Interestingly, I did exactly this about ten years ago when USB 3.0 was the coolest new thing. It was in fact one of the first upgrades I ever did to a computer. I was a middle schooler back then. Ten years later I have built dozens of computers, fixed dozens more, and even got myself a compsci degree. Watching this gives me nostalgia for some reason, which I know is a weird thing to feel about watching someone upgrade their computer...
When removing front bay blanking plates, it is a much safer idea to reach in whith a screw driver and tapping the handle to eject the plate. The metal tabs in those bays are very well suited to cutting through skin. 3 stiches was enough to teach me that lession, hopefully this comment can help others avoid such accidents.
I've had a quick look through the comments and I don't think anyone has mentioned one point about this upgrade, When I added a USB3 card, similar to the one you used, to a 10 year-old Mesh computer, I noticed that the USB3 card was not recognised by the BIOS. The USB3 drivers were supplied by the operating system, Windows or Linux. If you regularly try out Linux distros by booting from USB drives you still need to use the USB2 ports. The same would apply to a Windows Recovery USB drive. You can use USB3 for creating the USB boot drive as you already have an Operating System running. Otherwise it's a very worthwhile addition and, as usual, your explanations were very clear.
I recently got hold of 4 Tyan m/b's dated back to 2008, with onboard Intel graphics, 2 pcie slots, 8 USB 2, 6 sata and with 2.6 gb dual core Pentium cpu's...I'm running SpaceEngine on one of those with a GTX 1050ti and 4gb ram. (not to mention the Kingston SSD) Needless to say, USB3 will be my next upgrade here, so thanks a lot for this timely bit on the subject Chris. 👍
@@Reziac It's amazing how far you can stretch old tech with a little upgrade here and there. I'm running 2020 software (games etc) on a 12 yr old board. (edit)Oh yes, it's a very stable board..👍
As you can see on the pcie card, the manufacturers provide a gap to get your cables under the card for a better cable management. I discovered that not so long ago and can be really useful in hard cable management situations :) You can see the gap pretty well at 9:15
@@NicolasChapadosGirard it depends on what cable you're trying to get through, in my case it works well to get my fan cables all the way to the plugs at the bottom of the motherboad!
@@virtualtools_3021 I guess it depends on where the CPU power connector is placed on the motherboard but often it's at the top. Wouldn't running it behind the motherboard be a more elegant solution? Although you may have to root it before installing the motherboard.
you would be amazed at how much power is packed on the P5K pro motherboard used with famous core2quad processors, just add up a pcie card for usb 3.1 and m.2 and over 15 yrs later it is a very solid build
First thing I always do after watching a video from the EC upgrade series is take the panel off my PC and see what PCI slots I have available. Thank you Chris, informative as always, and thank you for including the Amazon links in the description. These are so much easier to watch than those videos with cuts and hops and sound effects every five seconds.
Howdy from across the pond in Houston, Texas! I had been unsure if it was possible to install a 3.0 port on my old computer motherboard and also have ports on the front of my case. Your video answered every one of my questions flawlessly. The views you showed in your video were excellent and the description was "spot on". I really liked the honesty when you showed that you had to figure out how to reroute the cables. That has happened to me so many times. Throughout the years I have used TH-cam videos hundreds of times to do all sorts of repairs around my home and yours was one of the very best I have ever seen. Thank you very much for making this video. I wish you and your family a blessed life.
Love your channel. Very well-planned and produced videos. The range of topics and the video lengths are appreciated. You hit the sweet spot in your level of technical explanation.
As a complete IT novice, it took me several weeks to find the courage to attempt to install the SSD I had already bought. I looked at many TH-cam videos but it was this one by Chris which finally enabled me to install the SSD. Everything is calmly explained with just a touch of humour and the various components and connections are shown so very clearly. I shall consider upgrading my usb slots next, Many thanks indeed Chris. I shall recommend you to the Which magazine computer staff.
I have also become a big fan of the hook and loop fasteners for cable management as well. If you swap things out with any frequency at all the re-use ability is so nice.
Wow!!! How perfectly profesional your video is!! I stumbled upon your video as one-off event and I guess I may never have to visit your channel in future as I am an illiterate as far as computers are concerned. However, I subscribed to your channel only because of the perfect professionalism found in your video. Your hands and fingers move in perfect sync with your narration, as if you have already made rerecording and then proceeded merely to act out for video, which is highly unlikely when the narration explains things that one encounters only when doing live audio recording. . . And I am also spellbound by the minor details you cared to point out. Amazing! Keep up your good work. [I am from India and sorry for my English]
I like your videos because they are real-world situations I've often had to deal with in friends and family computers. A lot of tech videos are only dealing with brand new hardware, perfect cable management, in cases that cost more than the entire computers some people have. I'm hardly ever dealing with brand new bleeding edge stuff- it's so often things like this- adding USB 3 to an old computer and dealing with 'how to get power to a new component" from some old PSU with all those red, black and yellow wires- NOT some nice modular 1000W PSU that's a week old! Anyway, thanks for a fun video on a real world upgrade!
I think one of the things I appreciate the most about your videos is when you point out the limitations/pitfalls of undertaking something like this. For someone who does this professionally or as a hobbyist it might seem like a no-brainer, but for someone coming into this green that can be invaluable pointing out bottlenecks (such as the PCIe x1 1.0 on this rig) so they're not tempted to install the latest and greatest parts in a decade old machine. Thank you for the video!
I did a similar upgrade on my computer about four years ago with 5 USB3.0 ports on the back and an AFT Pro-77U with 4 USB3.0, a CF card slot, a MS Card slot and a Micro SD slot. What a HUGE improvement in performance and versatility.
Really excellent video, very educational. I learned a few things that I wish I knew about a month ago. No worries though, the idea that the usb 3.0 PCIe could have a internal hub and extra power to it for front ports when your Mother Board does not have usb 3.0 connectors. All so did not know about the PCIe 1.0 could be put on bigger PCI's, 4x 8x and 16x...wow...
