If I wanted to build a computer for the first time.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

I've been reading MaximumPC mag and seeing all these people online who have built countless computers... so now I want to build one. I have a lot of computer knowledge for the most part, but there are a few problems.

1. I'm 13; I have no money. My dad says he can lend me some, maybe up to $600 or so, but he wants part of the profit (I'm going to sell it on ebay. This will only be an experiment so I can heighten my knowledge of computers.) So whatever I get, must be cheap, and it's got to sell on ebay for more than it cost me to build it, so I can pay my dad back and give him some profit. I would really care for the knowledge and experience more than the money.

2. I'm pretty good at picking out good parts when I customize a laptop on <insert manufacturer's site here>, but there are many parts I don't know the first thing about. Like, I have no idea how good any given motherboard is on newegg without looking at the customer reviews. And the power supplies, 400 watts? 500 watts? How will it help performance? And do you have to choose a case that has openings on the outside directly where the USB/eSATA/<insert port name> ports are located on the motherboard?

So as you can see, I need a little help. I think I'm pretty good on video cards, sound cards, RAM, monitors, procs, and HD's, but for basically everything else, could you geniuses please help point me in the right direction?

[Tweek]

!


ask agamemnon. he knows.

[Amit]

!


ask agamemnon. he knows.

ROFL


Cool, you wanna build a PC.

First of all do the following things and report back to us and we can give you a test so you know what you're doing when you start building:

1. Go to google and find a diagram of a motherboard that has been around for a few months.

2. Figure out what plugs in where on the motherboard and study the most basic connections on it:

1. powersupply ATX, mATX, or BTX plug
2. CPU fan plug
3. Chassis hardrive activity and power plug
4. Hard drive ports( IDE ribbon and/or SATA)
5. Optical (CD/DVD) Drive ports (IDE)
6. PCI-E slot(s)
7. PCI slots
8. RAM Slots
9. CPU mounting area
10. Chipset fan/heatsink area


After you study those 10 things come back here and tell me so I can get you a picture of a motherboard and put labels to where the names of the parts are supposed to be. You will then fill them in. Show me the diagram of the motherboard you studied off of.

This is meant to help you understand the placing of components on the motherboard. From there we can continue onto the other parts of building a computer.

[Snowy]

First off, you're not going to sell a PC on ebay for more than it's worth. Sorry, but you just won't. Second off, Newegg reviews are a joke. You can't think that a product is good based off a 12 year old's "5 eggs" because it's shiny and has blue led lights. You need to have a basic understanding of how each component of each component works, or what it does. (For example, the northbridge on the motherboard)

You also may want to get a decent idea of what overclocking is, how it works, and what a decent over clock is on different CPUs.

You must read lots and lots of product reviews, hang around a few tech sites like [H]ardOCP (http://www.hardocp.com). Read threads, gather info, get smart.

[paladin]

I'd start with pickings a CPU, thats pretty much teh most important aspect of your pc. Then, a motherboard, depending on what kind of pc you want (micro, full, desktop). If you want high performance (4 gb RAM, SLi) go with a full (650i SLi - 680i ultra). After that, the ram and hard drive type depends on your motherboard.

Building a pc and find the perfect parts takes a long time. It took me about 6 months until I was satisfied with the hardware I chose. If you need any help you can ask me. PM or email scottjshirley@hotmail.com.

Edit: adn I agree with snowy. You wont make a profit off Ebay. If you want to make a profit off building computers, advertise (such as craigslist.org) building custom computers. Ive made about $3000 so far in the past year doing so.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Amit, I found a bunch of diagrams, but they are all old (like, AT boards). I found the PCI and AGP slots, RAM slots, and CPU mount, but all the other stuff was not on there or not labeled.

Snowy, I have to get at least as much on ebay as I paid to make it. All I want is to know how to build a PC, and my dad wants his money back, so if I can get at least as much as it cost to build the thing, I'll be happy. Why else would people build PC's and then sell them on there?

[paladin]

You dont see hi-end pc's for auction on Ebay very often. Its mostly desktops. And if so, they are way over priced, and you can just build your own.

[StankBacon]

!


ask agamemnon. he knows.

i LOL'd ... loud.

>.<

[stankpot]

!


ask agamemnon. he knows.
oh yea this guy seems to know it all. LOLOL:-3

[TheGhost]

Second off, Newegg reviews are a joke. You can't think that a product is good based off a 12 year old's "5 eggs" because it's shiny and has blue led lights.

False, you can learn a LOT from reviews that product descriptions don't say.

[StankBacon]

False, you can learn a LOT from reviews that product descriptions don't say.

agreed, there are some very good reviews on most products.

