The Chicane Podcast
Welcome to the Chicane Podcast, keeping you up to date on everything sim racing. As we venture into this dynamic realm of esports and virtual racing, we'll be exploring a variety of topics, from the cutting-edge gear that's transforming the way we race to the newest games, hardware and software that are pushing the boundaries of what's possible in this virtual sport. We'll also be giving you an inside look into the lives of some of the top virtual racers in the world, through in-depth interviews that will give you a unique perspective on what it's like to compete at the highest level in this rapidly evolving eSport. So, buckle up and get ready for an unforgettable ride as we take you right into the cockpit of this exciting digital racing world.
The Chicane Podcast
Building a PC for Sim Racing in 2025
Unlock the secrets of optimal racecraft and discover how to overcome technical glitches in our latest Chicane Podcast episode. Featuring the return of Jeff Smart alongside hosts Jason Rivera and Eric Kelly, we dive headfirst into the thrilling world of sim racing. Despite feeling under the weather, the enthusiasm is contagious as we tackle the challenges Eric faced in his recent iRacing League experience, discussing how valuable community feedback can transform your racing game. From dealing with unexpected wheel disconnections to the joys of being part of a supportive league, we promise you'll walk away with practical tips and renewed motivation.
Journey with us through the intricacies of gaming setups that make every sim racing session an unforgettable experience. Whether you're curious about high-performance PCs or the latest in rig attachments, we've got insights that will pique your interest. Our conversation takes you through recent adventures in trophy trucks, rallycross, and NASCAR, sharing stories of camaraderie and excitement. As we reminisce about trying different racing classes and testing high-end cars, it's clear that the racing passion runs deep, bringing friends and family closer in shared adrenaline-filled moments.
If building a custom PC has always seemed daunting, we're here to change that perception. We break down the essentials of creating a powerful sim racing machine, emphasizing the benefits of custom builds over pre-built options. Learn why brands like AMD and NVIDIA are must-haves for performance enthusiasts and why tools like PC Part Picker are indispensable. We also explore the technical aspects of sim racing wheels, ensuring your setup is finely tuned for maximum immersion. So, buckle up and join us for an episode filled with expert insights, racing tales, and a shared love for pushing boundaries in the virtual racing world.
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The Hello and welcome to the Chicane Podcast, where we discuss all things in the sim racing world. I'm your host, jason Rivera, and I'm joined here by Mr Eric Kelly and Jeff Smart. Welcome back, jeff. How's everybody doing?
Jeff:Doing good man Doing good. I missed you guys, missed you guys. I missed the banger of an episode. So apologize to you, gentlemen, and I am ready to get back on the saddle or get back in the car here. All good man.
Jason:We had a good chat with Daniel.
Jeff:Dude. His stuff's awesome, so we.
Jason:Yeah, kills it. I mean I'm telling you the Chicane podcast friends list is growing, which is good. I mean I want everybody to stay tuned because you know we might do something for the summertime or we might do something for the end of the year, and I just want a room packed full of sim racers and creators and different views on things. And yeah, I mean it was fun. And, jeff, you know things come up. It's all good. We pulled through. As you can see, I'm not feeling too well and today was a long day. I'm not feeling too well and today was a long day. And then I got into the race, committed to the iRacing League and the Porsche and I'm completely I'm not feeling too good, but I'm going to do my part and do my best here on the show. Tanks on empty one fumes, basically. So announcements.
Erick:I appreciate the dedication man.
Jason:I appreciate you guys for being here and supporting me, so if I look a little weird, it's going around, so take care of yourselves out there. I know Eric came down on that. Last week he missed his race.
Erick:Rob Markman Jr. Yeah, I'm fresh off of it.
Jason:I know how you feel, man, rob Markman Jr, man yeah, so even if we're across the water, you know, say, breathing the same air, um, I guess some cleaner than others. Yeah, um, but how was your week? How was your week? Both of you, eric, jeff? What's going on?
Erick:uh, I'll, I'll go quickly. My week was great, um, you know, did you get to do a race earlier this week and it was a brutal race, um, not out of competition, but just learning curve for myself. You know, um still got a lot to learn as far as you know iRacing and some of the the rules and kind of just what to do when things aren't going right. But I'm still excited to learn um, and I appreciate the feedback.
Erick:And you know I was telling Vlad you know, in the racing league and I think his name is Thomas, the one of the stewards for the league I would, if this was just me racing by myself, I would just leave that situation not knowing what to do next time, not knowing the best path forward, and you know, just getting that feedback if something were to happen. I time, not knowing the best path forward and you know, just getting that feedback If something were to happen, I kind of know what the best, you know the best action to take is Like if your wheel disconnects mid-race, or you know you're in a race and you don't feel comfortable with the track, or you know you have some damage, or you know just all those race craft kind of things that just help you not ruin somebody else's race, that you don't really get feedback on when you're on GT seven or you're racing AI or something like that. So, um, I appreciate those guys in the league and the effort they put into try to make sure everybody's on the same page.
Jason:Yeah, they, they offered you um training, you know, and one-on-one sessions. And I'll say this for the wheel disconnecting. Any wheel that has LEDs on it doesn't have to have a screen. You want to put that on a powered USB. It's, you know. The computer just can't take it after a while. It can't handle that constant current of power draw depending on your brightness level. But you don't want to worry about that. You want to put it on power and give it more power than what it's drawing and it'll regulate itself. But if it doesn't have enough power, then those issues happen, they occur.
Erick:And so one more time for everybody and for me who's about to order this? Like damn near real time. What is the USB hub you suggest? The Sebrant?
Jason:The Sebrant.
Erick:That one.
Jason:Yeah, but for you I would do the 4. The 4 should be fine because you don't have that many devices yet and it's cool because the four always has. It's compact and it has a place that you can put near your rig, your rig. So if you want to put your computer to sleep instead of having to unplug the neo every time, you just press a button and it cuts the power so that's another plus.
Erick:So therefore, port has the the power button too yes, and I'll include that in the link.
Jason:Whoever wants to buy one they're not that bad they're like 20, yeah, yeah, no, zero kickbacks. Straight Amazon link yeah, but yeah, so I get it, and it's something you kind of had to go through to see why it's so important to have that.
Erick:Yeah, that's my first time having that happen and also I feel like just from my discussions before that'll probably address some of the other issues I must have with iRacing discussions before that'll probably address some of the other issues I must have with uh, iRacing, because some of it might have been connectivity like not network but some of the usbs kind of like falling off and reconnecting or something like that.
Jason:Well, you got to look at a pc as a more demanding platform than a console, because a console is designed to do one thing. Your pc is running, trading, paint, sim, hub, um, a lot of background stuff going on, so you want to keep it, you want to give it more power, so that way it doesn't have to worry. That's one less thing to worry about, that's all yeah, that makes sense.
Jeff:I see, and I see a nice little attachment to the rig there behind you. I haven't seen it, man. I've been out, mia, for a little bit.
Erick:Looks good, bud, oh yeah, man, that's courtesy of uh jeff verstappen over here looks good. I hope you like it about oh yeah, I got the buttons mapped on it. Um, I got a lovely uh dashboard running on it. Um, it's, it's been great man I'm, I'm getting more immersion freedom some buds on my wheel. Um it, it's been cool man. Yeah, I'm loving it, Excellent.
Jason:All right, jeff. What about you, man? It's been a while.
Jeff:Yeah, dude.
Jason:You kind of been MIA. I don't know. I don't know. I've been speculating. I saw something in the notes here. I can't wait.
Jeff:I've been driving everything. If there's a race for it, I've been driving it. I've been doing like trophy trucks, rally, cross, nascar trucks, oval, indy, dude. If there was a race I didn't get credit for like any of them because they're all like unranked races and I got to eventually just kind of like pick a couple and work through them, you know, get out of rookies in that class so you can like have real races, cause it's they're a mess and I'm part of the mess, cause, especially like trophy trucks, like you kind of need an e-brake, I imagine Right, and I don't. The stupidest thing of me was when I sold my previous gear, I included the shifter and the e-brake and I should have, should have kept it and just kept it off the rig.
Jason:Wait a minute.
Erick:Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
Jason:Here we go. You had a Fanatec chip.
Jeff:I did.
Jason:Yeah, oh, yeah, oh it wouldn't have worked, it wouldn't have worked. You would have to buy a $30 adapter, just for it to work which is kind of so you can get an E-brake bro.
Jeff:I've been in the market. I just got to press that button. Simshack, or SimShop, has a. I always call it SimShack for some. I apologize for that. Simshop has a killer deal on a one of their sequentials. So I'm like I got to just pull the trigger because I'm never going to get a deal.
Jason:So it's like 30% off.
Jeff:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jason:Is it the uh combination?
Jeff:uh h no I think it's just a straight. It's one of their nicer ones. It's got the led readout on it. I forget the model the q1 yeah uh, so it's q1 yeah, it's a solid one. I mean they got a killer deal. It's only like 30 bucks more than their. I say bottom of the line, their you know, entry level, I think is the right word they like to use.
Jason:That's a good one. That's better than mine, it's all metal, um, solid.
