Welcome to ComputerHobbyShop.com For Computer Enthusiasts who love to use a computer for anything they can.
For Computer Enthusiasts who love to use a computer for anything they can.
Who owns this site?
Don't you just hate it when by the time you figure a good thing out it is gone? I'm retired and don't have to do any of this, but it's what I enjoy. Who am I?
I'm Richard A McFarland, aka RAM, a baby boomer tech geek and computers are my hobby.
The boomer generation was the first to grow up in a technology-dominated world, and us
boomers have seen it all happen, from LPs to DVDs and from Happy Days to BluRays.
I'll help you enjoy modern computers plus fun and exciting vintage tech projects!
Ready for more? Besides Computer Upgrade Projects, that save you money,
there's a lot more fun at ComputerHobbyShop and just so you don't miss
a future post be sure to sign up & subscribe to be an early notified member.
Counting cores and straining to max CPU speeds is the familiar task for anyone needing more power at less cost. The good news is, the AMD Ryzen can check off all the boxes for the serious power user while staying far away from the higher cost of a Threadripper Workstation. You can save with compatible motherboards & the latest BIOS.
What specific CPU do I recommend? I give a 5 Star Score to the AMD Ryzen 7 3800X. It is simply the best CPU this side of an expensive workstation. You'll get the most bang for your buck while still seeing shorter compile times and faster project completions, especially when matched with an X570 ASROCK Steel Legend. A 2700 with a B450M motherboard from htcgo worked great and a 3800X and X570 Motherboard gave us an added speed bump. See the video clip by the indie youtube creator, F7GOS who used a 3700X when he upgraded from an ASROCK X370 to X570 Motherboard.
(Video sourced in sections from, F7GOS on YouTube)
If this posted review sounds like a commercial for AMD, they do deserve all this praise.
All my tests made me happy to endorse the Ryzen 3800X. AMD has a real winning CPU here.
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The 5680 Intel Core i7 CPU in my model that sold, actually had an upgraded AMD Video Card.
Here is an independent video review of a base model Dell Gaming System without my upgrades.
(video portions source, Digital Trends)
The image below is a summary, click it to load the full long page version.
I spent the money shown above to make a better MacBook Pro for you.
Here's your chance to help the planet by buying a Green Earth & Eco-Friendly Laptop
Installing and updating Catalina went fast with the upgraded 16GB RAM.
Ports shown left to right are, 1 Magesafe Power Jack, 1 Ethernet, 1 Firewire 800,
1 Thunderbolt 2, 2 USB 3.0, a Camera Card Reader, & Headphone Jack
There is plenty of space left in this Brand New Western Digital 480GB SSD.
You'll love using the working DVD Drive for movies + moving music CDs to iTunes.
After getting the message below, I finished installing all current updates.
It lid opens and closes easy & hinges work great.
In almost every review regarding the best laptops, this Macbook Pro is always the main challenger.
Supported by an Intel i5 processor with a speed of 3 GHz Boost and 2.5 GHz base, [upgraded with 16 GB] DDR3 RAM,
Intel HD Graphics 4000, and support for up to 2TB of hard disk memory this laptop is one of the best laptops of all time.
(Tech Reviews, Oct 29, 2020).
This MacBook Pro comes with a brand new Magsafe charger as shown below.
Besides coming with iTunes you also get Pages,
(Apple's app like MS Word)
Plus Keynote, another Apple app, (like MS PowerPoint)
And Apple's Numbers app, (a program like MS Excel).
You can use a power saving 4K TV,
or you might want to use any standard HDTV,
but you don't need it for the Mac laptop to work.
Refurbished for Richard's ComputerHobbyShop.com by
The seller is licensed.
See my great feedback below.
Fast & Free! Ships by USPS Priority Mail
(International buyers see eBay Global Shipping)
See the password info below for the buyer.
eBay item pricing does not consider upgrades and values fluctuate wildly on eBay & cannot be guaranteed.
In preparing ad, eBay posted this chart.
Below is an eBay search to compare price & value of 3 similar sold Laptops.
I'm rebelling against trends with my favorite way to surf the net. My PC connects to a large screen 4K TV and I didn't have to spend large on a second screen with a previous model 50" Vizio Family Home Theater/Game Room HDTV. It even supports a max of 1080p resolution. Surprisingly, it is as much fun to use as my newer 4K TV.
