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Geek Culture / Building my own computer and I need some advice!

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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 18th Mar 2012 05:31
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Howdy all,

Recently I've purchased this case and this PSU to start work on building my own computer!

I'm going to be buying this Intel motherboard next (it's a Micro ATX unit, the type compatible with the case), and the graphics card will likely be an EVGA TX 550 or 560 if I deem I can afford it.

I have a couple of questions though...

In the case, there are a couple of pins marked "Power LED -" and "Power LED +". Does it matter where in the front panel section of the board I plug them into? There's really no way for me to tell as the case did not come with instructions on how to plug in its cables...

Also, the PSU I bought seems to be for ATX/Micro ATX builds, and as a result has literally twice the amount of cables I need! Does anyone have any experience with keeping cables all nice and tidy? It's a pain in the rear! I have no idea where to stuff the extra cords I don't need...

Also any advice in general on building my computer would be appreciated. I don't really know my stuff on hardware.

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Tiarn
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Posted: 18th Mar 2012 05:39
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To keep your case nice and tidy I suggest, obviously, those plastic bands that tighten and click then you tighten them, I forgot what they were called lol. I personally had my computer custom made in 2009 for close to 3 grand, by digitalstorm and WOW they make the cleanest setup ever!! My computer has seriously every cable very nicely and neatly tied together adn going where the need it to go, they also use a mesh to help hold them together, so maybe try something like that! Hope this helps!!
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zeroSlave
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Posted: 18th Mar 2012 05:48 Edited at: 18th Mar 2012 07:12
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Hmm.. Most of those cables (if you are talking about the HDD lights, Internal Speaker, etc) should have the appropriate info on the end of the cable. The board should also have maybe some small lettering next to the pins for info. You can probably find a diagram on the internet for the mobo if it doesn't come with one.

I keep all my extra PSU cords just tucked up and away from everything. They are a pain, but once I get the case closed, out of sight, out of mind. You could probably use some clamp ties to keep it tidy, though. Congrats on a new computer!

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Dark Frager
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Posted: 18th Mar 2012 10:12
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Quote: "those plastic bands that tighten and click then you tighten them,"


Cable ties?

Fruitella's a badman sweet, do you get me?
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MrValentine
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Posted: 18th Mar 2012 16:27
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Thats why I always use full modular/rails PSU's... but yeah cable ties and try to tie them to some open parts of the case away from any moving fans and the lights are simple enough... There should be a diagram in the manual for the motherboard...

I am sure I speak for everyone when I say we are happy to help

I have more than a decade soon going on 15 years experience in PC customisation and building...

I will look into your components later tonight as I am on phone right now and about to go out and got a huge headache lol

cya for now...

Hiya Yoda... Tiarn... Zero and Dark hope you all had a nice weekend

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bitJericho
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Posted: 19th Mar 2012 15:39
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your motherboard manual has a list of where the cables go. For the case cables, each led or button has a + and - cable. The positive cable is colored or white. The negative cable is black.

darkBIT TGC Torrent Tracker / File Server - AGK Chat: #agk : irc.devhat.net
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 21st Mar 2012 15:20
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Thanks guys!

I found some great videos on Newegg detailing the process of building your own computer and they have good tips on organizing cables and hiding unnecessary ones away. Now I've just got to order the motherboard, processor and graphics card as well as an optical drive and I'm good to go!

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MrValentine
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Posted: 22nd Mar 2012 23:17 Edited at: 22nd Mar 2012 23:19
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hey Yoda... ensure you PERFORM CHECKLIST FOR REQUIRED COMPONENTS()



EDIT

And once you have come back here and

FOR x = 1 to CHECKLIST QUANTITY()
PRINT COMPONENTS$
NEXT x

I am tired lol

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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 1st Apr 2012 17:00
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Well, due to some events happening keeping me from yet again going to college this fall, I now have a slightly higher budget!

I saw this MB in Maximum PC on my Kindle Fire... Asus Rampage

It's a Micro ATX with a TON of features seen in bigger boards, and it has THREE PCI-E 3.0 slots, meaning I could easily have two or three GPUs all connected at once. I dunno that the power supply I bought could support that, though.

It also uses an LGA 2011 socket instead of 1155, so that means I have to buy a Sandy Bridge processor. Here's a good one for $600!

Seriously though, that'll be worth it. My computer will then not only be able to handle games quite well but I will finally have a beast to use for HD video editing, which is something I've longed to do for a long, long time!

All I have to do now is find a (maybe cheaper processor) SATA DVD drive, a GPU and my storage medium. Does anyone have any experience with SSDs? Can you guys tell me the benefits vs the cons of an SSD?