Jeff:So I'm just like, just do it, you know, cause it's, it's and I, and I'm in the market for uh, uh, I've reached out to a handful of people on Facebook marketplace for a real wheel, a round wheel, just so I can figure out what I like, size wise, before I you know if I'm going to get a nice one, um, cause I have another, uh, quick release that'll just jump right on there.
Jason:So, um, yeah, but dude 70, 70 millimeters.
Jeff:Yeah, I've just been driving everything.
Jason:Uh like.
Jeff:We have a family friend that's on the Island. Uh, this week, um, and the dude, um, different social economic status than I am, has he's got like a ferrari 430, uh, a viper. Oh, wow, you know like he's got. I don't know how I'm friends with him he's really my parents friends but neither here nor there, uh, so he was over the house last night and I I jumped in the ferrari, the viper that he has, and like I was cruising around monaco, you know, or the highways system in japan, you know that they have. And he thought, and like I was cruising around Monaco, you know, or the highways system in Japan, you know that they have, and he thought it was like the coolest thing ever. Uh, oh, yeah, he's about to get on one man, yeah, he's like oh man, it's got like the same thing here the stitching and I was like man that the only thing that kind of sucks is I love my wheel.
Jeff:I wouldn't trade my wheel for the world, but when we were in the Viper, it doesn't work. And when you're driving rallycross and you're like it just doesn't work You'll get smacked around by all the chunky grips.
Jason:Yeah, it's not going to work out.
Jeff:It'll hurt yourself man, I really just need to. You know it's going to be because, um, it's gonna be because you've seen, jason, you've seen my rig where I've kind of tried to almost make like the fuselage thing of the f1 car. So I'm gonna have to do a little bit kind of move away from there just because, dude, I, I don't know, I just wasn't doing anything. I wasn't doing anything great, but I was just having a good time just driving all different types of stuff.
Jason:That's why I took the. So there's a. There's a difference, right, cause I, and I'm speaking for myself, and now I'm speaking to you, cause I can. You can relate now. Well, if you want to drive different Sims, you have to give up some of the immersion to get the usability or the compatibility or whatever it is. I took the roof off my rig that I built completely, took it off and ever since I took it off, I'm happier Now. It looked cool and I could probably get some sick shots from it, but that's not all I do. You're finding out that formula is what your heart is, but it's not all you do.
Jeff:Yeah, it's cool. I think I did it once back when I first started iRacing a trophy truck, but I was like, man, this is like it's just fun. It's super fun, right, and that's I guess why we have these rigs is to blow off steam and have fun, right, you know, at the end of the day, so yeah, yeah, well, I mean, it depends, right, some, some are more competitive than others that's fair, but they're still having fun.
Jason:I get, I hope no, there, regardless, is it's always fun? It should be, and if you're not having fun, then something's wrong, something's really something's not right.
Erick:You got to figure it out. I don't know how you're not having fun.
Jason:Well, you cannot have fun by being uncomfortable or by getting pains where improper seating or being too hot in the rig or something that can ruin it. But you know, if everything is okay and your system is running and you're not having fun, then it's just simply not for you. I mean, I have no other way to. I can't say anything else. You know to say anything about that.
Erick:Yeah, it could be the case.
Jason:Yeah, you know, some people might think it looks cool and they try it, and maybe not. It's not for everybody. Um, a good majority love the hobby though I sure hope so yeah and your friend is going crazy yeah, and your friend that has these high-end vehicles and has a different status than than us. It, the hobby doesn't choose between. You know that. There's. How do I put this? You got joe rogan. You got cat williams that are millionaires and they have simulators when they can easily buy the same car. Dude he was-.
Jeff:And his wife stepped out and he's like hey, how much do I need to get one of these?
Jason:I don't know. Tell him to watch the show man. We covered basically everything here. I'm about to cover how to build the PC.
Erick:They gave it to me.
Jason:Yeah, so that's a good starting point for him it's cheaper than a viper or ferrari. Yeah, for sure and it keeps you out of trouble because you can afford it and you can drive it hard. But there's people out there watching you. Gotta be careful, you know and that applies to me too.
Jason:I have a, a heavy foot I've always had and this thing keeps me in check, because when I want to go really fast, I save it. I save that energy and come here and try to improve the immersion as much as I could to get that feedback, which costs money. That equals money. But if we're talking pound for pound, there's no comparison. You can, for the cost of one of those vehicles, you can build something crazy, you know what I mean for sure.
Jeff:Yeah, I was ripping around in like the sf, the super formula car, around spa with brake bound, you know, doing all the things, and he's like you can drive my cars anytime you want.
Jason:Yeah, I was like I don't have to replace a transmission.
Jeff:you know a differential any of that stuff, if I blow it here.
Jason:So Right, right, right. That's what's up, though. Good, I'm glad to hear. I'm glad to hear that. I'm glad to hear that because there's a lot of people asking about you, jeff, and GRL is trying to find a way to create a formula race. I just spoke with one of the admins just today no, just this morning, before I had my whole busy day today. I had a message and I was telling him that you're in Hawaii and that some hours of the day you can't make it. So they're trying to see for a way.
Jeff:Yeah, I mean I don't know if I told you this, jason, but I am officially getting out of the military now, so fixing to have some more time.
Jason:That's what's up, man.
Jeff:It is not easy to get out of the military. Nor is it quick. I'm like holy shit. So it's going to take some time.
Jason:It'll take a while but, there's a threshold.
Jeff:I'll be transitioning away from work time. Yeah, that's what I mean. Once you cross, that line.
Jason:it starts to go like this you know, and you start handing things off, and then you start going less and less until you don't go no more. You know what I?
Jeff:mean Guys. Now I just got to figure out what I want to do when I grow up and where I want to live and stuff yeah.
Jason:Yeah, all right. Well, this is a great life update.
Erick:I mean Definitely Congratulations. We've learned a lot here.
Jason:I'm just trying to get you to try the league, because everybody that has they're loving it, because everybody that has they're loving it. Mike from the Sim Racing Den has made it a permanent thing and that's a busy man too, very busy, and he's on there twice a week with me and we had some free coaching today from a pro driver teaching us. That's cool. He improved like a second off his lap time in less than five minutes. Yeah, and if you want to see that, if you don't believe me, not you guys, I know you guys. I hope you guys believe me, but anybody watching the show doesn't believe that. Go to my Twitch channel and watch today's stream, which would be a few days from now when you watch this.
Jeff:I mean, are you saying that Mike P had the time to be able to dock off? So just kidding Mike A little. Just kidding Mike, you're a friend of the show. Yeah, mike's cool, he's cool. I'm just giving him a hard time.
Jason:He's live on comms with me on the stream. You can hear him talking and he's. It's a great place now. There's rules, as Eric could tell you. There's some rules that you need to follow and they're serious about it because the experience is in a good, healthy state, because people follow the rules and because people are in line. So when those things happened, there was a rain of support come down on Eric. They were a little hard on him, but then after that it was a rain of support in the chat and calling him out by name, saying that we're here to support you If you want to do a one-on-one session, if you're not sure what to do, all the stuff. And this is a thousand percent free of cost, which is insane, I'm telling you man. So I'm telling you Jeff, until you, until you get on grid and you feel that pressure, and when there's 50 other cars on track and they're all and they're all talking, they're all talking, and they're all there and they're all fast.
Jason:You, you're, there is no slow, nobody, if anything. We're slow because we're new there, exactly, and you you do a decent lap time that you thought was decent, and you look up and you're like oh, that's not even yeah, that's, that's the worst feeling.
Jeff:That's the worst feeling I forget it was.
Jason:It wasn't this race, but I think the race or two races prior. One of the guys in there is like a 9 000 irony believable yeah 9 000 alien yeah, for sure and he would.
Jason:There's a lot of stories anyway. We could talk about this forever. I'll get right into it. Today I'm going to cover it's not going to be a crazy in-depth guide. If you guys want that, please let me know and I can make a super in-depth guide and talk to you about cores, cache and frequencies what do those mean? And overclocking, frequencies what do those mean? And overclocking.
Jason:But for those people that are just looking to upgrade, or they got a PC that was handed down and they want to add some parts, or you're brand new and you want to see how much money can I spend and how much performance can I get? Can I spend and how much performance can I get? So my personal opinion with building a PC the PC is the brains of everything. It has a motherboard which. The motherboard controls your wheel, it controls your pedals, it controls everything that's connected to that device. If it's on a hub, that hub is going to the motherboard. You know what I mean. And that motherboard needs how do you say this? It's always better to go with a mid-range to a high because of the cost of a PC these days, and if you go too low then you'll find yourself spending more in the long run trying to upgrade that low end and keep it fresh, because the more devices you add to a computer, the more software that you run in the background, depending on the SIM that you're running, depending on the mods that you have installed. Windows is another mess. It's a terrible OS and everybody knows it, and when there's an update you're praying that things don't break with it. You know what I mean, and it happens quite often. I mean they've been getting better at it lately.
Jason:I don't want to speak too soon, but I'm going to present today two options, and the first option again. I'm going to keep this very simple. The first option is NZXT and NZXT. If you Google NZXT right now, they have a bad reputation. They do they have a bad reputation. They do they have a bad reputation because of a subscription model that they're trying to charge people for PC gamers. There's a lot of controversy around that. But we're not talking about their subscription model. I'm talking about buying from them because one you don't have to build the PC. If you're not comfortable, they will build it for you. It's a flat rate of $100, but it's $100 of a two-year guarantee of their workmanship.
