplex with 16gb of ram and a Gigabyte rx580 8gb. It seems like it wouldn't be as enjoyable to play games on a modern system because you know it'll be decent. Using "old" systems and optimizing the experience is over half of the joy isn't it?
Oh my god yes, I already have all the pcs I need 😂 Although, most of them started out as fun projects. My gaming pc has a mining GPU with a custom driver. I have thin client running windows 10 (tiny 10 technically) A dell optiplex 740 with a different motherboard (no, the mounting holes didn't fit, I used zip ties and cardboard 💀) Also a few laptops and phones that are yet to find uses. My main laptop is mostly normal though and I don't dare to fuck around with my phone and tablet, they're to important to break.😂
I recently won a PC on ebay listed as for parts for £50 plus postage. Turns out the CPU power connector was unplugged, and other than that it works just fine. It has with an i7 4790k and Z97 board as well as an R9 290, all working fine. Couldn't believe the fix was that simple.
Ah yes good old Devils Canyon, the 4790K was the CPU I upgraded to after my 2600K, its a great CPU regardless of what people say about it, give it good cooling and itll handle pretty much anything you throw at it.
Sounds like my old PC. I still have i7 4790K on Z97 board with R9 290 (wanted to sell it but gave Graphic Card to brother and upgraded my rig with RX 590). I still have it but without case. Someday maybe I'll get case and get it running for older games.
I'm Canadian and have moved to Australia. I love the council cleanups. I've built my desktop right from the side of the road, it's great. I7 4790k, 32gb ram, gtx titan 12gb, 256gb nvme, 512gb sata ssd, 160gb hdd, 320gb hdd, 640gb hdd. Didn't pay a dollar, just found them at random times while going to work and back.
Yes, a video on Sandy Bridge/LGA 1155! Literally my favorite generation as of late. Almost every computer I’ve built for my family is some sort of Sandy Bridge Xeon or i5-2400/2500. Even my backup PC and laptop have sandybridge chips, an i7-2600k and i7-2820qm respectively. They’re still new enough to not be worth collector’s money yet, and are super usable. No matter what r/buildapc says.
And don't forget that back in ye olden Sandy Bridge days laptops also came with actual, pleasant to use keyboards that could handle more than a micron of dust :D
Ivy Bridge is also nice and uses the same motherboards but you get PCIe 3.0 instead of 2.0 that Sandy has. I still have a 2600k around too, that beast ran at 4.8Ghz for many years with no issues, might go dig it out later and see if the old girl can still kick it at 4.8.
@@trashpanda8437 And a better iGPU, which means that for a device without a dGPU(so a SFPC or laptop), the CPU doesn't ramp up when you click on youtube. That's pretty much why I had to mess with coreboot to get my Dad's T420 and T520( aka the sole devices that can survive his "enthusiastic" typing) so they could get a 3612QM in place of the 2520M
@@trashpanda8437And equally as importantly for laptops/SFF builds an HD4000 that means that the CPU doesn't ramp up like crazy just doing something like RU-vid playback. In fact, that's pretty much why I used CoreBoot to mod some T420/T520 ThinkPads so they could take an Ivy (a 3612QM to be precise), which made them quite viable as non-gaming devices that are literally more than a decade old.
I still use my first high end build 2600K / TITAN X 12gb / 32gb ram, and it runs every game I want in 1440p with high settings ( War Thunder, ETS2, WoT, Beam NG, Sims 4, NFS Heat )
You are doing it wrong if your 775 is crummy and boring. You can turn a cheap ($2) LGA771 Xeon 90° and overclock it by 50% for fun. My only problem is the stickers to do the pin mod cost $6 😂
It’s also a bit sad that that’s true, in a way, lol. We’re at a point where relatively old hardware is still “just fine” for most uses. Wasn’t true even 20 years ago. Advancement really has slowed a lot.
My 4th gen i7 notebook from 2014 is still completely capable of any task except gaming. I expect to get 10 more years out of it but I likely won't live that long.
