I passed with a 788, so nothing to brag about but i only studied seriously for about 3 weeks. I just finished up my Associates at college and am going for this cert to expand job opportunities. I have plenty of high level job experience in other fields (Construction and Aviation) but no IT work. So, I'm trying to beef up my resume and prove to any company willing to take me on they can trust me to figure shit out.
Pre-test Set up) I did the PearsonVue online. It was easy as hell, I purchased a test and a time slot which was super easy on their site, checked in 30 min before the test, used my phone to take pictures of my messyass bedroom and sent them in. You cannot have a watch, paper, pencil, phone, other monitors, anything on your desk or any posters or written text hanging on the walls or anything. they will monitor your voice and webcam, and I could not have my headset on or within arms reach and I did get yelled at for putting my hand over my mouth during the test. (I do the thing where I rest my elbow on my desk and put my hand on my jaw when i'm thinking or reading hard). As long as you're cooperative they're cool. about stuff like that.
1)I took a 2 month class over the summer which focused on CompTia's 501 book which was helpful. My teacher there gave me the best advice which was "Read the question". He'd say it constantly and in a serious voice and damn if he was right.
1.5)READ the QUESTION..... SPECIFICALLY WHAT THE LAST SENTENCE IS ASKING! IM PRETTY SURE I ONLY PASSED BECAUSE I DID THIS!
2)The questions will range from a quick sentence to about a paragraph at max. the pattern I noticed was that most were 3 to 4 sentences with about the first one to two being filler to a scenario, the second to last having a big clue to the answer (sometimes) and the final sentence being the Question asked. ALWAYS REREAD THE LAST SENTENCE AND UNDERSTAND WHAT IS BEING ASKED. I caught the test multiple time using the first three sentences to lead you in a direction you think it is going....then go somewhere completely different. so yea READ THE QUESTION!
3) the first 5 question are Performance based and *may* stress you out. I read about a lot of people who took too much time on these and didn't finish because of it. Skip them. You will have time at the end to go back and do them and they make it hard to exit the test without clicking a shitload of buttons with multiple warnings, so don't worry. I skipped them and went back and suddenly they seemed so much easier. Also 3 of my 5 were VERY similar to this sites:"https://passcomptia.com/comptia-security/"
4) Again with the questions on the test, Some situations have a list or order of "best to worst" I got a quite a few questions that were "this scenario happened" and in my head I automatically knew the best answer, but the question at the end was "Pick the best option below" and my answer was not there. So, ya gotta know the next best option. If there is a list, pro or con or order, know it forward and backwards. I'm sure this is where I lost most of my points.
5) I have experience with Linux, Programming and Networking. you're going to get questions with a wall of text from a scan or program and might have a "what is going on here". having just some basic knowledge of these subjects help me identify things like IF statements...which is a give away to a logic bomb, or port numbers which let me know someone is trying to use port 3389 to Remote in, stuff like that. I also saw posts where people complained about that. I'm not sure the solution to this but the GCGA premium test bank game me some exposure to this.
6)Know the Acronyms........you just have to. Yes there is alot and they are huge but when you can spell out the acronym in your head it helps eliminate answers. plus give you an idea of what the function is and what is going on.
7) I studied hard for about 2.5-3 weeks over the holidays using https://gcgapremiumpass.com/ for maybe 3-6 hours a day. I only bought the Test questions package for like 40$ i think and It was totally worth it. that site out of the 4 or 5 I found had the most accurate representation of the PBQ's and the actual test questions I got. I also Identified the areas i was the weakest in knowledge (Wifi security options and Cryptography) and went through the book I got from my summer class the day before on those chapters. Also expose yourself to a lot of questions and tests. get the same question from different angles and approaches and understand the concept behind what and why the answer is the way it is. they have a HUGE test bank but have to put certain information in there for the answer they're looking for to be correct, eventually you learn to identify these nit-bits of info and the patterns.
8) What I didn't see:
I expected more cloud questions, only got one.
Port numbers: not a huge deal but helped me figure out some questions quicker
Financial stuff: only one question on things like ALO and RTO
It was mostly focused on types of attacks and their identifiers, hashing knowledge, cryptography, network defense and a slew of scenario based stuff. This may not mean it won't be in your test though.
​
9) now off to get my CCNA! feel free to AMA if you're studying for this right now, the two links I posted were the *most useful* I think for the test but use whatever works for you and Good Luck!
Edit:
Maybe shoulda added this
​
The 2 days before the test I downloaded this pdf: https://www.comptia.jp/pdf/Security%2B%20SY0-501%20Exam%20Objectives.pdf
And went though one by one and physically wrote down with pencil into a notebook: the concept, for example 1.1 has Vishing, so i wrote
Vishing - phishing but over the phone, social engineering attack.
I did this faster than you'd expect since once you study for a while you can just look at most of the objectives and automatically know what it does or what it is about, but it let me know where I was knowledgeable and where I was not. It also helps you remember things like AES is an symmetric algorithm and comes in 128 192 or 256. which do some in handy
It also has a list of all the acronyms. This helped me containerize the massive amount of information into simple groups of concepts or purpose. Hope this helps and Good luck!

Basically, I spend too much time and money on this sub and now I have a bunch of hardware that needs a home. Do a favor for these homeless components, will ya? Bundles are prioritized and I'll knock off a few bucks in those cases, especially mobo+cpu combos. No smoking in this house so no weird smells on anything, everything's adult-owned and carefully handled. If you could spare an upvote to help combat the downvote bots that'd be much appreciated!
(As a side note, please just click the link in the hwsbot comment to pm me as chat sucks and scammers always use it. Please pm alongside a comment on this post, if your message makes it clear that you didn't even read the post I probably won't respond. I get so many "what's the price of blah" messages and such, just read please lol. And if the item you're interested in is not crossed out on my most recent post then it is still available. Don't pm me about if I still have a 9900k for sale from 3 months ago...)
imgur is being total trash for me so here's offbrand timestamps. all out of order and just awful >:(
2x Gigabyte 6800 Reference
Buddy of mine bought these off this sub for a project but it turns out that running 2 cards in one box is a bad idea for airflow. So these have ~2 days of use. Now I'm in charge of em lol. Primarily looking to trade one for a 3080 and recoup some of the costs of the other. Bonus points if you have a waterblock for the card or one of the waterblock-only cards. Not taking trades involving 3070s, 3090s, or 6900xts (already have a 3070 ftw3 coming in tomorrow, looking to trade that as well if you'd prefer!). Could maybe be tempted by a really really nice 6800xt but that'd probably be out of my budget anyways.
Trade for a 3080, or $830 plus shipping (really would prefer trade!) both sold for $1700 shipped
2x 1x 8700K
Was gonna use one for my own build but then I decided to go with 10th gen for no reason so here we are. Both are not delidded and were bought used here. One is in a 9900K box and the other is in its own box with matching batch number.
$210 shipped OBO both sold for $210 shipped each
2x Ryzen 3600
One was part of a bundle from buying stuff here, one was bought a while back and used in my own system for a few months with the X570-E. That chip runs great with a mild undervolt and can run 1733 FCLK. I should have clamshells for both to ship in.
$185 shipped OBO both sold for $180 shipped each
Asus Maximus XII Z490 Hero
Got this a week or two ago from here, but I'm not 100% sold on the looks. Has the box and all accessories. Primarily looking to trade it for a XII Apex, Formula, or Z490-E.
Trade for an Apex, Formula, or Z490-E, or $350 shipped OBO (really would prefer trade!)
Asus Strix Z490-F
Bought this off this sub for my buddy with the 6800 project, ran for the same ~2 days with a Celeron G5900 and 2400mhz ram. Probably the least stressed Z490 this side of the Mississippi... Has the box and all accessories are included and unopened. Would love to trade this for a XII Apex or Z490-E.
$215 shipped OBO
Asus Strix X570-E
Bought this off this sub a while back for use with the 3600. Had a brief stint with a 3900X at stock clocks, and 2x16gb B-die running 3600c14 @1.45v. Handled it all with ease, great board but the I ain't having anything to do with the Zen 3 price hike. Has the original box and accessories except for the manual which can be found online. Would love to trade this for a XII Apex or Z490-E.
$260 shipped OBO sold for $260 shipped
Gigabyte Z390 Gaming SLI
Got this in a bundle and it seems like a fine, no frills board. 10+2 VRM layout should handle a 9900K no problem. Has a few light scuff marks on the glossy trim sections, purely cosmetic and only noticeable in the right light. Comes with the box, a driver cd, and the manual, I/O shield is integrated. Can include an Aorus SLI bridge for +0 dollars and +420 frames in 3DMark.
$130 shipped OBO sold for $130 shipped
Asrock B450m Pro4
Fine little board that I bought off this sub a while back. Used it to test some parts like 3600s and ram kits. Has a few accessories and the I/O shield.
$60 shipped OBO sold with ballistix for $115 shipped
MSI Mech OC 5500 XT
Has been used for light compute work and gaming for a few months. In great condition, it's a nice little card that runs quiet and cool. Heatsink appears to be very similar to what's on the Mech 5700 XT, confusingly. Comes with the box and accessories.
$230 shipped OBO sold for $230 shipped
deshrouded 980ti
The card that got me back into PC hardware last year! Good news is that it's a Gigabyte Xtreme model, so the silicon is top notch. I had it overclocked to 1500mhz+ core, 8000mhz+ memory. Benchmarked just a few percent behind my 1070ti's. Bad news is that the fans and shroud RGB don't work so you'll need to zip tie some fans to it or something. I used some generic 1200rpm case fans and it ran under 70C in games, with a proper set of 120mms you could likely run it a lot cooler. I'll include the shroud in case I'm dumb and it works anyways, but no guarantees. I've repasted it with TG Kryonaut and the thermal pads are still the stock ones, they're still sticky. Card and questionable shroud only.
$170 shipped OBO sold for $200 shipped with 2x ML120s
Fans and Phanteks Halos
These have seen less than a few months of use, some are like new. The Phanteks fans appear to be 3x SK140 DRGB fans, non-PWM. Came with my P500A but I've replaced em after a few months. The Corsairs are 2x ML140, PWM and non-RGB or LED. Also, there are some Phanteks Halos, all DRGB versions. 1x 120mm plastic, 2x 140mm plastic, and 2x 120mm aluminum (The Lux version). Used the plastic ones in the P500A until I got some Luxes to replace em, the 120mms were the wrong size and have not been used. Buy 3 or more of any of these things or add them to another purchase and shipping is free.
CorsaiPhanteks fans: 15 each plus shipping
Plastic Halos: 10 each plus shipping
Halos Lux (aluminum frame): 20 plus shipping
18x Noctua A14 IPPC-2000 IP67 PWM
This pile of Noctua fans was bought off of here and have zero usage. I bought them from a guy who was planning some weird project and he had put a bunch of weird 24v connectors on em? I've had to learn a bit about common PC wiring things but now I can rewire all of these fans, which is what I replaced the P500A fans with. I'm using the original connectors and that nice Noctua sleeving from the original leads. Buy 3 or more or add them to another purchase and shipping is free. I've got a bunch of spare brown pads (Noctua SAVP1 size), free with another purchase or cover shipping for any number of em.
$20 each plus shipping
Crucial Ballistix 2x8GB 3200C16 E-die BL2K8G32C16U4B
Used these for a few hours to test some hardware, like new condition. Should overclock well; for a few bucks I can spend some time to bin em. Comes with the box.
$60 shipped OBO sold with b450 for $115 shipped
EVGA 650w G3 Gold PSU
Got this in a bundle, it's in great condition. Serial lookup says it's got another year or so of warranty to transfer. Comes in original box with all the original cables.
$120 shipped
CableMod custom sleeved cables in black, for Asus/Seasonic PSUs
These came with my ROG Thor PSU but I already had some. There's a few black cable combs, a 24 pin ATX, 2x 4+4 pin EPS, and 2x 6+2 pin PCIE. If you need some peripheral cables (non sleeved) or any other seasonic cables I can probably provide em. These cables will only fit "recent" Seasonic (made in the past few years, check via the Cablemod website if unsure?) and Asus PSUs (Seasonic is their OEM). If you use these with something else and catch your shit on fire, I told you so :P
Also, I'll toss in the Cablemod 20% off thingy in. No clue if it's still valid.
$65 shipped OBO
EKWB 10/13mm Duraclear
Been planning my first custom loop for a while and someone on here kindly sent me some of their spare soft tubing. But I've realized that I was working with the wrong tubing size. There's a bunch of short cut lengths and one piece that's like 8-10 feet long? Cover shipping or add this to another purchase and it's yours.
AORUS SLI Bridge (1-slot spacing)
It lights up and all that, woohoo! Pretty sure it's useless aside from that lol. It'd be great if I could find a proper home for this though. Cover shipping or add this to another purchase and it's yours.
Anker Soundcore Liberty Air true wireless earbuds
Decent Airpods copy, sound quality is good for cheap earbuds. Wasn't a good fit for my ears though, and they have less than an hour of use.
$35 shipped OBO
Below are some things I'm looking to purchase or to trade stuff from above for:
RTX 3080
Looking for a 3080 for my first custom loop! Bonus points for something with a waterblock. Would prefer to avoid Zotacs, Palits, PNYs, etc. but beggars can't be choosers lol
10600K/10700K
I've got a 10900K but 10 cores is overkill for my gaming needs. Looking to downgrade a bit, if you've got a binned chip with a good IMC and/or overclock I'm all ears!
Maximus XII Apex, Formula, Z490-E, maybe others
Big preference for Asus boards but I'm open to other midrange-highend boards. Onboard wifi is very nice but not a necessity. finally said fuck it and got a rampage lmao
4x8gb Trident Z Neo/RGB B-die
Looking to get two 2x8gb matching kits or 4x8gb of these. Prefer Neos a bit over the normal RGB ones for the a e s t h e t i c. 3200C14 is fine but fancier bins are welcome.
280mm radiator
99% of my loop is EKWB so an SE or CE 280 would be perfect but something like a HWLabs would be good too. If you have a HWLabs 420mm too, I'd buy that off ya with the 280 to match my rads.
Fanatec wheel and pedals
Looking to get one of their cheaper CSL or Clubsport wheelbases, a wheel for it, and a 3 pedal set with a load cell. Pretty new to sim racing so I'm inclined to stick to their ecosystem but if you have similar gear in the 200-500 dollar range I'm interested!
Any other hardware, guitar pedals/stuff, I dunno
If you'd like to trade something that I don't have listed here for something I'm selling, feel free to message me with what you've got. I can be easily enticed with random goodies, as may be clear from this post lmao
Questions and comments are welcome, thanks for looking!

