Our Ask GN series was put on hold during the onslaught of Ryzen 2, Hades Canyon, and X470 coverage of late. We're back in force, though, with two back-to-back episodes. The second will go live tomorrow, the first tonight. For this week's episode, we're talking B450 motherboard expectations (and Computex), realistic ways the GPU market might make a comeback, review sampling, HPET benchmarks, and more.

Separately, please note that we are planning a livestream for 5/1 at 7PM EST. The stream will be hosted on our YouTube channel. We will be attempting to overclock Hades Canyon further than our current record of 4.7GHz. We're hoping to push closer to 5GHz, but power may become a limitation at some point. We've already posted preliminary results over here. Be sure to tune in for the livestream! It'll be a fun one.

Ask GN 75 is an excellent episode. We had great questions for this one, including discussion on X370 vs. X470 benchmarking for Ryzen 2000 series CPUs (e.g. R7 2700X, R5 2600X), which we’ll get in to more detail with in the near future. As noted in the episode, we’re technically not under embargo for the Ryzen 2 CPUs, but we’re planning to hold our review until embargo lift out of respect for AMD’s decision to stop giving special treatment to some media, for this round. That said, we still talk a bit about X370 vs. X470 benchmarking in the Ask GN episode.

The other excellent topic pertained to receiving review samples and balancing hardware criticism – basically behind-the-scenes politics. Find the episode below:

We're back with Ask GN! It's been a long week of testing: Patrick has been working on FFXV, an Elgato 4K60 review, and other pieces; I've been working on managing the upcoming travel schedule, primarily for Computex and other tradeshows, and also have a whole slew of in-depth content coming up. One of our biggest endeavors for the week will be our upcoming livestream, where we intended to battle the LinusTechTips team for a top 10 spot in 3DMark benchmark rankings. It's a bit of a friendly rivalry, and we think you all will enjoy tuning in. We'll talk about that more soon.

We also have a news video going up tomorrow, as usual. The video will include several major news items for the past week, including some discussion of the nVidia GPP story that's been going around. Stay tuned for all of that.

In the meantime, Ask GN is below, and the timestamps are below that. Our Patreon bonus episode is here.

Timestamps

01:37 - David Watson: “Hey Steve , do you think we will end up seeing Nvidia competing with the aftermarket cards more directly by releasing their own non founders edition cards with new custom cooling solutions and heatsinks with double or triple fan designs ? i think its a fascinating prospect and one i feel Nvidia has had a lot of thought bent on and is surely bound to use much sooner rather than later because if they can get more marketshare then they surely will and i honestly feel its coming from Nvidia and could be massive for them , because i know one thing , if they released a badass new aftermarket card design that not only performed really well but looked really cool and actually ran cool then i for one would certainly be very tempted by it as many surely would Steve , do you feel this is on the horizon ? thanks man”

06:47 - Stank Buddha: “Quick question, regarding the 200fps limit in (newer?) games. Is this applied per monitor if you were using multi monitor or is it the actual game that is locked to to pushing 200fps total??? Like if the game is locked itself then a theoretical 3 60hz monitors would be maxing it out(60*3=180). Or can you do a 3 monitor 240hz and max em out each at 200fps. just wondering.”

08:57 - Michael Morgan: “Can you demonstrate the end user benefit of HBM memory over GDDR5 or GDDR5X on GPU's please?”

13:12 - vishal bobde: “#askgn-questions Why do CPU don't have different manufacturers like GPU. If there were more manufacturers we might get more enthusiasts features from factory like LM tim and better IHS.”

17:23 - Satoshi_Nakamoto: “@GN Staff Hey guys could you reach out to Thermaltake and ask them if they have any idea for the arrival of the Level 20 Case?”

18:14 – defenestrationize: “Steve, a massive limit limit for APUs is their need to use system memory. Do you think, APUs will remain on the low end or end up high end (is there not actually a limit to DDR for APUs) , More memory channels on APUs (possibly separate for CPU/GPU so 2 sticks DDR 2 sticks GDDR) or on chip memory (hbm) will appear in the near future? Given how board partners operate and push for chip consolidation , do you think we might see a MB, RAM, GPU, CPU as a single pcb ? Feel free to cut this question as needed to perhaps a simpler version.”

22:36 - Dayne_ofStarfall: “@Steve Burke Hello Steve, I’m a bit confused by case fans lately, specifically RPM and in relation to voltage. If I understand correctly different fans have different MAX and MIN RPM at a given voltage. But what happens when you connect two fans with different MIN/MAX RPM to a single header on the motherboard using a Y-splitter? Do the fans spin at different RPMs? And how does this work when they’re connected to a SATA-powered PWM Hub (like the one that comes with most Phanteks cases)? Also what is the amount of fans that can be safely connected to one header? I’ve read on forums that the cable or port can catch fire if they draw too much power, is this true? Thank you.”

