Finally Bought a New Desktop

[goobee]

My PC can pretty much play any game at high settings. Just for the heck of it,
I took inventory of all the games I have, it's nuts. I have games spread across 6 companies - GamersGate, GOG, Steam, Origin, Epic and Blizzard. Some of them are pretty old, I've been buying them for years thinking I will play them.

In Steam, I have 41 games, most of which I have never played. All together, I have close to 100 games across my game accounts that I have not played. When I retire, this will keep me busy for a while.


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[lonewolfz28]

I'm still playing Unreal Tournament 2004.
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Socially distancing since 1970.

[goobee]

Unfortunately, unless your broadband situation gets better, on-line game sites are out of your reach. Games are dirt cheap to on these services, especially the ones that are a few years old. Many of my games are like $5 or less. GTA V was like $20 but that's because it's still popular.
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[lonewolfz28]

Yeah, my internet is so bad, it sometimes takes a few minutes for even the "free" Microsoft games to open since they have to "phone home" to open. I play Mahjong, Chess and Solitaire, but sometimes say to hell with it because it's taking so long to open.
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Socially distancing since 1970.

[goobee]

Check out GOG. Once you have downloaded your games, you can play them in off-line mode. Like Steam, GOG has a web connected program manager called "Galaxy" that wraps all your games together so that you can play them from one interface. Galaxy requires a live internet connection to work but you don't have to use Galaxy to run your games.

After you have downloaded and installed your games (which you'll probably have to do overnight), you can start them directly from their executable files and they will play just fine without needing an active web connection.

Unlike Steam which requires DRM to run, you own the games you buy and download onto your PC.

https://www.gog.com/
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[lonewolfz28]

I'm not paying for games. I already have UT2004. I only download games if they are free. I just don't play them enough to spend money on them.
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Socially distancing since 1970.

[goobee]

That's the beauty with GOG, they have free full games that you can download. Most of my game inventory with them were gotten for free. Their business model is to attract people in with free or cheap games and hope that you buy other games while you're on their site. For some games, they'll give you the base game for free and have expansion packs that you can buy. They also have game demos but I don't have any interest in those.

I've been accumulating games with the intention to play them when I have time.
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[lonewolfz28]

I finally found the free games. A lot of them are marked "demo". Still none that really interest me. Just not much of a gamer, I guess.
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Socially distancing since 1970.

[goobee]

Yeah, GOG's selection of free games isn't that big but they constantly add and remove games.

If you ever get stable broadband, Epic is the game service with lots and lots of free games. They are in a pissing match with Steam to gain market share and have been giving a lot of games away to attract people.

Unfortunately games you download requires DRM and Epic doesn't have a true off-line mode. There is a workaround though, you start the game with your DSL on, wait until the game is fully running and then you can disconnect your DSL. Apparently once the DRM is verified, you don't need a live connection anymore.

https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/browse?q=free&sortBy=relevancy&sortDir=DESC&count=40
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[goobee]

Here you go, free games for Prime members. There are some previous top titles here:

https://gaming.amazon.com/home?ascsubtag=06f0a6d0e6d011ec8996868ec6c9cf1a0INT&tag=slicinc-20
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[goobee]

Prime invited me to be a Vine member and I signed up. Now I get to test products and write reviews for them. In exchange, I get to keep the products.

They sent me one of these to try out. Might be useful for streaming to a bedroom tv and general browsing. i can't see doing very much more with it. Hopefully Microsoft will let me downgrade the license to Windows 10, I do not want Windows 11.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BGMZWW5B?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

I get to choose the items so it's almost like buying stuff without paying full price. I'll get a 1099 on the products but it's still cheaper than buying them full price.
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[lonewolfz28]

Yeah, streaming and maybe giving some little old lady a way to view emails and pictures of her family. There are cellphones in that price range that offer as much or more, except for being able to view it on a larger screen.

I've got a little over $1000 of water cooling gear in my Amazon cart right now. The Corsair all-in-one closed loop water block/pump/radiator that the builder used on my computer has a lot of hours on it and a so-so reputation for longevity. If I'm going to do it, I want to do it with quality parts that I can actually replace or service if needed. I also want to water cool the video card to eliminate those fans ramping up when playing simple games like Mahjong. All of the old pumps, tubing, water blocks, etc that I've still got are so outdated I might as well start from scratch. Then I'll keep a spare D5 pump on hand in case of failure.

Most of that price is a new video card, since nobody makes a water block for my weak assed video card that covers the GPU and RAM. I could go the generic water block and glue-on RAM heat sinks, but wouldn't fully trust it. I've gone that route before and nuked a video card doing it.
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Socially distancing since 1970.

[goobee]

If you can find a decently priced 3070TI, those have pretty good performance. My evga 3070TI fans don't speed up to the point where I hear them and my case is on top of the desk next to me. If you are planning to get a 4K monitor, they you may want to step up to a 3080TI because my 3070TI is barely adequate for my 2K monitor in some games.
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[lonewolfz28]

I'm going with a EVGA GTX 1080 Ti FTW3. That's the cheapest card I could find that has a full card water block specifically made for it. The PSU I'm going with has a 135mm fan that doesn't come up until 60% load, and even then is only 20db at 100% output. My case can fit a 3 fan radiator, and I've got a box of low db 120mm fans for it and an old rheostat bus to turn them down even further when conditions are cool enough. I think my MB comes with a fan control system that I haven't played around with yet. I might try tweaking them with that first and then use the rheobus if I can't figure out the software route.
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Socially distancing since 1970.

[goobee]

I had wanted that card too but last year it was available nowhere except ebay for insane prices. I still paid too much for the 3070TI but this upgrade is going to last me for a while.
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