@@churblefurbles very true, it's just that I get a lot of hand me downs and I fix them up and some times the front end ports and hubs on the boards don't always work. Or at least not at 2.0....so I get PCIe 1x attachments which work well on Linux without any additional firmware. I just didn't know there were ones that can connect from that to the front as well..
Chris, you mention in the next video that you'll be upgrading the motherboard and CPU. I wonder if it's worth mentioning different upgrades that can be done, depending on a budget. For example: - If strapped for cash, a CPU upgrade to a quad core chip for the existing motherboard could bring about excellent performance gains. A Core 2 Quad computer is still perfectly serviceable for most web browsing, email, and media playback needs. - Upgrading the CPU and motherboard, but re-using the existing RAM - Going all out and upgrading the CPU and motherboard with ones that will also require newer RAM (in this case DDR4). - Adding other affordable upgrades as required for the users needs. For example, installing a graphics card would allow for things like 4K video playback, even on a machine this old, as the card would be doing hardware decoding. Just food for thought anyhow. Great informative video as always!
I'm currently in the process of converting an old laptop into a portable Linux machine. Im currently upgrading ram to 16gb of ddr3 1666mHz, storage to a 250gb ssd, and making a bootable drive. Battery may see an upgrade, but the system already gets a good 6 hours away from the wall.
THIS is the upgrade my 10 y.o. i5 1st gen PC needs. I'm so glad you cladrified certain things like the on card power supply and the hardware limitations, but we need a video explaining the renameing of the USB protocol and how some companies may take advantage of this at the expense of their customers, by misleading them. Thanks for all your effort. Stay safe
I did a very similar video 3 years ago with a very similar PCI-E card, only difference is my hard had 5 USB 3.0 ports. These PCI-E cards are brilliant and after 3 years I can report it still works. Great series BTW, enjoying these videos
a few years ago, when i was building a junkyard pc for my brother with LGA1156 platform, the mobo at the time was just right before the USB 3.0 tech. So i bought an Orico usb 3.0 expansion for 10$ from aliexpress. The expansion card is pretty solid especially the additional usb 3.0 front panel port suport besides the 2 rear ports.
I like how you throw in pieces about the various standards. I tend to forget about the importance of chipsets because it's not an everyday thought for us non builders. Spending that extra $ on a better motherboard at purchase can get you a few more years in this data hungry world, it's not all about what processor you get stuffed in there that makes it a relevant machine years down the road.
I remember watching a video years ago now, where you first purchased the front USB 3.0 bay. It was just after I built my first PC, so as soon as I finished watching the video I bought the exact same USB 3.0 front header, been using it everyday for years now and they really are a fantastic piece of kit!
I love seeing it too even tho I've done such upgrades a hundred times. There's always one more little thing to learn in the process. Also, I hate seeing perfectly good hardware junked when it can be helped along a bit and still be useful.
I had to do this to an old low profile Sandy Bridge PC via a low profile PCI-E card. Very handy for external drives and external network adaptors. Make sure that they have an external power connector as Chris has said.
I just recently bought two USB 3.0 PCI-E x1 cards for my two older PCs. They are G31 and G41 boards. I had to fit on x16 slot as these boards do not have x1 slots (of course your PCI Express video helped me to understand that I can use x16 slot, Thanks a lot for that video 😊). The G31 one running Windows 8.1 (x86) and G41 one is running Windows 10 (x64). I have already installed the G31 board's card and it was just plug and play. It did not require any driver. Running just fine. Both of my cards have molex power connector.
Professor, I know you explained in the first video that a new graphics card and processor would imply a new Windows license. But I hope you can consider these upgrades just to see how much old hardware can still be renewed and rescued into a perfectly usable computing experience by today’s standards. We all should strive to get as much life as possible from our devices.
Actually, you can carry your windows licence through all a lot of upgrades, including motherboards, processors, graphic cars, etc. They just make it harder and harder for you. My last licence took half an hour on the phone with Microsoft employees to renew, but it was worth the effort. They gave me a whole new one, for free.
Windows is crazy. You'd think the product license should follow the CD. Meaning if you have 3 computers and bought windows 7 you own windows 7. Not 1 of your computers owns windows 7 until you upgrade it. Not that you couldnt just run a free linux build or run your wiindows without a loicense(it just annoys you about not having a loicense. Ive ran chopper windows builds without a loicense for years before without much issue) Anyway doesnt encourage anyone to really buy or use their product with that attitude. Some companies deserved to get chumped on. As in Someone is going to get ucked here so lets make sure its not me.
@@mikes9753 Theyre $200 for a key here in the store. But somehow you can get a 10 yr old scrap top for that price with the latest windows installed with a key. Whoever is flipping those scrap tops I can gaurantee are not paying $200 for a key. I know someone who works for the government and he said "you paid for a key? I have 15 keys sitting right here. I would have given you one." the last time my hard drive died. I guess the state buys keys.
You are so convincing I am tempted to upgrade my current computers, which are relatively new but can always use more USB ports. Thanks for the inspiration.
Great Video: When you said about when to stop spending money on upgrading, it reminded me a bit of the episode that featured Triggers Broom in "Only Fools & Horses" :-)
Take the precaution of checking that your expansion slots definitely are PCIe. Despite my machine being a little younger than Chris's, the slots are just PCI. I checked this out and found that it wasn't fast enough for USB3, and so unfortunately I was unable to carry out this upgrade. Thank you Chris for another superb tutorial.
thank you for the good advice and sound realworld comparison. esp SATA II and SATA III, with PCIe x1 to x16 with their gen evolution. so this was very uselful. Thankyou.
At the beginning I thought "I wonder what PCIe he's got my in this" and promptly answer it. Then I though "ho, then what impact would it have on the usb 3.0 speed" and we get this wonderfully demonstration. I have to say I love the side by side comparison more than the one at the time and show differences after.
