1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:04,800 Whenever you shop for electronics, it's pretty easy to get lost in a discombobulating vortex 2 00:00:04,800 --> 00:00:09,040 of numbers that manufacturers throw at you to try to entice you to buy their gadgets. 3 00:00:09,040 --> 00:00:14,600 Ah! But, there are some that are really just fluff you can more or less ignore. 4 00:00:14,600 --> 00:00:20,320 So what are they? Let's start out with one of the most common and most useless specifications you'll see. 5 00:00:20,320 --> 00:00:24,040 A CPU's clock speed, usually given in gigahertz. 6 00:00:24,040 --> 00:00:27,880 You'll see this as being one of the first things listed for most PCs that you buy, 7 00:00:27,880 --> 00:00:33,320 and it's very easy to think, hmm, more gigahertz equals faster computer! 8 00:00:33,320 --> 00:00:38,800 See here's the thing, you can't really compare clock speeds between different computers. 9 00:00:38,800 --> 00:00:42,720 Processors have all sorts of other differentiating factors that are more important, such as the 10 00:00:42,720 --> 00:00:50,800 specific micro-architecture they use. Each new generation of CPU's typically contains micro-architectural improvements in the silicon 11 00:00:50,800 --> 00:00:55,240 that can give you higher instructions per clock cycle, better branch prediction, and 12 00:00:55,240 --> 00:01:00,120 more power efficiency. All of which are more important than the raw number of gigahertz. 13 00:01:00,120 --> 00:01:04,200 Clock speeds only really matter when you compare chips with the same micro-architecture and 14 00:01:04,200 --> 00:01:08,640 the same number of cores. Otherwise, you're not going to want to fret over this too much, it's kind of like how 15 00:01:08,640 --> 00:01:13,440 a Kia Rio and an Aston Martin Vantage can both reach 100 miles per hour, but the Aston 16 00:01:13,440 --> 00:01:18,840 Martin is going to get up to speed much faster and be far more powerful and responsive. 17 00:01:18,840 --> 00:01:23,000 Next up, let's talk about those eye-popping speeds that SSD companies put on their product 18 00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:28,920 labels. It's easy these days to find SSDs that claim to give you speeds at or above 3,000 megabytes 19 00:01:28,920 --> 00:01:32,240 per second, but those figures can be misleading. 20 00:01:32,240 --> 00:01:36,560 And while it's true that the NVMe-based SSDs that boast this kind of performance are indeed 21 00:01:36,560 --> 00:01:40,920 faster across the board than their older SATA counterparts, it doesn't mean you can 22 00:01:40,920 --> 00:01:46,800 completely trust their numbers either. You see, there are two main issues with just looking at that spec. 23 00:01:46,800 --> 00:01:51,520 Those high megabytes per second numbers refer to sequential performance, meaning it's not 24 00:01:51,560 --> 00:01:55,280 a good metric of performance if you spend most of your time watching videos, working 25 00:01:55,280 --> 00:01:58,600 in Excel, or serving up spicy takes on Twitter. 26 00:01:58,600 --> 00:02:04,040 During typical, everyday use, the random performance, given in eye-ops, is more important, as you'll 27 00:02:04,040 --> 00:02:08,800 usually be accessing smaller pieces of information from different places on the drive than large 28 00:02:08,800 --> 00:02:12,960 sequential chunks of data located in a physically contiguous spot. 29 00:02:12,960 --> 00:02:16,800 But let's say, for the sake of argument, you do work with large amounts of sequential 30 00:02:16,800 --> 00:02:20,760 data because you're a video editor or some such thing. 31 00:02:20,800 --> 00:02:25,000 Even in this situation, the numbers on the spec sheet often aren't reliable. 32 00:02:25,000 --> 00:02:29,680 Many SSDs have a relatively small amount of fast cache that's used when you first start 33 00:02:29,680 --> 00:02:34,760 moving files around, but as time goes on, sometimes even after just a few seconds, speeds 34 00:02:34,760 --> 00:02:40,400 will drop off precipitously as the cache fills and the SSD starts using the slower portion 35 00:02:40,400 --> 00:02:46,200 of its flash memory. This isn't to say all SSD manufacturers are dishonest, but some of them will put down 36 00:02:46,200 --> 00:02:50,120 a speed that you'll only realistically get for a short period of time. 37 00:02:50,120 --> 00:02:54,360 So be sure to read independent reviews and see how long the SSD you're interested in 38 00:02:54,360 --> 00:02:58,880 can maintain performance at or near what it says on the spec sheet. 39 00:02:58,880 --> 00:03:02,600 Finally, let's touch on a common letdown if you're shopping for monitors. 40 00:03:02,600 --> 00:03:09,400 HDR support. HDR, or High Dynamic Range, is a set of standards that can give you better contrast and clearer 41 00:03:09,400 --> 00:03:14,440 colors. But a monitor simply saying it has HDR support doesn't tell you very much, since there are 42 00:03:14,440 --> 00:03:19,400 a lot of monitors out there that technically accept an HDR signal, but the picture ends 43 00:03:19,400 --> 00:03:23,760 up looking like absolute garbage when you turn it on. So why does this happen? 44 00:03:23,760 --> 00:03:28,720 The two primary culprits are when the monitor can't get bright enough, as adequate brightness 45 00:03:28,720 --> 00:03:33,640 is crucial for HDR to look correct, and when the monitor can't display a wide enough color 46 00:03:33,640 --> 00:03:38,720 gamut or give enough color accuracy to take full advantage of the HDR signal. 47 00:03:38,720 --> 00:03:43,520 So instead of jumping on a monitor just because it says it has HDR support, check its peak 48 00:03:43,520 --> 00:03:50,480 brightness rating. Something that's certified for VESA Display HDR 600 or higher should at least get adequately 49 00:03:50,480 --> 00:03:54,760 bright with Display HDR 1000 or higher being ideal. 50 00:03:54,760 --> 00:04:00,560 A monitor that can cover at least 90% of the DCI-P3 color gamut is probably also a decent 51 00:04:00,560 --> 00:04:05,560 bet. But if you really want to be sure, read reviews where an actual human being looked at the 52 00:04:05,560 --> 00:04:10,920 screen with HDR turned on. Are there specs that manufacturers push that frustrate you? 53 00:04:10,920 --> 00:04:15,040 Let us know what they are in the comments and we might talk about them in a future episode. 54 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:22,720 Talk about your frustrations. Woah, that was a tech wiki alright, thanks for watching guys, like the video, dislike 55 00:04:22,720 --> 00:04:26,160 the video, these are options available to you, check out our other videos and comment 56 00:04:26,160 --> 00:04:32,080 below with video suggestions. Oh and hey, don't forget to subscribe and follow, because that way, we know that you 57 00:04:32,080 --> 00:04:32,580 love us.