[Xetsuei]

Since you only have $600, get a really shitty graphics card. Either that or if there is integrated graphics leave it like that. Then spend a lot of the money on the CPU.

[stankpot]

integrated booooo

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Yeah, and there's almost never a description on most products on newegg.

EDIT: Why? If it's going to sell for anything I'll need a decent grafix card. I was thinking an 8600GT, I think it was around 150 bucks.

[Xetsuei]

integrated booooo

Since he will be selling this to a complete idiot on ebay, all they will look at is the CPU. It's the same with everyone who sells mainstream computers.

e: No one on ebay looking for a computer will know what a graphics card even does. Don't waste your money on a graphics card for this.

[alby]

Make sure that you put a list of all the components that you put into the computer and then give the moron that buys the computer links to where he can get support, so that he doesn't bitch to you about something not working.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Xetsuei™;196571']Since he will be selling this to a complete idiot on ebay, all they will look at is the CPU. It's the same with everyone who sells mainstream computers.

e: No one on ebay looking for a computer will know what a graphics card even does. Don't waste your money on a graphics card for this.
Hmm. Mb. But what if an intelligent person looks at this?

[Xetsuei]

They won't.

[Snowy]

False, you can learn a LOT from reviews that product descriptions don't say.

There's also a LOT of false information you can "learn" from the newegg reviews.

[Snowy]

Snowy, I have to get at least as much on ebay as I paid to make it. All I want is to know how to build a PC, and my dad wants his money back, so if I can get at least as much as it cost to build the thing, I'll be happy. Why else would people build PC's and then sell them on there?

If you want to learn how to build a PC, take apart your current pc then put it back together?

[Mr Buckshot]

Congratulations Omega!

Go on google and type in how to build a computer. There are countless tutorials that will give you fine tips, although some of them are outdated since they were based on the technology of 2005.

http://computer.howstuffworks.com/build-a-computer.htm

The Howstuffworks link doesn't give tips on which parts are good, but it is good at telling you how to assemble the computer.

If you need help for stuff like which graphics card is better, which CPU is good, etc, feel free to post on this forum. For the building part, you should learn it yourself - it is a very rewarding experience.

[Amit]

Amit, I found a bunch of diagrams, but they are all old (like, AT boards). I found the PCI and AGP slots, RAM slots, and CPU mount, but all the other stuff was not on there or not labeled.


oh.


Hmm. Mb. But what if an intelligent person looks at this?

If the person was smart, they wouldn't look to buy a PC on ebay.


For the building part, you should learn it yourself - it is a very rewarding experience.

Damn right it is!

[Zeph]

I personally think you're too young and under budget to get anything good. Ask your family to hold onto the money and continue saving up until you can actually get something that's worth your time.

[Amit]

I personally think you're too young and under budget to get anything good. Ask your family to hold onto the money and continue saving up until you can actually get something that's worth your time.

Come on Zeph, it's the perfect age to start, I built this computer 2 years ago when I was 13 years old. It works as good as I want it to. I won't deny that he is underfunded, yeah try to save a bit more. For $600, honestly, you won't be able to get much out of that PC. The most expensive things you're gonna buy for your PC will be the CPU, GPU, and the Motherboard.

[Xetsuei]

I personally think you're too young and under budget to get anything good. Ask your family to hold onto the money and continue saving up until you can actually get something that's worth your time.

To young? Pffft. I built my first computer when I was nine. His budget is perfect for a mainstream computer.

[paladin]

Come on Zeph, it's the perfect age to start, I built this computer 2 years ago when I was 13 years old. It works as good as I want it to. I won't deny that he is underfunded, yeah try to save a bit more. For $600, honestly, you won't be able to get much out of that PC. The most expensive things you're gonna buy for your PC will be the CPU, GPU, and the Motherboard.

not true. I build my brother a dece computer for christmas (havent givin it to him yet) for under $500

[Amit]

not true. I build my brother a dece computer for christmas (havent givin it to him yet) for under $500

Cool, mind posting the specs and where you bought the parts?

[Patrickssj6]

Don't....

1.You are NOT going to get more money out of it
2.What happens if the comp get's damaged when shipped? Good luck without insurance.
3.Most people want a warranty for their computer...that's not guaranteed.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Then how could I get at least the same amount I paid for the parts? I guess I could try making a suckish one for idiots on ebay, then sell it. It's true, the CPU is probably the only thing they'll look at and then say everything else is really good (ex. Includes new Intel GMA X1300!!! Wow!)

I guess when I find some parts, I'll post em on here.

