And built it myself! It took me over a year and a half to collect the parts, but it's finally done! Actually, I've been using it for a week or so now, but I wanted to fix all the problems before I said anything.
Just for kicks, here are all the things that went wrong with my first built PC.
1. Motherboard: I ordered a micro-ATX for a case that's full sized ATX. The smaller power supply leaves a gap in the back.
2. Once I got all of the parts, I didn't realize I had all the cables until a month passed.
3. Once I connected everything, I reached to turn it on, and nothing happened. I had yet to connect the power supply. Lacking the instruction manual, I turned to my old PC and tried to imitate the connection there. Didn't work. Found the instruction manual online, and then my PC had power.
4. My moniter wasn't connected properly. I connected it to the motherboard and not the video card, because the video card had weird looking connections. Then I dug through a drawer and found a converter.
5. My copy of Windows XP was missing the 25 digit authenticity code. Just recently fixed that through technical support.
6. The sound wasn't working, the ethernet wasn't working. A quick installation of drivers fixed that and...
New PC! Definitely a learning experience. Hopefully next time I'll knock down the number of screw ups to...fewer than six. In the meantime, I get to play new games! Assuming there are any new games on the PC I need to play.
Just for kicks, here are all the things that went wrong with my first built PC.
1. Motherboard: I ordered a micro-ATX for a case that's full sized ATX. The smaller power supply leaves a gap in the back.
2. Once I got all of the parts, I didn't realize I had all the cables until a month passed.
3. Once I connected everything, I reached to turn it on, and nothing happened. I had yet to connect the power supply. Lacking the instruction manual, I turned to my old PC and tried to imitate the connection there. Didn't work. Found the instruction manual online, and then my PC had power.
4. My moniter wasn't connected properly. I connected it to the motherboard and not the video card, because the video card had weird looking connections. Then I dug through a drawer and found a converter.
5. My copy of Windows XP was missing the 25 digit authenticity code. Just recently fixed that through technical support.
6. The sound wasn't working, the ethernet wasn't working. A quick installation of drivers fixed that and...
New PC! Definitely a learning experience. Hopefully next time I'll knock down the number of screw ups to...fewer than six. In the meantime, I get to play new games! Assuming there are any new games on the PC I need to play.
My blog:
http://nvracar.wordpress.com/
http://nvracar.wordpress.com/
Sucks you had so many screw ups, but it's always nice to get a new machine... The feel of power and speed for the first few months... Make sure you get some of those programs that help keep your system clean of junk, not just any program though, make sure it is a reputable one... You don't want something that will slowly eat your software...
Congrats on your new toy... And I'm sure there are plenty of games out there you can find to play...
Congrats on your new toy... And I'm sure there are plenty of games out there you can find to play...
The Paved Straight Road, Won't Always Get You Farther Than The Winding Dirt Road...
Can You Run Your Game??? Click Here And Find Out...
*Note, Not All Games Have Been Tested & Therefore May Not Be Listed...
Can You Run Your Game??? Click Here And Find Out...
*Note, Not All Games Have Been Tested & Therefore May Not Be Listed...
Your actually lucky.
So much more could have gone wrong.
When I ordered all the parts for my wife's pc....
guess what.....
bad ram.
And it was a b**tch figuring that out.
Because it wasn't completely dead.
It somewhat worked.
So i had to pop out ram sticks, play with the voltage in the bios... and try different combinations, along with a program called memtest to figure out which one was bad.
Its really good you only had simple problems for you first run through. It makes it so you can actually learn stuff gradually.
Everything is working now. yay =)
So much more could have gone wrong.
When I ordered all the parts for my wife's pc....
guess what.....
bad ram.
And it was a b**tch figuring that out.
Because it wasn't completely dead.
It somewhat worked.
So i had to pop out ram sticks, play with the voltage in the bios... and try different combinations, along with a program called memtest to figure out which one was bad.
Its really good you only had simple problems for you first run through. It makes it so you can actually learn stuff gradually.
Everything is working now. yay =)
Matt
Here's the basic stats:
> Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo E7300 @ 2666 MHz
> Physical Memory : 2048 MB (2 x 1024 DDR2-SDRAM )
> Video Card : NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT
> Hard Disk : WDC (500 GB)
Also, I just ran Crysis on it at it's highest settings without stutter, so it doesn't seem out of date. And...no photo til I get a camera. Or a webcam. Or...something.
> Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo E7300 @ 2666 MHz
> Physical Memory : 2048 MB (2 x 1024 DDR2-SDRAM )
> Video Card : NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT
> Hard Disk : WDC (500 GB)
Also, I just ran Crysis on it at it's highest settings without stutter, so it doesn't seem out of date. And...no photo til I get a camera. Or a webcam. Or...something.
My blog:
http://nvracar.wordpress.com/
http://nvracar.wordpress.com/
Dude, get more RAM... I am really surprised Crysis runs without a stutter on that system to be honest. With RAM so cheap these days you would easily get another 2 to put in there.Vracar wrote:Here's the basic stats:
> Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo E7300 @ 2666 MHz
> Physical Memory : 2048 MB (2 x 1024 DDR2-SDRAM )
> Video Card : NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT
> Hard Disk : WDC (500 GB)
Also, I just ran Crysis on it at it's highest settings without stutter, so it doesn't seem out of date. And...no photo til I get a camera. Or a webcam. Or...something.
Other than that it's a neat system.
-Cub. =o)