Jason:And here's the thing with NZXT. The prices are retail. There is no markup. That is the one thing about them. So if you happen to find a 9800 X3D, that's what I have back here and I paid $400 for it. If you go on the street, a 9800 was going for like 800, 900 because of scalpers. Nzxt protects you from the scalpers and they didn't reach out. I'm not a partner, I'm nothing. I'm just. I am the host of this show and I'm trying to save you money. I'm trying to. I'm going to encourage you to spend a little, but in the long run, you're going to thank me later, you're going to thank me.
Jeff:You pointed me over there to them and I built a PC with some of your help and it was like three days later, this box sitting at my doorstep, yeah, and I could nothing but good things to say about them over there.
Jason:And that's us being in Hawaii.
Jeff:Yeah, Super fast shipping and I was like this thing's going to come in a million pieces.
Jason:It came literally over the weekend. You hit buy Monday morning PC's built. What do you do? You plug it in. There is no. What you call this.
Jason:Well there's the window set up. You got to sign in like any other person would sign in. But you're ready to go racing and I recommend that route because PC building is not hard. You can YouTube it and you can find the guide on where to put parts. But if you're not comfortable touching parts or handling these pieces, they got you, they got professionals that are working there. They do a nice clean cable management.
Erick:Jeff could tell you a million bucks, yeah, so how are they making money?
Jason:because that's crazy, I'm just, I'm just about to show you, bro, right now look I'm just saying because the $100 flat fee for assembling your computer are these like?
Erick:are you just picking the parts and you tell them to put it in? And I guess, if you're, professional.
Jeff:So, it's like you click on something and then like the PC, the box, whatever the hell it's called, and it'll tell you, like what fits in there, what you can select. Oh, if you want that, you got to go change this, yeah.
Jason:I'm going to go through that right now, gentlemen.
Jeff:Get it.
Jason:And one thing I recommend is don't buy pre-built PCs that is the biggest scam and stay away from refurbished, because we don't want anything used who knows what's wrong with it and we don't want subscriptions, because I have too many subscriptions already. Well, nevermind, no, we're not even going to go there, don't even bother dude. So like, for example, if I go to, let's see, it looks different on the see. These are the pre-built custom PCs. Right, look how easy this is, guys. Customize a PC Now. This is a very important screen. This will give you an example of how many FPS you'll get. We don't care about these. We're sim racers. We do care about 1440p gaming Recommend and we do care about the chipset being AMD, because AMD is king and they've been king for five years and they're still the king. So sorry for you Intel fanboys out there you can come and get me yeah, you can come and get me.
Jason:Yeah, you can come and attack, I'm ready.
Erick:We're down that hill right now.
Jason:So AMD, right, let's say, let's start with the 1500, build the budget. But I'm going to show you a trick or two. But I'm going to show you a trick or two. So here it is, loading, yep. So I'm going to give you guys a rundown. It comes with an eight seven flow. Um, I don't know what's wrong with this. Okay, there it is. So software do you need Windows Pro? The answer is no. You don't need Windows Pro for gaming. Now, if your productivity, if you want to use the PC for like work and gaming, then get the pro license. It's an extra $30. Okay, so the tower. You can save a little money by dumping down the tower. But I also I always recommend a tower that has many fans, so that way you don't have to put fans later. You know what I mean. Like this right here has. Well, I would have to go, I would have. You can select the color too. You can look. Eric, you like white builds? That would have been the one for you right here.
Erick:Yes, sir, I saw that motherboard. I was tempted.
Jason:So I don't want to go into detail, right, but what you could basically do is you can search up each tower and see what they come with. Rgb there's higher tiers. Well, right now I'm trying to save you money. This is kind of like does it matter? No, it doesn't really matter. We don't see the tower. If you're going for a triple screen, you don't really see the tower. And even if you do, it's a novelty, I will say it. It's a beautiful thing to look at. But when you're racing, you're not looking at the PC, you're looking at the. You're down range, you're down on the track. So I wouldn't worry about RGB because you're just paying more for looks. Now here's where it gets interesting Cooling.
Jason:I always recommend something that has see. All of these are RGB because they're trying to push you onto the RGB, but I would always recommend because cooling is one of the most important things. I would compare the difference between these two and let's say I'll go with this. Why? Because there's no. Honestly, water cooled is the way to go. Liquid cooling is the most efficient and it's quiet. You know what I mean. It has fans, but it's quiet. You can also add more fans, but more on that later.
Jason:So your motherboard that's the motherboard I have right here, the 870. So the motherboard depends on the chipset that you want to put in. So before you select the motherboard, I would go down to this right here. Cpu and, to keep it simple, right, anything that has a 3D clock is always going to be faster for gaming because it has a separate core dedicated for gaming. So it's always going to be. Then the X series. The X series is more geared towards productivity users. Even if it's clocked higher, I will take this chip and overclock it and it'll beat this chip to death if that's what I have the 7800 3dx nice, that's a great processor, right?
Jason:so now, with these are these are grayed out because this motherboard doesn't support that chip. So if want, you would have to look at basically the differences. Right, this is a 200 plus 290. You save money. I mean, you spend a little more money, but you got to look at what you're getting. This probably has Wi-Fi 7. This probably has more slots. This probably has. They all support the current gen. See any 9,000 series. Right now, even the 7,000s are AM5, and that is the current gen of today. So you would be good with that. So just to keep it simple again, I don't want to go into detail, I'll be here all night, so I would have to look at, let me see. So here you got RAM capacity and the highest RAM speed with a 5200. Now let's compare. If I pay an extra 290, what am I getting? Okay, their website is kind of okay, a little slow. So here it is.
Jason:Wi-fi is engineered. Let me see 9,000 series processor, pcie 5. So PCIe 5 and Wi-Fi 7, as predicted. Look, called it. Pcie 5 is a 50 series gpu ready. The 550 90. You'll be able to maximize performance on this. Um, sir, usb 4 is really fast. Usb ports. Um, most sim racing gear uses USB. Two is so. You know, the thing about sim gear is the power power, power consumption. But look at the RAM capacity, ram speed. So it just depends an AM5, as predicted. There it is AM5 socket, so will I. I would spend the extra money on this, why? Because it's future-proofing. Wi-fi 7 is actually the current and there's not many routers that support it yet, but that doesn't mean it can't do Wi-Fi 6 or 5 or so on and so forth. So if I pick this motherboard and of course there's a lot that goes into this, like how many USB ports I'm just trying to shorten it so that way you guys can see, kind of get an idea right, kind of get an idea right. So now, hmm, so these might be.
Jeff:Let me see something let's see it's grayed out for some could it be that they're out of stock it could be.
Jason:it could be it should support that chipset yeah because it's supporting the new 9700 series. Yeah, all of these are the same. It should be the same socket size. It might be out of stock, but right here, your GPU. Skipping over to your GPU, I mean your options. Look, you got a 4090 triple fan.
Jeff:That's a tall drink of water, baby.
Jason:We got to check retail pricing on that Just to make sure. I'm pretty sure they're supposed to sell at retail.
Jeff:You have the 4070 Ti above it. That's what I'm running.
Jason:So this, for this price, is not worth it. Hands down. I'll tell you now it's not worth it. So let's say you did get a 4070 Ti. You said a Ti.
Jeff:Yeah, that one. I don't think they're.
Jason:It's not available. It's like grayed out for me for whatever reason.
Jason:It's like grayed out for me, for whatever reason. So here you can see the TDP approximate and the clock speed and everything else. You want to do research, you want to watch reviews, you want to Google all of this. You want to go on YouTube and see, just Google the name of the graphics card and check out performance. But usually a 4070 is pretty damn good. So, as you can see this price jump, we're at 2300 and I'm not even done with power supplies and RAM. It looks like they're low on stock. It's probably because of this President's Day sale that they got going on.
Jeff:Yeah, I did see that.
Jason:Yeah, and that's at the time of this recording guys, so maybe come back and check this out. Um, yeah, I would not buy anything under a seven, anything under an 850 at this point. I would try and get yourself a thousand watt, um, which is upgraded to that same power supply to 850 um in white oh, this one okay yeah yeah, so there's your ram and it supports it.
Jason:So supports up to 8 000. You can also get this one, but honestly, just look at ram timings, which is another conversation, a totally different conversation, with RAM timings and all kinds of stuff. Ssd oh, they're like really low on stock.
Jeff:Yeah.
Jason:Really low. So let me go back, and I'm doing this real time with you guys. I didn't plan this. Let me look at a high build just to see.
Erick:Or maybe those parts are compatible but they exceed the budget. Maybe that's why they're grayed out.
Jason:Yeah, but even if you pick that higher budget, you can manipulate this still and make it your own and take off money here and there.
Jeff:Yeah, because that's what I did. I was like you know.
Jason:Yeah, they're not in stock is what it is oh, okay yeah but it's a super, super useful tool.
Jeff:To your point, jason over, like you know, trade off here to add more there, right and real-time pricing. It just, it just is super easy. And then it just shows it. Like me I'm, some are into the PC building that is right over my head. Just show up, I want to plug it in, I want to go.
