[ale] ***UNCHECKED*** Re: upgrading desktop

[DJ-Pfulio]

On 8/10/20 1:31 PM, Bob via Ale wrote:
> 
> 
> A couple more questions relating to building a desktop.
> 
> 1)  My wife is sensitive to noise, and we're often working in the
> same office at home.  She has mentioned that my current=old desktop
> is noisy.  Even though I don't notice it unless I think about it, I
> have to agree.
> 
> When building a new desktop, what things can/should I do to keep it
> reasonably quiet?

Higher efficiency in everything. Less heat means fewer fans and fans running slower. Use 4-pin PWM fans for everything you can. There are "silent" fans for almost everything. Each is about $10-20.  Get a 80% or better PSU. Less heat, less cooling needed.

> 2)  I have to record several hours of video each week.  I'm using
> obs-studio, and I think obs-studio has suggested a lower resolution
> due to the weak cpu.
> 
> For the new desktop I'm leaning towards a cheap graphics card as
> suggested by several along with the ryzen 5 3600 on a B450
> motherboard. (I'm not interested in gaming.)  Is the cheap graphics
> card still a reasonable choice if I have to record video?

I wouldn't go much below a current generation $70 GPU.  At some point, video encoding will be possible with Linux leveraging the GPU. Some intel and nVidia GPUs already support vp9 and avc1 encoding using specific drivers.  But if you don't spend enough on the GPU, then the hardware won't support any encoding, just playback.  About the last 5 yrs, GPUs have supported efficient playback in HW for mpeg2 and h.264 encoded video. Some newer cards support vc-1, h.265, and vp9 playback in HW.  This is why cheap chromebooks with terrible CPUs can play 1080p hidef video without trouble.

I know an nvidia 1030 (GDDR5 version; avoid the DDR4) is barely enough GPU to support h.265. Knowing what I know now, I'd get an AMD GPU.
https://developer.nvidia.com/video-encode-decode-gpu-support-matrix

And cheap GPUs will be noisy from the heat and the fan(s).