It also has VGA & Composite Video ports for older game machines. I've also used it on a Mac mini and
Mac Pro plus an Apple TV and my Gaming PC too. It has 1080P resolution and a newer Vizio has 4K.
(Shout out to Vizio! Sponsor a review here of your TVs to increase TVs sold as PC monitors).
Details are posted for my
MacBook Air that sold very fast for $300 less than normal...
Not to rub it in, but the savings missed was on a pretty 2015 Custom Apple Core i7 shown below.
ComputerPro2000
sold it very fast where eBay & PayPal also offer a 30 day money-back guarantee.
Wow, that last post for a green earth PC finished at 44 bids! When we work hard we'll want to take a break to play a few games too! Here is a nice DSi XL.
Honorable mention goes to naymare-7, who just purchased this on eBay. For him or anyone else interested, here's good news about this DSi XL. If you want to install a lot more fun stuff, I found a video with links to websites, that shows you how to mod it for root access. It seems a lot of people are doing that and you can essentially jail break it to load more games and unlock a lot more of it's features than was previously possible when softmodding this DSi XL console. Although I have not done this yet, it sounds like a lot of fun, which is why I built this hobby website to begin with. I'll see you next time. Won't that be fun!
In case anyone else wants to know, I received a question on my Dell Intel Core i5 with Fast SSD Drive.
eBayer kevigadsde_0 wanted to know, ... 'will your computer be able to hook up to my hdmi tv or [does it have to] be a computer montior?' I replied, 'No problem, you just need a DisplayPort to HDMI adapter. You could also adapt DVI to HDMI, but trust me, DisplayPort to HDMI is better ... the adapters are cheap, as found on eBay...' I have converted this PC from "BuyItNow" to an auction and it is at $9.95 at the time of this post.
What, you didn't get to bid? Sorry if you missed it! Don't want to miss out again? To be among the 1st to know subscribe below and if you like games, you're sure to have fun at my most current post!
I grew up on a farm & fought for the preservation of wild life. This attitude of a green earth was new to many people, but I followed it into my future work with computers and I just made a Green Earth PC Project for 2020.
12/30/2019: My last post on eBay for 2019 is where I upgraded a Dell Intel Core i5 with a Fast SSD Drive. It now boots faster into Windows using less power! I also has a new WD Black 1 TB Hard Drive for website graphics, data backups & maybe even a games library too. It was a lot of fun to refurbish. Click the image for more details. Happy New Year!
I think you would have liked how fast I made it.
So you won't miss out again, subscribe below and you can be among the 1st to know. This was my last carefully refurbished project from my last post in 2019. See you in 2020!
12/11/2019: Here's feedback from one I helped on the December 4th post, 'Refurbished Intel Core i7s'. (I think he meant to say, "transaction", but his main point is still clear)....
He bought 3 of my PCs from my post last week and he's very happy!
I'm glad, but so more people get a chance, in the future I'd ask followers to only buy once per post.
12/4/2019: On this date, I've been refurbishing used PCs & Macs just for the fun of it and
I've just finished 4 PCs and 1 Mac. See the Refurbished Intel Core i7s listed below.
Here an entire PC can sell for less than just the CPU might sell for alone.
What IBM geeks used to gather in User's Groups to help each other out with mainframe issues?
ANSWER ... SHARE was a 1955 group of aerospace industry users of IBM mainframes and is the oldest group still active. Most all of those once popular user's groups & club meetings have long since moved to the Internet as 'THE' source of help.
When I taught tech seminars, it was with all expenses paid as I had traved to teach a thousand + clients in the lower 48 states, Alaska, Hawaii + Canada. Traveling trainers get served by a lot of flight attendants.
I always enjoyed traveling, especially to share my best tech ideas. My success helping people has encouraged me to post on this site and share my expert skills!
Eventually, live seminars became less popular than the Internet and times changed.
More and more IT work was local and I'd get reviews like past and present ones posted below.
There, the real challenge seemed to be getting people to beleive in what they can do!
It was shut down when Covid-19 hit in early 2020.
For a future post, is there any retro Gamer's machine you'd like to hear about? Let me know by email.
Ready for more? Besides today's project, there's a lot more fun at ComputerHobbyShop.com!
So you don't miss another post, simply sign up & subscribe to become an early notified member.
Want more ComputerHobbyShop & RAM's Newest Posts?
So you can be among the 1st to know, click the subscribe button below. Thank You!
A payment will appear on the receipt as "ComputerPro2000" It's easy and you can unsubscribe at any time.