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Old 03-21-2012, 11:13 AM   #1
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Cool Building My First PC From Scratch
Yup. Should be a lot of fun. ordering everything next Tuesday and doing this.

I've upgraded almost every part in a PC before other than the motherboard, but that's the most difficult thing. Feel free to ask how the process goes in case you're thinking about doing this yourself and all and as I build it, I'll post things that slightly confuse me or aren't as straight-forward as I assumed. I'm throwing in my GTX 560ti, blu-ray writer and 1.25tb of HDD storage from my old PC, so here is the shizz I'm buying on top:

Case - Antec Twelve Hundred V3



It's blue! Has 6 blue stupidly quiet speed adjustable fans. And it's blue! It's not the best case in it's field, but it's one of the coolest and quietest even if it's a bit fiddly to work with. It looks nice and I have snagged a decent deal on it seemingly. The main reason I'm getting this case though is:

PSU - Antec CP-1000 1kw



No-one needs 1kw of power right now, but the main reason for buying this is it is literally silent until it gets to about 750w. it only fits in certain Antec cases and as it's been discontinued, it's only £100. Amazing deal.

Motherboard - Maximus IV GENE-Z/GEN3 Republic of Gamers



Pretty, as far as motherboards go. Has some really odd things like an LED error code reporter so it can be diagnosed fairly easily. It's a micro-ATX, so small, but it has so many different ports that you'll ever need that I don't ever see upgrading peripherals unless I get a second GFX card. Check the BIOS though. So glad we're finally in a world without a mainframe looking screen. You can even use a mouse on it:



CPU - Intel i5 2500k



Was looking at i7's for ages but since this is a gaming PC, it's not really that required from what I've looked into. The k means it can be unlocked for overclocking. Kind of sad that I'm moving away from AMD for the first time in a while, but they've really shit the bed recently. Staying with the stock cooler for now as the case should handle any excess from overclocking, but we'll review later.

RAM - G-Skill 8gb Ripjaws X 1600Mhz DDR3



Easy to overclock, fastest you can buy and amazingly even fit in with the motherboards colour scheme.

Boot Disc - Crucial M4 64gb



Fast SSD, should boot Windows in 9 seconds without the fat that will be added on at startup. Should actually be the most noticeable speed gain!

I honestly cannot wait to start. No doubt I will find a way to cut myself while doing it, I even do it when I install new optical drives.


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Old 03-23-2012, 09:01 AM   #2
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What's the damage pricewise, so far? Where do you get most of your parts?
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Old 03-23-2012, 09:57 AM   #3
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It's coming out at £643.62. Could probably knock £100-£200 off that if you didn't care about making it as quiet as possible and getting a slightly less awesome motherboard. The motherboard would perform the same, just without some of the fancy features like on the fly overclocking in Windows.

Everything apart from the PSU (Dabs) is coming from Amazon.

I found this site if you want to spec up a PC and see what the damage is. It works out pretty well.

http://pcpartpicker.com/uk/parts/partlist/
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Old 03-23-2012, 01:44 PM   #4
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Where did you get a single 8 GB ram stick in red? I have been looking at the ripjaws series and the only one is in blue.
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Old 03-23-2012, 01:45 PM   #5
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Also, just 64 GB of HDD space?
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Old 03-23-2012, 01:51 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by VSG View Post
Where did you get a single 8 GB ram stick in red? I have been looking at the ripjaws series and the only one is in blue.
It's not, it's 2x4gb.

Quote:
Originally Posted by VSG View Post
Also, just 64 GB of HDD space?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hasney View Post
I'm throwing in my GTX 560ti, blu-ray writer and 1.25tb of HDD storage from my old PC, so here is the shizz I'm buying on top
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Old 03-23-2012, 06:17 PM   #7
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Also, just 64 GB of HDD space?
It's SSD. I imagine he didn't want to spend a fortune on a bigger one.

Also, what he said about having more space on old HDs anyways.
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Old 03-28-2012, 05:26 PM   #8
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I wasn't going to do any updates, just a review of how the process went as a first timer. But the case and the case alone came today and I've just realised that I'm building a monster.



Holy fucking shit.
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Old 03-28-2012, 08:19 PM   #9
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Except for my first one, I've built every PC I've owned. I'm still sticking with AMD because I can't justify paying more than I need to as I'm not a power user or extreme gamer. And I thought you bought the Zambezi 8 core processor?
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Old 03-29-2012, 01:32 AM   #10
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Unhappy
I wanted to. Even on Tuesday I quickly switched out the mobo and CPU to the top of the line FX. It's £100 more on the AMD side of things for a CPU that benchmarks lower on games even after the Windows 7 hotfixes. I just couldn't justify my fanboyism.
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Old 03-29-2012, 03:21 PM   #11
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I wish I could do this.
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Old 03-30-2012, 03:22 AM   #12
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Probably going to do this as a step-by-step picture guide now to show people like Blitz that if a chump like me can do it, it's easy as fuck.

