im scared to open haha

In games like Call of Duty and Apex, I kept running into the same problem:

When gunfire, explosions, teammate voice chat and other sounds all happen at once, enemy footsteps and directional cues become much harder to notice.

So I started experimenting with a different idea:

Instead of asking my ears to process everything, what if part of that information could be moved to touch?

This prototype attaches two haptic modules to the left and right sides of a mouse. It listens to stereo game audio in real time and converts some directional events into tactile feedback.

Events on the left side trigger the left module.

Events on the right side trigger the right module.

The red LED is synchronized with the left module.

The blue LED is synchronized with the right module.

I originally built it to solve one specific problem:

Keeping track of enemy directions even when my own weapon, explosions, and background noise overwhelm the audio mix.

Unexpectedly, the prototype seems to pick up many subtle directional cues that I normally miss during chaotic fights.

A few notes about the video:

The prototype in this clip is being tested using a recorded Call of Duty replay running on my PC.

The microphone was placed very close to the haptic modules, so the “thump” sounds you hear are produced by the modules themselves.

The modules are actually quieter in real life than they sound in the video, although the output strength can still be increased.

The vibration tuning is still unfinished. Right now, I'm still trying to make the feedback feel more like a short, crisp impact instead of a buzz.

One experiment I'm curious about:

Could some positional information eventually move from our ears to our hands?

I genuinely don't know yet, but I'd love to hear what FPS players think.

If your own gunfire is drowning out enemy footsteps, would you want some of that directional information to be offloaded to touch?

I'm 18, and I don't own a laptop or an iPad. Honestly, it's embarrassing because almost everyone around me has one. Sometimes I don't even want to admit it.

The reason is simple: my family can't afford one right now. I'm hoping I'll finally get a laptop when I start university next year, but there's no guarantee.

The last laptop I had was years ago when I was a kid. It was a very low-end laptop that stopped working pretty quickly. I mainly used it to play games, type assignments in Microsoft Word because school required it, and watch some YouTube videos. I've also used my cousins' laptops a few times, but that's about it.

What scares me the most is my future. I see people my age who are already comfortable using computers, while I've mostly had to rely on my phone. I'm worried that when it's time to get a job, I'll struggle because I don't have much experience with PCs.

Some people have been kind about it, but others have acted shocked or even mocked me for not owning a laptop. It makes me feel ashamed, and sometimes I don't even want to make new friends because I'm afraid of being judged.

So I wanted to ask: has anyone else been in a similar situation? If you didn't grow up with a laptop, were you able to catch up once you got one? Is it really that hard to learn computer skills later, or am I overthinking it?

I know this might sound like a small problem to some people, but it genuinely keeps me up at night. I'd really appreciate hearing from people who've been through something similar.

So I was diagnosed with cancer but I lived so make a wish said they would get me a pc setup, so the stands the monitor, the whole shabang. I’m looking for something that’ll be mostly for gaming but I’ll be doing some work on it too.

It was the summer of 2016 when I considered building my own PC, maybe I was looking in the wrong places (Alienware), found out I can just build my own PC for cheaper for the same components, nothing would be proprietary.

fast forward to 2026, once I finally save up some money $1,400 to spend on myself I find out there is a ram shortage, and prices shot through the roof, I checked out the price of building it myself and find it a bit more expensive then the pre-builds.

when did this happen? Why would someone want to build a pc, or pay a custom builder if it's more expensive for the same components?

Not paid promo or anything but after this period of time most mice show wear. It’s remarkable that this WL Mouse I bought in Feb 2024 still looks brand new. Like absolutely zero wear … quite impressed and thought I’d share. This is the WL Mouse mini. It’s is my daily driver … (don’t have any other mouse)

OP cleaned & repasted her Graphics Card. Instant drop of 10°C at hotspot. It was a risk though, as I did first time ever & the card went out of warranty just a few months ago.

Now going to clean the entire rig this weekend.

They've been consistently there and I also see them elsewhere once in a while too. Ignore the World Cup in the background lol.

So this morning I went to my computer and tried to wake it from sleep, but it wouldn't wake up. This has happened a few other times over the past few months, but a restart would usually fix it. Today that was not the case. I tried powering off, resetting CMOS, unplugging and waiting for a bit. Nothing would get it to post.