Jason:Yeah, and then you have, like, today's recording is the 13th, so in five days that this thing will be shipped exactly how you want it, exactly how you customized it, all right. So I'm going to look at another tool, and this one is going to be more geared toward you people that want to custom build, that have a little more hands-on approach. So I think it's a tool that Eric likes. So I think it's a tool that Eric likes.
Erick:I'm pretty sure he he visited this website before.
Jason:Oh yeah, so this is pc park picker right now. Look how cool this is. It already gives me a link to this build so I can share what I'm building to you right away and you can open it and see what I did. So let's say I wanted a CPU and let's say I want that 7800X 3D and it costs $49.99. You see the difference in pricing. It's way higher. So let's do that. And then I go and I think, yeah, so this will automatically tell you what motherboard that chip is compatible with. So let's say you had a motherboard and you typed it up in here, you could see what socket if it works, you can see the form factor, which is a huge thing, and the AM5, right, am5 socket should be all of them because of that CPU that I chose. So this is just I mean it's a quick thing.
Jason:I wanted to show you guys on how to you know different options and tools for you to build your first PC. Again, I would to recap this I would stay away from pre-builds, because pre-builds are going to sell you something that you may not want, right? There's going to be a part in there that's going to be like okay, I guess I'll accept that part. It's not like NZXT, which I can see if it has parts that work for my situation, or if you have a PC and you want to upgrade it and you're not sure if a part is compatible. I didn't show you, guys, but PC Part Picker will also total out the amount of wattage that your PC is projected to pull, which is a huge thing. But I will say this the higher you go, the better off you'll be, because you don't want to push 750 watts on a 850 CPU. You're choking it to death. Essentially, it's working at full capacity, max load, and if anything spikes, anything happens, it could be a problem. So I'm just I know this guide is more geared to the very beginner that doesn't really know about pc components and parts.
Jason:Um, and once yeah, and once something that, hey, I want a sim race and I want to. I want a sim race right now and I want to just hit buy and it come here. Because, honestly, bro, building a rig, putting it together, then you have a PC with a million parts on your table. Then you got to build that. Some people like it, some people don't. Some people have the time to do that too. I mean, honestly, those are two good tools to look out for and catch a sale. I know, probably by the end of this recording, by the time excuse me, by the time this recording airs, that sale might be gone, but it's not the only sale. I purchased during Black Friday and they had very good discounts and it'll total out at the end and give you a final price and then you can compare those parts to the market. You can also use it as a tool. You can take those parts, see where the market compares to and if it's cheaper to go that route and have them build it for you, then by all means. That's why I had it pre-built. That's one of the reasons I wanted a 9800X3D and I wanted it now and it was sold out everywhere and they had it at MSRP. So, yeah, that's my take on PCs. Honestly, any decent motherboard in 2025 is going to be good.
Jason:Any brands I recommend, I guess? Well, msi is a great brand I like. Rog is a great brand. Nvidia is a great brand. Amd, so that's 90% of your computer built already. Um, yeah, and NZXT coolers, because that's what they're known for. That's what they started out doing was cases and and AIOs. You know all in one coolers. So they're coolers. I trust them, you. You know this is my second NZXT build and not a single issue. And I think Jeff has one and I don't think he's had a problem with it either.
Jason:Nope, nothing, I shouldn't say it, set it down yeah.
Jeff:This is me knocking on wood.
Jason:You know other than Windows and NVIDIA Surround, but that's any PC you build, I have the same issues.
Jeff:Can't get away from that and NVIDIA surround, but that's any PC you build, I have the same issues.
Jason:Can't get away from that. Yeah, it's getting better. It's getting better.
Jeff:Don't let them off the hook.
Jason:I know I'm trying to stay a little positivity on the show. If it's not EA, it's freaking NVIDIA.
Erick:If it's not NVIDIA, it's I don't know bro, yeah, man, yeah, I'll say, uh, that um nzxt site is dope. Because even with me, like I've worked with computers for like almost 20 years and know my way around them pretty well and went on pc part picker, pick my stuff, and if you're familiar with building computers but it's not your job every day, you know it's maybe a couple years since you built one um it. It gives you a little bit of peace of mind. But even once you get the parts at home, it's still yeah, I mean, especially if you're doing like the rgb route and you know I got a ao that has a display on it and all this stuff it's. There's a couple more things to plug up and connect and configure than you might've, you know, done in the past. But, um right, I haven't for a hundred bucks, like I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna lie. It took me about two, three days to build my PC and get everything plugged up, configured, working.
Erick:That's with me being fairly expert level Just having the case taking the motherboard out the box. If you don't do that every day, you're going to have to look up stuff and double check.
Jason:You're going to have to stop and check to see if this goes plugged in here.
Jeff:If that goes plugged in here, so I will say this I'd still be there putting my thing together.
Jason:So put it this way you bought parts from Amazon or PC part picker.
Erick:Yeah, I bought it from Amazon.
Jason:All those parts. Most of them have a warranty.
Erick:Rob Markman. Oh, all of mine, yeah.
Jason:Rob Markman, Motherboards usually come with a five-year warranty, usually, depending if you go with a name brand like the ones I mentioned. However, those are how do you say this? A manufacturer defect. But if you installed the part and you snapped the pin, you dropped it. Something happened to it, Rob.
Jeff:Markman Jr. That's not you.
Jason:Rob Markman Jr. That's not you that came that way. Rob Markman Jr. Yeah, you buy something from NZXT. They're guaranteeing the entire PC for the cost that's how I look at it For the cost of $100. You buy a TV today in Best Buy that costs two grand, which is about the same amount of money we're talking about, and they're going to charge you $200 or $300 to insure that TV for three years. Am I wrong? Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Jason:So, NZXT is charging you $100 to ship an item that's shipped, built and guaranteed for two years. You can't beat that. You can't beat it.
Erick:You will not beat it.
Jason:Yeah, Just make sure that you compare, though. You compare prices and you, how do you say this? Watch the market and don't rush into a PC build either. If you're not sure about it. Do the research. Don't just buy it because it looks cool. Do your research and don't look at raw numbers.
Jason:I know what we displayed is because I'm on a time limit here on the show, but I'm just trying to present a tool that you can use. Whether you decide to buy from them or not, it's still a good indicator on, well, how much would this cost? Because a lot of people have that question how much should I spend? You know what I mean, and it depends what kind of build you're looking for. But I recommend at least stay on the current gen, AM5 gen. Do not buy anything older than that. And for GPUs, I would recommend you stay on the 40 series. The 30 series is already sunsetting. The 20 series. Man, I feel bad. I feel for you. I feel for you. It's about to go down in history. Unless you're running a single screen and you want to turn the graphics way down, then it depends. Well, what are your priorities? What do you want? Do you want immersion, or do you want both immersion and performance. That's something to think about.
Erick:Yeah, like we say cry once, buy once, save up, get a 40 series, specifically because it is kind of being grandfathered into some of the newest NVIDIA tech that they came out with.
Jason:The DLSS.
Erick:It'll support a lot of the same features that the 50 series card will support, and also the 50 series just in raw power. Isn't that big of a jump of the same uh features that the 50 series card will support, and also the 50 series just in raw power. Isn't that big of a jump over the 40 either?
Jason:so right, we we lightly touched and that's why we're doing this one, because you know it was a good little segment and I just figured, well, let's piggyback off that because, um, yeah, it's trying to. You may look at it like an expense, like insane, but you can easily if a PC like kind of the ones that they're trying to sell you, that's a good five or six years of service and when you want to upgrade it you don't really have to change much out of it. You know what I mean. Hopefully, hopefully, but anyway, and they hold their value too. When you buy brand name stuff they always hold their value. I was able to sell my PC. I got it. I got like $1,500 back, oh yeah, so I mean there's always people looking to buy something and if you take care of your stuff and you buy quality parts, the better off you'll be in the long run.
Erick:For sure.
Jason:And I can't believe I made through that, because I you powered through man. I know it's just exciting to talk about hardware. I don't want to go into depth, but if you guys have questions, send us an email. I'll give you the facts on stuff if you need them. If you need me to or any of the guys here, they can chime in.
Erick:Yeah sure, definitely. I'll give you a rest, jason. You need them. If you need me to, or any of the guys here, they can chime in. Yeah sure, definitely, but uh, but I'll give you a rest, jason. I'm gonna go into uh, into my topic here, and this is one that I've seen and I've been answering as many questions as I can in, you know, facebook groups and discords, but if, and I'm gonna have- to unplug it just because it doesn't.
Erick:It only works if it's plugged into the ps5, which is kind of stuck over there. But if you're not familiar with this device, this is the sigma cortex converter. So this puppy right here is what allows you to use sim magic. Uh, gear pedals, wheels, handbrakes, shifters, all that stuff on your PS5. And we had someone reach out.
Jason:It looks slick, dude. I didn't think it was that small.
Erick:Yeah, it's a. Now, you know.
Jeff:It's a chunky guy. Yeah, it's got a little girth to it, if you will.
Erick:Yeah, yeah, there's a little girth there going on there, but it's not that bad, you know yeah, it's, it's chunky and just for for context like this, is it next to like a ps5 controller, if I don't knock my setup over, but yeah, that's not bad yeah, not too big.
