Will

My biggest concern with building something myself is knowing what to buy rather than putting it together. If pricing is beneficial then it would probably be fun to buy the bits and try it myself. My plan is for this to be on the living room TV which is 4K HDR, so I’d ideally want it to support that properly. Sounds like waiting a bit is definitely good to do then, gives me some time to work all of this out too. I had no idea! Are they the same spec? Any downsides to getting a mini version over the full size one? I love lego, so this is encouraging. Budget is for the PC only, anything left over will go into stuff like steering wheels but will budget for those separately. I don’t think it will get moved around much, but as it’s for the living room I definitely don’t want something huge. Something console size that can go under the TV is ideal. The budget is definitely more what I’m OK with rather than what I expect it to cost, my knowledge on PCs is basically zero so learning from you guys. Looking more on the 4K60 side of things but good to know I can do that well under my original budget. Excellent, will look into those. Yeah looks like these new NVIDIA cards are what I should go with, more good tips! Another thing I had absolutely no idea about so will definitely look into this too - thanks! So based off of these posts so far, I’m looking at: Ryzen Processor New NVIDIA graphics cards which come soon M2 storage Anything else I should be keeping in mind?

That’s really good info to know - thanks! Any tips on good suppliers I should look out for?

Street Fighter V is a cool one, I’ll definitely give that a good go next month. PUBG is a bit meh, not bothered by that one at all.

So I’m very tempted to buy a PC for gaming but don’t have a clue where to start. I know that I want: Something as small as possible, with a simple and sleek design (no crazy lights to gas turbines etc.) To be able to play racing sims on super high settings To be able to play flight simulator on super high settings Budget-wise I’m not really sure what is acceptable, I have in my head up to £5k is fine but if adding more to that would give me a huge advantage I’d be fine too. Does anyone have any tips for what I should look at?

Mine was the opposite way round. I was there the whole time and would have been there for the birth but they had to do a cesarean and wouldn’t allow anyone else to be there. It kind of sucked missing out on that but not much you can do. This is another one that’s been tough for us. I usually travel pretty frequently, at least a few times a month and that has all gone now. We wanted to go away before the baby was born but couldn’t, and now nobody can visit us either which means grandparents and other family members are still waiting to meet the baby. Hoping we can travel again soon, I’m desperate to get out of here for a while.

Listened while I was working and was nice having this on in the background. I’ve been playing a lot of F1 too and have stepped away from my 100% career mode to do some trophy collecting. Seems like none of it is too challenging so might even manage to get the platinum if I stick with it. I’ve also been thinking about getting a wheel, but don’t really see the point unless you go all in. Have been looking at the Fanatec stuff but it’s quite pricey. I also went over to a friends place the other night and was shocked to see how fast the game loads compared to my super slow PS4, so now a PC is on my buying list.

Mine too! I keep thinking of buying it but it’s almost always available on Netflix so haven’t yet bothered.

This whole thing has been a rollercoaster for me, some really quite bad times. We had our son during the middle of the lockdown here and due to the circumstances I was in basically got to spend the first two months with him. Since then I’m working from home which means I get to see him anytime I want to take a five minute break. Overall I’d say I’ve been incredibly lucky to get to spend so much time with him and it’s been quite an amazing experience.

I never played when this was a regular thing but it looks really fun, I’d like to give it a try too.

Final races of the year confirmed as: 15th Nov - Turkey 29th Nov - Bahrain 6th Dec - Bahrain 13th Dec - Abu Dhabi Will be fun to see Turkey back, always felt that that track deserved a place on the calendar. Two races in Bahrain is a bit meh, hope they do something to spice that one up a bit. Maybe if the championships are wrapped up by then the teams will agree to something interesting. Abu Dhabi was always going to be the final race so no surprise there. Kind of cool that the season is going on so long in the year. Hopefully they take some of the learnings into future seasons from how this year has gone.

It’s funny how different this is in different places. Part of my new role is to head our Covid response group and we have the exact opposite problem to this. People want to come back into the office and we have to battle them to stay at home. We’re currently not expecting to bring people back this year, and from next year onwards we’re investigating how we can operate with far more work from home and rethinking the role of the physical office as part of our work life. The next few years are (hopefully) going to see a huge change in how we work and the way society operates. I just hope we get it right.