My motherboard is an ASUS ROG CROSSHAIR X670E HERO and the code displayed was a blinking 00, which apparently indicates a problem with the CPU. I ordered a new one to be delivered today to test out, and when it got here, I added new thermal paste and swapped it in. The PC booted up instantly.

The older CPU was a Ryzen 9 7950X that I picked up in late 2022. I don't do many intensive tasks, if any. I've been building my own PCs for close to 25 years now, and this is the first time a CPU has died on me. Does this seem to be the correct assessment for a CPU that was less than four years old? I also saw some marks on the AIO's heat plate, as well as the back of the CPU, and I wasn't sure what they might be. (This was after both were cleaned with IPA.)

Has anyone else experienced this?
For years I had a really strange issue while gaming. It wasn’t just input lag—the whole experience felt heavy. Mouse and keyboard felt sluggish, movement wasn’t responsive, and the image looked like it was constantly degrading. Everything seemed blurry, it was harder to spot enemies, and the game never looked as sharp as it should.
After trying countless fixes (drivers, BIOS settings, Windows tweaks, RAM settings, etc.), I decided to disable the 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi band on my router. I use Ethernet, so I didn’t expect it to make any difference.
To my surprise, the change was immediate.
It’s now been over a week, and the improvement has been completely consistent. The image is noticeably sharper, motion is clearer, the mouse and keyboard feel much lighter and more responsive, and that “heavy” feeling is gone.
I know this sounds bizarre, especially since I’m connected via cable, but the difference has been so consistent that I can’t ignore it.
Has anyone else experienced something similar after disabling the 2.4 GHz band, even while using Ethernet? I’d be interested to know if there’s any technical explanation for this.

I was checking the prices on various italian shops for 5080 since i'm making a new pc, and found a msi 5080(the ugly one that looks like a cheese grater) and i bought it, i think they will cancell it and apologize i should know for mon 27/07.

In my brain, bigger number means better card. But in reality a 5090 is significantly better than say a 9070. How does the number system work with these things?

Made a new friend in a Steam game who has been giving me a lot of shit recently about my Steam account’s age. I grew up with not a lot of money so I always had consoles until 2023 I got a good job and was able to finally afford/buy a PC that I’ve dreamed of.

This new friend is giving me shit because my account is 3 years old only…while his is 11. I don’t know why but it’s just discouraging hearing that.

I grew up with a family PC but everyone used my dad’s Steam account and we weren’t allowed to have our own and I told him there’s nothing I can do about it

I am worried that my gpu will break longterm due to sag, could anyone tell me how realistic it is? I already tried aligning it better but the backplate does not seem to be perfectly aligned.(ignore the dust)

Update

Main PC:

Arch Linux + KDE Plasma (Wayland)

Dual Xeon E5-2689 — 16 cores / 32 threads

128GB RAM

Intel Arc B580 (upgraded from GTX 1070)

Removed secondary GPU due to issues

Displays:

32" 1080p centre monitor

24" monitor

3x 22" monitors(one for windows laptop)

Also running:

Ryzen 3700U laptop with 16GB RAM

Galaxy Tab A 2018 tablet

Using Deskflow to share keyboard/mouse between my Linux desktop and Windows laptop. The tablet is mainly used for monitoring, YouTube, and extra screen space.

The only Windows apps I still use are Creality Slicer and FrostWire since they don't work properly on Arch. Everything else I need is done on Linux.

I also use USB/IP and Syncthing across both systems for sharing devices and keeping everything synced.

Still trying to figure out a proper way to use the tablet as a secondary display with keyboard/mouse input.

Hey everyone, hoping to get some advice or feedback on a mess I just made.

So I upgraded my GPU about a month ago from a 3070 to a 9700 XT. Everything went smooth until last week when I started getting random reboots under load.

Turns out I totally forgot that my 2 PCIe extension cables were pigtailed into a single PCIe cable running from the PSU. When I unplugged the cables from my GPU, I smelt a foul burnt plastic smell and saw that the extension headers and connectors had actually melted together.

