My last post was about my grandmother Meynel Clowney Cato and how she survived the 1918 Spanish flu at Winthrop college.
We are all now living under the threat of the the Covid-19 virus and my wife and I have been following the guidelines and avoiding unnecessary travel.
The virus is bringing out the best and the worst in people and it is interesting to see the the variations in how politicians are responding. I am very disappointed with the response of the highest official in our government however I am very pleased that the county we live in, Gadsden County Florida, is taking taking the Corona virus very seriously.
Our county is mostly black with a lot of poor people (both black and white) and many older people like me. With a large population at risk Gadsden County has behaved responsibly and has implemented some strict but logical restrictions.
Gadsden County currently has a mask mandate in place and a 12 a.m. to 5 a.m curfew. The compliance has been very good from what I have observed in the local stores. I am quite comfortable going into our nearby Dollar General store where customers and staff all wear masks.
With extra free time from the lockdown I decided to improve my video production skills. I have a few videos on YouTube but they were not made with a high quality camera and I did not do much post processing.
It was time to up my game.
My favorite camera is my Sony A7RII which can record video in 4K. Processing 4K video requires a higher power computer than I had. High performance gaming computers can do the job but some are quite expensive.
Years ago I built my own computer from parts I bought at CompUSA store in Tallahassee that sold computer parts as well as brand name computers. I enjoyed building the computer however when it got out of date I decided buy a brand name computer because that was cheaper than buying parts to update my home made computer
Nowadays it is cheaper to build your own computer than to buy an expensive computer online. The price for CPU’s, mother boards, and graphics cards had been dropping for some time so I could save some money. The stimulus check also came in handy.
Before building a computer I wanted to watch some tutorials and YouTube has a LOT of videos on building gaming computers. I was surprised at how popular gaming computers are.
The computer I eventually built is not the fastest or most powerful but the cost was reasonable and it works quite well for my current needs. It can easily be upgraded if I eventually need more power.
The most important thing to me is that I know exactly how to repair or upgrade the computer should the need arise. Without the Covid-19 lockdown I would have never undertaken this time consuming task.
In my next post I will discuss my first video created in 4K using this new computer.