TKhaos

If you are UK and want to buy second-hand could try CEX, not my favourite with the grading methods and a little more expensive than eBay but at least they give warranties on all the stuff they sell. Just need to be careful with some stuff, for example my local shop was selling a Firestick for £33, Grade B so I pointed out you could buy it brand new for £30. If you want to go for new then you got these places: https://www.scan.co.uk/ does daily flash deals, get nearly all my stuff from them and used them for years. https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ is fairly decent and been using them since about 2007. https://www.ebuyer.com/ isn't too bad, had an account with them for 20+ years although not as cheap as they used to be. https://www.cclonline.com/ has been around since the 90's, can be hit and miss on prices buy worth looking at as some stuff is cheaper. https://box.co.uk/ not used these personally but they have been around a while and they do sell some of the older tech along with newer so might pick up something off the list new. Failing that you got Amazon, need to check daily for flash sales but some stuff is really cheap, I've seen GPU's with 40% off before, if you aren't in a rush the Black Friday sales are on in November but good chance you will find a better deal before then.

No problem

Download this file, it's for the A-10C but works fine with the A-10A. Open your DCS Saved Games, if you don't know how just type %USERPROFILE%\Saved Games into Windows Search and select the DCS folder If it's not already there create a Liveries folder and create a new folder called A-10A so you end up with DCS\Liveries\A-10A Copy the unzipped contents of the downloaded file across which will be USCG Clean and USCG Dirty then just select them off the loadout menu as normal You will end up with: DCS\Liveries\A-10A\USCG Dirty DCS\Liveries\A-10A\USCG Clean https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3308126/

I use the Logitech G502 Lightspeed wireless mouse, C920 webcam and G733 wireless headphones on one of my systems and use GHUB for all of them. I've never had a single issue with GHUB since it was launched, the previous Logitech Gaming Software it replaced could be a bit hit and miss at times.

Price difference is due to Steam promotion ending yesterday and still a few days left to go on the DCS site. If you buy on Steam you can transfer the license to DCS standalone but not vice versa so if you buy on DCS site has to be used with standalone.

You AV has likely quarantined a file, check it then run repair or restore the file and whitelist it and should work fine. It's generally a DLL file out the aircraft Bin folder. The worst offenders for doing it recently are Malwarebytes and McAfee but Windows Defender has been playing up recently.

There is that down side and have felt it at times in the past, even this week it's been fairly warm in the UK so pushed room temperatures up. Plus in the summer I run different fan curves to keep things cool so that pushes power output up having 7 fans in the system, plus CPU and GPU

Handy in the winter, heavy gaming I can heat my room up by 2c, has hit 3c sometimes and cheaper than having the heating on and that's with a single AMD card Yeah wouldn't see me spending that kind of money on GPU's, could buy a decent secondhand card for that

Would need a 3080 +3080 or a 4090 + 4090 as matched pairs.

No problems at all, very professional and well respected company. I take it you have privileged information concerning the phone call or live chat then of what took place. I have read the OP several times and can see no point in which they claim Scan have basically just said do it yourself and hung up on them. Having dealt with Scan extensively over a 30 year period, both personally and professionally I have a pretty good idea how they operate and how they go above and beyond to help clients. The 3XS support team have no problem with walking a person through how to do something and will even do video chat with you so they can show you how to do it. All 3XS systems are built to order, to your specs and when you place the order, for a small fee you get the option to go to Scan and build the system yourself with one to one tuition from a 3XS tech. All 3XS systems have extensive testing before being dispatched so I would imagine if they thought the fans where noisy they would have looked into it and rectified it before dispatch. It comes down to what the OP is used to, if they had a relatively quiet system before then it's going to notice more. My Antec case was noisy out the factory because the case and CPU fan control default was set to Auto in the Bios, as soon as I changed it to PWM and tweaked it the noise level dropped dramatically. Dunno, maybe if you did that and it was suddenly a lot quieter that would indicate that it was the CPU and case fans creating a majority of the noise and not the GPU. Although they could have just opened Armoury Crate and looked at the CPU/GPU fan speeds. Maybe if we knew what the previous system was, as in what case fans and CPU fan were installed we could compare it to this system and the dB between the two. I have very acute hearing so what sounds noisy to me isn't a problem for 99% of other people. Maybe they should have contacted Scan on delivery of the system, not wait a year. The end user also has a responsibility to report a potential problem ASAP, not just leave it for people to point the finger and make accusations that they aren't getting what they paid for. Anyway I've got better things to do with my time than waffle on about this. I've seen how a simple question about monitors turned into 6 pages of who knows best and dragged on for days and I'm not really that interested to be honest.