[Patrickssj6]

Dude, use your brain please before you regret it. You can't possibly think you found a niche in the market.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Of course not, I just want to learn how to do it so I'll have a full understanding of how the computer works. I won't necessarily start a movement and build computers by the hundreds and make a profit by selling them on ebay :/

[paladin]

Cool, mind posting the specs and where you bought the parts?

Raidmax Ninja ATX Mid-Tower w/ 450 watt psu - $69.99
MSI K9N4 nForce 500 SLi - $78.99
EVGA GeForce 8500GT 256 PCI-E - $74.99
AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+ @ 2.6 GH - $119.00
Mushkin 2x1Gb 240-pin PC 6400 Duel-channel RAM - $49.99
Western Digital Caviar 250 Gb SATA 3.9Gb/s - $69.99
LG SM 18x DVD/CR burner - + $28.99
total: $491.94


Its dece, its not a "OmG ULTIMATE GAMING MACHINE!!!!!!!111!!!!!1!" but it is a nice dual core machine and so far runs perfect.

[Amit]

Raidmax Ninja ATX Mid-Tower w/ 450 watt psu - $69.99
MSI K9N4 nForce 500 SLi - $78.99
EVGA GeForce 8500GT 256 PCI-E - $74.99
AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+ @ 2.6 GH - $119.00
Mushkin 2x1Gb 240-pin PC 6400 Duel-channel RAM - $49.99
Western Digital Caviar 250 Gb SATA 3.9Gb/s - $69.99
LG SM 18x DVD/CR burner - + $28.99
total: $491.94


Its dece, its not a "OmG ULTIMATE GAMING MACHINE!!!!!!!111!!!!!1!" but it is a nice dual core machine and so far runs perfect.



Yeah, that is pretty damn decent, the only thing lacking is the video card. A GeForce 8600GT would make a perfect upgrade.

[paladin]

Yeah but you cant get a good gpu for $400

[Mr Buckshot]

Yeah but you cant get a good gpu for $400

Depends on how you define a good GPU. IMO, a "good" graphics card is a Geforce 7600 GT or higher, and the 7600 GT costs $85 on newegg now. My definition of a good card is something that can run most games on highest settings at WXGA resolution or higher.

Many budget-conscious builders will probably select mATX low-end motherboards...not everyone will truly notice the benefits of high end motherboards. For many PC gamers, having a PCI-e 16x slot and the appropriate CPU/RAM/SATA/USB connections is all that matters.

Also Omega, if you want dual-core capability at an affordable price, go for the socket AM2 AMD Athlon 64 X2 processors (3600 or higher). The Intel Core 2 Duos and the higher end Athlons (4800 or higher) are the true beasts of gaming, but the Athlon X2 3800 which I have is still very capable and worth a purchase for budget gamers. Core 2 Duos are all far more expensive.

Finally, I hope your $600 budget doesn't include a monitor, since you own a laptop right now. If you want a budget gaming PC AND a monitor for $600, then you might get lucky with those bulky CRT monitors...but if you want a nice widescreen LCD, up the budget by at least $150.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Nah, no monitor. Remember, I'm not going to keep the thing, I'm going to sell it afterwards to pay back my dad.

So AMD processors are cheaper? I'll keep that in mind. Maybe I should start picking out parts later today or tomorrow... I have a grueling swim meet today, and it's the first one when none of my strokes are freestyle, and I have a 200-meter IM. So maybe tomorrow.

[4RT1LL3RY]

It better if you find soemone in your area who would like to buy a computer, buy the parts, build it and charge a part mark up and labor, keep it reasonable though. You can always send out fliers, but be sure to include details, like if you want money ahead of time and the expected wait before they get it.

[paladin]

Depends on how you define a good GPU. IMO, a "good" graphics card is a Geforce 7600 GT or higher, and the 7600 GT costs $85 on newegg now. My definition of a good card is something that can run most games on highest settings at WXGA resolution or higher.

Many budget-conscious builders will probably select mATX low-end motherboards...not everyone will truly notice the benefits of high end motherboards. For many PC gamers, having a PCI-e 16x slot and the appropriate CPU/RAM/SATA/USB connections is all that matters.

Also Omega, if you want dual-core capability at an affordable price, go for the socket AM2 AMD Athlon 64 X2 processors (3600 or higher). The Intel Core 2 Duos and the higher end Athlons (4800 or higher) are the true beasts of gaming, but the Athlon X2 3800 which I have is still very capable and worth a purchase for budget gamers. Core 2 Duos are all far more expensive.