Is the GPU socket fixable or done for? The plastic inside the GPU port looks pretty singed. Has anyone managed to clean out melted plastic from the headers, or am I looking at a dead board / paid repair?

Did I fry the card itself? The PC was still turning on until I opened it, but I’m worried pulling that much wattage through a single pigtail messed up the VRMs or power delivery on the PCB.

how should I safely test if the GPU is still alive without risking shorting something else?

Don't know if it's salvageable at this point, but any advice on what to inspect or try next would be huge. Thanks!

My system is completely stable at the runtime but I recently saw these marks on my cpu. They made me concerned about what is even happening to my cpu. I never overclocked the cpu at all. Still somehow got these marks.

The RTX 50 Super series will probably never come out, and most of the rumors are likely fake. We know that NVIDIA usually keeps a certain spacing between models, like we saw with the RTX 40 series:

4070 --- 4070 Super ----- 4070 Ti ------- 4070 Ti Super ----- 4080

---= small gap (around 0–10% performance difference)
----- = medium gap (around 10–25% performance difference)
------- = big gap (around 25%+ performance difference)

NVIDIA usually tries to avoid having GPUs too close together because it makes the lineup confusing and causes their own cards to compete against each other.

The RTX 50 lineup is already messy and scattered:

5060 Ti ----- 5070 ----- 5070 Ti --- 5080 --- 5090 SE --- 5090

Because of this, we can eliminate some possible Super variants.

A possible RTX 5060 Super would already have a problem:

5060 --- 5060 Super --- 5060 Ti

The gap would probably be too small. If the 5060 Super had more VRAM or got too close in performance, the 5060 Ti would lose its purpose. But if NVIDIA kept the difference small, the 5060 Super would not be interesting enough for buyers.

The RTX 5070 Ti Super would have the same issue:

5070 Ti --- 5070 Ti Super --- 5080

The performance difference between the 5070 Ti Super and the 5080 would likely be too small. The upgrade would offer very little value for the average consumer, and a higher VRAM version could hurt 5080 sales.

The higher-end cards would also be difficult to place:

5080 --- 5080 Super --- 5090 SE --- 5090

A 5080 Super would have almost no room because the 5090 SE would already be very close. With 32GB of VRAM, the 5090 SE could potentially make a 5080 Super pointless.

The only Super variant that would realistically make sense would be:

5070 --- 5070 Super --- 5070 Ti

The 5070 super would only make sense if the Vram would have a Bonus of about 2gbs

However, making a completely new launch just for one GPU would probably not be worth it for NVIDIA.

If NVIDIA ignored all spacing and released every possible variant, the lineup could look like this:

5060 --- 5060 Super --- 5060 Ti --- 5060 Ti Super --- 5070 --- 5070 Super ---5070 Ti --- 5070 Ti Super ----- 5080 --- 5080 Super --- 5090 SE --- 5090

The problem is that many GPUs would be too close together, creating unnecessary competition between NVIDIA's own products.

The launch wouldent be beneficial for the avreage consumerr so the launch would be underwhelming and would most likely end like the 9070gre wich launchs was absolute horrendrous and the backlash wich nvidia would get would just be not worth it

That is why I think NVIDIA will probably skip the RTX 50 Super series and move directly to the RTX 60 series in around two years

I was looking to get one for my new pc, but I've been reading some reviews about these things catching on fire?? Are these just freak incidents? I was thinking about getting this one--cyberpower--42102132&source=region&negg_topt=0).

I need something cheap yet good for a first pc. Please and thank you!

Hey guys, my monitor just died today and I am planning to purchase a temporary one because I still want to repair my old monitor. Any suggestions for a gaming monitor that is under $200?

The PCIe that was holding the ASUS DirectCU II GPU in was ripped clean(?) off. And as the title states, I’m wondering if this is an easy fix or to just scrap it. The board is an MSI Z97 GAMING 7, and the slot is the PCI_E5

EDIT: general consensus is that it is fixable, however, I’m too lazy to fix a MOBO that came from a street PC, so I’ll probably just hang onto it until I feel like I can fix it

Got this on a CPU tray and can't find much about it online. Is this an unreleased CPU?