Erick:Um, it does have a type c port and it comes with all the cables you need and it has a four port hub on the top. Nice, okay, focus, yeah, so it's really compact, well built Aluminum, has a display that when you plug it in it'll light up. Like I said, my PS five's over there. But I'm gonna go through my settings in response to an email that we got requesting that you know just kind of want to know what my settings are, that you know just kind of want to know what my settings are. And I'm going to head the gentleman's name here here, second, uh, mr josh barnett, and uh, actually he's in alabama as well.
Jason:so that's pretty cool, um, yeah yeah, man, there's a lot of people that stood up when you said alabama yeah, man, it's.
Erick:You know I ain't gonna get into the real time conversation. I'm not a. Do not come for me, all right, I support the school. They got my money, it wasn't oh no, oh no, you know that's not who I support, but I'm gonna plug this in and I'm gonna go through the settings here for a second okay, that's cool man so so this will be yeah, sure go.
Jason:This is real quick. I mean, eric bought this out of pure faith. I told him there's a converter, it may or may not work and he became like a-.
Jeff:Legend.
Jason:Like a SME, a subject matter expert.
Jeff:I remember.
Jason:People pinging him and messaging him on Discord. You guys need to pay attention.
Jeff:I remember when you posted on I forget which Facebook group it was, but like the comments in, there were gold. They're like the hero we didn't know we needed, but all wanted. You know, it was like.
Jason:Yeah, that was cool, man oh shit, that was awesome.
Erick:Yeah, because it was because you know Jason and cool man oh shit, that was awesome. Yeah, because it was Because Jason and Jeff, you might be this way as well, but when we kind of get a hold of something, we turn over every rock.
Jason:Oh yeah.
Erick:Pebble. Oh yeah, we're searching something we're digging.
Jason:I click on every single tab.
Erick:Every tab. I'm reading the manual, I'm looking online, I download it to me, looking at it, just so I kind of have idea of what I'm, you know what I'm getting. And there wasn't a lot of. There were like pieces of information in separate places, but there wasn't like one place where they kind of addressed because it's not, you know, it's not native, so it's about 95 percent plug and play, just being transparent, and if you are racing anything other than gt7, I think that was really their focus. Um, which makes sense.
Erick:That's by far the largest um yeah, yeah on playstation um based on which build you're running it works with.
Jason:That's the best racing game on ps5.
Erick:I'm sorry oh, yeah, yeah and community wise. I mean, we got a set of course of there, but it it's yeah, so the force force feedback on the set, of course, is better than gt7, like by far yeah, I'm.
Jason:I'm just saying you don't have access to the multiplayer servers, so it automatically kind of closes the community on PS5.
Erick:Yeah, because you're stuck playing just PS5. People, which is not that many on HTC.
Jason:Yeah, and good luck getting a clean race in there too.
Erick:I got in there, man, it took me back to our Xbox days. People were talking crazy and stuff. I'm like is this Call of Duty? Of course? What's going on here? Man, it was crazy, but yeah, it's a lifesaver. It really gives you some other options, because I know we talked about some of the options that are out there for console play, logitech, and you know it just gives you access to another ecosystem and so just kind of I'm going to have to be a little awkward here, but to go through it gives you several different options. So pretty much all the options you have.
Erick:If you're running the software you can do your total force, and I just read the option and the percentage I'm running. So for total force, I'm running 75%. I'm on the SimMagic Alpha, so 15-newton-meter wheelbase, total force 75%. Max torque is 80%. Wheel return speed is 20%. Smoothness is at a 4. Return speed is 20%, smoothness is at a four. And for GT seven they do something weird with the um, the steering angle. They do some sort of like calculation based on the car you're in. So even if you set it at, you know, 600 based on the car you're in, it'll automatically kind of adjust it. So right now I have mine at 600, but that was to match up with the Ferrari I was driving here most recently.
Jason:Which is weird, that's so weird.
Erick:So I'll have to bump that up and bump it down, like in formula cars. Nothing I do. I can get it to be one-to-one with Not even 360?
Jason:Because usually 360 is a formula. Formula is kind of just one turn, like that. It won't go further than that.
Erick:Rob Markman. Yeah, I can try it again, but Rob Markman. That's why the wheel is so small, rob Markman, because Rob Markman, and that's the reason why it kind of sucks, because I'm having to move a lot more and the person in the you know in the car is barely turning and so I'm losing, I'm having to go hand over hand and stuff. But yeah, that's the only car I found that's kind of weird in gt7 and it might be a cortex thing.
Jason:But I'll follow up with you, I'll come down to 360 and see if that it also depends on the type of wheel you're using too. If you're like a round wheel, then yeah well I'm a neo guy so if you got a neo, then yeah, you can, you can, you can get away with using that for formula and you can get away if slightly larger.
Erick:I know it's bigger.
Jason:Yeah, yes, slightly though not by a lot, you know it's still 300. I mean formula is like 275 in real life or 280 yeah okay, because they keep changing them, or the cars change and the wheels kind of. But if you look at jeff, could probably definitely talk about this. This is his realm, um, but if you look at the fuselage, there's no room, bro, like the fuselage is, literally it's when they shave the fuselage, so there's no room, bro, the fuselage is literally.
Jeff:It's when they shave the fuselage so they can get their hand through.
Jason:Any false movement and you're hitting the. It's wild, the metal, solid metal or whatever it is Carbon fiber yeah.
Erick:That shit is freaking huge.
Jason:It's curved to their. So there is no back and forth in a formula. The seating position, that's your car, molded to your ass.
Jeff:Yeah.
Erick:So I'm definitely way out of spec when it comes to driving and stuff.
Jason:And it makes sense, right? Because a GT style you're upright. There's more freedom to do this with your arms. They don't have that option. These guys are laying down. So you see my arms. The way they're bent is a little bit more, bit more. I'm exaggerating, but you know what I mean. Car needs to be able to steer this occasionally.
Jeff:Yeah, yeah, unless you're lance stroll unless you're stroll or fernando.
Jason:That doesn't give a shit. That's why I love him. He doesn't give a shit. There was a meme. I'm sorry I had to put this out, but there was a meme. He was like uh, fernando, what tire do you want to put on next? He's like I don't know, you pick the tire, I drive the car. I drive the car.
Jeff:He saw that, bro he's such a driver's driver right, he's like just put something on there, I'll rip.
Jason:I'll drive the hell out of it.
Erick:difference that's hilarious. Hey, that's the driver, though man yeah, I'm gonna drive whatever it is. I'm gonna drive the hell out of it, so it don't matter you don't have to be there.
Jason:Lonzalo's a billionaire. He, he's good oh those are the. Those are the worst type of guys to work around yeah, yeah somebody that ain't got to be there he's in his 40s, he ain't got to be there he can retire tomorrow yeah, I can't wait till I get to that point, just for some shit to do.
Jeff:Just for some shit to do.
Erick:Y'all going to hate me. I'm not doing nothing I want to do. Anybody say something crazy. I'm meeting you right there with it, yeah.
Jason:Man.
Erick:That's hilarious man. But just wrapping up the settings, like I said, the wheel angle limit, that's your steering angle, that's just what they call it in here. Mechanical spring we're running zero. Mechanical damper 25. Mechanical friction is 20. Mechanical inertia, central damper, are both at zero. Feedback detail I have at nine. Feedback frequency is zero. Uh, feedback detail I have at nine. Feedback frequency is zero. And then for game spring, game damper, game friction and game inertia are all at 100.
Erick:And then for soft lock strength, I have it at default and they have some other um kind of specific options on here, like radio channel, like you can set up different channels with sets of options that you can cycle through, memory slots where you can save your settings, reset slots, and then you can do your center calibration, which you know on the sim magic deal. They do it automatically. You don't have to worry about that. But um, one important piece is make sure you plug your steering wheel separately into your PC, update the firmware on that, plug your wheelbase in and set the torque to 100 in the wheelbase in the software, so that way when you're adjusting this guy, the wheelbase is basically operating with the full 15 newton meters and not anything less. Um, and they make sure just keeping everything up to date as well yeah just for compatibility and um, also this.
Erick:Uh, speaking of updates, this guy has updates. Um, they've slowed down a little bit, which I guess if you've been looking at some magic here recently they're they've been kind of preoccupied. They've been dropping a lot of new stuff, but right now this cortex is kind of in a good place, especially for GT seven. You're getting the actual direct drive feedback right. When I got it they were just coming out with direct drive. They were doing they were emulating a g29 and it was crazy, like you could, when you were running the build that doesn't do the g29, I mean it does the g29 emulation. You could feel the clunk like that. When I first plugged it up I was talking to jason like this is it says emulating the G29. When you plug it into the PlayStation it shows a G29 and it I had a G29 it felt like clunky, like it was physical gears in there like the gear driven because it was emulating.
Erick:The hell out of it yeah, and then when I updated to the direct drive one and everything just like tightened up, it was like a completely different product and I felt like the direct drive difference like just the smoothness of it, the quietness, like it was even loud like a, almost like a gear driven.
Jason:I was like this this is crazy, but yeah, once you get used to that dude, it's hard. You can't go back. You can't go back.
Erick:I will not go back. It's hard, you can't go back. I will not go back. For real, it's not happening.
Jason:There's no way. There's no way.