If you don't sort it through adjusting fan speeds in software I would just get hold of Scan again, they are normally pretty good and more helpful than most. They most likely mentioned the Bios in relation to the CPU fan as they can be noisy at times if running near full, probably trying to eliminate that and so they know it's the GPU fans. It’s not like Scan are a bunch of amateurs, they know there business and have the credentials to back it up. I have known shops claim the warranty is void because an issue was left so long that it's the end users responsibility that something failed. Scan are okay though, but better off not mentioning it's been like it a year. Most of the X3S systems are 3 year warranty and they do cover parts, labour and carriage. Normally get the quickest response via phone or Live Chat. They are much better than most at support, I've never had any issues with them in the past 30 years. It's not like they are some one man band rip off or backstreet shop that doesn't care once they have your money, they are one of the biggest suppliers of software, hardware and pre built systems in the UK and supply overseas. They supply Royalty, MOD, NHS, Education, Emergency Services, Government and all kinds of other businesses and home consumers. They actively encourage people to learn and self build systems. Very few businesses provide things like Scan insurance so if you break something on installation they replace it free, handy if you drop a £500 GPU and you only paid £6 installation insurance.

If you go on this site you can create your own in a few minutes, it's lists the UH-60L and all the maps. Excellent site for creating missions and campaigns especially if you're not too familiar with Mission Editor. You can pick maps off Context & Environment and choose aircraft from Flight Groups then fill in the rest as required. https://dcs-briefingroom.com/ It's doesn't list weapons loadouts for the UH-60L, just default mod loadouts but you can create the mission then just open it in Mission Editor in game and change the loadout if you got the weapons mod installed.

I have done that before, was stuff I had planned on getting just a later date but at 50% off it made sense to buy then

I almost never impulse buy anything, spend weeks researching something if I don't know about it, then will wait till I see good deals come up. As you are in no rush maybe keep an eye on places like Amazon for the flash sales or wait till end of November for the Black Friday sales and see if anything comes up in that.

Yeah I guess it depends how deep the desk is, I've used a 32in 16:9 before with a desk mount because I didn't want to drill holes in the wall for mounts. Wasn't too bad as my desk is 34in deep, the monitor was set back almost 1ft then probably another 18in where I'm sat it my chair so had a nice bit of distance. Would probably struggle a little bit with 48in that close but that's just me so now I've decided to buy one it's either going on a floor standing TV mount I got or the wall. It's like my TV, the optimal size is 50in measured between the cabinet and my sofa where I sit so that's what I got, because I'm a bit OCD with things like that. I did the same with my 8 speaker surround sound, everything got measured out

Yeah that's what I meant, not something I would do having a 48in monitor sat maybe 2ft away on a desktop it would be wall mounted so it didn't affect my eyes I just remember I got a high level adjustable TV stand in storage that takes a 60in TV which would be ideal and goes up to at least eye level so might not be wall mounting after all as I can put that against the wall and just drag the desk back further

Explains a lot then, can imagine the size of that on a desk and it being impossibe to have at eye level

Not sure what happened to that either, I have seen it with places I've worked but was more for monitoring purposes rather than working on say documents but would give me neck ache. When I did some teaching at the local college before they were even allowed to switch anything on in the computer classes they had to set their own monitors up, but we had to do it according to Health and Safety guidelines. Personally I set my own monitors up at eye level with my head in a natural position but it's each to their own.

In the UK the HSE guidelines state you should take a 5 to 10 minute break every 60 minutes or more frequently if required. Others also suggest the 20-20-20 rule which is 20 second break, every 20 minutes and focus on something 20 feet away to prevent eye strain, in reality it rarely happens though. I know many professional reviews and articles claim the optimal size for a desk monitor is 27in for both work and gaming. You could further argue that with at what resolution, 4K, 2K or FHD because everyone's eyesight is different. I've never had any issues with 16:9 monitors before, a majority are that aspect now unless you go over 32in so it all depends on the size of your monitor. I have never had any issues and don't even need to move my head with a 27in 16:9, do have to marginally with 32in but barely anything. Saying that I could have a 45in 21:9 monitor and still not have problems unless I'm sat 2ft away from it, if it's at the correct distance it's fine. So not sure where the 16:9 issue comes in as it's all about screen size and position.

