About to embark on the heady adventure that is computer building.

[VKALFIERI]

Like seemingly every second person these days, I'm an IT graduate. I have an Advanced Diploma of Computer Systems Engineering; so you'd think I'd be confident in my ability to build a system without breaking it; but by the time I finished my course just over a year ago; technology had changed just enough to make most of what I learned about building and maintaining a system completely moot.

So, instead of being sure of my ability, I plan on watching a YouTube tutorial and winging it in the hopes that I'll actually be able to pull out a miracle and build a new system.

Things I haven't ever done: Installed a water cooling unit.

Put the processor into a machine that wasn't a test machine that could be broken without consequence.

and

Installed an SSD.

How difficult on a scale of noob to saibot (mortal kombat reference ftw!) are these components to install, and should I just bite the bullet and grab the bits and pieces and DIY the thing?

 

[Culhwch]

I'm a total amateur but I've built several PCs over the last ten years, and in spite of it being a fairly nerve wracking process (for me, at least) these days it's kind of just like grown-up LEGO. Expensive grown-up LEGO, sure, but still...

My advice is that age old adage - measure twice, cut once. Check everything is compatible on a site like Pick Parts, Build Your PC, Compare and Share - PCPartPicker Australia before you buy to ensure compatibility, and then make sure to check all the manuals before you start slotting things into other things.

I've never used a water-cooling unit, but my understanding is that they come pretty ready to go these days. Plenty of youtube tutorials out there for those, as well. Dropping the processor in is the worst part for me, but I've never stuffed it up, and I have shaky hands and a nervous disposition. Installing an SSD is simple - basically plug and play.

Hope that helps - keep us updated on how it goes!

 

[The Ace]

Water-cooling systems were a bit expensive for our customers, but I've built a few PCs in my time, and it's probably easy enough if you follow the instructions.

SSD drives are 2.5", so you need an adapter to fit one into a standard 3.5" bay, and you want to set AHCI mode in your BIOS for best performance, otherwise it's just installing a SATA hard drive.

As to the rest - installing PSU (DON'T do what one of our noobs did and complain of an incompatible PSU - I turned it the right way up, and no more problem), processor, RAM, and connecting front panel/USB, it's all pretty straightforward if you take your time and read the manual that comes with your motherboard. Make sure you buy the correct processor type, RAM, and graphics card (PCI express and AGP are not interchangeable), the best way to do this is to buy over the counter from a local dealer. USB 3 uses a 19-pin header, and you may need an adapter card (often with rear ports too) if your case has USB 3 but your motherboard only has USB 2.

Remember to include at least one optical drive, so you can install your OS, and then your device drivers.

Software installation (especially Windows updates) will take far longer than the actual construction.

 

[Jeremy M. Gottwig]

I used to hack computers together all the time out of whatever parts I had laying around in the house. Then I got married, and my wife got tired of hard drives and video cards sitting around everywhere and my array of Linux boxes. This was the beginning of the end.

That said, I did build a new machine about 6 months ago. It brought back old memories. I even bought a beefy video card, because I believed that I would start playing games again. This hasn't happened.

 

[Cathbad]

Ahhh... my beloved Frankenstein computer... ~suddenly lost on Memory Lane~

 

[VKALFIERI]

I have a quoted price I worked up online and most of the parts fit together on pc part picker, the only things I'm particularly concerned about are the water cooling and the processor. The rest is fairly easy.

My plan is take the quoted list into the store from which I got it online and ask them what they think about all the bits and if they would recommend any changes.

I should qualify this by saying my Diploma only involved working on old beastly things. But we learned the basics.

The rest of the course aside from the computer repair part was quite involved and on newer machines

 

[VKALFIERI]

Parts purchased. Now the fun begins. May have accidentally dropped some of the bits. Hoping they still work. Fingers crossed!

 

[Edward M. Grant]

Good luck!

Worst part of building my new gaming PC a couple of years ago was installing the CPU. Everything else was much easier than it used to be; e.g. the thin SATA cables that go from each drive to the motherboard, vs the old, shared, ATA ribbon cables that you had to route to two drives at a time.

Used to be that CPUs had pins that went into holes, and you knew it was correctly in place if it went into the socket. Now the pins are on the motherboard and you have to drop the CPU into the socket, close the latch, and hope that crunching sound isn't the pins breaking; every time I hear that, I think I screwed up and destroyed $500 of CPU and motherboard.