I mean... I haven't bought a VGA cable in 20 years, and I'm pretty sure I only own one. On the other hand, I have a spare WiFi card, complete with antennas, in the PC I'm using now because I don't have an anti-static bag to keep it in. PC hoarding be like that sometimes.
I don't go any lower than Haswell these days. That being said, Sandy/Ivy bridge are still absolutely solid office PCs paired with a cheap 120GB SSD. my old work dev PC just had an i5-2320, 12GB RAM and a GTX 745 in it, and I wasn't ever longing for more powerful hardware
my linux dev box is an old 2600, and my old 2600 imac powers my klipper instances for my 3d printers (like a central hub instead of individual pi's) Still plenty of uses for the old girls
I just saw a 6c/12t 9th gen ES chip with 4.3ghz turbo for $38 new after coupons and tax on AliExpress (some kind of BGA1440 mutant chip). You can grab an 1151 Mobo these days for $20, or not much more, pretty easily (Loads of Lenovo Legion Y530 boards going for $24 for example). I also saw someone on local marketplace selling a box of i5 9400F for $30 ea. That's pretty cheap.
Oh what a marvelous beep beep beep. Identical to "beeps that mean BadThings in an aircraft cockpit" (master caution, engine failure, etc) and this is the first time I've ever heard anything outside a cockpit make that particular noise. Fascinating.
Idk why, but these 8~12 years old motherboards look cool af imo. And considering how well 2nd gen Intel processors still perform, I have no idea why people doubt I'm telling the truth when I talk about how usable my 4th gen Intel laptops are... I mean, I do have an idea, 4, 6 cores keeps being pushed as the minimal required for a pc nowadays, for some reason
I think it's more about people not knowing it's changed. In the 90s to the mid 00s computing moved very fast, and everyone kind of assumed that they still move fast, helped along a little by advertising.
@@henryokeeffe5835 which's fair when you consider older people, but most of the people that say that are at my age or younger. But yeah, I think advertising is mainly what causes that. And it's worsened by influencers telling people that games running at less than 60fps on ultra on a piece of hardware means it's shit... I mean, you can run games from the early 2000s on a 4th gen Intel iGPU and it'll probably get to 60+fps at ultra
My 4th gen i7 notebook can do literally anything I could possibly want, except gaming modern games. The built in Nvidia 860M is not up to it. I expect 10 more years out of that notebook with no issues but I probably won't live that long. That said, I have just retired my 2nd gen i5 2410 notebook. It has been struggling terribly with Windows 10 but never worked that well anyway even when new.
@@LatitudeSky my i7 4510U with a 840M is kind of at the same place, altho it seems it can run Mount&Blade 2, which alongside Street Fighter 6 is one of the few modern games I wanna play, all I need to do is get enough money to buy it now. All older games worked perfectly so far tho.
@@henryokeeffe5835 This is probably one of the big reasons everyone's pushing AI. The industry has been desperately trying to invent something that actually requires high-end hardware and isn't _transparently_ an excuse to waste energy for no gain like blockchain was, and they finally found it.
My main desktop PC is still 1155/Ivy Bridge. It's got a i7-3770, a lot of RAM, and a rather anachronistic Radeon Vega 64 Frontier Edition. It does most things I need or want of it exceedingly well still, though of course the Vega 64 is basically a 300 watt space heater under load.
Man i hate CPU naming. I read i7 and i thought it's something newer. 😂 Ok I bailed out of the hobby more than 10 years ago. Some interest is still there but I find my self often on comparison sites and benchmarks because I can't figure out the performance from names or even the stats.
I was trying to guess the generation that processor is from based on the heatsink sticker visible on the thumbnail and I was quite close. My guess was at best 3rd gen Ivybridge i3 or something (but turned out it was a Pentium from the same era), since starting around Haswell its all blue and not the 2 part blue and white of earlier gens. The SSD dangling on the cables is just hilarious since I've also done that before while cloning SSDs and it looks jank, but works fine since they ain't mechanical drives.