Finally, I hope your $600 budget doesn't include a monitor, since you own a laptop right now. If you want a budget gaming PC AND a monitor for $600, then you might get lucky with those bulky CRT monitors...but if you want a nice widescreen LCD, up the budget by at least $150.


A Good Gpu, to me, is 320 bit memory, with 640+ on-board memory.

If you lived in Washington, I'd build you won. Hell I still will, but shipping it would be a challenge.
I charge 10&#37; on hardware, plus $200 for installing everything. Optional parts and labor warranty ($100-$200).

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Washinton DC? Or state? Cuz I live near DC. But that's ok, I don't need a new one, I just want to build it.


My definition of a good card is something that can run most games on highest settings at WXGA resolution or higher.
Yes! That's the kind I want in my laptop that I was looking for. Something that could run all modern DX9 games on full settings at 1280x800.

[paladin]

Wa State.

[Atty]

Second off, Newegg reviews are a joke. You can't think that a product is good based off a 12 year old's "5 eggs" because it's shiny and has blue led lights.

Negative.

New Egg reviews are great if you are smart. The best thing to do is sort by most helpfulness; usually the most helpful reviews are voted up to the top. Those are the ones that list problems, fixes, incompatibilities, etc, etc. Back when Core 2's were just releasing, around my last PC build, New Egg reviews saved a lot of us a lot of trouble. The motherboard reviews listed if it was shipping with Core 2 capable BIOS, RAM reviews listed incompatibilities with various chipsets, etc, and usually they include information on new revisions and their update rules. A lot of times they list fixes for common problems with parts, such as timings being off. New Egg reviews are also great for one other thing, DOAs. You can find out if an item has a high DOA rate from their reviews, something most review sites never say, and definitely not something product pages release. Sure, you can get most of this from a community forum, but still New Egg’s reviews aren't to be dismissed wholly on the fact that some are written by retarded 12 year olds; if you had that mentality you'd dismiss all forum posts as well. Sure, you can get most of this from a community forum, but still New Egg’s reviews aren't to be dismissed wholly on the fact that retarded 12 year olds write them too, if you had that mentality you'd dismiss all forum posts as well.

Really, for building your first PC, you will want a lot of help. You'll want to basically be led by the hand the entire time, having people giving you information on what to buy and whatnot. From that you'll learn enough to make it out there on your own. It’s a bit harder then it sounds to just jump into a community like Anandtech or H and just figure out what you're doing, PC building isn't as easy or simple as it looks.

To start out with you'll want to look at benchmarks, a lot of them. At this time of year sites are doing huge benchmark tests with all the common products, from low end to extreme enthusiast, there are groups of benchmarks on most every product. You'll want to find something that performs well in your price range and then from there work on a build. If you are going for a low-end build I'd like to suggest you get the best CPU, Motherboard, and PSU you can, leaving you open for upgrading later down the road. RAM can be easily upgradeable and is constantly going up and down, if need be grab some cheep ram and upgrade it in a few weeks when you can scrape together an extra $100 dollars. Hard Drives aren't a big thing but its best to get something reliable, I'm a huge Seagate fan, I own 2 of their Perpendicular storage 320GB drives and will soon own a third (unless I go for their 500/1TB drive, depends on how much I want to spend,) graphics card is always a hard purchase, you have the choice of either buying now and being disappointed in a few weeks/months when it drops in price considerably and something cheaper and 10x better comes out or waiting it out a bit, which sometimes is good but can sometimes leave you waiting a helluva long time. Cases are easy to buy, look for something that you like that’s also very good. It’s not best just to buy based on looks but they are a factor. If it’s got good features, enough room, and good airflow, and you also think it looks sexy, get it. Hopefully you won't need to worry about a monitor because that’s a huge cash drain, if you want something good that is. You can get a cheap monitor but believe me; you'll see its price reflected in its performance quickly. I'd look into recycling old parts if you want to save money, most times I only recommend recycling for DVD/CD Drives but if you've got some good ram you might carry that over and hold off on buying a new kit when you find a good deal, as I said earlier.

Beyond that you can probably handle yourself. Just don't be silly and buy your parts without consulting someone first. The most common problem with newbies to PC building is they rush into a purchase and buy something that’s not going to do what they want or that is entirely incompatible with the rest of their parts (AMD Proc Intel Motherboard, anyone?)

If you give us a price range and an idea of what you'd be using it for, either myself or someone else can give you a place to start from. I'd suggest Anandtech and her forums for advice and information; it’s a great site.