That's funny -- early on I'd think "I wonder if he's going to explain..." and that was the NEXT thing Chris mentioned. THREE TIMES! Great minds and all that. :D
This video is also useful for people who just want to add some more USB 3.0 connections to their PC. The PCI USB 3.0 connector does show the limitations of an older motherboard like this. But it is still a noteworthy upgrade. (copy paste)
When you told us about next week's upcoming video, I was reminded of "This, milord, is my family's axe. We have owned it for almost nine hundred years, see. Of course, sometimes it needed a new blade. And sometimes it has required a new handle, new designs on the metalwork, a little refreshing of the ornamentation ... but is this not the nine hundred-year-old axe of my family? And because it has changed gently over time, it is still a pretty good axe, y'know. Pretty good."
To be honest all of that single board computer videos was a bit overwhelming. I'm glad to see a balance between SBC and normal computer videos lately on this channel.
Like usual, I always find something useful to learn from your insights. Thank you for being clear and thorough in explaining the details of your given topic of the week.
This video series gives me hope in old pcs :) Hopefully parts will be more affordable sometime in the future, and mobos not be as forgotten in spec lists >.>
I had the same thought! of course it would depend a lot on the choice of board and CPU. I have a couple different i7 that have almost the same performance and similar specs -- idling, the Dell uses about 40W and the Asus-based system uses about 140W.
I think it was really helpful to talk about where the bottlenecks lie in this upgrade. Wasn't where I thought it was going to be and that's interesting. Production remains as always, intentional, clear and concise. Really gives me ideas on what I would want my own videos (one day) to look like.
The most important thing in a PC is the power supply. I have seen so many PC users upgrade their RAM, HDD, graphic card, CPU etc... and then the crappy $15 PSU which came with the PC decides to "blow up" and fry the motherboard and everything connected to it. If you decide to upgrade, even an older computer, *always* start with the power supply unit. It doesn't have to be a super fancy expensive thing, but at least go for a brand which is a 80 PLUS or better. Corsair, Seasonic, be quiet!, MSI and Cooler Master are great brands. You can find a really good Corsair PSU for $40-45 today. Your PC's power supply / PSU plays a big role in determining your system's reliability. The PSU's found in older HP, Dell, IBM, Fujitsu-Siemens, Lenovo desktops are junk. Replace them immediately - before they cause huge harm and give you a severe headache.
Huh. My computer at work, over the years I've also had it upgraded with more RAM, an SSD, and USB 3.0 ports. And it'll be 10 years old very soon (still has a sticker on it that says manufactured April 2011). Still getting work done though, unlike so many of the Macs around the place that have had to be replaced. Hurray for non-upgradability! 🙄 Speaking of non-upgradability, I really hate how modern PC cases don't have 5.25" drive bays anymore, at least in the DIY market. Look case manufacturers, just because I don't use disc drives anymore doesn't mean I don't want 5.25" drive bays. I can stick other things in them, like the USB 3.0 front panel expansion as shown in this video, or small drawers to hold flash drives, or who know what else. A lot of options out there! Not when you have no bays, though. My case at home has built in USB 2.0 only, as well as Firewire and eSATA (it's a pretty old case). But it also has USB 3.0 type A and 3.1 type C thanks to 5.25" expansion bays. Also has side panel intake; forget about tempered glass, I want cooling for my graphics card! Anyway I'm rambling a lot now. At least maybe the algorithm will like it...?
@ExplainingComputer I bought a used Motherboard off of eBay and the USB 3.0 ports (only 2 on the back) started acting flaky! I remembered this video and ordered a 4 port one and the 3 1/2 bay addon and the thing works great! Thanks to your video my USB 3.0 is right as rain... So thanks for the video Chris! Thanks again! LLAP
I need to do the same to mine. I'm still upgrading the ancient thing. It recently got a SSD and the fastest CPU available(xeon w3580) for the board. Perfectly usable and comfortable to use today.
And after all these upgrades, don't we end up with the equivalent of Trigger's well maintained broom (Only Fools and Horses), where the broom is 20 years old with 17 new heads and 14 new handles! :)
@@watsoft70 And just think. When you've finished the upgrade, you can build a new PC from all the old parts you now have, that looks remarkably similar to your old PC.
@@watsoft70 ... well, actually, he’s gonna upgrade the CPU only, no motherboard swap mentioned. Which is something I do quite often with Intel Core 2 Duo setups. The older E8500/E8600 used to be stupid-cheap. Around Turkey-Day 2019 I got four E8600 off eBay for $10 shipped. Total. All four. I haven’t bought any since PanDemic days, but prices on most used PC stuff on eBay has grown rocket engines... to the moon.
One thing for sure, if you plug in more than one USB 3.0 devices into the card, you are going to have a much lower speed. This is because the bandwidth will be shared. Sadly, there is no USB 3.0 add-in card that support PCIe gen 4 yet. You will be severely limited if you populate many devices into the card and uses them all at once.
16:44 Would you get better results if you plug the card into an x4, x8, or x16 slot? That is, would all of the devices run faster sharing a faster bus?
@@dwmac2010 The card only has x1 connection, so it doesn't matter whether the port is x1 or x16 port, it will only use x1 PCIe lane. Unless the PCIe generation is 2 or 3, the card will be severely limited.
Went to rewatch this video to drop a like and say my thanks for the idea of using a USB 3 PCIE card. Thanks Chris! The one I got a few months after this video for about ~8USD was very similar just without the additional molex power. Used to test if the USB ports of my daily driver computer that being a weird swine that's acting up in various ways and died recently, so I'm waiting for a new one. The USB 3 card is now in my older pc that has only 4 USB ports at the back and that will probably be its home even if its communicating via PCIE 2.0 x1. I still have to get a front panel bay for easy access in the front because the internal USB 2 of the old pc can be weird at times and having USB 3 at the front is way more convenient than always going to the back of the pc.