I thought a lot about the best way to do this.... I don't want to be the only one editing the sheet because there's hundreds of suits in this game and that's just waaayyy too much work for little old me, so I'm going to cross my fingers and hope that this open-edit masterlist goes okay and doesn't just crash and burn.

Link to the sheet here

Please be careful about sorting alphabetically while someone else is editing the sheet! If you want to make a copy of the sheet so you can sort through things without worry then please click File → Make a copy. Any edits in your copy will not change my original sheet. You can sort things by clicking the triangle on the 'Suit or pack name' box. I've been sorting it from A→Z after adding every few suits and this way I don't have to worry about messing up links by incorrectly adding a row or something lol.
If you want to sort things by whether or not you can craft them/find them in the secret shop then click the same triangle in the 'Suit or pack name' box and then 'sort by color'. 'Fill color' will sort it based on color of the box and 'text color' will sort it by whether or not a thing is in the Secret Shop. This is obviously a work in progress, since we don't currently have a comprehensive list of what is in the Secret Shop, but I'm working on that over in this thread so hopefully we can get a good system up and running!
If you notice a link is broken/leads to the wrong thing please either fix it yourself or fill that link's box in red so that it can be fixed or replaced by someone else.
Hooh boy. Wow guys, it's been almost exactly a year and five months since I first posted a static image breakdown in this subreddit. Since then I've done breakdowns for 84 different suits and item packs??? Apparently???? 🙀
Anyone who's newer to the sub might not realize, but the image breakdowns that are so popular these days were basically nonexistent two years ago! This means that suits older than eighteen months just....don't have breakdowns. Or they might have a bit of breakdown and versatility checking in a YouTube video in the middle of event discussion, but for those of us with vision/auditory processing issues (or even just wifi slow enough that the video quality is bad) the video versions are far less helpful. So I'm asking for everyone's help filling in those gaps!
I've tried to make things in the sheet as easy to understand as possible. Since suits in the Secret Shop can also be available in the store/for crafting it can't be a normal box fill and instead is text color + an asterisk. I tried to make the back fill colors ones that are easily accessible on mobile and also colorblind friendly but I'm not colorblind myself so not sure how effective that actually is. If you have feedback/suggestions please tell me! This is a system that makes sense to me and fulfills what I would want from a sheet compiling breakdowns, but it very well might not be what you would want. I want this to be a good community resource for everyone and have absolutely zero clue what I'm doing so I will have no hard feelings whatsoever even if you tell me it absolutely sucks and that you want to reformat my header boxes. I, too, want to reformate my header boxes. I haven't created spreadsheets from scratch since my 7th grade computer lessons and that was....many, many years ago.
As I am posting this, I have pretty much only added in the breakdowns that I made myself or that I linked to in my own boards (so hell event suits, early tiers when I did the late tier, etc) If you made a breakdown yourself please check if it was linked properly! Each suit should have it's own spot and not each event. Anything that was in a mass list in one board (because it was a multi-suit event) can have the same link used for the multiple suit listings. I favored linking reddit threads over the imgur galleries where applicable because of description/discussion commentary in the posts. This took me....many hours. It will take many more hours past this to fill in all the gaps. Any help is appreciated! If all you want to do is fill in the names of the suits we don't have breakdowns for yet, please go for it! If you want to cross-reference which suits are available in the Secret Shop and make sure they've been marked on this list accordingly, please go for it! Just notice that one single suit you're curious about isn't there yet? Add the name and see what happens. I (personally) will be trying to fill in the gaps from suits already listed there first and then checking the wiki to add the last ones in later. This is an absolutely massive undertaking so any help/quality checking is extremely valuable.

Want to help make breakdowns but don't know where to start?

Here's my tips and tricks:

• Use a fairly neutral background with as little detail as possible. The green forest woodland path one is a good option if you're a new player, as is the empty beach one. Try to avoid backgrounds with animated snow/flower petals as well, since those pass in front of Nikki and blur things. Sometimes items appear different on pale/dark backgrounds due to transparency or shading so its a good idea to check items on both!
  
• Make use of the undo button! I saw a post a few months ago where someone didn't even realize there was an undo button. It is there. It is lovely. Click on a suit set to load all the items then click undo to go back to whatever you were wearing before. Extremely useful. Extremely easy.
  
• Use a darker skin tone! This really helps show the edges of items, transparent areas, and places where items were obviously created with only the default skin tone in mind. A lot of old hairs/some random new ones have a fade near the scalp that is colored in the default skin tone and makes it so they don't work on anything darker than Warm Ray without using accessories to cover the scalp up. Since some players prefer using dst whenever possible, it helps us make decisions about the suit's versatility. I usually set one of my outfit slots to be Hackers Secret + Bikini + Plague Physician hair so that I can quickly switch between that and the items I'm exploring.
  
• Show items in the free dressing screen with the menu open. A lot of players don't use Starry Corridor and only want items that their friends can see in their friends list and/or in their association members list. Feel free to take screenshots of the items in view mode as well, but the vast majority of regret I see is because people didn't realize an item would be off-screen!
  
• I personally prefer imgur, because lensflare doesn't work well for me on mobile, but if you're using imgur it is very important to set the album to private/hidden so that people don't comment weird stuff or downvote it. (downvoting doesn't actually do anything but it makes me feel bad so eh)
  

Just wanted to give everyone an update. After receiving my PC, I've had basically no problems. Although shipping times were awful, I had nothing but positive experiences utilizing both this subreddit and IBP discord. So huge shoutout to both support groups as it seemed to be the best way to get a response to questions. Below you will find some important thoughts as well as my full order details and build:
​

• I was on the preorder list for a 3080 for whatever was first available. The desktop was shipped with a GIGABYTE VISION GeForce RTX 3080
• They shipped the entire product with their specialized packaging inside the case and a duel box setup. PC came in Lian-li packaging and then packed into a larger box with foam.
• They were out of stock on my original motherboard and they gave me a free upgrade to the GIGABYTE Z490 AORUS ULTRA - WiFi 6. ($100 better MOBO)
• The BIOS for the MOBO was on Version 2 or 3. So I had to flash to the most up to date BIOS which was Version 7. If you don't know how to do this, don't worry, everything will work perfectly fine out of the box, but it's something you should consider doing as it just helps reduce errors and increase performance.
• The GIGABYTE Z490 AORUS ULTRA - WiFi 6 has a hard time recognizing RAM specifically for LED sync based on their horrible RGB Fusion 2.0. This will not affect performance and it is a common problem for RGB fusion. If you are all about RGB, then I would recommend a non Gigabyte MOBO. I prefer strong performance and overclocking and this is where Gigabyte MOBOs shine.
• There were a lot of drivers which were not running the latest version. This is expected due to imaging and you can expect to update drivers once you come in. I prefer using DriverFix to perform after Windows has done all of it's updates.
• The PC did not come with any extra parts such as a SATA cable for SSD expansion. Also, no additional screws included so if you do plan on doing any upgrading, you will need to get your own parts.
• Running a few different benchmarks, everything has performed flawlessly under load and scores remain in the top 60% based on other users with similar systems. These were all done with the stock clocks and were not over clocked.
• My shipping times were only a day because I live in California. If you don't live in Cali, expect longer shipping times.
• Just one general reminder. Customer service doesn't make the policy of overselling, so don't hold it against them. They are doing their best and they are almost caught up. So take it easy on them.

