[Chastity]

I hate 2022.

As you sit there listening on your set of LCD-5's

 

[Mad Lust Envy]

As you sit there listening on your set of LCD-5's

Lol, ironically, I don't sit here listening to any headphones. LCD-5 included. I hardly touch any of my headphones except my Koss clip ons.

I listen to my desktop speakers (some Presonus Eris 4.5s) 90% of the time. The rest is my clip ons, and sometimes I'll use LCD-5, LCD2C.

Why? General laziness. Koss is mainly just convenience as they're like not wearing anything at all.

Late at night if I'm playing games, I'll put the LCD-5s on unless I'mn just not in the mood, then I'll use the clip ons, again.

I'm gonna push for some Audesze clip on planars, that aren't in-ear a few years, down the line. If mainly just for my own benefit.

 

[JdeFalconr]

Yeah, I'm most likely going to get the card hopefully repaired. However, if the thing is busted, and I wasted money.... ugh, I just....no.''

In this GPU scarcity, you might want to simply give your PC to a PC service for maintenance: Repasting and de-dusting as mentioned before

My story: 2 GPU's later I figured out that the cards were absolutely fine but... Windows automatic driver updates screwed me over *in combination* with a bad DP cable .
And no, you hardly stop windows installing newer ( but faulty ) drivers behind your back.

- Used a Club3D cable ( higher quality than monitor supplied)
- Used Display Driver Uninstaller, manually installing AMD WHQL drivers
Fixed. I then owned a RX480 4Gb and RX5500 4GB as spares, lol.

You card is most likely fine, so I think
I wouldn't like you to throw away a perfectly good card in these times.

I hate 2022.

Oh I can relate. Early 2020-ish my computer began to hard-lock (100% unresponsive) while turning the monitors back on after turning them off for power save; no bluescreen, no errors in Event Log; it just locked up and only the power button would bring it back. It was clearly something with hardware so I started with a new power supply (and RMA'd the old one), got new RAM, RMA'd then replaced the motherboard, swapped the CPU, did a clean Windows install just for kicks, changed BIOS settings...no effect. I RMA'd my video card, finding that there was some kind of liquid damage on the underside from some kind of leakage. That helped but on rare occasions the problem still happened. Finally I swapped my ten-year-old sound card, of all things, and the problem almost entirely went away.

Now it's happened perhaps once or twice in the last six months and I can deal with it when it does. My theory now is that the problem actually has to do with the fact that one of my monitors "winks" - turns off and on again briefly whenever I get up from my chair. It sounds crazy but I found that it's actually a real phenomena, especially with DisplayPort cables (of which I have some long ones) and gas-lift chairs. (I'm not crazy. Also here's the White Paper). I wouldn't at all be surprised if there was some poor shielding or my longer cables are subject to some kind of EMI that's causing enough of a problem to lock up the computer.

So the point of that lengthy story is that 9 out of 10 times your normal technical troubleshooting process is going to nail the cause. That 10th time it's going to drive you crazy and end up being some crazy-ass thing no person would ever have conceived of.

 

[halcyon]

Yeah, I'm most likely going to get the card hopefully repaired. However, if the thing is busted, and I wasted money.... ugh, I just....no.''

I hate 2022.

Join the club. Have ordered 2 GFX cards in 2020 and am yet to receive either. Have participated in lotteries and nanosecond flash-sales for 1.5 years and gotten zero cards.

Things MIGHT get slightly better in 2023, IFF crypto prices (and speculation) stay depressed.

So, my spare gfx card is from 2013... Not going to pay 2.5x prices due to crypto speculation.

 

[JdeFalconr]

EVGA has a queue system where you register with them and sign up in a queue. It might be months but you'll get an opportunity to buy a card at MSRP.

 

[Mad Lust Envy]

I contacted LaptopMD who says they charge $450 MINIMUM pre-approval, and that doesn't even include shipping to them.

This is bordering on me just saying forget it and praying for more luck. What a farce.

$500+ to fix a card is just... that should be criminal. But hey it's only $95 if they DON'T fix it.

I'm gonna call the local shops to see if it's any better. I remember a few years ago fixing a scufed laptop for $200 to repaste, clean and debug all issues.

Those were the times.

Newegg Shuffle has also been an absolute bust. Bot protection my arse. I'm sure scalpers and miners are saturating the Shuffle with a million entries.

 

[Chastity]

I contacted LaptopMD who says they charge $450 MINIMUM pre-approval, and that doesn't even include shipping to them.

This is bordering on me just saying forget it and praying for more luck. What a farce.

$500+ to fix a card is just... that should be criminal. But hey it's only $95 if they DON'T fix it.

