Ty Sherback-Author

Ty Sherback

Author

Contributor Since September, 2024
Expertise
PCs, Windows, Gaming
  • 390
    articles
  • 1
    News
  • 170
    Features
  • 209
    Lists
  • 6
    Guides
  • 4
    Reviews
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About Ty Sherback

His love of PCs and their components was born out of trying to squeeze every ounce of performance out of the family computer. Tinkering with his own build at age 10 turned into building PCs for friends and family, fostering a passion that would ultimately take shape as a career path. 

Besides being the first call for tech support for those close to him, Ty is a computer science student, with his focus being cloud computing and networking. He also competed in semi-pro Counter-Strike for 8 years, making him intimately familiar with everything to do with peripherals.

What was your first computer?

I was introduced to computers far too young to remember the first one I had used, but my first build was cobbled together from my dad's old parts bin. Pentium 4, some ATI Sapphire card, and no more than 4 GB of RAM. If you could get past the artifacting and rattling case fans, it wasn't a half-bad experience. 

How long have you been interested in technology?

Ever since my dad sat me down on his lap to watch him play Half-Life. Probably a bit early to be exposed to a violent FPS, but once I learned that all the cool stuff on the screen came from a black box, I wanted nothing more than to learn everything there was to know about computers and how they functioned.

What tech products or categories are you most passionate about?

I'm most excited by desktop PC components. There's something really novel about buying all the parts and putting it together yourself, but it doesn't end there. The process of upgrading, tinkering, and personalizing a build doesn't ever get old to me, even if the PC isn't mine. 

I also really enjoy working with peripherals due to my esports background. Anything to do with mice, keyboards and mousepads.

Latest

A photo of Valve's Steam Machine
There’s a good chance the Steam Machine is DOA - and that’s okay
Phones, smartwatches, and everything else

Even under perfect market conditions, the Steam Machine had an uphill battle to climb

By 
A photo of the Universal Blue home page
Universal Blue wants to redefine the entire Linux ecosystem
Linux

A distro-less future could be on the horizon for Linux

4
By 
samsung 9100 pro ssd closeup
4 things that can cut your NVMe SSD speed in half
SSD

Beware of these configuration errors when using your new blazing-fast drive

By 
Black Myth: Wukong running on a gaming PC.
The future of gaming isn’t DLSS, it’s asynchronous reprojection
Nvidia

Gameplay that's smooth as butter with minimal performance impact

8
By 
Installing a HDD inside the Asus ProArt PA602
I ran a shucked drive 24/7 for years, and it held up perfectly
Storage

I don't judge an HDD by its cover

1
By 
A photo of the inside of an old gaming PC
I turned my old gaming PC into an AI assistant that's actually useful - here's how
Home Lab

Put your old gaming PC to use

1
By 
A photo of the Project Bluefin Linux homepage
Bluefin convinced me the future of Linux is boring (in the best way)
Linux

An OS that prioritizes being unexciting...is exciting

11
By 
A photo of a monitor showing the NerBird control center
Tailscale is great, but NetBird is better for first-time home-labbers
Software and Services

Tailscale is almost fool-proof to set up, but NetBird's features are worth the effort for new users

6
By 
A photo of the initial setup screen for Linux Mint, showing different colored folder themes
Linux Mint 22 convinced me Cinnamon is the most underrated desktop
Linux

It may not get as much love as GNOME or KDE Plasma, but it's just as capable

10
By 
A photo of a monitor showing the About System settings in CachyOS
I switched from GNOME to KDE Plasma and found the one thing I can't live without
Linux

And it has nothing to do with the taskbar

6
By 
Running a Nextcloud container on NixOS
NixOS broke my brain, but it permanently fixed my home lab
Home Lab

I wasn't a fan at first, but NixOS quickly grew on me

1
By 
A corner of a screen showing the ChatGPT page
I let AI guide my entire journey through switching from Windows to Linux, and I was pleasantly surprised
Windows 11: Everything you need to know

ChatGPT got a lot of things right

3
By 
A photo of a browser showing a locally hosted AI LLM
5 things I wish someone had told me before I tried self-hosting a local LLM
AI

It's more capable than you might realize, but tapering expectations is key

5
By 
An Ubuntu VM running on a Proxmox server
4 Windows tools I replaced with a single Linux VM
Linux

Consolidating these tools into one place was so useful, I should've done it sooner

1
By 
Two photos of PC builds side-by-side, featuring a Radeon RX 9070 XT and an RTX 3080
I miss my Nvidia GPU, but it's not for the reason you think
Nvidia

They were a disaster at launch, but Nvidia's driver stack is something I'm missing immensely on my AMD card

By 
A collection of smart home devices.
5 VLAN rules every smart home should have
Smart Home

Implementing these VLAN rules is a simple way to tidy up your smart home networking

5
By 
Nvidia-GTX-Titan-2013-3
It's not really possible to future-proof your PC — and that's okay
PC Build Guide

Build your PC for the performance you want today

1
By 
A person holding a USB-to-Ethernet adapter
USB Ethernet adapters are bottlenecking your NAS
Networking

If you want to take full advantage of your hardware, you'll need to ditch the adapters

By 
A BIOS menu showing various memory EXPO profiles
The best RAM upgrade isn't always more capacity
RAM

Speed makes a difference, and sometimes you can get a boost without reaching in your wallet

1
By 
photo of a laptop running Arch Linux showing the terminal with system information
Swapping from Windows to Linux on my laptop was a huge mistake - here’s why
Linux

Linux isn't ready for primetime on some laptops

53
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