I started thinking about that as soon as I replied, visualising a nice big monitor on the wall with the desk pulled back. Currently my monitors are all set at eye level which means I've lost quite a bit of desk space, especially from my main monitor in front of me. The LG 45in UltraGear or the 49in UltraGear would make nice additions, still keep one of my 27in either wall mounted or to the side of the desk as I need a second screen for work stuff I had considered before dual resolution, some of the Alienware have dual mode so 4K for gaming then switch to FHD for work but it was a little low for my liking would have preferred native 4K/2K. I've never have my desks flush against the wall, currently got about 18in gap as it allows for airflow, being able to get to the back of the base unit without moving the desk, which is 7ft long so a pain and easy to get stuff back I drop down the back

My nephews got one of them, really nice they are. His is wall mounted though as he uses it for PC and PS5. It's a bit big for me as I use desk mounts due to multi monitor setup although suppose I could ditch the multi setup, wall mount then pull the desk away from the wall

If you were thinking of going to 32in, 4K then the Dell Alienware AW3225QF is really nice but bit pricey compared to others, you can buy it from Dell direct. This is the specs, it's the UK site so can just change to where you are: https://www.dell.com/en-uk/shop/alienware-32-4k-qd-oled-gaming-monitor-aw3225qf/apd/210-bllv/monitors-monitor-accessories Couple of decent 1440p monitors are the 32in Corsair Xeneon 32QHD165 and the 34in Philips Evnia 8000 34M2C8600 which are a lot cheaper than the Dell. Corsair Xeneon 32QHD165 https://www.corsair.com/uk/en/p/monitors/cm-9020007-pe/corsair-xeneon-315qhd165-32-inch-ips-gaming-monitor-qhd-2560-x-1440-165hz-1ms-hdr-ready-1-07-billion-colors-pe-cm-9020007-pe Philips Evnia 8000 34M2C8600 https://www.philips.co.uk/c-p/34M2C8600_00/evnia-curved-gaming-monitor-qd-oled-gaming-monitor

Yeah the charge ports are charge only so no data transfer. It's handy if you have things that require a power source for operating or you just want to keep things on charge. It still gives you the 7 x USB 3.0 ports or if you are only interested in expanding the ports they do the 10 port version, as you say without any charging ports. The Anker A7515 is very similar and a little cheaper but hasn't got the individual switches which are quite handy. Both have the same power ratings, that's being said USB ports have limits, people think it's powered so just plug whatever in thinking everything will be fine. So say you got a 16 port hub then plugged in something a bit more power hungry like a USB 3 portable drive to all 16 in then you will have issues. Most manuals that come with the hubs or specs on the websites give recommendations. Personally I think the Sabrent has a slight edge on the Anker hub with the on/off buttons but then the Anker is more pleasant to look at if you aren't bothered about switches. Both units are almost identical specs wise. You can look the Anker up either by product code or just use 'Anker 10 Port 60W Data Hub with 7 USB 3.0 Ports and 3 PowerIQ'

Boeing state the maximum ceiling for the Chinook is 20,000ft, although there have been a couple of cases where it's been pushed 10% higher than that. In the UK the RAF operate with 15,000ft maximum density altitude based on there operations. So 9,000ft sounds a little low unless you were fully loaded with fuel and cargo, which in your case you weren't as you only had fuel. Guess flight characteristics aren't fully implemented yet.

Anker, Sabrent and StarTech all do decent powered USB hubs, Anker quite often come out in the number one spot for the hubs especially the USB 3.0 powered. TP-Link and Belkin do some decent ones but you don't get as many ports so probably not much use for upgrading. StarTech can be a bit pricey but is decent. I have stuff by Anker, Belkin, TP-Link, StarTech and Sabrent and it's all decent bits of kit, when it comes to power banks I only use Anker and Belkin and some are still going strong and holding charge after 5+ years of extensive use, bit off topic I've used all the brands above and never had any issues with any of them, supplied well over a 1000 different bits of kit from these brands over the years and don't remember having to return anything in all that time. Been using StarTech and Belkin since the late 80's, Sabrent and TP-Link probably 20 years and Anker for maybe 9 or 10 years. I would never buy anything off Ali Express for a computer, well actually anything at all