I gotta give you points for fighting with the pins on cpu. Bending the pins sounds like a giant pain in the ass. I would have said screw and just by another cheap like it on ebay rather than fight with angry hurt pins. But I admire your dedication to getting a proper test. I just imagine you staring at the cpu trying to bend the pins back together. Telling your cpu gonna give me those tests or die trying. You have good drive.
But "z" boards are not cheap. Not super expensive anymore (still too expensive for 12y old board) but if you don't have one it doesn't make any sense as you can get am4 board for same money.
Man I just love your everyday approach to everyday scenarios that are affordable for the normal human being it's nice to see you producing this stuff that is very satisfying without a big budget sponsor and all that stuff like it gets old and I am an actual tech and it's nice to see somebody else going through the things that I have wondered about and gone through. There's always a diamond in the rough it's just a matter of finding the right deal to invest in.
Ah, the HD 3000. I haven't had to deal with that thing since I was interested in Hackintoshes. Had a Dell laptop that worked *almost* out of the box with Snow Leopard, except that HD 3000 just couldn't be used for accelerated graphics. Was the bane of that entire project.
1050Ti can still pull its own weight, Pascal was an amazing architecture. I feel like my first 'real' 3D accelerator was a Voodoo 3 2000. (Of course you could count the Cyrix MediaGX and the first gen Athlon with SiS motherboard graphics, even though they didn't really do much it was a huge leap from a 386. Although I have attempted to play actual 3D games on a 286.)
Almost exactly my scenario. It was night and day swapping out the factory R7 360 2 GB (Dell OEM) for a GTX 1060 3 GB. Had a second power supply with a paper clip in it and all as the factory internal was only 240W. Much, much simpler times.
This very processor was powering my main gaming PC for YEARS. Paired through much of it's working life with a GTX 750TI. I still have the processor, motherboard, and the 750TI and I suddenly want to rebuild it and do something with it.
I miss using my Zotac GTX 760 2gb which served me very well for years. I still have that build with it's Haswell processor in the Fractal case I got just for it 9 years ago.
Picked up a i5-4750, H97M-Pro motherboard,8Gb ddr3,GTX750,500W PSU, Silverstone case and blue-ray drive for 3,500 JPY which is about 18.30UKP.. The case was fine just a few marks ..bought a cheap SSD and it's good to go
My back up system is running a Sandy Bridge E3-1245 Xeon with 16gb ram and a GTX 750ti with that exact CiT psu (which I think I may swap out for a Corsair VS450 after seeing this video), 100mhz shy of I7-2600 performance on base and boost for about half the price on average. Nippy little rig that does the job as far as basic use and light/older games.
@@blakecasimir the VS is one I've already got, I know it's not an ideal choice but should be sufficient for such low power components until I have the spare cash to get something better. Especially as it's in one of my back up rigs.
It feels odd to call HD 3000 "much maligned" given how competent it was for iGPUs at the time. AMD announced Llano but it was only a paper launch (plus the terrible CPU perf). HD 3000 was the first, uh, "gaming" GPU for the many, many people who bought Intel's Sandy Bridge i3/i5/i7 chips. And being able to struggle-settings Skyrim was icing on that cake.
I love seeing these types of computers just like older ones that still hold their own in a lot of tasks for such a cheap price. It's a nice refresher from videos on other computers that are like so new and flashy that are 10x more expensive.
I've recently thrown together a 2600k/GTX 970 system and I'm honestly shocked at how much it can run. BFV at 1080p medium 60fps most of the time. It's perfectly fine for a daily driver too. Yeah sure in a perfect world we'd all be running 4090's and all the rest but where would be the fun in that? Awesome content mate! Keep it coming!!
I have a 6th gen Pentium with a 2060, it plays all the games I need it to do like BeamNG and Vintage Story (WITH high settings). It’s also a killer with other stuff, like KiCAD, screen recording, and 4K RU-vid.
I bet a sixpack of beer that it runs better under Linux, nothing better than running an older system under something that doesn't have so many built-in system hogs. (No i am not giving up 😁)
CS2 seems to do some sort of shader compilation during the first minutes of gameplay. I get 100% usage on all cores and some stuttering for like 5 mins when I open the game, then the usage drops and it runs fine like you experienced there.