Order Details:
11/28/2020 01:27:33 AM -Order Submitted by Customer
11/28/2020 06:48:00 AM -The order has been received and will be reviewed/processed by a sales rep.
11/30/2020 03:10:52 PM -ATTN: There is a compatibility issue with your order. Please contact us at 888-462-3899 to resolve this issue.
12/03/2020 11:38:21 AM -Payment has been successfully received/approved.
01/18/2021 06:16:42 PM - Materials are now being gathered to complete the order.
01/20/2021 02:11:01 PM - The motherboard you selected has run out of stock. We will change your order to the GIGABYTE Z490 AORUS ULTRA - WiFi 6 at no extra cost to avoid any further delays. Please contact us at (888)462-3899 if you have any questions. We are sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.
01/20/2021 06:55:51 PM - The materials needed for the order have been gathered.
01/21/2021 01:51:13 PM - Assembly of the computer has been completed and has been sent to Software/Burn-in.
01/21/2021 10:54:22 PM - Final Quality Control check complete.
01/24/2021 02:59:11 PM - Software install/Burn-in has been completed, system sent to shipping.
01/25/2021 05:54:48 PM - The order has been packaged and is awaiting shipment.
01/26/2021 10:00:42 PM - Shipped:
01/26/2021 1:00 PMISH - Arrived at my home
Case: iBUYPOWER Lian Li LANCOOL II Mesh RGB Tempered Glass Gaming Case - Black
Processor: Intel® Core™ i9-10900K Processor (10x 3.70 GHz /20MB L3 Cache)
Motherboard: ASUS TUF GAMING Z490-PLUS (WI-FI) - WiFi 6, ARGB Header (1), USB 3.2 Ports (1 Type-C, 5 Type-A), M.2 Slot (2)
Memory: 16 GB [8 GB x2] DDR4-3200 Memory Module - ADATA XPG SPECTRIX D41 (RGB LED)
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 - 10GB GDDR6X (VR-Ready) - [PRE-ORDER ITEM]
Case Lighting: None
Power Supply: 800 Watt - High Power - 80 PLUS Gold
Processor Cooling: iBUYPOWER 240mm Addressable RGB Liquid Cooling System - Black - Free Upgrade to iBUYPOWER DEEPCOOL GAMERSTORM RGB 240mm CASTLE 240EX Liquid Cooler
Primary Hard Drive: 1TB GIGABYTE AORUS M.2 PCI-E 4.0 NVME Gen 4 SSD - Read: 5000 MB/s, Write: 4400 MB/s / Gen 3 - Read 3480 MB/s, Write 2100 MB/s

Update: IT'S BEEN FOUND! Check out Update #3 below for details

--
Hi,
Long story short, my kid lost our nintendo switch *somewhere* within wifi range of my router and we've now spent the last 9.5 days looking for it.
it's still connected to our modem as I write this. I can "arp-ping" it's IP address from my computer.
She was playing a bunch of animal crossing in the car last sunday, and sometime between her getting out of the van and an hour later when I went to grab the thing to buy some Turnips in AC, *poof* it was gone. I've turned my vehicle upside down, we've deep-cleaned everwhere she was, i've looked all over my bloody house, top to bottom, but no trace of it.
Except that it's apparently still alive.
So my obsrvation is simply: this thing should have been dead a long time ago right? It's not attached to any chargers or the dock, so it's presumably just.. sitting somewhere, collecting dust. But off dock for 9 days? It shouldn't still be active on my network, much less pingable. How long do these batteries last when not being used, but also undocked and clearly alive?

--- UPDATE 1: 01/12/2020 ---

Hi Everyone,
This post blew up in ways I wasn't expecting, and I thank everyone for their interest in suggestions for where to look. I'd like to supply an answer to some frequently suggested concepts:
​
The Vehicle
The moment I found out I could ping the device with arp-ping (seen here: https://imgur.com/SJVENPl) as the switch blocks the ping protocol, I jumped into my vehicle and drove it a couple blocks away, and continued to run arp-ping continuously while doing so. When I got home, i kept the arp-ping going for quite a while, just to be sure. The signal never went away, and never got any weaker. I was genuinely hoping it'd be in the vehicle, would have been such an easy win
My kid is hoarding / hiding it
I'm sure this is a pretty valid theory in most situations. But my kid is 7, and one of her favorite things to do is collaborate on our island. I've caught her having nightmares in the middle of the night about having lost it, and she feels genuinely awful about it. But as far as her memory serves her, she ran from the vehicle, kicked off her shoes, and ran to the living room. To get really specific it's because she had a tent setup earlier in the day that she wanted to "camp in" once we got home and was ultra excited about it, so she rushed. She has no idea where she could have placed it, sadly. We've been through the memory and retracing steps together execise several times over
My Neighbor has it
This one is a work in progress. My downstairs neighbor and I aren't on very good terms at all, to the point where we communicate with each other exclusively through our landlord. He's a 45yo divorced drunkard who makes his living selling weed, loves to get high and as such likes to project his anger in life and pick fights with my family and has an on and off again feeling towards my kids.Based on ALL of this, if my kid dropped the switch outside while b-lining to the front door and didn't hear it fall (landed on the grass?) I could beleive he would have seen it, snatched it up, and brought into his suite. At the same time, his kids come around every other week and I think there were there that sunday. So I could also beleive that one of his kids saw it, picked it up, and brought it inside. I've sent an email about it to our landlord, attached with photos of the device in my kids hands.But, there's a couple holes in the theory though that keep me from nailing this one down

1. He's somewhat tech savvy. If he had the switch in his possession, he'd know to switch the wifi to his own, or wipe the device with a factory reset and he jsut scored a several hundred dollar baby sitting device for basically free
2. If his kids had it, and let's say, hid it from their dad.. wouldn't they have taken it with them during the week when their mother picked them up?

Lost in the couch or shelves
I can't begin to overstate how much i've obsessed over checking every nook and cranny of our upholstry, furniture, shelving units, even the fireplace 😂 it's been quite the adventure, every day
Use the router as a "metal detector" of sorts with wifi signal strength
*sigh* man I wish.Unfortunately the router itself is one of those modern ones with the "friendly UI" that was supplied by my ISP. It's a Shaw BluCurve for anybody who's curious. This interface does nothing for displaying signal strength, nor does it provide much logging information. It just shows a histograph of network activity and that's it.See here: https://imgur.com/HQtzD4e for a snapshot of the interface I took a couple minutes ago as of Dec 2nd 2020 (this was lost on Nov 22nd 2020)I've gone through hoops to find apps both on my phone and laptop to detect wifi signals, but they all seem to require I track a mac address. And while I have that mac address, the Switch itself only periodically once in a while pops on, and secondarily the switch seems to block standard protocols, like ping, which I somewhat suspect these apps are using to detect signal strength; so the switch's mac address is never available to detect in these apps.Some luck would have it that I have had the switch connect to my phone's wireless hotspot before as an auto connectable SSID. So I have unplugged my router and turned on my hotspot, and I have had the switch connect to it, but it only stays connected for a few seconds at most, and goes away again just as quick as the device pops up in my connected devices list. And still yet, no apps will detect it's mac to track 🙄I've even used my laptop for this purpose too.I'm open to suggestions on how to improve this process though.

-- UPDATE 2: 04/12/2020 --

Well everyone.. looks like the device has finally bit it.
https://imgur.com/w1wFbL9 It's been well over 24h since it last reached out to the router, with my router reporting the last connection was 2/12/2020
The good news is, this means my neighbor doesnt have it. Because I know for a fact he possesses USB-C devices (his phone) and there's no reason he wouldn't have found itself on a charger if someone knew where it was around here. So this means it's definitely in my suite somewhere.
Sadly, that night (2/12) is when my family needed the wifi until late at night. I had hoped for just.. one more day. One more day of hope. But the Nintendo gods said no, and before i could set my laptop up as a hotspot with the same SSID/PW as the router, shut the router off, and use ARP tools while I walked around the house..
Seriously that's the thing that gets me, simply because I never use this feature, I completely forgot you could use a laptop as a hotspot. I'd been using my phone as a hotspot, because, well, "data", y'know? *sigh*

-- UPDATE 3: 07/12/2020 --

It has been found!

Boom, here it is, in all of it's dead battery glory: https://imgur.com/CoWjXi8

Where was it?!

Let's cut right to the chase with a TL;DR: It was found in this: https://imgur.com/kDz9FT2
How was it found? How. In the world. Did it wind up in there? and as a follow up: how did it go for so long without being found?
Well, I have your answers.

How was it found?

I carry my laptop backpack around with me everywhere I go, because naturally it has my laptop in it. I do a lot of chauffering my family around as I'm the only driver in the family, and as a software engineer who's "peace zone" is writing code (I know..) it's always by my side.
Today, as I was picking my oldest (the one who lost the switch) up from school, I was informed to park a little ways away so my oldest could get some walking in with her friend today. Happy to oblige I did so, and while my youngest slept in her car seat, whipped out the laptop and did some stuff.
When my oldest got to the van, and I went to put my laptop away, I noticed that I couldn't get the laptop into the bag far enough to zip up. But, I mean, for the past couple months I've been packing my laptop charger in the same slot out of convenience. So I reached down to the bottom of the slot to move the charger aside so the laptop could seat properly.
and that's when I felt something.. distinctly not my laptop charger, https://imgur.com/E6df4my

How in the world did it wind up in there?

I shoved the newly found switch into my inner coat pocket after picking my jaw up off the floor, and got out of the car and gave her a huge hug. Specifically so she'd feel something in my coat pocket that isn't normal. People of reddit, the look on her face when she felt the switch in my coat, ran the gammut of emotions from happiness, to relief, to mentally exhausted, to excited, to confused, and back to happy with a tear. My youngest, still in her car seat and missing the heck out of Mario (her favorite game) was losing her absolute mind with excitement, to the point of actually crying (three year olds and their emotions haha)
Part of my oldest's range of emotions was the fact when I told her I found it in my backpack in the laptop slot, her eyes lit up like everything was coming back to her.
"OH. OH YEAH. OH MY GOD THAT'S RIGHT." she exclaims.
That's when she takes me through what really happened that fateful evening.
Switch under her arm, she hears me ask her "remember to bring in the case" from the front door way, and see's me turn around and enter the house. She tells me that because she was "running out of hands", she noticed I had forgotten to bring in my backpack, and decided to unzip it and slide the switch into my laptop's slot, before rezipping my backpack back up, and then in her rush, only remembering to grab the case to bring it in, also forgetting the backpack, before bolting for the door and coming inside.
After she takes me through the whole thing, I ask her straight out: "Why would you put it in my backpack, and not the it's case that you we asked to bring in?", and she answers "You know, that's a great question and I wish I had an answer..."