Another point on choosing a USB expansion card: are the ports horizontal or vertical? I've found that the vertical ports often don't leave enough room and require an extender cable for flash drives and other devices that are a tish wider than the ports. Similarly, horizontal ports can be set too close together, tho are less likely to interfere otherwise. But check for your usage before you install the card! I like how that front drive bay mount is made so it can simultaneously support a 2.5" drive. Put the velcro fuzzy side in to reduce both wear and dust collection. That next upgrade is cheating. I know, having done much the same a time or two... still have parts in there from the original PC...
Frellin awesome, all the upgrades that you have done & are going to do are the exact same upgrades that i need to be doing....super uncanny. Thank you Christopher, i didn't think that the USB 3 port upgrade would be included in this as i desperately need to replace or upgrade the front USB's as little children accidentally knocked mine and they have never been the same since, glad that replacing them is as simple as putting lego together. Looking forward to the cpu & motherboard upgrade as this is something I am also looking to bring into the 21st century, not that my pc is old but this is why i had mine built to a specification in order to be able to upgrade, again thanks for your methodical walk through
At this point, Chris *has* to be aware of the memefactor of some of his catchphrases. "I hope to talk to you again..... very.. soon..." It gets me laughing every time. Also, cheers for this Chris, I've actually been wondering if I shouldn't upgrade with some USB3 ports. I even have PCIe 2.0, so should get a pretty good speed increase.
Very much looking forward to the next episode, hopefully to include the thought processes leading up to upgrade of the mobo and CPU. How to choose and whether to do it at all. Can't wait.
Just got the notification, still 12 comments were already in. Adding USB 3 hardware to old PC I certainly good choice; removes data transfer bottleneck.
I enjoyed the video more than I thought I would. Who knew a USB retrofit could be so interesting? Now, I'm keen to learn what motherboard and CPU Chris will recommend. Oh, the suspense...
Many thanks for all the information here. Upgrading to USB 3 is just what I have in mind for my old baby - i7 from about 2012 - and this video surely helps. However, for the sake of folks new to this kind of tinkering, I think it will be good if you put some emphasis on taking anti-static precautions!
![[FREE] lil tony sample type beat - "no fear"](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/34VmEacsn1k/mqdefault.jpg)
Interestingly, I did exactly this about ten years ago when USB 3.0 was the coolest new thing. It was in fact one of the first upgrades I ever did to a computer. I was a middle schooler back then.
Ten years later I have built dozens of computers, fixed dozens more, and even got myself a compsci degree. Watching this gives me nostalgia for some reason, which I know is a weird thing to feel about watching someone upgrade their computer...
Crazy because I’m looking into getting a compsci degree as well and it feels like I’m experiencing exactly what you have.
When removing front bay blanking plates, it is a much safer idea to reach in whith a screw driver and tapping the handle to eject the plate. The metal tabs in those bays are very well suited to cutting through skin. 3 stiches was enough to teach me that lession, hopefully this comment can help others avoid such accidents.
I'm pretty sure some of 'em are in cahoots with razor blade manufacturers...
I've had a quick look through the comments and I don't think anyone has mentioned one point about this upgrade, When I added a USB3 card, similar to the one you used, to a 10 year-old Mesh computer, I noticed that the USB3 card was not recognised by the BIOS. The USB3 drivers were supplied by the operating system, Windows or Linux. If you regularly try out Linux distros by booting from USB drives you still need to use the USB2 ports. The same would apply to a Windows Recovery USB drive. You can use USB3 for creating the USB boot drive as you already have an Operating System running. Otherwise it's a very worthwhile addition and, as usual, your explanations were very clear.
I recently got hold of 4 Tyan m/b's dated back to 2008, with onboard Intel graphics, 2 pcie slots, 8 USB 2, 6 sata and with 2.6 gb dual core Pentium cpu's...I'm running SpaceEngine on one of those with a GTX 1050ti and 4gb ram. (not to mention the Kingston SSD) Needless to say, USB3 will be my next upgrade here, so thanks a lot for this timely bit on the subject Chris. 👍
Okay, now I'm jealous. Back in the day Tyan was my fave board. I still have several from the 440BX era. Super-stable and reliable.
@@Reziac It's amazing how far you can stretch old tech with a little upgrade here and there. I'm running 2020 software (games etc) on a 12 yr old board. (edit)Oh yes, it's a very stable board..👍
As you can see on the pcie card, the manufacturers provide a gap to get your cables under the card for a better cable management. I discovered that not so long ago and can be really useful in hard cable management situations :)
You can see the gap pretty well at 9:15
I didn't even notice that. Thanks for the tip!
I thought of that too. I still wonder if the cable length would be a bother in that situation.
@@NicolasChapadosGirard it depends on what cable you're trying to get through, in my case it works well to get my fan cables all the way to the plugs at the bottom of the motherboad!
i always used that gap for hd audio headers and the cpu power cable
@@virtualtools_3021 I guess it depends on where the CPU power connector is placed on the motherboard but often it's at the top. Wouldn't running it behind the motherboard be a more elegant solution? Although you may have to root it before installing the motherboard.
john lennon tech tips
Exactly！！
_I really liked the part where you explained how the older PCIe spec and chipsets curtail the speed of the USB 3.0 card!_
timestamps??
This is actual helpful stuff. You are showing useful information for a normal budget user instead of showing 64 core CPU benchmark score ;)
you would be amazed at how much power is packed on the P5K pro motherboard used with famous core2quad processors, just add up a pcie card for usb 3.1 and m.2 and over 15 yrs later it is a very solid build
First thing I always do after watching a video from the EC upgrade series is take the panel off my PC and see what PCI slots I have available.
Thank you Chris, informative as always, and thank you for including the Amazon links in the description.
These are so much easier to watch than those videos with cuts and hops and sound effects every five seconds.