Yeah it’s one of those things that isn’t overtly offensive but an example of the system leaning towards the white male that we need to be careful about. I don’t think there should be any issue/backlash with white actors playing characters like Apu in the past because it just wasn’t a thing anyone thought about. Now it is and we need to move on and improve things. I also liked the concept of the videos @Rummy posted but didn’t think they were executed all that well. Done with some decent comedians I think they could be hilarious and quite a powerful message. I still have an issue with talking about this sort of thing outside of this thread because I’m never clear what the correct amount of outrage on which particular thing I should have without getting my head bitten off about everything. I have a lot of friends the west coast of America who will absolutely lay into you if you don’t align with their outrage properly.

Can’t you just edit the width of them so it looks lovely again? The meals look great, would definitely eat those!

It’s the Indy 500 today, would have loved to watch it but unfortunately it starts at 1am here. I quite enjoy the big oval races, but not enough for that start time. My main interest this year would be Alonso, although unlikely I’d love to see him win it. If I can avoid the result in the morning I may try to find a source to watch it while working.

I started running again this week after a few weeks off to see if my foot would get better. Managed to do 3 x 10km but way slower than I’d been doing before. I was getting close to 45 minutes for a 10k and am now back up to 53 minutes or so. I did manage to do a couple of km in each run below the 5 minute mark but those were a lot of effort at the end of the runs. On the plus side I only have about 150km of my target for the year left. If I can keep up the schedule I might be done by the end of September which I’d be incredibly happy about. Will try and get back into the body and arms this week, but my setup at home isn’t great for much progress on that front. We do have a gym in the complex but it’s always busy and I don’t really enjoy the environment. Also thinking of taking up more swimming but not sure what the best way to track it is - any suggestions on that front?

I’ve never had one nor even heard of them, but they look like the kind of thing that would be disgustingly delicious though. Those waffles don’t look properly cooked mind.

Yeah I’m a little way into episode two and really enjoying it so far. Well worth a watch for anyone with some interest in games and their background. I really like this more serious/business take on something about games, seems we don’t get it all that often.

Really getting tempted to finally put together a decent PC for this. Watched a few videos and it looks so good.

It's funny, I'd completely forgotten it was even in No More Heroes until this episode. Always brings Lumines to mind for me.

I think the console looks great, way better than the PS5. The dashboard design is also really nice, and although I expect most of the phone integration will end up being part of the PS app too it’s good to see them commit to it like this. They’ve done a really good job on this side of things.

The Nanoblocks? They’re pretty cool, and I think they do a pretty massive range of Pokemon. When I was in Japan they had a promo with McDonalds and you could buy a set that was basically a Big Mac meal, it’s one of my most prized possessions!

Another great episode. I know you mentioned just before the Topic of the Week that it was a lot of non-Nintendo talk but honestly, I actually prefer the non-Nintendo stuff. I think hearing about that stuff from fellow Nintendo fans just fits nicely with me and I really enjoy the impartial talk about the other markets. The talk on Fall Guys I generally agreed with but I do think the slightly spongier controls are what makes the game. If it was pure skill it would turn into any other online game and before long I’d be out as I just can’t dedicate the time to get good enough. As it is I can see myself being able to play for a good while. I’ve also been someone on the fence ever since launch about Snake Pass. I will pick it up at some point, but it’s one of those games that seems easy to ignore, I’m not sure why. Was hoping I’d be helpful with the Sumo Digital knowledge, but you already beat me to it damnit. I also loved the Genki Rockets at the end. Hadn’t heard that in a while so ended up listening to a few more songs for the final part of my run. Even added a couple to my running playlist!

I didn’t realize so many people managed to make it to the meets. Which members are in that picture?

Definitely good to have a disconnect. I have my work setup in our spare bedroom and once the work day is over it all gets shut away and I don’t think about it. The desk came today and already so happy to have it. I’d been on our picnic table until now and by lunch time I felt like my spine was going to dissolve. Being able to sit for a while, then stand, all in the most comfortable position possible is a real game changer.

I think if it does turn out that the $599 price is true Sony will come out pretty soon after saying the PS5 is $499. MS will then announce the S at some cheaper price point and Sony will counter that with the digital PS5 being the same price. Or Sony will just match it, because... I’d be happy paying $599 for either machine, but it has to have some content I actually want to play. For myself, and I think a large number of people the XBox doesn’t have that. Some sort of subscription plan would be really really compelling if they had specific new content that blows people away, but I don’t see many people signing up for a two year contract for an XBox with the lineup they have available. Not at launch at least.