Erick:And just to, I guess, speaking of the update, I'm currently running firmware version 1.1.4.
Jason:Okay, as of today.
Erick:I don't have any. That's not the latest. The latest is 1.1. Okay, as of today. Yeah, so I don't have any. That's not the latest. The latest is 1.1.7, but 1.1.4 gives you, it's the one that works with ACC as well.
Jason:I see yeah.
Erick:I did have somebody reach out to me and they were having issues with it and I was running 1.1.7, which for me it doesn't make a difference. It adds in functionality for some of the other accessories like handbrakes and sequential shifters and stuff like that. But 1.1.4, it solves an issue with ACC, where as soon as you start the game up well, not as soon as you start the game, as soon as you start a race, like you start the car up and you hit the gas the wheel just goes full.
Jason:I remember that All the way right to the right or left or whatever it was.
Erick:It just goes full lock and it scares the shit out of you first and second yeah, it's a strong wheel Every time it does it.
Jason:Every time it does it. Yeah, it's a strong wheel doing that going.
Erick:Yeah, it's a strong will doing that. You're not expecting it, yeah, yeah, so, um, trying to make sure I covered everything that's important. Update the cortex. Um, if you're interested in acc 1.1.4 and if you got any questions, drop them in the in the chat. Uh, I know the information is kind of scattered out there and you know, I guess it's an opportunity for me to put together some sort of guide on the cortex, something I need to do Right now. Drop a question, leave a comment on the video.
Erick:Also like and subscribe if you're not as well.
Jason:Oh yeah, of course.
Erick:The cortex.
Jason:I mean it's a good tool, right. It's a good tool to get you. It's great. Yeah, man, so that way you can buy the hardware that you really want to buy. If you like the SimMagic ecosystem and you can't technically get a PC yet, this is an option that you can use the stuff that you bought and or pick it up on a sale, whatever. So I mean I think it's worth it. I think it's worth it's like a hundred bucks, right.
Erick:Uh 125.
Jason:Yep, okay, 125.
Erick:Which is easy, I mean, if you are like me, which I knew at some point down the road. I wanted the option to move over to PC, or at least experience PC even if I didn't move over there full time and I literally plug in one cable, one from. I, plug it from here, plug it into my PC and my haptics pedals wheel everything. I connect my MagLink and I'm fully over PC. I'm taking advantage of SimHub. I got the lights on the Neo. Shout out to Daniel Newman, rob Markman.
Jason:Jr. Dnr. Rob Markman Jr. Yeah, rob Markman Jr.
Erick:I ordered the beans bro. I ordered the beans Rob.
Jason:Markman.
Jeff:Jr A good man Rob.
Jason:Markman Jr, I paid $20 for a can. That's coming from the UK. And then he messaged me. He's like, yeah, the giveaway is over. I was like Daniel, yeah, somebody won a year of the NR membership just for eating beans on toast, oh man. So what you going to do?
Erick:So he's going to do this.
Jason:I told him there needs to be another challenge. Like fish and chips. So I don't know what's in the UK like tea? I don't know.
Erick:So they do have something else. I forget the name of it, but basically it's like a baked potato. Yeah, yeah, yeah and it's like 80% of what we do, and then they slap beans and tuna on it. It's like, oh, tuna, yeah, yeah, it's weird.
Jason:It's like Cool Tuna.
Erick:Yeah, it's weird Not to not confuse you, but that's something that's different than how we do our baked potatoes. We might put half a pig on there, or something like that. But beans and tuna is not the route we would go down.
Jason:I'll say that I want to apologize. I want to apologize. If we have a viewer from the UK, please correct us Please.
Jeff:Tuna and beans on a potato.
Jason:I can't do tuna and beans. That is a straight trip to the bathroom.
Jeff:I'm assuming there is a canned tuna. Right, it's not Instant bro.
Erick:So the video I saw and there might be somebody's homemade recipe where they use different quality ingredients, but the video I saw can of beans bloop and can of tuna right on top.
Jason:Oh, I can't. I mean, hey, thank you If we have UK Daniel Newman's, our only one that I know of. Daniel's going to beat us up, man Daniel's going to come at us with a force to be reckoned with. So, daniel, if you made it this far, feel free to come at us.
Erick:Let us know what's up. I'll try. I'll try anything once.
Jason:I'm going to do the beans and toast, though Beans and toast is good man.
Jeff:I do. The beans on the bread, like I said, that's kind of something he got me into when I was a kid. The beans on the bread, like I said, my old man's, that's kind of something he got me into when I was a kid.
Erick:But not the toast. I'll try the toast next time. Yeah, yeah, that's cool.
Jason:Yeah, all right. Well, thanks, eric. Thank you so much for coverage on that. I think that was over. I think that was due. So good call. I think that was due because a lot of people, a lot of followers, are using the sim magic gear and a lot of them are on console too. So maybe they were a little hesitant on if it's, you know if it's worth it. But you know, you're living proof. It's almost been a year, I want to say, or getting close, very close, to having that Sim. We started the show in May. May is our anniversary, so if you guys want to send us an anniversary gift or card, let me know.
Erick:A birthday month too, An e-gift.
Jason:Send us an e-gift and address it to Jeff, Eric and me.
Erick:Accepting all gifts for sure.
Jason:But it's that time.
Jeff:It's that time.
Jason:I like saying this it's actually a cue for me, but it's that time. It's that time. I like saying this it's actually a cue for me, that way, I know, but it's that time for Track of the Week, and Jeff has something for us cooked up today. Welcome back again, brother, missed you. Let us know. Likewise, what was your selection this week? Yeah, what drove it? Yeah, what's up? What is it so we don't?
Jeff:know we've had a couple comments and it's probably rightfully so that we haven't. Really we don't really dig in very much to the to those. You know, dudes, that uh are trading paint on the oval tracks and oval. You know the oval courses and there's a lot of them out there. You know like now you think of nascar indycar there's a lot of stuff out there. So, yeah, I figured I'd start the first oval track for race of the week. And if you're going to pick an oval track for race of the week, you got to start with numero uno, daytona international speedway. So, without further ado, I'm gonna dig into uh, daytona. Um, I don't know if a lot of people know this. Uh, I've actually been to the track when I was a kid. Uh, my parents brought me there. It was super cool, um, but it didn't wasn't always where it was. It was actually no kidding on the beach, like they raced on the sand. That's where the track started. How Daytona speed and all this thing happened.
Jeff:It was like just a handful of miles away from where the track is to um, to the beach, where it really really was. So, um, I'm gonna show a? Um, just the overhead track of the current setup, and you'd be surprised like this track, as you see here, hasn't changed since, um, like really the 50s, the 60s, uh, with over, like I mean, obviously you're not gonna, you know it's as you know, I'll get into it here. So, but before so I do want to cover a couple stories and history over the course. On the beach it was called the ordman Beach and Road Course. It was a motorsport track that was instrumental in the foundation of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, nascar. It originally became famous with a location and on that beach 15 world land speed records were set. I was reading another story there was a dude that went 202 miles an hour on the beach. That's wild on the sand. On the sand, like they didn't put pavement on there, it was sand, so uh you know how bumpy that must have been, oh my god right.
Jeff:so, um, the lap length, uh, in the early events were 3.2 miles. It was eventually length lengthened to 4.2 in the late 40s. So here's where we get into the actual racing of it. So Daytona Beach officials asked the local racer, sig Huggendale, to organize and promote an automobile race along the 3.2 mile course. The city posted $5,000 purse. The city posted $5,000 purse. The ticket takers arrived to the race day on March 8th to find thousands of fans already at the track, lost the opportunity to sell them a ticket. The Sandy turns became virtually impossible to pass, which caused numerous scoring disputes and technical protests. The event was stopped after 75 of the 78 laps. Why they didn't just do the last couple, I don't know, I know. Wow. So Mark Milton was declared the winner of the 78 laps. Why they didn't just?
Jason:do the last couple? I don't know, I know Wow.
Jeff:That's funny. Mark Milton was declared the winner by the AAA. The Carnation Body in the second place Protested, didn't win, and this guy, william France, finished fifth. The city lost a reported of $22,000. In 2016 dollars, it was just under half a million dollars, and the city has not promoted a Daytona 500 race since. It's probably because they don't need to now, right, um, yeah. So here's a super interesting story about that race. Uh, this guy named Lloyd seeley finished fourth in that race in 1941. After his car rolled twice, got back on the track and finished fourth, right. So this is where, like nascar, and he rolled and the solve fits perfect ready.
Jeff:He returned later that year to actually win a race at that at the track later in the year. But a couple years later he was killed by a family member in a dispute over the family's moonshine business.
Erick:Oh my god, dude, if that's not like the guy rolls on track, nascar is in the uh the um and he passes that moonshine business so that's in that, like the um, like the supposed history, or like the origin of nascar, like uh, or like the origin of nascar, like uh was, like uh, whiskey runners or moonshine runners or whatever.
Jeff:Yeah, probably those drivers started racing in that form nascar.
Erick:I don't know if that's a fake story or what, but that's so crazy so, um, all right.