Howdy from across the pond in Houston, Texas! I had been unsure if it was possible to install a 3.0 port on my old computer motherboard and also have ports on the front of my case. Your video answered every one of my questions flawlessly. The views you showed in your video were excellent and the description was "spot on". I really liked the honesty when you showed that you had to figure out how to reroute the cables. That has happened to me so many times. Throughout the years I have used TH-cam videos hundreds of times to do all sorts of repairs around my home and yours was one of the very best I have ever seen. Thank you very much for making this video. I wish you and your family a blessed life.
Thanks for this. Good luck with your PC upgrade.
Love your channel. Very well-planned and produced videos. The range of topics and the video lengths are appreciated. You hit the sweet spot in your level of technical explanation.
Thanks for your kind feedback, appreciated. :)
As a complete IT novice, it took me several weeks to find the courage to attempt to install the SSD I had already bought. I looked at many TH-cam videos but it was this one by Chris which finally enabled me to install the SSD. Everything is calmly explained with just a touch of humour and the various components and connections are shown so very clearly. I shall consider upgrading my usb slots next,
Many thanks indeed Chris. I shall recommend you to the Which magazine computer staff.
I have also become a big fan of the hook and loop fasteners for cable management as well. If you swap things out with any frequency at all the re-use ability is so nice.
Wow!!! How perfectly profesional your video is!! I stumbled upon your video as one-off event and I guess I may never have to visit your channel in future as I am an illiterate as far as computers are concerned. However, I subscribed to your channel only because of the perfect professionalism found in your video. Your hands and fingers move in perfect sync with your narration, as if you have already made rerecording and then proceeded merely to act out for video, which is highly unlikely when the narration explains things that one encounters only when doing live audio recording. . . And I am also spellbound by the minor details you cared to point out. Amazing! Keep up your good work. [I am from India and sorry for my English]
Thanks for this. But there is no narration here -- all audio is recorded live with the video.
I like your videos because they are real-world situations I've often had to deal with in friends and family computers. A lot of tech videos are only dealing with brand new hardware, perfect cable management, in cases that cost more than the entire computers some people have. I'm hardly ever dealing with brand new bleeding edge stuff- it's so often things like this- adding USB 3 to an old computer and dealing with 'how to get power to a new component" from some old PSU with all those red, black and yellow wires- NOT some nice modular 1000W PSU that's a week old! Anyway, thanks for a fun video on a real world upgrade!
Thanks for this post, it is great to get this kind of feedback. My experience is also that most people do not have the latest expensive hardware.
Just done this today with my 11 years old desktop at my workshop, now I can do backups with my external hard drive much much faster! 🤓👌🏻🔝
Great to hear! :)
"Bay Watch" ROTFL. Informative and entertaining as ever, Mr. Barnatt.
The show where "if it's jiggling, we need to tighten that part down". :D
:)
Always love a bit of 'Stanley, the knife, action, lol.
I think one of the things I appreciate the most about your videos is when you point out the limitations/pitfalls of undertaking something like this. For someone who does this professionally or as a hobbyist it might seem like a no-brainer, but for someone coming into this green that can be invaluable pointing out bottlenecks (such as the PCIe x1 1.0 on this rig) so they're not tempted to install the latest and greatest parts in a decade old machine. Thank you for the video!
Wow, there’s a lot of technical factors to take into consideration on a fairly simple project like this. Looking forward to your next video!
I did a similar upgrade on my computer about four years ago with 5 USB3.0 ports on the back and an AFT Pro-77U with 4 USB3.0, a CF card slot, a MS Card slot and a Micro SD slot. What a HUGE improvement in performance and versatility.
Another immensely useful and informative episode. Thank you, Chris!
Really excellent video, very educational. I learned a few things that I wish I knew about a month ago. No worries though, the idea that the usb 3.0 PCIe could have a internal hub and extra power to it for front ports when your Mother Board does not have usb 3.0 connectors. All so did not know about the PCIe 1.0 could be put on bigger PCI's, 4x 8x and 16x...wow...
Your motherboards controller has an internal hub, only the highest end expansion cards have actual multiple controllers per port.
@@churblefurbles very true, it's just that I get a lot of hand me downs and I fix them up and some times the front end ports and hubs on the boards don't always work. Or at least not at 2.0....so I get PCIe 1x attachments which work well on Linux without any additional firmware. I just didn't know there were ones that can connect from that to the front as well..
"Sometimes can be an absolute swine." Brilliant!!!!!
Im no computer guy and all the tutorials i watched never helpped. This video was amazing and explained everything very well. Thank you so much.
Just finished ripping down the kitchen
And now I shall chill back, watch and enjoy👍
Chris, you mention in the next video that you'll be upgrading the motherboard and CPU. I wonder if it's worth mentioning different upgrades that can be done, depending on a budget. For example:
- If strapped for cash, a CPU upgrade to a quad core chip for the existing motherboard could bring about excellent performance gains. A Core 2 Quad computer is still perfectly serviceable for most web browsing, email, and media playback needs.
- Upgrading the CPU and motherboard, but re-using the existing RAM
- Going all out and upgrading the CPU and motherboard with ones that will also require newer RAM (in this case DDR4).
- Adding other affordable upgrades as required for the users needs. For example, installing a graphics card would allow for things like 4K video playback, even on a machine this old, as the card would be doing hardware decoding.
Just food for thought anyhow. Great informative video as always!
Agreed -- there are many potential options. :)
Loved your Victorian "modesty" swimwear in the Bay Watch section - lol. Again clear and honest instructions and appraisal - thank you.
Best assembly close-ups I have ever seen, especially the screw retaining the PCI-E card!
A pleasure to watch, for the quality of the filming alone.
Thanks. :)
I can do with upgrading my laptop with a new battery, just recently I upgrade the memory to 12 gigabytes. Well worth the speed increase
I was thinking the same. And to replace the hard drive with an SSD.
I'm currently in the process of converting an old laptop into a portable Linux machine. Im currently upgrading ram to 16gb of ddr3 1666mHz, storage to a 250gb ssd, and making a bootable drive. Battery may see an upgrade, but the system already gets a good 6 hours away from the wall.