I'm gonna call the local shops to see if it's any better. I remember a few years ago fixing a scufed laptop for $200 to repaste, clean and debug all issues.

Those were the times.

Newegg Shuffle has also been an absolute bust. Bot protection my arse. I'm sure scalpers and miners are saturating the Shuffle with a million entries.

Back in Jan 2020 my gamer laptop died, and it was cost prohibitive to repair it, so I decided to rebuild my desktop system. Built a nice AMD 3600 setup. At the time I had a R9 390, and I debated spending the extra $429 for a Sapphire Nitro+ 5700XT. I decided to do it, to get the RDNA benefits. Boy, am I glad I did, since you know what happened 2-3 months later.

 

[Chastity]

Thought you all might enjoy this. IEMs for gaming is an interesting concept.

 

[JdeFalconr]

Thought you all might enjoy this. IEMs for gaming is an interesting concept.

Haven't watched the whole video yet but I will say the KZ ZST's have excellent detail, especially for under $20. Pre-pandemic I would play Switch games on the bus during my commute and the ZST was my go-to.

 

[Radio81]

The issue for me with IEMs and gaming is chat. In order for the IEM to sound best, there needs to be a seal. If you've ever tried to carry on a conversation with IEMs, it's like that. Can't really hear myself talk.

Noise cancelling IEMs with an ambient sound passthrough option work better in that regard. I've used Sony BT IEMs with ambient sound mode, along with a head-worn mic on PS4/PS5.

I like the idea of this product for an IEM gaming headset, but the reviews are meh:
https://www.amazon.com/Razer-Ifrit-Professional-Duo-Streaming-Broadcaster/dp/B07HRG7HV9

I'd say most IEMs I've tried work well for about an hour, then I need to remove them for a few minutes due to discomfort or annoyance in the ear canal. I don't have that issue with full size headphones.

 

[Mad Lust Envy]

My life would've been so much simpler if I could stand wearing IEMs.

I can't.

I also don't like how they hard pan unlike normal headphones. I think IEMs for me would need a certain level of cross feed just for comfort's sake. It's actually audibly uncomfortable to listen to IEMs as well, for me.

That's one huge benefit of virtual surround DSP... the crossfeed. People talk about how virtual surround sounds fake, but nothing is more fake than the sound of headphones. Real world hearing has everything crossfeed between both ears, not just one.

 

[Zachik]

My life would've been so much simpler if I could stand wearing IEMs.

Have you tried custom IEMs? For me, it was a big revelation!

 

[JdeFalconr]

My life would've been so much simpler if I could stand wearing IEMs.

I can't.

I also don't like how they hard pan unlike normal headphones. I think IEMs for me would need a certain level of cross feed just for comfort's sake. It's actually audibly uncomfortable to listen to IEMs as well, for me.

That's one huge benefit of virtual surround DSP... the crossfeed. People talk about how virtual surround sounds fake, but nothing is more fake than the sound of headphones. Real world hearing has everything crossfeed between both ears, not just one.

Speaking personally IEMs rarely fit right and it's an enormous pain to find tips that will stay in with a good seal. 100% of stock tips that come with IEMs don't fit me. What helped tremendously was when I learned my ear canals are apparently oddly-shaped (or at least according to a doctor who was looking while getting examined for the flu). I have to use the absolute largest-diameter size of Comply tips and only then can I get them to seal properly and stay in my ears for more than a minute. Could it be something similar with you?

@Zachik had a spot-on suggestion with custom ear tips. You can find them online relatively easily in the range of $150 give or take. Alternatively UE now makes wireless earbuds that actually let you create the custom-fit tips by yourself in-home. Everything I've read about custom tips agrees with Zachik in that they apparently will give you a dramatic improvement in comfort and sound quality. Of course the other side is the expense of custom tips as compared to the cost of whatever IEMs you're using them with.

 

[Trancefreak]

Yeah, I'm most likely going to get the card hopefully repaired. However, if the thing is busted, and I wasted money.... ugh, I just....no.''

I hate 2022.

Bud, If I lived close to you I'd do that for free ( I like restoring shtuff ).
Alas, I'm in Belgium.

I hope you find a solution and don't throw the card out just yet!

 

[Mad Lust Envy]

It's that and I don't like how much they isolate noise. I'm actually not a fan of being closed off from external noises. Is that weird?

So today's Newegg Shuffle actually accepted me, but it's for a 3070ti with a mouse. I didn't even notice it was a 3070ti... I thought I clicked on 3080s and above. damn.

I don't wanna spend another $1100 on a card that is marginally better than the one I have. With less VRAM to boot. Removed...