24:25 - Ash_Borer: “#askgn-questions how do delidded (with LM) temperatures compare to soldered CPU temperatures? Do you ever plan to delid a ryzen and test the results? Im under the assumption that delidding provides better temps, so i dont mind that intel doesnt solder anymore - as an enthusiast i want to delid anyway and if its not soldered it is easier to delid.”

25:29 - Armand B.: “Modmat out of stock ? DAMN MINERS !”

25:53 - Nory The Explorer.exe: “@GN Staff What is an important fact, viewers should know about GamersNexus?(edited) And the opposite, what is a big misconception viewers have expressed about GamersNexus?”

Host: Steve Burke
Video: Andrew Coleman

This newest episode of Ask GN furthers out latest video discussion where we demonstrated how to kill a motherboard VRM with zealous overclocking, found here. The continuation of this discussion (in Ask GN) starts with questions positing whether it's possible to damage GPU or CPU components from overdone undervolting, and then follows-up by asking about whether overclocking just memory (on a GPU) can somehow "hurt" the memory.

In addition to this, we take questions on GPU heatsink damage, liquid metal ongoing maintenance and nail polish/electrical tape application for SMD protection, personal triumphs/failures in hardware, and case airflow. Floatplane is also briefly mentioned.

More below.

The latest Ask GN brings us to episode #70. We’ve been running this series for a few years now, but the questions remain top-notch. For this past week, viewers asked about nVidia’s “Ampere” and “Turing” architectures – or the rumored ones, anyway – and what we know of the naming. For other core component questions, Raven Ridge received a quick note on out-of-box motherboard support and BIOS flashing.

Non-core questions pertained to cooling, like the “best” CLCs when normalizing for fans, or hybrid-cooled graphics VRM and VRAM temperatures. Mousepad engineering got something of an interesting sideshoot, for which we recruited engineers at Logitech for insight on mouse sensor interaction with surfaces.

More at the video below, or find our Patreon special here.

Our latest Ask GN episode talks methodology and benchmarking challenges with GPU boost, GDDR6 availability, "mining" on AMD's Radeon SSG, and more. This is also our first episode that comes with a new accompaniment, released in the form of a Patreon-only Ask GN. The separate video is  visible to Patreon backers, and answers a couple extra questions that were submitted via the Patreon Discord.

As usual, timestamps are provided below the embedded video. The major focus is on some quick GDDR6 news, then some discussion on GPU benchmarking approaches.

Find out more below:

Ask GN returns! We're now on Episode 68, having taken a brief haitus for CES. A lot of questions piled-up in that time, and we dedicated the usual ~25 minutes to address as many as we could in that time window. Of note, a large number of you have been asking about GPU and RAM prices, and we recently had our own encounter with severe price surges at a Microcenter location. We also received questions pertaining to component failure, proper handling of components (ESD, oil/grease, etc.), GPU failure, and must-have tools for our arsenal. 

Oh, and as a bonus, we take a question on "dream testing methods" that are unachievable (presently) due to time/money/practicality limitations. Great questions this week from the community. Find the video and timestamps below:

This episode of Ask GN is very likely part 1 of a two-parter. We had so many good questions from the previous round that we had to cut a few out for this one, but given the proximity of CES, we may film another prior to the show. For this one, we take several questions that relate to heat generation within a computer, particularly those focused on component failure and early death of components. GPU mining is, of course, a popular topic to do with component longevity, and so makes a lengthy appearance in this episode. We also relate the information to 3D rendering and animation/production work, as it's all really the same idea: Load a component at 100% for most (all?) of its life, then see how long it lasts.

This episode of Ask GN, shipping on Christmas day, answers a few pertinent questions from the last few weeks: We'll talk about whether we made ROI on the Titan V, whether it makes more sense to buy Ryzen now or wait for Ryzen+/Ryzen2, and then dive into the "minor" topics for the segment. Smaller topics include discussion on choosing games for benchmarking -- primarily, why we don't like ROTTR -- and our thoughts on warranty/support reviews, with some reinforced information on vertical GPU mounting. The conclusion focuses on an ancient video card and some GN modmat information.

The embedded video below contains the episode. Timestamps are below that.

This episode of Ask GN headlines with answering the most common question we’ve seen in the past 24 hours: Should I buy now or wait for Volta? That’ll start us off for this episode, followed by clarification of VRM quality, a history lesson on AM4 motherboards at launch and HIS existence, and silicon death from overclocking. This episode runs about 25 minutes, with each question timestamped within the video. We also have the timestamps and questions marked below, if you’d like to see when a particular topic of interest appears.

The Volta topic, we think, is among the most interesting and common for questions right now. This seems to come around for every new architecture, and our answers are generally the same. Find out more below!