THIS is the upgrade my 10 y.o. i5 1st gen PC needs. I'm so glad you cladrified certain things like the on card power supply and the hardware limitations, but we need a video explaining the renameing of the USB protocol and how some companies may take advantage of this at the expense of their customers, by misleading them.
Thanks for all your effort. Stay safe
By episode six Chris will be saying, “Right, as you can see we’ve upgraded this 10 year old PC into an IBM Mira.”
Baah! I have a Radeon 9250 PCI in my first build a Socket 7 ;-P
@@jba2048 Yup! Socket 7! Look it up! 1.mover :-P
Yeah, well, OKAY! It is not my primary - in 2021. Happy?
Edit: all above x86 desktops < me.
nice meme
@@jba2048 Why the "< me" ..dunno should i've said Deep Blue to be cool?
@@jba2048 ..or maybe I'm to AMD CPU blind? (AMD ♥'er since the 486 DX2 66MHz!!) ...let's just HATE each other - INTEL™FAN-boi!
I did a very similar video 3 years ago with a very similar PCI-E card, only difference is my hard had 5 USB 3.0 ports.
These PCI-E cards are brilliant and after 3 years I can report it still works.
Great series BTW, enjoying these videos
Just came upon your channel. Excellent! The way you explain things can be easily understood by anyone. Very good! 10/10.
Thanks and welcome.
Glad I came across this, have been planning on doing this for awhile , good pointer on the molex power connector, wouldn't have thought of that.
I agree. Very crucial detail.
That's a spiffy update for an old piece of kit. Loved the "Real World" performance figures!
I like your videos because they are real-world situations I've often had to deal with in friends and family computers.
A nice cup of tea on a lovely sunday afternoon is best paired with a new ExplainingComputers video from Chris :-)
Greetings!
Was also drinking tea while enjoying the video :) Just seems to go together, eh?
a few years ago, when i was building a junkyard pc for my brother with LGA1156 platform, the mobo at the time was just right before the USB 3.0 tech. So i bought an Orico usb 3.0 expansion for 10$ from aliexpress. The expansion card is pretty solid especially the additional usb 3.0 front panel port suport besides the 2 rear ports.
I like how you throw in pieces about the various standards. I tend to forget about the importance of chipsets because it's not an everyday thought for us non builders. Spending that extra $ on a better motherboard at purchase can get you a few more years in this data hungry world, it's not all about what processor you get stuffed in there that makes it a relevant machine years down the road.
I remember watching a video years ago now, where you first purchased the front USB 3.0 bay. It was just after I built my first PC, so as soon as I finished watching the video I bought the exact same USB 3.0 front header, been using it everyday for years now and they really are a fantastic piece of kit!
I love the Old PC upgrade series. So helpful for those on a budget.
I love seeing it too even tho I've done such upgrades a hundred times. There's always one more little thing to learn in the process. Also, I hate seeing perfectly good hardware junked when it can be helped along a bit and still be useful.
I had to do this to an old low profile Sandy Bridge PC via a low profile PCI-E card. Very handy for external drives and external network adaptors.
Make sure that they have an external power connector as Chris has said.
Great series. Really looking forward to motherboard replacement episode. That’s one upgrade I have never tried and I am eager to hear Chris’s advice.
I just recently bought two USB 3.0 PCI-E x1 cards for my two older PCs. They are G31 and G41 boards. I had to fit on x16 slot as these boards do not have x1 slots (of course your PCI Express video helped me to understand that I can use x16 slot, Thanks a lot for that video 😊). The G31 one running Windows 8.1 (x86) and G41 one is running Windows 10 (x64). I have already installed the G31 board's card and it was just plug and play. It did not require any driver. Running just fine. Both of my cards have molex power connector.
Professor, I know you explained in the first video that a new graphics card and processor would imply a new Windows license. But I hope you can consider these upgrades just to see how much old hardware can still be renewed and rescued into a perfectly usable computing experience by today’s standards. We all should strive to get as much life as possible from our devices.
Actually, you can carry your windows licence through all a lot of upgrades, including motherboards, processors, graphic cars, etc. They just make it harder and harder for you. My last licence took half an hour on the phone with Microsoft employees to renew, but it was worth the effort. They gave me a whole new one, for free.
Windows is crazy. You'd think the product license should follow the CD. Meaning if you have 3 computers and bought windows 7 you own windows 7. Not 1 of your computers owns windows 7 until you upgrade it. Not that you couldnt just run a free linux build or run your wiindows without a loicense(it just annoys you about not having a loicense. Ive ran chopper windows builds without a loicense for years before without much issue) Anyway doesnt encourage anyone to really buy or use their product with that attitude. Some companies deserved to get chumped on. As in Someone is going to get ucked here so lets make sure its not me.
@@gantz4u never had original win and im happy with that. Im eastern european so i cant afford original one anyway.
@@mikes9753 Theyre $200 for a key here in the store. But somehow you can get a 10 yr old scrap top for that price with the latest windows installed with a key. Whoever is flipping those scrap tops I can gaurantee are not paying $200 for a key. I know someone who works for the government and he said "you paid for a key? I have 15 keys sitting right here. I would have given you one." the last time my hard drive died. I guess the state buys keys.
You are so convincing I am tempted to upgrade my current computers, which are relatively new but can always use more USB ports. Thanks for the inspiration.
Great Video: When you said about when to stop spending money on upgrading, it reminded me a bit of the episode that featured Triggers Broom in "Only Fools & Horses" :-)
That is the cleanest 10 year old PC I’ve ever seen. Cheers!
Loved the "Stanley of a knife " cameo😀
Even though it was a short cameo, he doesn't slack on his cutting edge method acting.
Nar it’s all about mr scissors ✂️ for me he’s a cut above the rest
... if I could just cut in for a second ...
Don’t forget Mr Scissors!!
I think Mr. Screwdriver as supporting lead adds a twist to the plot.
