How to Build Your Own PC

If you are interested in knowing how to build your own computer, then you don't need to search any further. The following paragraphs tell you how to build your own PC. Building your own computer is cheaper than buying one off the shelf. Most per-built computers are made with OEM (original equipment manufacturer) components, which are not of high quality. On the other hand, when you build your own PC, you can choose brand-name parts that are of high quality. But the manufacturer of a per-built computer can offer you support, if you have a problem; which is not the case, if you build the computer.

Building your own computer

Before starting to assemble the computer, you should wear a wrist strap because static electricity can damage the parts of the computer. The ground wire should be connected to the wall outlet. You will need a screwdriver and screws to build your own computer.

So, how to build your own computer from scratch? The first step is to remove the cover from the computer case. Clean the case and remove any dust from the power supply. You should install the power supply, so that the fan side points to the outside, and the wires side points to the inside of the case. Set the voltage of the power supply to 120 volts, if you are in the United States, or to 220 volts if you are outside the US. If you have an ATX case, you will need an ATX power supply.

There are two brands of processors available today: the AMD Phenom line and the Intel Core line. The Intel Core i7 is the most advanced processor in the market nowadays, and it is suitable for 3D gaming and video editing. The Intel Core 2 Duo processor is good enough, if you want to just use productivity software such as Microsoft Office.

You should install the components on to the motherboard, before you install the motherboard in the case. Sometimes, the processor comes with a cooling fan and a heat sink attached. Intel uses Socket B for its Intel Core i7 processors, while AMD uses Socket AM3 for its AMD Phenom II processors. Next, drop the processor into the socket. This should require no pressure, if the processor is oriented right.

The next step in building your own computer is installing the heat sink on top of the processor. Place a thermal pad on the bottom of the heat sink. Instead of the thermal pad, you can apply some heat sink compound on top of the processor. Most motherboards have two or four memory slots. The memory modules, which may be DDR SDRAM (double data rate synchronous dynamic random access memory) or the faster DDR2 SDRAM, go into the DIMM (Dual Inline Memory Module) slots. Mount the motherboard on the cover plate, and screw the standoffs into the holes.

A PCI Express video card is better and more popular than an AGP video card. The cheapest option is to buy a motherboard with on-board video. Gamers will either want the NVIDIA GeForce or the ATI Radeon video card. The hard drive can be SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) or ATA (Advanced Technology Attachment). The latter can further be divided into SATA (Serial ATA) or PATA (Parallel ATA). A PATA drive, which is also called an IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) drive, is slower than a SATA hard drive. The size of the hard drive is always going up, with even 1 terabyte (TB) models available. The cache size of the hard drive can be 16 MB or 32 MB. The rotation speed of the hard drive is usually 7200 revolutions per minute (rpm). An optical drive can be a CD drive or a DVD drive. If a CD drive has a speed of 52x, then it has a read speed of 7800 kilobytes per second. If a DVD drive has a speed of 16x, then it has a read speed of 21600 kilobytes per second. A CD drive has a different write speeds for CD-R and CD-RW.

The last step is configuring the BIOS settings for the date and time, so that your computer is up and running. Now that you know how to build your own PC, you can assemble one so that you can use it for work and play.