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charger bandit
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Posted: 1st Apr 2012 21:34
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Socket 2011 is a waste of money. You gain almost nothing over 1155. Right now Intel is refreshing their Sandy Bridge series and releasing as Ivy Bridge which should be a bit faster so I would wait for that.

I highly recommend an ASUS Sabertooth motherboard for socket 1155 and an Ivy Bridge processor (when it comes out) to go with it Rather put more money into the SSD. About SSD's:

Pros:

-super fast
-no noise
-less chance of breaking (no mechanical parts)

Cons:

-price for the size (smaller sizes compared to HDD,but faster)
-must never be fully filled
-defragmenting is a must every week or two

Buy a 256gig SSD and a 2tb HDD to go with it as a storage unit,you only keep the system and important apps on the SSD for faster loading etc.

For the multi GPU config, your PSU will probably barely handle a 2xGTX560, so you just buy a Geforce GTX580 and when it's not fast enough,buy another one and replace PSU.


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bitJericho
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Posted: 2nd Apr 2012 13:51 Edited at: 2nd Apr 2012 13:53
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Might I recommend instead of blowing money on a new computer, if you can't go to school, learn on your own time.

What do you plan on going to school for? Instead of going to school right now, imagine your end-goal, and make it happen now, and do it on your own time. You might find yourself being successful without having spent a dime on school.

If you're planning on becoming a doctor or lawyer though, you should probably disregard my suggestion School is crazy expnsive and if you're good at what you do, you may not even need it. Unless you want to work for the man, you don't necessarily need a degree.

Anyway, about your question at hand, a 600 dollar processor?? Get yourself an AMD cpu for a quarter the price with equal performance.

darkBIT TGC Torrent Tracker / File Server - AGK Chat: #agk : irc.devhat.net
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 3rd Apr 2012 07:00
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Oops, I thought I posted the cheaper board and processor I found. Guess not.

Yeah, $600 is a bit crazy so I looked into this board and this CPU. Much more affordable!

Anyhow, what I want to go for is IT web development/networking. I realize I COULD do it on my own, but there's a lot to be said for getting experience out in the field, which is why I'm going to be going to a technical school instead of a university. I'l hopefully only need to be there a couple of semesters, so the total cost should be less than $10K.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 3rd Apr 2012 12:44
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Quote: "Anyhow, what I want to go for is IT web development/networking. I realize I COULD do it on my own, but there's a lot to be said for getting experience out in the field, which is why I'm going to be going to a technical school instead of a university. I'l hopefully only need to be there a couple of semesters, so the total cost should be less than $10K."


Rock on.

darkBIT TGC Torrent Tracker / File Server - AGK Chat: #agk : irc.devhat.net
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 02:49 Edited at: 5th Apr 2012 02:51
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Okay, so I bought my processor and aftermarkey cooler today!

I bought this Intel Core i7 CPU, this fan and heat sink (it was mentioned in the reviews for the CPU and people loved it, especially when OC'ing the CPU to 4.4GHz), and some thermal past that for some reason isn't wanting to be linked... oh well.

To date, I have purchased the following items...

Fractal Design PC Case
Corsair TX650W PSU
Asus Maximus Micro ATX Motherboard(They're out of stock! I bought one of the last ones!)
Intel Core i7 CPU
Cooler Master Fan and Heatsink combo

Total cost of build thus far (excluding about $6 in shipping): $563.06.

Wow. So much cheaper than I thought it would be!


Things to buy still...
RAM I'm going to buy
Blu-Ray/DVD Drive
Video Card (not final decision but could be the one I end up buying)

Total estimated cost: $966.03. Holy crap. That's amazingly cheap for all of that power I'll be packing!

And in case you're wondering why I didn't list a hard drive it's because I'll be re-using the one from this computer. It's a 1TB Western Digital, so all I'll have to do is wipe it.

Oh, add $100 more for Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, so the total cost is $1066.04. Not too shabby!

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budokaiman
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 02:57
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Quote: "Blu-Ray/DVD Drive"

Be warned, that drive is an OEM. OEM drives don't come with any software, cables or manuals. You'll need to buy software that can play blu-ray movies, because I don't think that media player or media centre can play them (regular DVDs and CDs will work fine though).


Being a scientist is never having to say you're sorry.
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Indicium
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 03:02
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VLC will play it, surely?

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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 03:23 Edited at: 5th Apr 2012 04:24
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Hmm, thanks for that info Budo. Did some checking and a BD-ROM drive doesn't seem to be the best option for me yet.

