The New PC
As you might have gleaned from our Instagram page, I’ve recently built a new PC. It’s meant to serve as both a work and gaming station, and I’ve made sure that it’s somewhat future proof and upgradeable.
It’s running an i7 6700k, overclocked to stable 4.8 Ghz on an ASUS Z170 chipset motherboard, the Maximus VIII HERO and cooled by a Corsair H110i GT AIO water cooling solution. It’s got 16 GB of G.Skill Ripjaws V series RAM in two 8 GB modules, running at 2400 Mhz. For graphics, I’m running an ASUS Strix GeForce 980, currently on a modest overclock, but I plan on tinkering with it further when I have the time to do all the proper pre-overclocking benchmarks. EVGA SuperNova NEX 650W 80+ Gold PSU is in charge of the power delivery, while a 500 GB Samsung 850 EVO SSD is tasked with boot and installations. A couple of my old mechanical HDDs are inside for storage, at least until I replace them with either a RAID setup or a dedicated NAS, and an old trusty DVD reader/writer is there until a stronger Blu Ray unit replaces it. And all of that is enclosed in a beautiful, majestic, all-black Phanteks Enthoo Luxe full-tower case and lit with color-changeable LEDs.
I’m extremely happy with how this build turned out. We’ve had lots of fun with it, and taking it slow, it took a better part of a day to get it all done and set up. There were a few issues with the SSD that took a bit of time to resolve, but that withstanding, there were virtually no hiccups at all. Building in Enthoo Luxe was a joy, as the case is so spacious and provides tons of opportunities to suit your needs. Even though it’s a massive case, I still find it much easier to access than my old mid-tower, so tinkering “on the fly” is so much easier – a definite plus. And the amount of airflow it provides is simply amazing! And the best part about airflow in this case – dust filters everywhere! Yum!
So, what does any PC enthusiast and builder do after he got settled into his new setup? Plan the upgrades, of course! First on the list would probably be a Blu Ray drive to replace my old DVD. I’ve got a few BRs that I’d like to be able to watch in all their glory, plus it doesn’t hurt to be able to burn some seldom needed data on a BR an leave it in a drawer. Next, I would probably look to get a silent solution for my rear exhaust fan. The one that came with the case is doing great work moving air out, but I think it’s a tad too loud when there’s no music playing in the background, so a silent fan should help with that. Then, a second monitor would be a much needed upgrade. Probably another IPS, but bigger and better. As mentioned earlier, a RAID storage setup or even a NAS would also be high on the priority list, as probably the best solution to offload my collections and work files to and have the security of redundant copies, just in case. I was also thinking of perhaps getting another SSD to serve as a dedicated cache drive, but that’s something I’ll have to research the benefits of further first. After that, there are the dream upgrades – another 16 GB of RAM would be great, and not to mention another 980 for an SLI configuration. A guy can dream. If we’re going full wishful thinking, then a complete water cooling loop would be up there too. Maybe one day, who knows…
Streaming & Videos
So, we’ve got a new PC? And it can run anything with ease? Why not put it to good use then?
One of the main limitations from before was a comparatively weak PC that could barely handle video-rendering during the few tests we threw at it, let alone streaming or comfortable editing. With this recent change, all of those are moot, and we’re presented with new opportunities. Firstly, it speeds up much of the workflow from before, leaving us with even more time to do what we like to do. And – more importantly to this topic – it allows us to make videos and stream content with ease.
With the recent advent of Twitch Creative, it’s even easier for us to do everything in one place. So, we had a couple of ideas on what we could do for streaming, but settled on these as probably the most useful points:
- Gaming
- Leatherwork
- Miniature painting and modelling
- Drawing
At least, that’s where we currently see us being able to provide most useful content, be it the form of entertainment or education, or both.
That also means that most of the streamed material will be available later on through our YouTube channel, in either unedited or edited form. That remains to be seen, but currently, I think we should do it on a case-to-case basis, so for example, edit the tutorials for brevity and add captions and annotations where needed to allow for the material that is easiest to follow, while leaving entertainment videos as unedited as possible.
Plans
Ok, let’s break it down then. We play a variety of games, but our main games come from Blizzard. And while it would be fun to play various different games from Steam, with all kinds of genres and themes, I think it would be a detriment in the beginning, where focus is a much better option (if not safer even). Therefore, I will probably stream Blizzard games for the time being – mainly World of Warcraft, but also Diablo, Hearthstone, Starcraft, and Heroes of the Storm (and Overwatch when we get it!). That way, we would be able to have a focused, consistent theme, and later on, if the audience expresses interest, we could easily branch out to various other games that we play.
Digital drawing and painting streams will be easy to set up too, so those will be joining gaming shortly. While I have a lot more to learn and hone my skill in the digital medium, coming from the traditional background, I’m sure there’s stuff that I can teach others too, and at least provide some entertainment while on that road. So for those interested in the artistic side, you’re welcome to join in as we doodle, sketch, draw concept art, paint, and generally have fun.
Leatherwork and Miniature painting and modelling will take some work to set up before actual streaming can begin. First, I’ll need to get a decent camera that can capture detail well enough to be worthwhile. I’ve been eyeing a Logitech C-920 for that purpose, but if there are better solutions feel free to send me an email letting me know. I’ll also have to get a tripod for it, and lastly, a soft lightbox to augment my work light for video clarity. It will take a bit of time for all that to assemble, but once it’s done, I believe it will be quite worthwhile to tune in for those.
I would love to be able to have a streaming schedule, but at present that’s simply impossible with everything we have going on beside it. However, as soon as an opportunity arises we’ll set one up, so anyone who wants to watch a particular type of content will know when to tune in. But before that, the best way to get a heads-up on when and what the next stream will be, would be to follow me on Twitter. I’ll try to post an update on when and what I’ll start streaming as early as possible, so you can plan for it. Other than that, our Facebook page will contain some updates of that too, but for real-time info, Twitter is the place to go.
Well, there you have it. As we boldly march into 2016, we have new challenges before us and it’s going to be very fun to see how it’s all gonna turn out. We at WolfDrake are always looking for ways to broaden our horizons and this feels like a step in the right direction. And we hope you’ll join us for the ride!
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