Transport Tycoon and its modern remake - OpenTTD - are one of the best computer games for me, still, in the year 2024. And it looks like this game is immortal. Chis Sawyer is a legend.
I upgraded a cheap PC I bought off Craigslist with a similar board. It had the same issue. Beeped when I upgraded the CPU from a Core i3 to an i5. Thought the CPU was bad, put the old one back in still beeped. Turned off the power supply pushed the power button and released all the power from the capacitors and let it sit a minute. Turned on the power supply then pressed the power button and it came back on, placed the i5 back in and it worked then. Seemed to be an issue with power in the capacitors being there still. Can try that next time.
Agree with the conclusion about Sandy Bridge's longevity - my brother ran an i7-2600k until last year and it was completely smooth doing anything outside of running the most CPU-intensive newest games. Technology has come such a long way that you can get a ton of value from these old mid-range parts
G2030 is ivy bridge and the iGPU is the HD graphics ivy bridge version (sometime called HD2500), not even the HD4000 from high end ivy bridge CPU. HD3000 is exclusive to high end sandy bridge CPU. The HD graphics of ivy bridge is slower than HD3000.
1155 was a real game changer of a platform. I build a lot of systems, and a pretty large percentage of them are 1155 based. I do a ton with E3 v1 and v2 xeon CPUs but also a lot with i5-34** CPUs. Even now, they're still very capable.
I decided to go haswell for my parent's PCs that they'll honestly probably use till the bitter end lol, but this vid makes me think I could have saved a bit on each by going sandy bridge instead! haha great vid man - the price to performance king
I'm still using an 1155 CPU fished out of a Dell Optiplex, but I was lucky enough to have a friend with a better mobo laying around too. This kind of thing is useful if you don't have the spare parts!
I'm watching this video on an i5-2400 using the built in video. It's perfectly fine for internet browsing and 1080p videos. It's one of those Dell optiplex types. Just great for my needs.
The problem I see is that almost anyone with the skill to replace the CPU, straighten pins, and other work to get the thing ready, they have some a lot of better options. I have straighten pins before on a Ryzen 2600 that I used to build a roommate a PC. A beginning PC person is not going to likely do this. Those who have the technical skills likely have already a better system and/or could make a much better upgrade for really only a few dollars more. Likely worth it to spend on a slightly better power supply and a GTX 960 or 970. They are currently still supported and receiving updates.
Hmm. My upgrade suggestions would be too increase the ram to 8x2. Why did you leave it at 4x1. An i7 3770. And if possible gtx 1650 low profile or rtx 3050 low profile. Upgrading the power supply too. I really want to see what *3rd gen* is capable in a modern scenario
While I've upgraded my main pc to a Ryzen 7900x, I still have my old desktop that I used till early 2020 which is a Sandy Bridge i5-2500k overclocked to 4.4ghz. It's still a nice computer today.
Nice. I recently picked up an i5-6600 optiplex myself that I’ve paired with 8gb of ram and a wx2100 for $40 total. I’ve missed building cheap computers
Great video. My only concern with these older CPUs is that as capable as they are, they no longer support the latest Windows operating system and Linux gaming has not come far enough yet.
my home server used an i7 2600 up until like a year ago, when the motherboard on the poor lenovo office pc crapped out. still havent replaced my home server, my ryzen 9 3900x main rig has been able to handle all my homeserver/ gaming needs at the same time.
My previous system had a 2400. It lasted until 2022 when sadly the motherboard died. It was still pretty capable for everyday use with 8 gb of RAM. For gaming not so much.
I have an i3-2120 system that I got for the cost of drilling a hole in the HDD for the previous owner, and a new PSU. It's not the best system in the world. It's not even the best system in the room, but you can't beat it for the price. I wouldn't hesitate to pick up another Sandy Bridge system for general computing, or gaming, if it had the right chip. There's nothing wrong with them.
A quick tip with crt monitors. You can often push the resolution and or refresh rate much higher with cru (custom resolution utility). Most crt's can likely do 1600 by 1000 at 60 or 75 hz.