Jeff:So here's uh kind of how, a little bit more how nascar format formatted. This gentleman, william france, I spoke to earlier, knew that promoters need to organize the efforts. The drivers were frequently victimized by, you know, sketchy promoters who would leave the events with all the money before the drivers got paid. So a bunch of these promoters met at this ebony bar in the streamlined hotel right there on daytona beach in florida and that was the official formation of NASCAR as how we know it, in February 21st, coming right up 1948. Wow, just interesting. How. Actually NASCAR, it's the home of NASCAR, right? Um? So here's another interesting story. In the race in 1951, marshall Teague guided his 1951 fabulous Hudson Hornet to victory lane for his first career victory. He beat Tim flock by one minute and 14 seconds. Damn, that's wild. And now they're winning by like less than a second, yeah.
Erick:And if you make it, yeah, if you make it in 1952, teague made it two in a row with his Hudson.
Jeff:He gained the lead on lap two. Listen to this the lap was shortened by two laps because of the incoming tide. Dude, like you don't think of that stuff, you're putting on a huge race. That's hilarious. The water's coming.
Jason:We got to cut it.
Jeff:Got to cut it short and he won by a minute and 21 seconds. So get this. The day earlier they had like another race for the weekend, right? This guy, tim flock, who came in second, uh, was flagged for winning that modified race and the day before the big race but disqualified for having a wooden roll bar. Like if you're gonna cheat on something like I wouldn't like put a crummy roll bar in. But hey, listen, this is bro, a wooden race.
Jason:What you brung, yeah exactly how good is that going to be?
Jeff:when the thing rolls, it's gonna crack that must have been some heavy duty freaking maple, so yeah, so 1953 it became increasingly complicated to run the race on the beach because of the urban growth of daytona beach area. Hotels were being constructed along the beach. This guy, francis, knew that a permanent track needed to be built withhold larger crowds as it got bigger and bigger and you can ultimately see where this is going. So william, france wanted the track to have the let's talk about funding, because this is kind of interesting A Texas oil millionaire, clint Mershon Sr, lent France $600,000. And this is in the 50s, that's a lot of cheddar Along with all the necessary equipment to build the track. He secured funding from Pepsi-Cola, general Motors andley uh, hardly. Edler a second mortgage took a mortgage on his house, uh oh man. So he wanted to have.
Jeff:So william france wanted the track to have the highest banking corn turns so they could go the fact, so it could be the fastest track. He traveled to ford motor company because they had a track, a high speed track with bank corners, and ford shared their engineering design and how they built the track. Uh, with with um france and he brought that back to daytona to build the high banks crews. So this is kind of how he got. They built the track because this is super interesting. To build, the high banks crew had to excavate over a million square yards of soil in the tracks infield because the high waters in the area, the excavated holes filled with water to form what is now known as Lake Lloyd After one of the builders. The lake is stocked with 6,000 fish.
Jeff:They also conduct speedboat racing in there now. I don't know if they still do it but probably killed all the fish yeah right, I know like it doesn't really mix.
Jeff:Uh, they mixed the infield with 22 tons of lime mortar had to be brought in binding base, uh. So they had a problem with asphalt. This is super interesting. They couldn't run the steamroll or the, the excuse. My life I don't remember what they called the, the that runs over the pavement to push it down because the, the turns were so banked. So he had this great idea that, hey, we're going to put a bulldozer on top of the turn and we're going to chain it to the cement roller. So what? The cement roller is going to go forward so it doesn't fall over. It's going to be chained to the bulldozer and they're both going to go at the same pace all the way back and forth. Back and forth.
Jason:Oh, my God bro.
Jeff:Dude, you want to talk about some redneck stuff.
Erick:That's the definition of where there's a will, there's a way.
Jeff:But dude, it's how they made Talladega, a number of all these tracks.
Jason:See, now I want to go see how, like this process?
Jeff:um, and they made talladega, charlotte, a number of these speedways using this like redneck rinky, dink you know, like something you're doing, like middle school, when you're like, hey, I need to do this. Well, if I just chain this to this thing and nail it on, yeah, just drag it all the way through like damn bro, they make it happen. Yeah. So the first practice to run on the new track was in February 6th 1959. On February 22nd, 42,000 people attended the inaugural Daytona 500. It's finish had started.
Jeff:The track itself, the track took a beating, it took a couple. The track took a beating when it opened up and eventually became the fastest track for stock car racing until Talladega came along 10 years later. So it currently has obviously NASCAR, but Supercross I was a big Supercross fan part of the series goes to daytona after I think it's the week after the daytona 500 and they race on the infield where it says daytona 500. They set up a dirt bike track right there and they do jumps and stuff super cool. They also do flat, flat track and infield go-kart tracks uh, paved short track, and they've even had high school football games and even soccer matches. Yeah, oh, I mean, they have enough grass.
Jeff:So there's like three rv parks inside this, the track inside the uh oh, yeah, yeah, because they camp out there, right yeah oh, I can't imagine the partying that happens out there it's I would get hammered, oh yeah I think it's part of like, it's like part of your ticket that you agree you will get hammered, probably off bud light or budweiser or something like that you know and you're probably gonna go with all the loudness all day oh man.
Jeff:So 41 people have unfortunately um been a fatality of on-track incidents 24 car drivers, 12 motorcycles, three go-karts. Uh, three go-kart drivers and one powerboat racer. Uh, in one track worker. The notorious death um, that was uh, dale earnhardt. Uh, you know. Rest in peace. Uh was killed on the last lap of the daytona 500 in 2001. I know that was that hit up the nascar uh family community like really hard. The last lap too. The last lap. Yeah, I remember it was crazy. I'm not a big NASCAR fan, my brother was. He was sitting in front of the TV and watching all 500 miles. It was crazy. But I remember just sitting there and I was like saw the crash but they didn't even focus on it, obviously because it's the last lap. They got to follow the people that are Well, yeah it's busy, right?
Jeff:Yeah, and it wasn't until like a couple hours later that it was like yo, that guy died, like died. He just was like going around the corner, got hit, went up into the wall. It was just a real freak accident. I think that's where the Hans device mod I got. Like everybody was like all right, enough's enough, we got to do this Hans device. Don't quote me on that. I vaguely remember hearing about it. Um, but here we go. So it is included in the video games.
Jeff:The first one that I could find was surprise, surprise daytona usa, a racing game based around the speed track was released in 1994 for sega model 2 arcade system, so you remember going into like uh, chucky cheese, or whatever. You have the the yeah in the little thing. Yeah, so that was like, I guess, the first one that had.
Jason:Yeah.
Jeff:Yep and Jason, you'll appreciate this. It was initially released um in Japan for testing. Uh oh, so that, yeah, that it was released there first. Um, that's kind of interesting.
Jason:Yeah, sega.
Jeff:Sega is a Japanese Uh yep, so single player and multiplayer modes is officially sponsored by the racetrack um which is cool. That's cool man yeah, and it wasn't till about 2021 where playstation 3 and xbox 360 got it um. So, yeah, like that's a super cool story, now I want to go every time we speak about tracks.
Jason:man, now I need to go, and this is home soil, bro, this is, this is our stuff. Go back to that. Real quick, jeff. You want to go back to it? Yeah, I want to show you something. So it was a great story. And we always look at tracks. We usually look at Formula and GT tracks, even though I believe GT cars go on here. I believe so in a different setting, if I'm wrong, please yeah, the 24-hour Daytona here too, right? Yeah.
Jeff:So prototypes and whatever the road course in here goes around, I forget where it goes. To be honest with you.
Jason:You can see all the different configurations or whatever.
Jeff:Yeah, like endless in here.
Jason:So you know how notice that there's no go-kart track how we usually find them.
Jeff:I wonder if it's somewhere they build it up in here. Maybe no, I found it. Zoom out. Oh, you did. Where is it? I was looking for it earlier today I've been trying to tell you to do this.
Jason:Look at the bottom right. You see that K1 speed. Those are go-karts. They're indoor though they're electric, so they always have like a go-kart track. K1 speed by a gate. 40, bottom left.
Jeff:Oh bottom, oh yeah, yeah, over here I see, yeah, yeah.
Jason:Look at the K1. Yeah, indoor. Yeah.
Erick:Look at the K1.
Jeff:Indoor. Those are super fun.
Erick:They got an urban air.
Jeff:Look at even the RV park has a racetrack outside the gate.
Jason:I would rent an RV and just camp out there, bro.
Jeff:Oh dude, Especially for the Daytona 24.
Jason:Dude, I'll have a grill out. I'll have music playing. Well, you probably can't hear it. You'd have to have a chain top on.
Erick:Yeah, oh yeah.
Jeff:Yeah, that's got to be fun though, man. Yeah, if I can do this real quick to give you guys a perspective.
Jason:Yeah, let's see if that. Huh, look at that.
Jeff:To give you a perspective of how banked these things are. It doesn't do it justice. I've been here in person.
Jason:Now we got to redo all the tracks now.
Jeff:And it's way steeper than that. It just feels like it's way steeper.
Erick:I saw a video of somebody trying to walk the track and they couldn't climb up the incline. It was so steep. Yeah, I was struggling. They're going all fours to try to climb up it. That's how steep that is, but that's crazy. So the funny thing is they had to drive the google car on the daytona 500 oh that's right oh can you imagine being the guy in the little Google car driving along there? That's crazy. You've got that thing pegged.