Take the precaution of checking that your expansion slots definitely are PCIe. Despite my machine being a little younger than Chris's, the slots are just PCI. I checked this out and found that it wasn't fast enough for USB3, and so unfortunately I was unable to carry out this upgrade.
Thank you Chris for another superb tutorial.
You are right -- very important to check you have PCIe slots first.
Chris, you are my favourite with a wicked dry sense of humour. I absolutely love this channel!
thank you for the good advice and sound realworld comparison.
esp SATA II and SATA III, with PCIe x1 to x16 with their gen evolution. so this was very uselful. Thankyou.
"Intense plug-in insertion action"
Darnit Mr. Barnatt xD
we all have a twisted mind don't we ? ^^
At the beginning I thought "I wonder what PCIe he's got my in this" and promptly answer it. Then I though "ho, then what impact would it have on the usb 3.0 speed" and we get this wonderfully demonstration.
I have to say I love the side by side comparison more than the one at the time and show differences after.
That's funny -- early on I'd think "I wonder if he's going to explain..." and that was the NEXT thing Chris mentioned. THREE TIMES! Great minds and all that. :D
Excellent episode. I’m continuing to upgrade my old Linux PC right along with you. Thanks
This video is also useful for people who just want to add some more USB
3.0 connections to their PC. The PCI USB 3.0 connector does show the
limitations of an older motherboard like this. But it is still a
noteworthy upgrade. (copy paste)
Didn't expect to see Bay Watch in this video. 👀
Unfortunately, this new hardware doesn't make it flop around when it's running.
😂
@@lastinline1958 The movie was entirely shot in slow motion.
When you told us about next week's upcoming video, I was reminded of "This, milord, is my family's axe. We have owned it for almost nine hundred years, see. Of course, sometimes it needed a new blade. And sometimes it has required a new handle, new designs on the metalwork, a little refreshing of the ornamentation ... but is this not the nine hundred-year-old axe of my family? And because it has changed gently over time, it is still a pretty good axe, y'know. Pretty good."
To be honest all of that single board computer videos was a bit overwhelming. I'm glad to see a balance between SBC and normal computer videos lately on this channel.
I'm glad you are happy, but nothing has changed with the balance -- I've been doing an SBC video just under every other week for five years! :)
Both are awesome !
This UPGRADE is awesome. I liked it a lot. Congratulations! I'm going to do it on an old PC I have at home to see the result. Excellent job tips.
Perfect technical practical that everybody can understand with smooth comments. Thx.🙏🇮🇳🙏
Like usual, I always find something useful to learn from your insights. Thank you for being clear and thorough in explaining the details of your given topic of the week.
This video series gives me hope in old pcs :)
Hopefully parts will be more affordable sometime in the future, and mobos not be as forgotten in spec lists >.>
Good clear explanations, reasonable measured pace, crystal-clear camera work, accurate and detailed.
An interesting comparison when you upgrade the board and processor would be power consumption of both old and new systems
I had the same thought! of course it would depend a lot on the choice of board and CPU. I have a couple different i7 that have almost the same performance and similar specs -- idling, the Dell uses about 40W and the Asus-based system uses about 140W.
I think it was really helpful to talk about where the bottlenecks lie in this upgrade. Wasn't where I thought it was going to be and that's interesting.
Production remains as always, intentional, clear and concise. Really gives me ideas on what I would want my own videos (one day) to look like.
Thank you for the video
I was also planning to add a new USB 3
Good job
The most important thing in a PC is the power supply. I have seen so many PC users upgrade their RAM, HDD, graphic card, CPU etc... and then the crappy $15 PSU which came with the PC decides to "blow up" and fry the motherboard and everything connected to it. If you decide to upgrade, even an older computer, *always* start with the power supply unit. It doesn't have to be a super fancy expensive thing, but at least go for a brand which is a 80 PLUS or better. Corsair, Seasonic, be quiet!, MSI and Cooler Master are great brands. You can find a really good Corsair PSU for $40-45 today. Your PC's power supply / PSU plays a big role in determining your system's reliability. The PSU's found in older HP, Dell, IBM, Fujitsu-Siemens, Lenovo desktops are junk. Replace them immediately - before they cause huge harm and give you a severe headache.
Just ordered the two usb components off Amazon from your Link. Good informative video.
Great to hear -- good luck with your upgrade.
I love watching explaining computers so much I mean it's fun and easygoing to watch
Huh. My computer at work, over the years I've also had it upgraded with more RAM, an SSD, and USB 3.0 ports. And it'll be 10 years old very soon (still has a sticker on it that says manufactured April 2011).
Still getting work done though, unlike so many of the Macs around the place that have had to be replaced. Hurray for non-upgradability! 🙄
Speaking of non-upgradability, I really hate how modern PC cases don't have 5.25" drive bays anymore, at least in the DIY market. Look case manufacturers, just because I don't use disc drives anymore doesn't mean I don't want 5.25" drive bays. I can stick other things in them, like the USB 3.0 front panel expansion as shown in this video, or small drawers to hold flash drives, or who know what else. A lot of options out there! Not when you have no bays, though. My case at home has built in USB 2.0 only, as well as Firewire and eSATA (it's a pretty old case). But it also has USB 3.0 type A and 3.1 type C thanks to 5.25" expansion bays. Also has side panel intake; forget about tempered glass, I want cooling for my graphics card!
Anyway I'm rambling a lot now. At least maybe the algorithm will like it...?
@ExplainingComputer
I bought a used Motherboard off of eBay and the USB 3.0 ports (only 2 on the back) started acting flaky!
I remembered this video and ordered a 4 port one and the 3 1/2 bay addon and the thing works great!
Thanks to your video my USB 3.0 is right as rain...
So thanks for the video Chris!
Thanks again!
LLAP
Great to hear about this. :)
It’s weird to think of a USB port being bottlenecked by PCIe of all things.
Even more fun when you realize many oems put in a pci-e 4x slot that was only wired for 1 or 2x!
I need to do the same to mine. I'm still upgrading the ancient thing. It recently got a SSD and the fastest CPU available(xeon w3580) for the board. Perfectly usable and comfortable to use today.