So, I think I'll go with this LiteOn DVD drive that's got everything I need right off the bat.

EDIT: Oops. I just realized that in order to SLI two cards, I'll need to upgrade my power supply in the future... Again. The Corsair I bought only has 2 PCIE connectors, not 4. I didn't look into that very well.

Oh well. When I SLI it'll be several, several months down the road (if not another year), so it's not too big a deal. I only need one video card for now.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 12:17 Edited at: 5th Apr 2012 12:21
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Might I recommend an i7 xeon, for the same ghz, they are about the same price. You lose the built in graphics but gain vpro and other features (so it does depend on your needs), and it sounds like they perform the same clock for clock. The xeon consumes less power too.

http://communities.intel.com/thread/4033

http://ark.intel.com/products/52276

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115081

darkBIT TGC Torrent Tracker / File Server - AGK Chat: #agk : irc.devhat.net
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 15:24
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Too late. My order's been processed.

And honestly, I'm quite happy with the processor I bought. I originally didn't want to get one with integrated graphics, but I also realized that I can't exactly get a video card of the price point I set in the next couple of weeks, so having Intel HD 3000 graphics actually works out for me. And it's still a step up from my HD 2000 PC I'm using now, but I know it can't be by much.

I've heard a lot of good things about EVGA (my friend used to have one of their cards), and I found this cheaper card.

Also, do you guys think I should get the cheaper OEM version of Win7 Home Premium, or should I spend the extra $90 and opt for the not-OEM version? I know with OEM I could only ever install it on one computer, so maybe it would be worth it to the the $90 more expensive version if I ever need to install it on another build.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 5th Apr 2012 16:28 Edited at: 5th Apr 2012 16:32
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Windows 8 is coming out soon, within the next year or so. If I were you, I'd use the consumer preview until 8's released. I've been using it for months (the dev preview and consumer preview), in my experience it's just as stable as 7, with a lot of great new features. Once it comes out, then get yourself the OEM copy. If you upgrade any part in your computer and it needs to be reactivated, you just let MS know and they'll put you on through.

And as a benefit, you save yourself 100 bucks for the time being.

darkBIT TGC Torrent Tracker / File Server - AGK Chat: #agk : irc.devhat.net
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 6th Apr 2012 00:24
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^That's what I'll do then. Great idea!

I'm not too huge a fan of Windows 8 yet, but for saving $100 for the time being I think I could get used to it.

Or I could just install Ubuntu first and then install Windows later.

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bitJericho
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Posted: 6th Apr 2012 03:53
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Indeed. Ubuntu 12.04 is coming at the end of the month! I'm looking forward to it!

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Phaelax
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Posted: 6th Apr 2012 06:12
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Quote: "defragmenting is a must every week or two"

Umm, no its not. Defragging an SSD isn't required at all. No seek time like a normal HDD, so no point. You'd only be wearing your drive out quicker.


I believe VLC will play blurays, I think I've used it for that before. I'd have to double check to be certain though.

"You're not going crazy. You're going sane in a crazy world!" ~Tick
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 6th Apr 2012 06:47
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Quote: "Indeed. Ubuntu 12.04 is coming at the end of the month! I'm looking forward to it!"


Oh yeah, I forgot that was coming! I think that's what I'll install on it then. Who can beat a free, fairly reliable OS these days, eh?

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charger bandit
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Posted: 6th Apr 2012 07:19
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Phaelax: Yeah my bad, TRIM does the job,but for that you need Windows 7. I am not completely sure if theres a solution for linux.


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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 7th Apr 2012 03:55
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Well, I went out and bought my HDD (it's a Seagate Baracuda 500GB 7200RPM), my DVD drive (HP) and a graphics card to get me up and running (PNY GeForce GTX 550 Ti - Not the best card I could've gotten, but it was the cheapest one supporting SLI, so if I get another 550 Ti I could have more power. Also, it's definitely compatible with Linux, which was a major factor for me).

Couldn't believe the price of memory in-store though; $54 for 4GB! Ugh. So I'm still ordering that from Newegg!

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charger bandit
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Posted: 7th Apr 2012 23:52
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My GTX550Ti does the job awesomly. The only thing about is I overpaid it (I gave 140€ while it was 120€ the next day -.-). For RAM,I'd suggest just going 8gb for like $55 because RAM is cheap right now,maybe it won't be as cheap ever again.


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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 12th Apr 2012 00:54
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IT'S BUILT!!!!!

It's the best computer I've had ever. I have it overclocked and it's not breaking a sweat. I'll post a pic later.

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