Or, how to build a simrig with determination, scrounging and LOT'S of duct tape!!

The 'history' of how I got here from my PS2 is at TheWayIPlay.com so I will just start with what I have now.

I recently converted my rig back to LHD from RHD and this time took pictures.......Here we go:

First, I finally got "my own shelf" and put my book collection there.


And so, here's my sim corner as and after I stripped it:

And now to rebuild:
I started with an IKEA desk I stole from my daughter:

Than add one lid from an old chest we had. Kids were using it as a toy box at the time so I merely unscrewed and 'borrowed' the lid.

Help together by a random clamp:

And now, the real glue of this build!!!

Power needs taken care of:

Mocking up and beyond. I also had to duct tape my G-25 as the clamps no longer work:








And used this tape to mark where my chair is when I use my pedals.

You'd be surprised how strong Duct tape is!!

Almost there!!

And here it is up and running. I keep meaning to take care of the wires but never manage to 'find time'. Hahahahaaaaa.

Well, as you can see in the last few, I use headphones. Except THESE are my wife's that she loaned me when mine yet again lost one ear. It's the 2nd set in a year so I decided to go upmarket this time.

After reading Chris's most excellent review on the Logitech G35's I decided I wanted a set of surround sound too.

So, I started looking at reviews etc as here they're almost $150 and I couldn't budget that. I ended up ordering a set from Turtle Beach but that was June 11th and last week, I ended up cancelling the order as they still hadn't shipped. Look excellent also for 50 bucks less but unfortunately, I never got them. Tiger Direct was most helpful though and cancelled my order and I immediately ordered these which were only 10 bucks more.




I ordered them July 2nd in the evening and by 6pm, an hour later, they informed me they'd been shipped!! And arrived today, the 6th!! wow.

I'l have a full review when I can but still hooking them up as I had my G-25 pedals apart all day fixing them.

YAAAAY!! Part came today to fix my shifter!!!!

The UPS truck just went by my house and dropped off something..........

So..

Yesterday I opened the nice package.......



Well, time to open Hector up. It's dusty in here!!


So, recently I was working on the overclock on my GPU and was thinking I can go further but maybe I don't have enough power.......



So, how about we DOUBLE IT!!!!



Better lay our tools out. heh. Actually, I kept the beer on a separate table as I wouldn't want to spill it here!!!!



Point of no return?
My cheerleader/Partner in grime, my 10 year old Emily hams it up.



Wow!! What a difference in colling fan size!!!

PSU is in, now to get to the FUN part!!! Liquid cooling!!



OH NOOOOO!!!, What have I done??!!??



Rad's in.



The part that made me nervous, adding it to the CPU.



And since the fan for the new cooler pumps air IN and my old fan was noisy as all Hell (dying) I got this nice fan to pump air back out. I figure it'll keep air flowing.



And all back together. Not as fancy as MixieMike's coolerMONSTER but....Haha.

And how did it all work? Well, it didn't. Turns out the CPU hasn't an 8pin connector. Took me a bit to figure it out. The one I thought was turned out to be a GPU connector. (PCI-E). And so, I put my old one back in and it worked. I also ran the PC to see what temperatures were like closed up. Well..

CPU at idle went from 59C to a steady 30-33C. The GPU even dropped from 64C to 55C.
Under load I was seeing during GTA IV CPU running as high as 98-100C and once even hit 110C which is what prompted this. Now? 44 CPU steady and GPU has dropped from 80-90C to 70C.

For the money for this cooler, I'm quite satisfied.

So, I thought I had the CPU solved and put it back in but was wrong. I've found I can get an adapter but got tired of taking everything apart so for now Hector looks like this!!




Oh, and today, I O/C'd my CPU again (as a year ago I dropped it back to stock after getting RealTemp and discovering it was running over 100C!!) and it's now idling at 38C and runs 44C to 51C whilst playing GTA IV. My verdict HERE will be when I get the adapter and close it back up again with the 1000watt PSU and up the clocks on my video again....

WHEEEE!!!!!!!!