Luckily this case doesn't have square edges, so I'm not likely to bleed like I did on my old PC when replacing the CPU, memory or DVD drive.
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Old 03-30-2012, 12:25 PM   #13
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I'd like to do this with my next desktop so I'll be following the steps too.
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Old 03-30-2012, 05:25 PM   #14
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Right then ladies and gentleman, lets get this shit started.

Before we go any further, I should say that all cases and motherboards are different. Not usually in any major ways, but this should go without saying:

READ YOUR FUCKING MANUALS

What you'll need that you may not find in your kit is:

A phillips head screwdriver
Pliers
Ant-Static Wristband

With that out of the way, let's see what we've got once we remove the 4 thumb screws from the back of the case and slide the 2 panels off:



At the bottom of the case there, we have the PSU pre-installed as I already did that before most of the other kit arrived. It is the best thing to install first though, so go ahead. It is a 4 screw device and is more commonly found at the top of the case, but either is acceptable.

Easy job next, your case will have an I/O shield at the back, but it likely won't fit your shiny new motherboard. Luckily though, it pops straight out with a little pressure from the back of the case pushing towards the inside, like so



Replace this with your new I/O shield from the motherboard box. Just push to clip it in, that simple.

Now plug in your computer using the kettle lead. Make sure the PSU is set to off (the "O" position) and that it's off in the switch in the wall. What this means is that you PC case is now grounded so you can attach your anti-static wristband to it if you don't have another grounding point. Anti-static wristband? I hear you ask. Well that's a pretty dumb way to phrase the question, but it's one of these bad boys:



There's a crocodile clip at the other end, clip it to the side of your case. This should stop you from discharging electromagnetic energy to your parts and therefore keep them working. Another precaution you can make is being barefoot apparently. Go on, do the Japanese thing for once. Actually, do they wear socks? I'm rambling.

Now, your case will either have standoffs pre screwed in, or in with all the screws. Don't know what one is?



This is where you screw in your motherboard! The only problem is every motherboard is different, so the standoffs might be in the wrong place, so you need to lay your motherboard down see where the holes for standoffs are and where they match the screw holes in your motherboard. It's alright if some don't match, as long as you have quite a few in there evenly spaced out around your motherboard. Where you need to screw standoffs in or out, use your pliers.

If your case has a decent cable management solution like this one does, may as well connect some power wires here. Feed it out of the gap nearest to the PSU and feed it in through the hole near where it plugs in. Take the 4 or 8 pin CPU power connector and the 20 or 24 pin main power connector and plug them into the obvious places on the motherboard.



Most modern PSU's and motherboards have the 8 pin and 24 pin plugs and sockets, but if one has say 20 pin and the other 24 pin, they still work, so don't worry your pretty little head about it.

There are a few case cables to insert at this point. Most of it is self explanitory but it can be so different per case and board combo, I'm just going to show you where they all are on my combo.





The fiddly ports are all 2 pin plugs that you need to check wire colours on. It's fine if you just read carefully and this allows the speaker, case audio and case USB to work.

This is a nice and easy part, throw your RAM in! Most RAM comes in dual-channel these days meaning buying a matching pair should give a performance boost. These are usually colour-coded so I've thrown both sticks into the red slots. They only go in one way and you just give a good hard push at either end until you feel it click into place:



I then installed the 2.5" SSD in it's position at the bottom of the case. The positioning of this in this specific case is fucking stupid, so I recommend getting a 2.5" to 3.5" converter so you can install it in a standard hard drive bay if you get this configuration.



I plugged it into a SATA port and added a power cable, but I'll cover this in more detail when I do the standard drives.

Now with the motherboard pretty much installed, it's best to decorate the case with the motherboard sticker so people know what hardware you have. The Maximus IV Gene-Z came with quite a sexy one that I assume works like a go faster stripe!



Then as I put the side of the case down to cover up the PC before tomorrows tasks, I caught it and it cut me. This shouldn't happen, but I am an oaf.



My CPU hasn't been delivered yet, but hopefully tomorrow. If it is, we will cover installing that, the CPU cooler, hard drives, DVD drives and the case fans. Smooth sailing so far!
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Old 03-31-2012, 01:24 AM   #15
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So wish I had the patience to do this. How much do you think this is saving you from going to a store and picking up a similar model?
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Old 03-31-2012, 01:36 AM   #16
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I've heard on average it's about $200 premium on made to order PC's.