Jeff:You're praying dude, I think. I remember going on the tour and they said you had to go like 87 miles an hour to at least stay on the track, or you would, you would slip off yeah. So yeah it's a cool story, dude, the oval track racing is a lot more fun. I you know. Not that I didn't think it was gonna be fun, but it's totally different. Especially nascar and those truck driving like the whole race is rubbing rubbing right it is chaos, especially like a rookie race.
Jason:Dude, forget about it what about ranked, any ranked oval racing yet?
Jeff:no, I do. The problem is it's like I get in there and I'm like I just want to go have fun and do all the. Okay, you know I gotta, just because, like dude, it's wild. The I want to race a gen three dude but you need to be like oval is like 0.3 mile laps you're like turning the whole time. I was like, oh dude, I'm getting dizzy here.
Jason:Rob Markman. Yeah, bro, it's intense.
Jeff:Rob Markman. I just got to do it just to get out of it, so I can have more races to pick from Rob Markman. Okay, rob Markman and I need to get a wheel and the shifter. There's always something, gentlemen, there's always something.
Jason:Yeah.
Erick:Rob Markman Never done Never done, never done.
Jason:The C word, as Eric put it out the other day the C word.
Erick:Never complete. Don't use that word Complete.
Jason:Yeah, don't confuse us now. Ha ha, got you thinking, all right, so thank you, jeff. That concludes the track of the week. Another one in the bag.
Jeff:If you guys have any suggestions for us?
Jason:it could be oval, nothing wrong, it's a track, track's a track and technically it's a track that everything is being raced there. So, except for Formula or Formula One, right, I'm pretty sure Formula.
Jeff:Yeah, I didn't read anything that was really open wheel racing besides the go-karts.
Jason:I wonder if IndyCar race is there.
Jeff:I got to look and see I'd have to look. None of the research said that, but it seems like it would be a great track to run. Yes, not that I know a whole lot about it.
Jason:I mean, how scary would it be opening the DRS on the hill? That's got to be it.
Jeff:Yeah.
Jason:Death wish. That's probably why they're not there. That's probably why they're not there it makes sense. Imagine doing a pass on the oh man, yeah, alright, well, that's gonna be about it, for you know, this week, today, I really don't have anything else to put out, um, other than the questions that we owe Chad. So, chad, um, we kind of have a situation here. You're um, you suggested a piece of software that enables 360 Hertz in iRacing. See, the issue is that all our wheelbases already support that.
Jeff:But if anybody First world problems.
Jason:Right, first world problems. I know I was waiting for that one, so let me get that to others to see if you guys want to take a stab at it. If you have a device that doesn't support the full 360 hertz, then you can, probably because you know it's really hard to test, right? So we got an email from Chad. I'll read it. He's like I'm not sure if you guys have seen this, but a clever program has come up with a cool app that opens iRacing 360 hertz to more bases and offers several options which I highly appreciate. Um, you know putting this out and you know sharing with others, because not everybody has a sim magic or semi cube or what have you. So yeah, kudos to you. He says, main one being the ability to scale FFB detail higher without having to increase overall FFB force. The guy effectively separated the detail and maintained force via two channel, ac and DC. So it's interesting, it's very interesting. I still may take a stab at it and see. He also added here the main issue I see now and I suffer from myself is that SimMagic bases are not functioning properly with the app, but all other brands I have mentioned usually the usual suspects are working well, you know the usual suspects are working well. The dev says that he will be working to address the sim magic issue. So I guess not all sim magic supports.
Jason:I'm pretty sure the alpha does support 360 out the box after software update. Um, um, also interesting is that Dave Tucker from iRacing programming team uh, team has been chatting with the dev and seems to appreciate the direction. Wow, so he actually is talking to the dev of the iRacing. So I will leave links to this software. If you have a base and it's not working it's not compatible with 360 hertz on iRacing this might be worth a go. This might be worth a go and I'll still end up trying it because I'm hardheaded and I'll try it anyway. But as of right now, the settings on my sim right now are super dialed in and we've been racing really hard and very close in the league. As mentioned before, the GRO league is super competitive, so tinkering with anything right now is kind of a challenge.
Jason:But for the users out there, you know I I will definitely take a look at the website and the software. So, chad, um, sorry it took this long to get to you. Um, you know, we we mentioned you in the last episode and I said you had top priority but upon checking you know we checked the actual bases that we're using. They all support 360 and iRacing. So let me know your thoughts. Let me know your thoughts. Leave us a comment below. So that's all I have for announcements. I'll give it to Eric next to see what he has Not announcements. Sorry, again, I'm out of it. Roundtable I got you Roundtable, eric's Roundtable. Let me know what you have, if anything.
Erick:Yeah, no, I've got nothing for Roundtable man. Another good episode. Man Fun talking about sim racing. Yeah man, this doesn't get old.
Jason:This is 42 episodes in it's crazy man, this is 100 plus hours of knowledge for everybody, and we still got more. Trust me, we have way more lined up for you, jeff, sorry.
Jeff:Sorry man, I just got a quick one. What?
Jason:is your round table? I think I know what it is. I just got a quick one. What is your round table?
Jeff:I think I know what it is. Netflix came out this past week and said on 7 March, drive to Survive, season 7. Let's go. Let's go bro, let's go.
Jason:I'm hearing rumors and birdies around there that Leclerc was 1.8 seconds faster than Hamilton in the Ferrari. You see this, you see it. You see it.
Jeff:The little tear. No, there ain't no damn tear. I also heard he wrapped his car around the telephone pole Well, maybe not the telephone pole, but he put it into the wall. And I was like, oh man, that's a shame, it's just a real shame I am a lewis hamilton fan.
Jason:I support him. You are um great for the sport 100 seven time world champion and for some, even for daniel daniel. Daniel will tell you he's the eight world. He is the eighth time they've refused to accept that last race.
Jeff:Uh, hey you don't have to convince me where mikey know that you know we'll live in infamy in f1 history. Yeah, that was, that was bs season. Yes, ever though. Yeah, the fighting we yeah, we watched that race in your garage like three years after it happened. We watched the whole race, the whole race yeah and he led the entire race.
Jason:Man, oh, you know, I don't want to get into it. Yeah, it, um yeah, gives me stress. So I'm kidding, I'm kidding. F1, I'm excited. The rivalries, the texting between drivers. It's been kind of low. It's been kind of low, it's been kind of low key. But when that starts to pick up, I'm telling you I can, russell, I hope you're ready, bro, I hope you're ready to take.
Jeff:I mean, it gets so heated, I'm ready to like launch mortar rounds from my house to yours and stuff. Are you going to?
Erick:do the old school one. The angle. Oh, yeah, yeah.
Jeff:Boom Boom Fire. For effect Boom boom boom.
Jason:All right, so that's all you have for a round table, jeff, yeah.
Jeff:And oh, drive fast, break late.
Jason:Yeah, yeah, yeah, come on, jeff, drive fast-er and break a little later well, it depends on the car, because send it that porsche is more about breaking a little earlier. She's do not want to accept her. She's a handful huh.
Jeff:Oh yes, I've. I've spun a couple laps on her, jeff.
Jason:I mean Jeff. Well, you did, you did, jeff. And Eric just bought the Porsche and he seems to like it, from what I'm hearing.
Jeff:You ain't going to drive a harder car. Man, there she is.
Jason:I'm telling you, eric, get your license and let's see what you got in her. Oh yes, she's a handful. She can be, especially in the rain. Put that car in the rain, oh hold on Whoa.
Jeff:Eric Kelly has left the chat.
Erick:Hey look, I got no shit to talk about driving in the rain All right, I'm not even going to front about that. No shit to talk about driving in the rain All right, I'm not even going to front about that. The dry, you know, I need to do some races and see really where I'm at. But, just like I said, drove it on Suzuka, drove it on Road Atlanta. I loved it, man. And, like I said, that's a lot of what I drive on GT7. Outside of the weird stuff they throw in there from week to week.
Jason:I can see that, and you're a Porsche guy too. You like Porsche, you always like Porsche. So get your license, man. Let's put it to the test, let's get you in there. But anyways, thank you guys. Again I want to do a big shout out to the GRL group. I think you guys, you know, after everything, after the review, I know there's some heated there was, you know, some heated things being said on the stream. But the thing is, the aftermath was positive and the aftermath is we're all trying to get better and that's kind of what the league is about. So the amount of support that we received there and, uh, neil, um, it was great to finish, you know, and neil and you know behind me. So, neil, if you're watching, you heard it from me and and I'm sick and I got you.
Jeff:anyway, he's going to come after me for this.
Jason:Neil, yeah, yeah, neil's my dude and Neil, you know, we got to get Neil on this podcast. We really do. He doesn't want to, he doesn't want to, oh no, but we got to get him in here. We got to get him in here. We need to have a discussion with that guy. Anyway, awesome community and I want you guys to not be scared and go and try it. I want, because the more we have in there, the better, the bigger and the better things we'll get, I guess. But yeah, I'm rumbling, mumbling. So thank you so much, guys again, for being here. Jeff, welcome back, and to all you viewers and listeners out there, if you have any questions, email the show at thechicanepodcasts at gmailcom. Leave a like, comment, subscribe and please have a great start of your week, thank you.