How did it go for so long without being found?

The switch was lost on a sunday. It was either Tuesday or Wednesday that I noticed it was on the WiFi and tried the whole pinging thing, and that's when I tried taking the van a couple blocks away and walking home to see if the pinging reduced, figuring it was left in the van.
Thing is, while I had forgotten my backpack in the Van on Sunday evening, I had retrived it the following morning (Monday). I had asked my oldest to look through the Van that Sunday evening and she reported she couldn't find it.
When I brought my backpack inside from the Van, I inspected it of course, In case I somehow had a memory lapse and it was I that put the switch in there.. somehow, and I checked each of the pockets. However, as I have already mentioned, I'd been putting my laptop charger in the same slot as my laptop for a while now. It's a pretty deep pocket. But this means when I reached in and pulled out my charger, somehow, I managed to miss feeling or even seeing the switch sitting in the bottom this entire time. Of course I went through each of the other pockets, but here's the weird part: I've been taking my laptop and charger out and back into my backpack nearly every day for the past couple months. It -somehow- had simply evaded my grasp and sight this entire run, and of course at no point did my daughter remember that she had at any point slipped the switch into it at all.
But this is why when I drove the van away to test the ping, that the ping enver went away.
But this is also why the signal was weak, it was stuffed inside my backpack in a room onthe opposite side of the house. But the thing that really slays me the more I think about it, is that I had actually taken my laptop and charger out of my backpack SEVERAL TIMES in order to use it as a beacon to track the wifi signal, little did I know the switch was beside me the whole time.
In fact, the thing was always with me, all the time, every day.
Pictured: the normal view of my laptop's backpack slot open https://imgur.com/QJ1DSjJ
But now we have a happy ending. My youngest (3) is enjoying her favorite game https://imgur.com/UYIHtB4 and my oldest can't wait to meet up with Apple in Animal Crossing later when it's her turn.
​
Thank you everybody for your wonderful suggestions, for all of your help, care, and wishes for a hopeful finding. I hope for those who were curious and desired a follow up post are not disappointed with the outcome 🙏
​
Cheers everybody! 🍻
​
Now, time for me buy one of those bluetooth beepers or a 2nd controller or something lol I'm just really excited to have it back, and in perfectly working order!

PLEASE READ THIS FIRST (or right after is cool too):

If you ask for 1, 3, and 7 and someone before you asked for 2, 3, and 9 I'm going to let you know that 3 was spoken for but still give you priority on the other two.
COMMENT HERE FIRST CALLING DIBS ON EXACTLY WHAT YOU WANT OR WANT TO DISCUSS, THEN PM, DIRECT. DON'T JUST SAY "PM'ING" IN A COMENT, THEN NOBODY KNOWS IF YOU ACTUALLY GOT DIBS ON SOMETHING AND IT'S HELL TO KEEP TRACK OF. I THINK THIS HELPS WITH TRANSPARENCY. DIRECT PMs WILL BE IGNORED WITHOUT COMMENT FIRST.
Not really looking to trade unless you're trying to work a deal +/- cash to get me a Leupold Deltapoint Pro.
If I'm off on pricing please do let me know or just call me whatever you want like we're on WSB you filthy autist. I'm open to any reasonable offers or price comparisons with other things that have sold here. Full price offers take priority if you're trying to negotiate a lower price and they call dibs.
I accept PAYPAL F&F and VENMO, Paypal G&S is an option for 30+ flair, you pay 3%. NO NOTES ON ANY OF THOSE. NO NOTES. If you want G&S and are below the threshold but are active on other subs and seem like a decent dude/dudette we can chat but it's on a case by case basis.
Will ship out this Friday morning.

BEHOLD MY GARBAGE.

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE GOODS.

1. Magpul foliage CTR commercial spec - $40 with the friction lock it actually clamps down in mil spec nicely. New in box. SOLD
2. Magpul MOE stock, commercial spec - $28 each
3. Arisaka mlok inline scout light mount - $30 Sold
4. VG6 Epsilon 5.56 new in packaging - $60
5. VG6 Epsilon 9mm new in packaging - $65
6. 6.5 Grendel Satern stainless 18" mid-length barrel, flame blued and lacquered by a gunsmith buddy - $85 READ THIS: From the start is didn't really like 123gr ammo, loved my buddy Jeff's 110gr handloads though. Picture comparison below, sub MOA 3-shot group (one flyer due to me) with my buddies 110gr load but more like an orange with Hornady ELD black all off a rickety folding table at 100yds. ~130 all brass rounds down pipe. Maybe it needs more rounds down it, maybe it needs some steel run through it? Maybe it just really likes 110gr? I don't know. But my buddy gave me a 20" fluted barrel so I don't need this. SOLD
7. 5", 5/8 x 24tpi (30 cal) slim flash can, some wear as pictured on the slots from last owner tightening/removing - $20 Sold pending funds
8. Olight Baldr RL (brand new in box, unmounted, has factory batteries) - $80
9. 3X carbine buffer weights, purchased here with unknown provenance - $20 for all
10. 2X 1X Venom Defense Carbon Steel micro hybrid linear compensator (new in bag) - $40
11. CAMELBAK Maximum Gear 3L Thermobak DCU Desert Camo 100 Oz. Hydration Pack, replaced the bite valve because the stock one was annoying. No mold, great condition - $30
12. Leather Sling (stud version) with Elk stitched in, okay condition - $20?
13. Mixxar flashlight with tailcap, pressure switch, nylon case, 18650, car and wall charger, and AAA battery converter insert - $20? Idk, it's a good truck flashlight or something but I have a ton of lights. No visible wear. Amazon link here. Includes only what is pictured. SOLD
14. Hogue OD green Beretta 92-series (off my 92FS) with wrap around finger grooves - $25 SOLD

TYPICAL ADD-ONS:

CLICK HERE TO SEE ADD-ONS
A) Grip Screws (x76 52 sets) - Stainless with washer and star lock washer, 1" length and on request can include a 1/4" aluminum spacer for lowers that require 3/4" (Spikes, old Andersons, etc.) for $1 more. $2.00 without spacer.
B) Gas block roll pins (x120 70 pieces), 302 stainless steel passivated and 3/8" x 5/64". They're longer (more reliable) than typically included roll pins. I bought them because I got tired of the ones provided with every gas tube barely making it through even one side. These go all the way through with very mild extension (see here) - 5 for $1
C) 5X A2 grips and 1X Ruger grip off an MPR, 1X FDE grip accidently sent to me by Joe bob (will only work with mil-spec, no closed ear lowers) - Idk $5 each for the A2, $8 for the Ruger, $10 for the FDE?
D) 3/4" 3-slot picatinny riser - $8 SOLD
E) UTG FDE foregrip, 3-positions - $8
F) foregrip (no bolt) and dumb skinny (useless) 1/2 x 28tpi muzzle device - FREE, just ask
G) Offset no-brand iron sights, non-folding, thought they would suck but one has actually held zero on a beater rifle but I don't need two. - $10? SOLD
H) Clamshell heat guards off a S&W M&P Sport II - $8
I) Raine Rigger webbing belt with hook and loop tail management, 33" up to maybe 40"? - $6
J) Thick-ass belt I don't know what to call it, 34" and lower waist - $8

GOOFY ADD-ONS: GET READY BOYS, THE CARRNIVAL IS IN TOWN AND EVERY STUPID PRIZE IS ON THE BOARD FOR THIS GARAGE SALE

YES, YOU ARE WELL WITHIN YOUR RIGHTS TO MAKE FUN OF ME FOR HOW DUMB SOME OF THIS SHIT IS.
CLICK HERE TO SEE DUMB SHIT YOU DON'T WANT (EXCEPT THE WHISKEY CUBES, WHICH YOU DO WANT)
K) Stainless whiskey cubes set with "R" logo laser engraved (have 87 78 sets) - $3 for a set of two, as many sets as you want
L) Beats Studio Gen 1 headphones. Cups in good condition, overall B+ condition (see pictures) but sound great, I just never use them, come with case and cable. Currently running on two Harbor Freight AAA batteries so you know this shit is Gucci. - $35
M) Apple Airport Express A1392 2nd Generation Dualband WiFi Router Extender Airplay - $30 READ THIS: Used to use this for work when I would travel to get better wifi in hotels. Just set it up and it worked great with my Windows laptop but not with my brand new Android phone, I'm sure this is some settings issue with specific bands but I don't want to dig through to figure it out. Seems to work fine though.
N) Cheap Chinese Smart watch, actually plugged in and connected to my phone, was given it as a joke because I love my Garmin so much. Don't need it. Maybe your kid will like it or something - $8
O) Bolo tie with fake turquoise - $5
P) The Legend of Zelda Adventurer's Pouch - Nintendo 3DS/ Wii GameCube - Brown, comes with two stylus - $5
Q) "Just STOP Drugs" hat with a couple loose threads. Commemorate drugs winning the war on drugs - $5
R) Kindle model D00901, battery started swelling so I took it out before it buggered anything, you can get a new battery on eBay for $15, literally two screws in and out, nothing difficult- $10
S) MF'in BEANIE BABIES MOTHERFUCKER, clearing out some old stuff and found these from 20 years ago. Do you or your kids want to buy these to store in your safety deposit box as currency during the apocalypse? Have at 'em - $5 each, not separating the momma and baby blue jay you sick bastard. And YES, the dog has an American flag stitched into him. YES he is the 9/11 NYPD German Shepard as I've found, nothing classier than that. Buy him if you don't hate America.
T) stiletto auto-folder knife, UP TO YOU TO MAKE SURE IT'S LEGAL IN YOUR AREA BEFORE I SHIP, 13-year old you's wet dream. - $10 SOLD
U) idrips bluetooth speaker, I'm actually kind of surprised by the quality of this when I tested it just now, but I only run Altec Lansing, no clue how I got it - $9
V) Gun lock cable - FREE just ask

I'm wondering if there's a place that will purchase used computers and other tech/accessories. Additionally, if there's somewhere that you can take old and broken tech to get properly recycled and disposed of. Over the years I've accumulated various computers/electronics that have either completely died or have been aged out and left to collect dust in a closet cause I'm not sure what to do with them.
Alternatively, if any of you are interested in the following, please feel free to PM me for local purchase/pick up. I need these out of my apartment! Thanks in advance for looking and for any input in regards to tech recycle spots.
​
2011 Mac Desktop: https://imgur.com/a/V6PfNe7 Older machine but is great for someone who just needs *something* for school or office WFH. Been formatted for security purposes and so needs OS reinstalled. If you're not sure how to go about that, the computer can be taken to the Apple Store and they'll help you out at no cost. Just make a genius bar appointment. I did that with this same machine just after lockdown began last year. Used this Mac just fine up until I built myself a new PC in November which is why I don't need it anymore. Hoping for $275.
​
Samsung Galaxy Tab3: https://imgur.com/a/7TJOaTm I was bullied into taking this home by SPRINT years ago when I upgraded my cell phone. I never set it up for cellular service, used over wifi in airplane mode only. Barely used, like new. Has a small scratch on the back. Make me an offer.
​
Skytech Gaming Keyboard & Mouse: https://imgur.com/a/Zx3PLs0 Brand new in box. Never used. Rainbow backlight with breathing effects so you can be a real gamer girl. $35 for the set, firm.
​
Dell Latitude E6420 Laptop: https://imgur.com/a/BI4cjau Another older machine but is good for someone who just needs *something* and can't afford a brand new computer yet. Best for cloud-based working or for a young student. Has SD slot & a CD/DVD player. Freshly reset to factory settings, ready to use after setup. Aiming for $150.