Oh and btw, I didn't bother reading any posts in this thread beyond the thread title and Ghost's, and I only got the New Egg thing from Ghost's post, so if I'm repeating information or giving him information he doesn't need, so the fuck what, this just ate up 20 minutes of my School Day. :downs:

[Patrickssj6]

A Good Gpu, to me, is 320 bit memory
320 bit? That should be interesting. 1 pixel at a time...wohoow at real time. ;)

[alby]

320 bit? That should be interesting. 1 pixel at a time...wohoow at real time. ;)


The 8800 GTS G80 is 320 bit memory.

[Patrickssj6]

The 8800 GTS G80 is 320 bit memory.
Get the facts straight. Learn what "bits" are.

320 bit is the memory interface and 320MB is the memory size.
And don't tell you meant memory interface in the first place.

[paladin]

Who are you talking too? Hopefully not me?

I agree with Atty, Newegg reviews are informative. I learned almost everything I know about computer by surfing newegg and reading reviews to learn whats good and not. A product description tells you nothing!

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Lol 320 bit video memory.

Atty, the only reason I'm doing this is just to learn how to build the thing. Once I'm done building it, I'll have no use for it, I'll just sell it to pay my dad back for the loan he gives me to buy all the parts. I don't really care what parts it has so long as I learn how to put all the stuff together. I'm leaning towards getting low specs and a good CPU, like everyone else said, because the noob who comes across my ebay auction will look at the proc and assume it's a good computer.

Actually, I might learn a few things about building a computer very shortly, because my school has a tech club that I'm going to join, and our first thing we're going to do is take a bunch of old crappy computers donated to us and fix em up, and install windows and office and stuff on em and give em to kids so they can do research for school. Lol, kind of an umpromising cause (afterschool pr0n mb?) but I can get the basics of building a machine before I go out and blow a bunch of money on real parts that I must pay for eventually.

And yes I agree with paladin; most items on newegg don't have a description anyway.

[alby]

Get the facts straight. Learn what "bits" are.

320 bit is the memory interface and 320MB is the memory size.
And don't tell you meant memory interface in the first place.

I did mean the memory interface, and so did paladin when he said it in the first place.

Edit: Next time I will explain myself a little more, sorry for the confusion. Also I do know what bits are.

[0m3g4Muff1n987]

Alright, I've picked out some parts, I'll probably revise later because the parts are crappy (integrated audio and video...) and cheap (final price without OS or monitor or anything = $262), but I picked em out in about 15 mins. So here you go.

Winsis WN-22 Black SGCC MicroATX Mid Tower Computer Case 350W Power Supply (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811234019)


GIGABYTE GA-M61SME-S2 AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128045)


AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Windsor 2.0GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 89W Processor (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103735)


WINTEC AMPO 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820161172)


Western Digital Caviar SE WD2500AAJS 250GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136113)


ASUS Black 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-ROM ATAPI/E-IDE DVD-ROM Drive Model DVD-E616A3 OEM (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827135147)

See how good those are, and yell at me for picking out such cheap sucky parts :D

[Xetsuei]

Get the facts straight. Learn what "bits" are.

320 bit is the memory interface and 320MB is the memory size.
And don't tell you meant memory interface in the first place.

He never said 320 bits of memory, he just said 320 bit memory. It's not hard to understand.

[Bad Waffle]

Are you building a computer, or a tiny playtoy thats useless for anything but watching movies and old games? Just save your money like i did, and buy something that can REALLY kick. When i was your age i was gonna buy a computer, but i waited until i was 17 to buy it because by then i had enough money to get something that i wouldn't get laughed at for.

Look at my computer stats to see what you can get for 2k.

[Xetsuei]

Shame you bought an E6850 instead of a Q6600.

[paladin]

Yeah, but why pay $500 right now for +.6GHz? 45nm technology is new, theres not much out there to run with it, not even and SLi motherboard. Its not worth $1000 to me.

Edit: Disregaurd this. I mistaked you, Xetsuei, for the QX6850.

Om3g4: I wouldn't buy a mid tower for a baby/mirco ATX. Also, if you get that casem you are most likely going to have to buy a new, more powerful psu. 350 can barely run my toilet.

Definitely on my Christmas list: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115035
lol^^ more than my whole system combined.

[Xetsuei]

Yeah, but why pay $500 right now for +.6GHz? 45nm technology is new, theres not much out there to run with it, not even and SLi motherboard. Its not worth $1000 to me.

Basically for that .6ghz and an unlocked core multiplier. You can overclock it to hell and back. Example: My 4ghz QX6800.

[paladin]

Yeah, whatevs. Im just jealous cause I could only afford the Q6600. I have it set at 2.8Ghz. Fu and your 4.0 Ghz...!!