It’s Alive!!!

I just completed the best Gaming PC Build that I have done to date, Buckenstein. Something that wasn’t to have been taken so seriously that turned out to be a lot better than I expected. From learning from mistakes in previous builds, I did my best not to repeat them. There were times I was ready to move away from the project, and there are still some things that I want to do with it like hooking up small chains that come down from the CPU radiator that connect to the GPU to make it look like the rising table that Frankenstein way laying on.

Lots of things weren’t going right at first, and I will admit that I was worried about the whole thing blowing up in my face, because I was very uncertain about the motherboard since it was shipped as an open box. After inspecting the board a couple of months later after I realize that Newegg wasn’t going to do anything about it, I was willing to give it a try because I had a weird feeling that my B650 was bottleneck my 9950x3d, and after changing plans with Buckenstein, I was right. To make it work, I borrowed off of other systems, game devices, and used spare parts laying around.

I spent day two and three assembling the motherboard, and preparing the case. I felt that I did the best cable management that I have ever done on any computer that I have ever built. Mind you not, it’s a computer so there will be exposed wires that just can’t be hidden unless you buy one of them new MBs that have reverse wiring, but you still will have the GPU power cable. When I was wiring up an added fan towards the bottom of the case I realized that the cable connection was different from my other fans. What should have been an easy fix didn’t work quite right because I didn’t discover that till I had the motherboard mounted in place. Because the power connection wouldn’t fit between the area that I had the wire, I had to cut the wires which wasn’t a big loss, but I didn’t have another black 3 pin fan laying around, so I just threw in a white one.

After I got everything all in place, side panels up, I realized the only thing that I forgot to do was to hook up the wireless antenna. That is where I discovered why the motherboard was returned and didn’t come with an antenna. The male ends on where the antenna was stripped off of the IO plate. The big question was whether it was Newegg, Jay’s Marketplace, Asus, or was it the customer who did that. I’m betting that the customer did that, and Newegg didn’t realize it was gone and just Either way I wasn’t too happy, I just happened to have a spare 25 foot cable laying around that meant I had to run it from a router from my room, under a door that doesn’t get used, and then tap it down on the floor and throw a rug over it so no one would trip over it. Then I had to go to the Asus web site and download drivers for ethernet. I also discovered that even with proper drivers that bluetooth was out of the question. It would discover the sound bar but was too weak to get a good connection so I had to run the next day and get an auxiliary cable.

It took me two times to get Windows 11 to install right. The first attempt was with a discounted key that I bought from Walmart.com. Red flags started when I noticed the 2021 date of the version of Windows that was on the thumb drive. I inserted the Key code which seemed to put me to the next level in insulation when it wanted me to connect to the internet. Unlike the discounted version that I installed on the couple of rigs that I build, it wouldn’t let me change from anything other than Wifi. The easy fix to that was to let it install the dated version that was on the thumb drive. After I got everything installed I started doing all of them annoying windows, but ran into a road block because the one thing that I didn’t install to a different thumbdrive was the lan connection capabilities. After that I, the updates worked just fine, and then I installed the AMD, and Nvidia drivers. However I thought that it was kind of weird that the install still hadn't asked me to log into my Microspunge account, or to register, and name my computer. So I hunted down how to rename it and did that, which finally the system asked me to log into my account, and then I got that computer to reboot. Then I checked to see if I needed to do any other updating and that is when the background turned black, with an error window popped up saying you need to register your version of windows. I was like, what the hell, did I get a BS version of Win 11? I went to check to see what was going on and I noticed that it said my key was for the home version, and that you have installed Pro. From what I read, the only fix is to re-install Windows. I figured that I would take a gamble and used a legit copy of the OS that was on a different thumb drive. It let me install the Lan drivers, and it also asked me to log into my Microsoft account and it recognized the key stamped to my account, so that fixed the Windows issue. I brought on my own BSOD when I accidentally installed a wrong driver, but it was an easy fix.

My next issue that I ran into was the IO. Since I can’t hook up any devices that require bluetooth. I thought that I was going to get my soundbar to work, because it was recognizing it, but I was getting errors along with other conflicts. I finally realized the only thing that I could do was to just shut down all BT functions which kind of sucks because I’m having flashbacks of my Packerd-Bell days which was my first true PC because I have to use all wired products.

After getting everything installed again, I was able to test some games, and other programs, and everything seems to run mostly great. As I figured, the other motherboard was causing a bottle neck for the 9950x3d CPU. I also noticed with Task Manager that I was getting a second graph that I can’t figure out, but things are running way better compared to before. I looked all over the net to figure out what I was looking at but I so far can’t find any answers. The shutting down of CCD1 when running games is running properly, but that was also happening on the other motherboard, but I don’t think it was taking advantage of the extra cash because I noticed about a 20% performance bump.

I wasn’t going to talk about any of the games that I tested, but I have been trying to replay Atomic Heart. The one thing that I like about steam is how it uses cloud saves, but it does even the same when it comes to setting which can be a royal pain in the butt especially when using the ROG Ally or my Laptop. So it wasn’t no big surprise it did the same with Atomic Heart. The reason while if figured I would talk about this game is because I’m trying to get back into it, but I personally find it a hard and confusing game and that is even with the settings set to wussy mode. When I have been playing it on Buckzilla with the RTX 5060 8gb with a R9 7900X the game with graphics would run pretty good even set at high, but then it would start to badly studder causing a very much unplayable experience, I dropped the graphics down which helped for a bit it after a bit it would just go into the toilet. Someone said I was running out of V-ram, but it showed even playing at high that there was enough. I fired it up on Buckenstein with the 5080 with the 9950x3d, and just like the other machine it ran great for a bit than the same thing started happening so I’m ruling out that the V-Ram isn’t the issue and that it might be an AMD cpu thing, or Asus Strix motherboard. It a test that I need to try with my intel system. I know that Spyro The Dragon doesn’t like AMD yet it plays great on my AMD laptop/Radeon. With that game I get stick-drift.

Another weird issue that I ran into with Buckenstein was with the M.2 1tb drive that I tried to put into it. The stick was the original stick that came out of the Ally X. It turned out that the Samsung Stick is locked to that device.

I did get a couple more Blue Screens Of Death, but it happened after the latest Windows Update. I just hope that the motherboard doesn’t have more issues other than no wifi and Bluetooth. I’m going to try to simulate where I ran into the latest crashes. If it’s a motherboard issue, it might be for quite a while before I can replace it. The only error I see is coming from the IO, other than that, I think the system is running pretty good.

As of yet, I haven’t been able to repeat the BSOD, but Frankenstein had his moments at the start… or was it Young Frankenstein>