Ordered on black Friday, specs are listed below. The build took exponentially longer than promised, as most have according to the other reddit posts I've seen. And on Dec 16 it reached packaged and waiting for shipment and then.... nothing. I reached out to the customer service line, put in help desk tickets, tried discord, and ended up here where after posting a few comments I finally got ahold of Brad and waited the couple of days for a response (not a hit on him, I know he is neck deep in all the flood of messages). Initially it was a 'wait and see how it goes' approach, shipping takes time, then as days turned to weeks and I still hadn't gotten any tracking information (which as of 12 Feb I still haven't) Brad was nice enough to go digging only to find the computer, for all intents and purposes, ceased to exist after USPS picked it up on 17 Dec 2020... which I wasn't made aware they had even picked up the computer in the first place. An RMA was issued and approved, and days started adding up again into weeks so I message again... what's going on, where is an update, what the hell is happening? Now we are waiting for parts....... again. So, please, anyone associated with IBP, please, give me any reason to keep waiting. Hell, give me a reason to recommend this company to anyone ever again. As it stands now I wouldn't recommend getting an IBP system to my worst enemies or my ex wife, may she rot in the hell of her own bad decisions.
Now, in my opinion, the missed guarantee, shit communication flow, stalling tactics, lost system, and circling all the way back to the "waiting for parts" stage of the entire shit-show that this experience has been rates getting the first available equal-to/better-than parts as they become available. Maybe a nice "thanks for waiting" card included in the box, hell I'd like to see my rewards points at some stage of all this... a little consideration... at all... would be nice.
Also give Brad a raise, that guy rocks at his job... just saying.
Case: be quiet! Dark Base PRO 900 Tempered Glass Gaming Case - Orange with Wireless Charging and LED Lighting
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-10700KF Processor (8x 3.80 GHz /16MB L3 Cache)
Motherboard: MSI MPG Z490 GAMING EDGE WiFi - WiFi 6, ARGB Header (2), USB 3.2 Ports (1 Type-C, 5 Type-A), M.2 Slot (2)
Memory: 32 GB [8 GB x4] DDR4-3000 Memory Module - Certified Major Brand Gaming Memory [Free Upgrade to 32GB DDR4-3200 XPG D41 RGB]
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 - 10GB GDDR6X - GIGABYTE GAMING OC (VR-Ready)
Power Supply: 1050 Watt - High Power 80 PLUS Gold, Fully Modular
Processor Cooling: Thermaltake ARGB Pacific C360 DDC Hard Tube Water Cooling Kit
Primary Hard Drive: 500GB WD Blue SN550 M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD -- Read: 2400MB/s; Write: 1750MB/s
Secondary Hard Drive: 4TB Toshiba Hard Drive -- 64MB Cache, 7200RPM, 6.0Gb/s - Single Drive
Sound Card: 3D Premium Surround Sound Onboard
Network Card: Onboard LAN Network (Gb or 10/100)
Operating System: Windows 10 Home - (64-bit)
Warranty: 3 Year Standard Warranty Service
Warranty: Three Year Standard Warranty
Rush Service: No Rush - Standard Service - Guaranteed Delivery Before Christmas
iBUYPOWER SafeGuard Packaging: iBUYPOWER Specialized Advanced Packaging System - Protect your investment during transportation!
Case Fans: 3x [ARGB] iBUYPOWER 120mm Addressable RGB Fan
Advanced Cabling Options: [Black] - Sleeved 24-pin Motherboard + 8-pin CPU + VGA Power Extension Cables (Include Professional Wiring)
Advanced Build Options - Thermal Paste: Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut Thermal Grease Paste - Top of the range thermal paste with excellent thermal conductivity

Hello my favorite gaming community,
I, as an enthusiastic member of PCMR but not so experienced part picker, am looking for a new upgrade of my old build. From this I want to take over exclusively my EVGA RTX 2070 Black. The rest is to be ordered new.
Here are a few points the new setup shall fulfill:
Budget 900€ max. (no gpu and case needed) if thats possible
+no case needed as I am going to reuse my 20inch rim "case" +microATX board!!! Full size won't fit +b550 socket +NVME M.2 (if possible 2 slots) + up to 32 gb ram (I want to use 16 gb for the beginning and be able to upgrade without problems) +Wifi would be nice to have but isn't a must-have. +Modular PSU +if necessary low profile cpu cooler (only 13cm height possible, dont know anything about heat problems with stock coolers) +RGB not necessary +only for gaming +1440p/ 4k able +I'd appreciate being able to play everything for the next 2 years without problems
So far I've been thinking about:
https://de.pcpartpicker.com/list/s2jrW3
I hope it is okay to post that link tho...
I'd appreciate you guys giving me some advice for better parts or even a complete build suggestion whats best for the budget. Neither am I that picky about AMD/Intel... I hope some of you can help me. Feel free to ask me for further information needed to help me.
Edit: Acc. to my list I'm NOT planning on getting 2 M.2s. I'm unsure if a 970 Evo Plus is necessary. I guess it is overkill.

Link to the AMA on /Starlink

Sign up at Starlink.com

Starlink Careers

/Starlink FAQ

• Q: Any updates about the space lasers? How much better can the latency be with them? How much better can transcontinental connections be with them? When will real world testing begin?

A: The speed of light is faster in vacuum than in fiber, so the space lasers have exciting potential for low latency links. They will also allow us to serve users where the satellites can't see a terrestrial gateway antenna - for example, over the ocean and in regions badly connected by fiber.
We did have an exciting flight test earlier this year with prototype space lasers on two Starlink satellites that managed to transmit gigabytes of data. But bringing down the cost of the space lasers and producing a lot of them fast is a really hard problem that the team is still working on.

• Q: Top on my list: Data caps. Yes? No? Hard limit or fuzzy limit?

A: At this time, the Starlink beta service does not have data caps.

• Follow-up Comment: The vagueness of this answer is worrying. I like how the SpaceX reply bellow has more upvotes than this

A: So we really don't want to implement restrictive data caps like people have encountered with satellite internet in the past. Right now we're still trying to figure a lot of stuff out--we might have to do something in the future to prevent abuse and just ensure that everyone else gets quality service.

• Q: I live in Canada and the winters can hit -45C, do I need to worry about the dish at those temps?

A: Wow that's cold! While we've performed life-leader testing down to these cold temperatures with no issues the dish is certified to operate from -30C to +40C.

• Q: Do you know what the target date for a fully open, non invite based, release is?

A: Steadily increasing network access over time to bring in as many people as possible. Notably we're planning to move from a limited beta to a wider beta in late January, should give more users an opportunity to participate.

• Q: How do you think the speeds we're currently seeing from beta users will hold up once Starlink goes public and a lot more people are subscribed?

A: This is not going to be like your regular satellite internet where it gets way too crowded--as we launch more satellites over time the network will get increasingly great, not increasingly worse.

• Q: Could you settle the debate over whether the dish has a heater?

A: The Starlink does have self-heating capabilities to deal with a variety of weather conditions. In fact, we'll be deploying a software update in a few weeks to upgrade our snow melting ability with continued improvements planned for the months ahead.

• Q: How are beta users chosen and what's a good bribe amount?

A: No bribes necessary, our goal is serve everyone eventually. If you really want to help drive that the best thing you can do is send great software engineers over to Starlink to help make it happen.

• Q: My question is regarding mobile use. I understand that currently the system is designed and optimized for use in a fixed location. However, I live on and work from my 47ft sailboat, currently tied, literally and figuratively, to a dock in South Florida. A mobile system that gives me reliable connectivity will truly set me free to roam the coastal US, Bahamas, and eventually beyond (once the inter-satellite laser link capability is ready). There's a lot of speculation as to whether the current hardware could handle a mobile platform using the phased array antenna and existing mechanical pointing capability, or whether more extensive active stabilization would be required. Anything you can share about this would be most welcome, including, especially, when mobile Starlink might be a reality.

A: Right now, we can only deliver service at the address you sign up with on starlink.com You might get lucky if you try to use Starlink in nearby locations, but service quality may be worse.
Mobility options - including moving your Starlink to different service addresses (or places that don't even have addresses!) - is coming once we are able to increase our coverage by launching more satellites & rolling out new software.

• Q: The dish seems to consume a 100w at this point which is pretty great for normal use however on most small to medium sailboats that's a lot of power to be using. Any plans to build out a more efficient system in the future?

A: We have a couple of items in progress to further reduce power consumption. We are working on software and network updates to allow your Starlink to go into a deeper power savings mode to drop power consumption while still remaining connected to the network. Power reductions are a key item we are focusing on for the future.

• Q: I'm super curious how the Starlink terminal locates the satellites. Presumably it has a built-in catalog of TLE's and/or state vectors or some other description of where the satellites are, which it can download from the Starlink network itself. But how does it make first contact? Does it use the phased array in a particularly low-directivity manner to just shout out "hey, can any satellites hear me? I need to know where you are!"? Does it come with satellite locations preloaded from the factory (seems unlikely, satellite elements go stale).

A: Good question! The Starlink actually has no knowledge of the satellites when it powers on; the constellation is updating all the time so this would be difficult to keep up to date. The Starlink is able to electronically scan the sky in a matter of milliseconds and lock into the satellite overhead, even though its travelling 17,500 mph overhead.
When it detects a satellite the Starlink hones in on its position and makes a request to join the internet. After that the dish is able to download a schedule of which satellites to talk to next and with that it can point right at the satellites when the time comes.