And after all these upgrades, don't we end up with the equivalent of Trigger's well maintained broom (Only Fools and Horses), where the broom is 20 years old with 17 new heads and 14 new handles! :)
Was thinking thes same, lol. I wonder if a new case and PSU comes after the motherboard and processor video. ;)
@@watsoft70 And just think. When you've finished the upgrade, you can build a new PC from all the old parts you now have, that looks remarkably similar to your old PC.
@@chrisg6597 I bet you'd soon be thinking about upgrading that one...you've done it before after all, lol.
@@watsoft70 ... well, actually, he’s gonna upgrade the CPU only, no motherboard swap mentioned.
Which is something I do quite often with Intel Core 2 Duo setups. The older E8500/E8600 used to be stupid-cheap.
Around Turkey-Day 2019 I got four E8600 off eBay for $10 shipped. Total. All four.
I haven’t bought any since PanDemic days, but prices on most used PC stuff on eBay has grown rocket engines... to the moon.
Certainly i didn't think of connectivity, usb 3.0 addition is absolute must i would say, great video 😁
A new CPU and motherboard? This upgrade path is all too familiar.
Me: I might upgrade my RAM
Also me: £800 later...
Well this will be like at the end just a case from original pc
Interesting. It’s pretty good to have these on a daily basis, especially with high speed drives becoming the standard
Next series: re-use old hardware (IDE hard disks and parallel printers) by downgrading modern pc's with PCIe cards.
One thing for sure, if you plug in more than one USB 3.0 devices into the card, you are going to have a much lower speed. This is because the bandwidth will be shared. Sadly, there is no USB 3.0 add-in card that support PCIe gen 4 yet. You will be severely limited if you populate many devices into the card and uses them all at once.
16:44 Would you get better results if you plug the card into an x4, x8, or x16 slot? That is, would all of the devices run faster sharing a faster bus?
@@dwmac2010 The card only has x1 connection, so it doesn't matter whether the port is x1 or x16 port, it will only use x1 PCIe lane. Unless the PCIe generation is 2 or 3, the card will be severely limited.
10:53 Chris said damn 😂
Went to rewatch this video to drop a like and say my thanks for the idea of using a USB 3 PCIE card. Thanks Chris!
The one I got a few months after this video for about ~8USD was very similar just without the additional molex power. Used to test if the USB ports of my daily driver computer that being a weird swine that's acting up in various ways and died recently, so I'm waiting for a new one.
The USB 3 card is now in my older pc that has only 4 USB ports at the back and that will probably be its home even if its communicating via PCIE 2.0 x1. I still have to get a front panel bay for easy access in the front because the internal USB 2 of the old pc can be weird at times and having USB 3 at the front is way more convenient than always going to the back of the pc.
Thanks for this. :)
Finally, been waiting for this, I may use this for my old pc
Another point on choosing a USB expansion card: are the ports horizontal or vertical? I've found that the vertical ports often don't leave enough room and require an extender cable for flash drives and other devices that are a tish wider than the ports. Similarly, horizontal ports can be set too close together, tho are less likely to interfere otherwise. But check for your usage before you install the card!
I like how that front drive bay mount is made so it can simultaneously support a 2.5" drive.
Put the velcro fuzzy side in to reduce both wear and dust collection.
That next upgrade is cheating. I know, having done much the same a time or two... still have parts in there from the original PC...
I had a stroke reading the USB names. They seriously need a re-rename.
It did go semi-ok until 3 ;-D
Frellin awesome, all the upgrades that you have done & are going to do are the exact same upgrades that i need to be doing....super uncanny.
Thank you Christopher, i didn't think that the USB 3 port upgrade would be included in this as i desperately need to replace or upgrade the front USB's as little children accidentally knocked mine and they have never been the same since, glad that replacing them is as simple as putting lego together.
Looking forward to the cpu & motherboard upgrade as this is something I am also looking to bring into the 21st century, not that my pc is old but this is why i had mine built to a specification in order to be able to upgrade, again thanks for your methodical walk through
One of the best channels overall in TH-cam
It's an amazing time we live in, that a decade old PC with minimal upgrades can be a capable modern computer
At this point, Chris *has* to be aware of the memefactor of some of his catchphrases. "I hope to talk to you again..... very.. soon..." It gets me laughing every time.
Also, cheers for this Chris, I've actually been wondering if I shouldn't upgrade with some USB3 ports. I even have PCIe 2.0, so should get a pretty good speed increase.
Very much looking forward to the next episode, hopefully to include the thought processes leading up to upgrade of the mobo and CPU. How to choose and whether to do it at all. Can't wait.
That's the plan!
Just got the notification, still 12 comments were already in.
Adding USB 3 hardware to old PC I certainly good choice; removes data transfer bottleneck.
...to old PC *is...
Nice vid. Well explained. I'm watching this series as recently had some issues with my pc, and I'm learning more about what happens "under the hood"
Thanks Peter. :)
What a coincidence. That's exactly the two items that I bought last week.
Your video quality is so good. When the screw was on the screen I actually looked in the corner because I thought the video was in 4K.
Thanks. :)
I see the notification, I happily click.
Excellent!
I enjoyed the video more than I thought I would. Who knew a USB retrofit could be so interesting? Now, I'm keen to learn what motherboard and CPU Chris will recommend. Oh, the suspense...
These series are great, I love restoring old hardware and give them a new life!
A simple upgrade but explained with excellent detail. Thanks for another great video.
This PC is turning into Trigger's broom😂
I was just thinking exactly the same thing 😂
Yep, and I'll bet that Roger is still using that same "new" broom in heaven. "Dave" told me.
Many thanks for all the information here. Upgrading to USB 3 is just what I have in mind for my old baby - i7 from about 2012 - and this video surely helps.
However, for the sake of folks new to this kind of tinkering, I think it will be good if you put some emphasis on taking anti-static precautions!