It's hard to qualify for sure, all I know is that for y budget I got some of the best parts money could buy after doing the research. I saved some for sure, but without finding a PC with this exact combo of hardware, it's hard to say.
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Old 03-31-2012, 10:36 AM   #17
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Success! It's amazing how fast it is with this SSD and it's soooooo quiet. I'm just doing the basic "just installed Windows" things so I'll update this a bit later!
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Old 03-31-2012, 04:28 PM   #18
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Too bad SSDs aren't cheaper. I thought they would be much cheaper than they are now by now. Maybe when they become more common and a lot more flash chips are produced.
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Old 04-01-2012, 08:44 AM   #19
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So my CPU arrived! I installed that next. Modern CPUs are fairly easy to install, so let's take a look at the motherboard CPU slot.



Fairly simple to get into this. Push the lever down and pull it away and lift. The remove that cover and we're good. The socket has a grey mark to align with the triangle on the cpu, as shown in these bad boys.





So place it in the socket with those two lined up. And unlike most parts, actually just place it. Don't press down until it clicks, it just sits in. Then pull the lever back down and lock it into place.

Next to install the CPU cooler. As I'm just using the standard one in the box, it is really easy to install.



Those four fan mounts just need clicking into place through the four holes in the motherboard to secure it and the wire hooking up to the CPU fan socket. If you had an AMD CPU/motherboard it's even easier, just 2 clamps and bam.

Now to hook up the fans on the case. For this you just take the 4-pin power cables and plug them into the 4 hole fan power connectors.



At this point, I have everything hooked up for a working PC, so we can see if all of this is installed properly. Lets flick the switch!



LIFE



BIOS! YAY!

Alright, turn it off and lets have a look at installing everything else. What I did next was install the GFX card and this was.... STUPID. It's easy enough to install, but this should be left to last I now know as it's so huge, it makes everything else difficult. But to do it, first I removed the screws from the back plate cover to fit it in.



Then I pushed the card into the slot until it clicked and screwed it in at the same point. If you have 2 or more slots it would fit in like I do, use the top one as it's usually the fastest one.

As well as being huge, modern GFX need their own power supply and PSU's now have plugs for the card specifically. If yours doesn't though, you can get converters for the 4 pin sockets to work with the PCI power. You need two of these plugs and they fit here:



So that's the motherboard and internal components pretty much done. Admire your handywork.



Don't tidy the cables yet though as you still have DVD and hard drives to go!

Disc drives just go in the top slots from the front. Remove any cover, slide them in and then just use 4 screws to secure it.



Hard drives are just as easy. Most of the time, they're installed from inside round the back, then secured with 4 screws. Mine has specific caddies that slide out the front and are then screwed in making it even easier!



Both of these things then just need a SATA power point from the PSU and a SATA cable from the motherboard to the drives. They fit so easily and only one way.

Screw that bitch up, you're done! Time to power it on again.



Looks fine... But it doesn't boot. Once it gets to the BIOS screen, it says the CPU is too hot. Well, one issue only is better than a load of them. I took to the internet and found the only people who had 85 degree celcius running CPU's are people who screwed up installing the cooler. I took a look around the back of the motherboard and found this:



So I opened it back up and lined up the mounts better so they go through the holes and gave it a big click again and they are now all pertruding through.

Now that's been done after installing Windows and all the software, I've had the PC on for about 20 hours at this point and even when it was under load overnight, it never went above 30 degrees. Fantastic.

This is easy to do and really feels like you achieved something. I built this whole PC! Now I can't wait until BF3 downloads so I can really test this sucker out.
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Old 04-01-2012, 06:52 PM   #20
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That's a nice looking BIOS! Also, I agree with Juracus- SSDs are far too expensive for 2012.
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Old 04-02-2012, 05:28 AM   #21
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The motherboard is easily the best thing in the whole PC. So many options in that BIOS to overclock and tweak and there's even a CMOS reset button round the back, which is damn handy as when I tried to overclock the RAM, it wouldn't even get to post, so a quick stab of that button and we were working again instead of fannying about with jumpers.

Then the ASUS suite has an auto level-up overclock button which runs a bunch of tests to see how much it can safely handle. It jumped the GFX card up 300mhz and left the CPU with it's stock cooler alone. Amazing.
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Old 04-05-2012, 02:49 PM   #22
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Wow! The last time I assembled a desktop was back when I had a Cyrix processor. Your BIOS looks rad. Good work Hasney

And how fast does Windows boot up?
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Old 04-05-2012, 05:36 PM   #23
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SSDs helping Windows 7 boot faster so you can watch your porn without wasting time.
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Old 04-06-2012, 04:31 AM   #24
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mondo Gecko View Post
Wow! The last time I assembled a desktop was back when I had a Cyrix processor. Your BIOS looks rad. Good work Hasney

And how fast does Windows boot up?
I've even turned off the boot logo. About 11 seconds including the BIOS post.
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