• Q: Once there are more satellites deployed, how important will it be to have an absolutely obstruction-free view of the sky?

A: You should think about communication between the Starlink dish and the satellite in space as a 'skinny beam' between dishy and the satellite. So, as the satellite passes quickly overhead, if there is a branch or pole between the dish and satellite you'll usually lose connection (not - obstructions generally cause outages and not reduced speeds!).
We're working on some software features that are going to make this much better and, long term, the clearance you'll need is going to shrink as the constellation grows. So this will get much better!
Also, hot short-term tip! The satellites clump up around 53 degrees latitude (north and south). So I would focus on keeping that part of the sky clear as we keep improving this!

• Q: What part of the project invited the most creativity from the starlink engineers?

A: Creating Starlink has come with tons of exciting challenges, but top few that come to mind:

1. Selecting full phased arrays for the satellite and dish. It was a major leap of faith to start down this very technically challenging path and hope that we could arrive at an affordable and scalable implementation.
2. Creating a truly "plug-and-play" experience for customers. We've spent a lot of effort and have gone thru tons and tons of creative ideas on how to make this as simple of an experience as possible - including mounting solutions, automated pointing of the dish, and general unboxing. Any and all ideas welcome!
3. We've also had to be creative in how we operate what is now the world's largest satellite constellation. We have a very small operations team, so automated orbit guidance and collision avoidance was a must have feature. We tell satellites what their final orbital slot is and they figure out how to get there. For collision avoidance, we upload data on close approaches to relevant satellites multiple times a day, and the satellites then calculate on their own when and how to dodge something, if necessary. (Shout out to the 18th Space Control Squadron for being really awesome partners here!)

We need help solving problems like these everyday on the Starlink program - check out https://www.spacex.com/careers/index.html if you'd like to join us!

• Q: Will starlink be supported in a situation where you can move it to where you need it? If I have a summer cabin that I visit, would it be okay to move it to the other location when we are there?

A: Mobility options - including moving your Starlink to different service addresses (or places that don't even have addresses!) - is coming once we are able to increase our coverage by launching more satellites & rolling out new hardware and software.

• Q: How are the efforts to bring down Dishy's production costs going? Can you tell us how much it costs to manufacturer?

A: It's going well but this is no doubt one of the hardest challenges we're tackling and there are always ways to improve.
If you want to help design the Starlink production line or product, check out some of our hot jobs below, or email the team directly at [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]) .
Production Design:
Automation & Controls Engineer
Sr. Automation & Controls Engineer
Test Automation Engineer
Manufacturing Development Engineer
Product Design:
Certification / Compliance
Antenna Engineer
Mechanical Engineer
RFIC Engineer
PCB Designer (Redmond) and PCB Designer (Hawthorne)
Software:
Starlink Software
Software Test

• Q: Do you have internal "human friendly" nicknames for the individual satellites? Who gets to name them? :)

A: Not yet. Any suggestions?

• Q: Is there a bug bounty program? Is one planned? Looking forward to getting my hands on the equipment to start research.

A: Yes this :)

https://bugcrowd.com/spacex
Source: https://twitter.com/scaleoutsavant/status/1329683147034828801

• Q: What wind speeds is the dish tolerant of? How much shelter from the wind does it need? Is this something that should be taken in before a storm, or could you mount it on the tail of a flatbed trailer flying down the interstate into a collapsing thunderstorm? How does the presence of occasional strong winds, (greater than 30mph/48kph), effect the projected service life of the UFO?

A: We definitely don't recommend that you mount it on your flatbed and fly down the interstate into a storm!
The dish is not designed for tropical storms, tornadoes, etc. For high wind events it’s always the safer option to bring the dish inside if you have any concerns .

• Q: what’s the most misunderstood part about starlink??

A: That we have it all figured out :) We are super excited about the initial response and future potential of Starlink but we still have a ton to learn. If you know any great people who can help us with that, please have them email their resume to [[email protected].](mailto:[email protected].)

• Q: IPV4, IPV6 both? Does it matter? I've not seen info about this yet from testers.

A: We're testing out IPv6 now, and will roll it out soon! Once it's ready, you'll get both an IPv4 and an IPv6 address.
IPv4 addresses are a limited resource – IPv6 is the future.

• Q: Do you have a target latency that you would like to hit in the future? What is the timeframe when this goal would be met?

A: We challenge ourselves every day to push Starlink to the fundamental limitations of physics. Current Starlink satellites operate at 550 km, where light travel time is 1.8 milliseconds to Earth. The roundtrip from your house to a gaming server and back is at best 4 times 1.8 milliseconds at these altitudes, or under 8 milliseconds.
There are many obstacles that get in the way of achieving these latencies. For examples,

1. When satellites are not directly overhead, your data must travel through the air for more time.
2. Small levels of packet buffering are helpful for a stable service, but hurt latency.
3. Starlink traffic travels through fiber on the ground. This is an indirect pathway that is 1.5 times slower than photons in vacuum.

We will continually fight to provide the best latency possible, especially to provide a stable and reactive experience for gamers. We need experts who are passionate about pushing the boundary of physics and breaking expectations about what is possible with the internet! Send your resumes to [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]) :)

Closing Comment:

Thanks for participating in our first Starlink AMA!
The response so far has been amazing! Huge thanks to everyone who's already part of the Beta – we really appreciate your patience and feedback as we test out the system.
Starlink is an extremely flexible system, and will get better over time as we make the software smarter. Latency, bandwidth, and reliability can all be improved significantly – come help us get there faster! Send your resume to [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]) or check out some hot jobs below.
We’re continuously improving all of the parts of the system. We update all of our satellites weekly, and push software updates to the Starlink dishes, WiFi routers, and phone app every couple weeks.
All the feedback so far as been invaluable and is being directly incorporated into engineering decisions across the organization. This has been really inspiring to us all. We're incredibly excited to continue on this journey together as we bring internet to disconnected populations across the world. And, then to Mars!
Production Design:
Automation & Controls Engineer
Sr. Automation & Controls Engineer
Test Automation Engineer
Manufacturing Development Engineer
Product Design:
Certification / Compliance
Antenna Engineer
Mechanical Engineer
RFIC Engineer
PCB Designer (Redmond) and PCB Designer (Hawthorne)
Software:
Software Engineer (Starlink)
Senior Software Engineer (Starlink Network)
Software Engineer (Starlink Automation & Infrastructure)
Software Test
Product Security Engineer

Bonus Comments by Elon Musk:

• Q: Any updates about the space lasers? How much better can the latency be with them? How much better can transcontinental connections be with them? When will real world testing begin?

A: Did you say space lasers? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ykL-iMtpV50
...
Closing Comment: If you want to build the Internet the way it should be, join Starlink

It's only day two but things seem to be working great. Glass is intact, all of the parts are functioning, held up well under a gaming load.
Some notes:

• Ordered Black Friday at night
  
• Shipped to east coast
  
• I received the amazon gift codes by email yesterday, the day my package arrived.
  
• My Galactic Bundle code still worked on Intel's website despite being "expired" and I was able to get Jedi Fallen Order as promised.
  
• I'll have to double check all my emails but I don't think I ever received my GeForce Now code. Something to keep in mind if this matters to you. I may send an email to them, but I didn't plan to really use it anyway so I'm not personally concerned about it. Doesn't make it okay to not send it, though.
  
• I opted to pickup the PC rather than have it delivered. The website wouldn't let me do this but once I figured out how to get through the hell that is FedEx's robo-operator to talk to a real person I got it sorted.
  
• PC was secured in a box, which was then in another box with foam on the top and bottom.
  
• There was a foam insert inside. I did not buy advanced packaging. I highlight this as I know it's a concern expressed by many people on here. Unless I got a free upgrade somehow the insert is standard (as it should be).
  
• Didn't boot initially. Clicked on, fans began to spin and lights came on, then abruptly stopped. Then clicked on again, etc. This just kept cycling til I cut the power. I reseated everything and double checked that every cable was snug, and the issue is gone. I'm not 100% sure which thing fixed it as I didn't bother to attempt boots after each action. Regardless, all reasonable things to happen with shipping anyway. Does kind of stink for someone who may not be as savvy and isn't comfortable opening the machine up, but shipping causing cables to come loose isn't an IBP thing. It's just a shipping reality.
  
• XMP appeared to be enabled at first blush, but then I noticed there were multiple profiles. Be sure to turn on the fastest one. Mine had a 3000 profile selected instead of a 3200 one.
  
• My "surprise me" RTX 3070 ended up being an MSI Ventus 2x OC. On the budget end of the 3070 range, but still a solid card and I wouldn't expect a high end partner card without specifically selecting one.
  
• The two fan Ventus can run warm, but not worryingly so. At least so far. Using afterburner to monitor temps and usage in-game it was fluctuating around 76-79 degrees. Again, warm but not dangerously so. I may look into undervolting as I've read good things about that with this model of card.
  
• Fans can get a bit loud, but it's fan noise. No whine that I can detect, and personally fan noise doesn't bother me. I sleep with a fan. Plus, I wear a headset when gaming anyway.
  
• Be sure to do windows updates and update your graphics driver. IBP does not ship with the latest updates on the machine (but then, almost no one does)
  

I post this because with all the doom and gloom on this sub it's easy to get caught in a stress loop and assume the worst about your order. I know I was anxious to get it and make sure nothing got messed up. Most people who are getting their machine and having it work properly though aren't posting. Keep in mind there's a lot of self-filtering going on here so you're only hearing the worst. I do sympathize with those having issues though.
Specs:
Case iBUYPOWER Element MR Mirror Finished Tempered Glass ARGB Gaming Case
Case Fans Default Case Fan
Processor Intel® Core™ i7-10700KF Processor (8x 3.80 GHz /16MB L3 Cache)
Processor Cooling iBUYPOWER DEEPCOOL GAMERSTORM RGB 240mm CASTLE 240EX Liquid Cooler
Memory 16 GB [8 GB x2] DDR4-3200 Memory Module - Certified Major Brand Gaming Memory [Free Upgrade to 16GB DDR4-3200 XPG D41 RGB]
Video Card NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 - 8GB GDDR6 (VR-Ready)
Game Bundle [Receive Game Bundle] - Get the Intel Q3 Galactic Gaming Bundle - w/ Purchase of Intel Core i7/i9 Processor
Game Bundle [Receive Membership] - Get 1 Year GeForce Now Membership - w/ Purchase of NVIDIA RTX 30 Series Graphic Cards
Motherboard ASUS TUF GAMING Z490-PLUS (WI-FI) - WiFi 6, ARGB Header (1), USB 3.2 Ports (1 Type-C, 5 Type-A), M.2 Slot (2)
Power Supply 700 Watt - High Power - 80 PLUS Gold
Advanced Cabling Options Standard Default Cables
Primary Hard Drive 1 TB WD Blue SN550 M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD -- Read: 2400MB/s; Write: 1750MB/s
Sound Card 3D Premium Surround Sound Onboard
Network Card Onboard LAN Network (Gb or 10/100)
Operating System Windows 10 Home - (64-bit)

What will you be doing with this PC? Be as specific as possible, and include specific games or programs you will be using.