Yes, you can also change the monitors config manually in windows or linux and technically overclock it. My guess is that since he’s in Europe, he’s stuck in PAL, which means a slower refresh rate by default.
@@benshannon9386 yes there is a massive rabbit hole when it comes down to learning about how all the timings work, but it can be alot of fun. I use my cheap dell at 1679 by 1100 75hz for desktop, and 1260 by 540 at 144hz upscaled to 1680 by 720 for gaming using vsr.
Just barely beat you out on price yesterday at $7 for the HP mini tower and a PS/2 keyboard...that the PC didn't have the ports for... Ended up being an i3-8100 with 1TB HDD and 16GB Optane module. Oh yeah. Negative was that it lived in the office of a bowling alley kitchen and smells like deep fryer while it's runnin...LOL!!
Hell man, get rid of theat death trap mistakenly named power supply. It may fry everything anytime. It probably causes more problems as voltages are surely off.
I get similar-ish systems (tough mostly prebuilds) for free every now and then, because they'd otherwise get scrapped. I grew up having to scrape together my money for a PC, just to get scammed over and over (eventually leading to me having to learn how to build/fix them myself) so I can't say no to such offers, even if it means having a lot of PCs standing around at times. I've never seen the illusive R7 450 for a low price, tough. As far as VGA, DVI and Power Cables go, I either have none or 30+, never anything in between.
My second system is a xeon E3 1270( i72600), 16GB ram and a 1650 ddr6, beside 3A gaming is still nice. If you have P/Z 67/77 mobo and want to squeeze some more power, can overlock non K non xeon (i5/i7) cpus +400mhz all core. For example my i5 2400 was running at 3.6 ghz all core( no blck oc) with only 1.165v. I think 1150/1155 or x99 are decent performers.
Long time ago I bought dell optiplex 390 sff with i3 2120 and gt 710 pci ex8 ddr3 variant. Swapped out gt710 woth used gt 1030 (20 pounds) and i5 2500k + wifi card. And it handles ok. Unfortunately steam doesn't work anymore on windows 8, it 8s dedicated win8.1 machine. P.s. don't judge me for using win8.1, there is a reason behind it.
Great video👍 Idea/suggestion: change the PSU, put an i7, 16 GB of RAM, and a more powerful Graphics card in it, and see how far it can go in terms of more modern games...
Great video showcasing the value of these Sandy and Ivy bridge chips, I use an Ivy bridge i5-3470 in my main PC still and it performs well for its age Also, the Discord server invite link is invalid
CiT power supplies are absolutely awful. There's a reason why you say it can't power a HD7870: these cheap and nasty PSUs have awful 12V rails - basically, the amount of power it can supply on the 12V rail is very limited. This is important because all of your beefy components, such as the CPU, GPU, hard drives, optical drives, case fans, etc, are all powered from the 12V rail, and they are the components you need to power. Most good PSUs can supply their label wattage, or very close to it (say, give or take 50W) on just the 12V rail(s) alone, and some premium PSUs can even exceed the label wattage - whereas the cheapy CiT PSU only manages to meet the label wattage by adding everything up (including the standby rails) and some dodgy rounding. In some cases the 12V rail can only supply half of the total rated power (!), overly compensated by the 3.3V and 5V rails (which are now less important). Hence, if it's a cheap PSU, and it says 500W, it might not actually be able to power a full system.
Heyyy i use the same Board, H61-S2PV with i5 3470 , 8GB DDR3 RAM (1666mhz oc), Sapphire R7 240 1GB Gddr5 (oc) i can still play majority of older games till 2015-2017 with ease ^_^
I'm not sure about dual core CPUs being adequate for web surfing and day-to-day tasks. Modern websites and video streaming are demanding. Maybe Nanna won't notice but anyone with a modern smartphone will notice the slowdown. Spending just a bit more on a 4 core CPU will improve the experience tenfold IMO. I tried upgrading my FM2+ motherboard but my A10-7800 APU is the cream of the crop. Threw in an Athlon X4 860 with minimal gains and went back to my old APU lol Love the videos mate