Playing videogames at 1080p 60 FPS. Some example games are CoD Warzone, Battlefield modern titles, League of Legends...

What is your maximum budget before rebates/shipping/taxes?

550€ after taxes (sorry but in Spain we don't use prices before taxes).

When do you plan on building/buying the PC? Note: beyond a week or two from today means any build you receive will be out of date when you want to buy.

Next summer.

What, exactly, do you need included in the budget? (ToweOS/monitokeyboard/mouse/etc)

Only the computer, no peripherics needed.

Which country (and state/province) will you be purchasing the parts in? If you're in US, do you have access to a Microcenter location?

Spain.

If reusing any parts (including monitor(s)/keyboard/mouse/etc), what parts will you be reusing? Brands and models are appreciated.

A 250 GB, 2.5" SSD from an old laptop.

Will you be overclocking? If yes, are you interested in overclocking right away, or down the line? CPU and/or GPU?

No.

Are there any specific features or items you want/need in the build? (ex: SSD, large amount of storage or a RAID setup, CUDA or OpenCL support, etc)

An HDD of at least 500 GB. Network card, since I won't be able to use Ethernet and I will need Wifi. Also, I could add more RAM in a nearby future to get to 16 GB, so a free RAM slot would be nice.

Do you have any specific case preferences (Size like ITX/microATX/mid-towefull-tower, styles, colors, window or not, LED lighting, etc), or a particular color theme preference for the components?

The cheapest option possible. I'm not interested in aesthetics.

Do you need a copy of Windows included in the budget? If you do need one included, do you have a preference?

No.

Got some spare parts to sell, help me out eh? Bundles are prioritized and I'll knock off a few bucks in those cases. No smoking in this house so no weird smells on anything, everything's adult-owned and carefully handled. If you could spare an upvote to help combat the downvote bots that'd be much appreciated!
(As a side note, please just click the link in the hwsbot comment to pm me as chat sucks and scammers always use it. Please pm alongside a comment on this post, if your message makes it clear that you didn't even read the post I probably won't respond. I get so many "what's the price of blah" messages and such, just read please lol. And if the item you're interested in is not crossed out on my most recent post then it is still available. Don't pm me about if I still have a 9900k for sale from 3 months ago...)
Timestamp album
More pics of the 5600 XT
Asus ROG Strix 5600 XT TOP
Got this last month but just got some 6800s off of the sub so this must go. The UPC is missing from the box as I sent in for a rebate a few weeks ago. In like new condition and has only seen a few days of use for benchmarking against a 5500 XT and a 1070. Overclocks to the maximum allowed by AMD easily, if you're knowledgeable with the current BIOS flashes to circumvent that then this should have a ton of headroom with the 8+6 pin power. Comes in original packaging with all original accessories.
$320 shipped OBO sold for $320 shipped
Samsung 970 Pro 512GB
Used for a year or two, buddy of mine has inexplicably removed the top sticker. The metallic thermal sticker is still on the back, and the serial number is in the SMART data. 10.6TB read, 15.6TB written. Comes in original packaging.
$110 shipped OBO
BNIB Sennheiser Game One Black
Brand new, these don't ship with a factory seal but they have not been used. These are a more recent revision with EPOS branding on the headband. I've been using my own pair for almost 2 years now, the sound quality and microphone are incredible by gaming headset standards and it is very light.
$120 shipped OBO
Anker Soundcore Liberty Air true wireless earbuds
Decent Airpods copy, sound quality is good for cheap earbuds. Wasn't a good fit for my ears though, and they have less than an hour of use.
$40 shipped OBO
Below are some things I'm looking to purchase or to trade stuff from above for:
5950x or 5900x
Fine with BNIB or used.
8700K/8086K or 9900KS or 10600K/10700K/10900K
Considering an Intel chip for a gaming build, binned/delidded chips are welcome!
Midrange to high-end Z390/Z490/B550/X570 motherboard
Preference for Asus boards and I'd like 4 dimm slots and an ATX or EATX form factor but I'm open to other solid choices. Midrange lineups and above (Strix/Maximus/Crosshair, Ace/Unify/Carbon/Godlike, Aorus MasteXtreme, Taichi), wifi is very appreciated but not a dealbreaker. Hit me with some of those newegg bundle boards :D
Trident Z Neo/RGB B-die
Looking to get 2x8gb or 4x8gb of these, may consider a 2x16gb kit. Prefer Neos a bit over the normal RGB ones for the a e s t h e t i c. 3200C14 is fine but fancier bins are welcome.
2080ti or 3080
Looking for Asus cards to sync with my motherboard like the TUF and Strix, although if you have a good offer I'll consider similar cards (2080ti FTW3/Aorus/AMP/etc. or similar 3080s). Maybe even a 3070 or 6800XT, lemme know what you've got. Waterblocked cards welcome!
Fanatec wheel and pedals
Looking to get one of their cheaper CSL or Clubsport wheelbases, a wheel for it, and a 3 pedal set with a load cell. Pretty new to sim racing so I'm inclined to stick to their ecosystem but if you have similar gear in the 200-500 dollar range I'm interested!
Cheap DDR4
Need a bit of DDR4 for a super cheap B365 project. If it's cheap and fully functional, it's good enough. Speed, aesthetics, and heatspreaders aren't important for this one, even a single 4gb stick is enough but a bit more is nice!
Any other hardware, guitar pedals/stuff, I dunno
If you'd like to trade something that I don't have listed here for something I'm selling, feel free to message me with what you've got. I can be easily enticed with random goodies, for better or for worse lol
Questions and comments are welcome, thanks for looking!

I ordered and IbuyPower pc because I didn't want to wait for 3070 card to be back in stock. My brother did the config for me after asking him telling him I wanted something for 4k editing with lots of effects blender rendering and after effects, adobe photoshop/lightroom as well. He chose the 5600x cpu and I argued the 3800 or 3700 would be better and he disagreed. Anyways, should I cancel my order or keep it, sell the cpu and buy a better???
heres the specs
Case: iBUYPOWER Lian Li LANCOOL ONE Tempered Glass RGB Gaming Case
Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 5600X Processor (6x 3.7GHz/32MB L3 Cache)
Motherboard: MSI MPG X570 GAMING EDGE WIFI - WiFi, ARGB Header (2), USB 3.2 Ports (1 Type-C, 5 Type-A), M.2 Slot (2)
Memory: 32 GB [16 GB x2] DDR4-3200 Memory Module - G.SKILL Ripjaws V
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 - 8GB GDDR6 (VR-Ready)
Case Lighting: None
Power Supply: 700 Watt - High Power - 80 PLUS Gold
Processor Cooling: CORSAIR iCUE H100i RGB PRO XT 240mm Liquid Cooling System
Primary Hard Drive: 500GB SEAGATE FIRECUDA 520 M.2 PCI-E 4.0 NVME Gen 4 SSD - Gen4 Read: 5000 MB/s, Write: 4400 MB/s, Gen3 Read: 3450 MB/S, Write: 2500MB/s
Secondary Hard Drive: - [FREE] 2 TB SEAGATE HARD DRIVE 7200RPM - Today Only
Sound Card: 3D Premium Surround Sound Onboard
Network Card: Onboard LAN Network (Gb or 10/100)
Monitor: None
Operating System: Windows 10 Home w/ Windows Recovery USB - (64-bit)
Warranty: 3 Year Standard Warranty Service
Warranty: Three Year Standard Warranty
Rush Service: No Rush - Standard Service - Estimated Ship Out in 3-4 Weeks
Media Card Reader / Writer: None
iBUYPOWER Labs - Noise Reduction: None
iBUYPOWER Labs - Internal Expansion: None
USB Expansion Card: None
Case Engraving Service: None
Limited Time Offer: [$9] - iBUYPOWER MEK 3 RGB Mechanical Gaming Keyboard [Blue Switches] ($49 Value) - RGB Customizeable LED Backlight Keys
Case Fans: Default Case Fan
Video Capture Device: None
SLI Bridge: None
Advanced Cabling Options: Standard Default Cables
Advanced Build Options - Thermal Paste: Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Paste - Increase your cooling efficiency with upgraded thermal paste

Just thought i would come back and give some feedback on how my experience with the G2 has been.
​
Specs: Gigabyte RTX 2070 super, AMD Ryzen 3900x 12 cores, 128Gb ddr4 ram 3000mhz, 2x pcie4 nvme ssd, 1000watts platinum PSU, fractal case, 34' curved ultra wide monitor, and secondary 27' 1080p monitor.
​
Box opening: professionally packed in a stylish all black box, came with the simple 1-3 step instruction sheet on top. The protective bags were useful and i use them for storing the device and controllers now. has both a usb c to usb a adapter as well as a display port to micro display port one.
​
USB issues: didn't work in a powered USB hub (7-14 error), and did not work in any of my front panel slots (didn't even recognize it was connected) . It did work by plugging it into a regular blue colored usb 3.0 back slot. Had ordered a pcie usb card but didn't need to use it (haven't even installed it).
​
Software, drivers and windows: I had pre installed steamVR and wmr for steamvr on steam. Windows was updated to 1909, nvidia drivers were from this august i believe but not the most recent. All bios, usb controllers and mb chipset drivers up to date. I saw that the 20h2 update was available to me yesterday and installed it overnight, but any effects this may have on the headset will be discovered tonight :P
On plugging the hmd in it immediately recognized the hmd and launched wmr set up. That went fairly easy, the controllers came paired from the factory and only required pressing the windows button to activate them (no need to manual pair). Room boundary set up is a bit funky as you gotta hold the headset in your hand while pointing it at your designated center, but it does give you a really nice visual representation of the boundary you setting and it has given me no issues since doing so. It works well.
For games/apps: So far i've tried Alyx, Raw Data, CyubeVR
​
audio: i've never had over ear headphones before like these and i must say i absolutely love them. I do normally wear a boss headset for my gaming, and even thou its super comfy after several hours of gaming my ears are on fire. Reminds me of my boxing days and getting cabbage ears. With these there is no pressure on your ears and its soo nice. The sound quality itself seems fine, maybe a little more bass would have been nice but i have no complaints. i've not changed any audio settings so its all in default. both speakers appear to be working fine, there is no wiggle in any of them, and no sound issues.
​
lenses: Clarity is absolutely amazing, i do find that it gets a little blurry right in the center where the two lenses meet. IPD is at around 64mm. I can see the edges all around the screen giving that goggles feeling (did order some face pads to see if i can do a fov mod and decrease that distance to the lenses as i think that will help with that) but i quickly got used to it and it doesn't particularly bother me anymore. Because the clarity is soooo good, i do find that positioning plays a really big roll. Even a small change in how your headset is sitting will affect the image significantly, also because the cable is quite stiff it will often nudge the headset as i move causing it to slip ever so slightly. End result is that as i play sometimes the image will start getting blurry, repositioning the headset will fix it. I'm not sure if this is pupil swim or not, but sometimes my eyes also lose focus and i have to take a little pause and blink a few times to refocus them, this especially happens after looking to the sides of the image and returning to center.
Where clarity and blurriness is most obvious is with text. Its also where you can see the effects of the headset positioning. Looking at the tutorial window for cyube (its a textured text window) i played around with moving my headset and ipd to try to find my ideal setting and it helped me quite a bit to figure out its quirks. Positioned right the majority of the text up to the edges was super clear and i could read it without moving my head, but even a slight nudge on the hmd and only the inner 25% would stay clear and the rest became blurry and hard to read as the contrast between sharp and blurry is super disorienting, throwing you off.
​
Controllers: this is my first VR headset, although i did experience VR before in a VR cafe that exists close to my work. The controllers feel fine to me honestly, i'm not much into haptics and they do feel a bit wimpy but it serves the purpose of getting my attention. The noise from the rumble doesn't particularly bother me but its there and i see what people are referring to.
Tracking: I actually spent some time testing this in CyubeVR yesterday. I am not sure if its my system, or how i stand/look (i do tend to always slightly look downwards and have poor posture) but tracking is working really good for me. Even with the hands by my sides and slight behind my hips, tracking is perfect. Raising my arms up over my head still maintains tracking. Grabbing a weapon from my back holster in Raw data works fine, same as pulling an arrow from my quiver in cyube. No issues.
It does get a little peculiar when using the bow and trying to aim down sight while pulling back the string as the controllers ring is quite large and will prevent you from getting your eyeline down that arrow. But a little adapting in how i held the bow helped with that.
In Raw data, aiming the pistol with one hand i can bring it almost close to my face before it freaks a bit (it only starts freaking when you literally touching your hmd with the controller), and does get a little shaky at times but that is probably just my old shaky hands.
​
Bindings: Raw data required me to import custom bindings from the workshop. Alyx worked straight out of the box (and man oh man .. its gorgeous), Cyube worked right out of the box as well and it even recognized and tailored the tutorial to the hp reverb g2 controllers (really great dev behind this game).
​
Performance: WMR environment, and all steamVR games worked 100% fine with no issues out of the box. This was with the default resolution setting in steamVR of 2700x2300 or something. I've since changed it to the 2160x2160 natural res of the reverb (or as close as steamVR would allow me to). Raw data was played in the original default settings, Alyx and Cyube with the native res. Graphic settings set to high. They all worked great, buttery smooth, with no performance issues and they all looked absolutely stunning (especially alyx.. omg).
SteamVR home environment only worked once without issues, but every other time it would just be a laggy, jaggy, buggy mess. It started on setup which was a pain to get through, once that was done and i closed the settings screen it worked fine, but on launching a game and returning to steamvr home it was back to being unresponsive. I disabled the home environment so i only get a grid with my titles and that works perfectly fine (except for some reason after leaving a game it doesn't automatically take me back to steamvr, have to go to wmr home and then relaunch steamvr). I also did do the registry entry change yesterday to prevent wmr from creating the extra virtual displays, and i believe this should actually fix that issue with the steamvr home but i won't know until i give it a try tonight.
Haven't launched any revive games yet, but the installation worked fine and the games do show up within my steamvr list.
game impressions:
Alyx - i spent 5 mns drooling over the floor in the main menu. I don't think words can describe how real it looks and feels. In all i played about 1 hour and 30mns, taking me to the point where we are at a childrens playground about to meet the person who rescued you (don't want to give too many spoilers but its basically still the intro of the game).. i actually caught myself cooing and talking to the little creature in the jar when i came across it because that damn thing felt so real. At one point when you are talking to a friend across a barred gate, i felt it was the first time in a video game where the npc literally felt real, like i could almost feel her body an inch for me.. it was also the first time that i considered that there might be something to VR porn after all lmao. Performance wise the game run smooth as a cucumber on high settings. I used controller oriented smooth locomotion despite being brand new to vr and was able to tolerate that amount of time before starting to become a little queasy and needing a break. Controllers worked perfectly from the start with no need for any customization.
​
Raw data - was the first game i tried on the g2, and was still on the higher resolution within steam. Still performance was smooth (and has me considering bumping the resolution back to that now since it was working anyways). Tracking worked perfectly, including reloading guns, as well as pulling weapons from back, shoulder and hip. Of note is that when you initially start the game, you start in a dark room with only a lighted area in the center. The blackness was perfect for me as i literally couldn't see a thing in the room until the lights come out and i was surprised at all the stuff that was in it. I don't think i would have a good time playing a horror game in the g2.. or at least i i would definitely need some extra pants around. Required me to download custom bindings to get the controllers to work.
​
cyubeVR - minecraft like game that is being built from the ground up for VR. This means that the interactions are really well done and specifically tailored to that environment. For example you make an axe by stacking the blocks in 3d with your hands. Or strike fire in a forge by piling some wood in it and striking flint with your hands. Its pretty neat. Graphically its quite gorgeous. It ran buttery smooth with all settings at max, some gorgeous lighting and volumetric effects. Controllers worked perfectly without adjustment and the game auto recognizes it and shows you the bindings on screen.
​
Feel free to ask any questions.
​
Edit: forgot to list my motherboard which is a Asus Crosshair Hero VIII WIFI pro.
also forgot - Room setting:
The lighting in my game room is a single energy efficient led bulb which was on during the gaming session. There is one window in the room that was partially covered with opaque blue curtains. The walls are a light off white, there is a single painting in one wall in tones of blue. There is furniture all along the room (2 computer tables, 1 tv table, 1 small side table with a lamp, 2 small free standing bookshelves and 1 small blue and grey lounge couch). There are leds strips all along bottom and top rim of the wall set to blue but they were not on during the gaming session. The 2 monitors were both facing towards the HMD but did not seem to interfere with tracking. I have 1 ps2 camera for TrackIR purposes (using delanclip), which was on but did not interfere with tracking (tracking via open track was was off - red light wasn't on in camera). The floor is a white fluffly amazon carpet over hardwood

Got some spare parts to sell, help me out eh? Bundles are prioritized and I'll knock off a few bucks in those cases. No smoking in this house so no weird smells on anything, everything's adult-owned and carefully handled. If you could spare an upvote to help combat the downvote bots that'd be much appreciated!
(As a side note, please just click the link in the hwsbot comment to pm me as chat sucks and scammers always use it. Please pm alongside a comment on this post, if your message makes it clear that you didn't even read the post I probably won't respond. I get so many "what's the price of blah" messages and such, just read please lol. And if the item you're interested in is not crossed out on my most recent post then it is still available. Don't pm me about if I still have a 9900k for sale from 3 months ago...)
Timestamp album
Z390 Maximus XI Gene
Got this way back and some of the pins were bent. After fretting about this for a few months I went ahead and attempted a fix; it was way easier than I thought lol. Confirmed with a test cpu to work flawlessly now, no pins are out of alignment and all memory channels are working properly. In great cosmetic condition with no scratches, comes with the original box and all the accessories shown in the timestamp, including the DIMM.2 and antenna. If you need some sata cables I should have a spare or two.
$250 plus shipping OBO sold for $250 plus shipping
Samsung 970 Pro 512GB
Used for a year or two, buddy of mine has inexplicably removed the top sticker. The metallic thermal sticker is still on the back, and the serial number is in the SMART data. 10.6TB read, 15.6TB written. Comes in original packaging.
$110 shipped OBO
Corsair Vengeance LPX 2x16GB 3200C16 B-die CMK32GX4M2B3200C16
I've got two kits of these, both have v4.31 ICs which are B-Die. Should scale well with voltage, I had a kit of these a while back and got 3800c19 at ~1.45v.
$140 shipped OBO for one kit, $250 shipped OBO for both sold for $225 shipped
BNIB Sennheiser Game One Black
Brand new, these don't ship with a factory seal but they have not been used. These are a more recent revision with EPOS branding on the headband. I've been using my own pair for almost 2 years now, the sound quality and microphone are incredible by gaming headset standards and it is very light.
$120 shipped OBO
Anker Soundcore Liberty Air true wireless earbuds
Decent Airpods copy, sound quality is good for cheap earbuds. Wasn't a good fit for my ears though, and they have less than an hour of use.
$40 shipped OBO
Below are some things I'm looking to purchase or to trade stuff from above for:
5950x or 5900x
Fine with BNIB or used.
8700K/8086K or 9900KS or 10600K/10700K/10900K
Considering an Intel chip for a gaming build, binned/delidded chips are welcome!
Midrange to high-end Z390/Z490/B550/X570 motherboard
Preference for Asus boards and I'd like 4 dimm slots and an ATX or EATX form factor but I'm open to other solid choices. Midrange lineups and above (Strix/Maximus/Crosshair, Ace/Unify/Carbon/Godlike, Aorus MasteXtreme, Taichi), wifi is very appreciated but not a dealbreaker. Hit me with some of those newegg bundle boards :D
Trident Z Neo/RGB B-die
Looking to get 2x8gb or 4x8gb of these, may consider a 2x16gb kit. Prefer Neos a bit over the normal RGB ones for the a e s t h e t i c. 3200C14 is fine but fancier bins are welcome.
2080ti or 3080
Looking for Asus cards to sync with my motherboard like the TUF and Strix, although if you have a good offer I'll consider similar cards (2080ti FTW3/Aorus/AMP/etc. or similar 3080s). Maybe even a 3070 or 6800XT, lemme know what you've got. Waterblocked cards welcome!
Fanatec wheel and pedals
Looking to get one of their cheaper CSL or Clubsport wheelbases, a wheel for it, and a 3 pedal set with a load cell. Pretty new to sim racing so I'm inclined to stick to their ecosystem but if you have similar gear in the 200-500 dollar range I'm interested!
Any other hardware, guitar pedals/stuff, I dunno
If you'd like to trade something that I don't have listed here for something I'm selling, feel free to message me with what you've got. I can be easily enticed with random goodies, for better or for worse lol
Questions and comments are welcome, thanks for looking!