THE FIRST PC I EVER BUILT
It wasn't the first computer I had, but it was the first PC I built
from scratch. As I have said in the About
Us page; I have been involved
with computers all of my life, but I never really built my first PC.
I have repaired them, replaced parts, taken them apart, cleaned them,
but never had the time to build the whole enchilada. This was my chance
to build the one that I wanted.
Several years ago, when I was trying to
consolidate
my five computers down to one that I could use; I started by salvaging
all of the usable parts and seeing which computer
case would
satisfy my needs. I
had four
mini towers, and one mid tower which I decided to keep. The others I
discarded. I had replaced power
supplies a few times, so I decided to
keep the newest one. With these two items I assembled the case and
power supply. This was the start of my first PC.
As you can see I had many of the items that I
needed to build a computer; but in order to achieve the performance I
wanted, I had to purchase a few parts. I chose one of the
online computer supply houses and made my purchase. I am not a gamer,
nor was this going to be a server, so I chose mid-range components. I
ordered a motherboard,
a 1.6 G Hz CPU,
and 1 Gig of memory.
Every day I looked on the Internet to see where
the shipment was. I watched as it moved across the country. Finally the
package arrived. I now could begin the rest of the building process.
I opened the motherboard package and inspected it
very carefully for any damage, it looked good. After the inspection I
installed the peripheral connection template and set any jumpers needed
on the motherboard. The next thing was to
install several M3 brass motherboard standoffs on which I would mount
the motherboard with the screws provided. Then it was time to make the
connections to the power
supply and the case. Yes, I did read the manual, and I always use a
grounding strap.
The CPU was then mounted in its socket and
secured. Then the fan/heatsink was attached to the CPU using thermal
past provided and secured to the motherboard. The fan was electrically
connected to the
motherboard.
The final thing for the motherboard was to insert
the one Gig of RAM (memory) into the slot provided. A few years later I
added the second Gig of RAM.
I
took a hard
drive
that I had salvaged from my old computer and mounted
in the 3 1/2 inch drive bay of this first PC. This drive had all of my software on it,
so I didn't have to load any. I secured the drive with four #4-40
Phillips head screws. I set the master/slave jumper and connected the
power supply cable. The final thing was to connect the EIDE cable
between the hard drive and the motherboard.
Another salvaged item
was a CD
burner
(reader and writer) which I also mounted in a 5 1/4
inch drive bay. The next thing was to make the electrical connections,
power, data, and master/slave jumper. A few years later I replaced it
with a combination CD and DVD burner.
For some inexplicable
reason I decided to install a salvaged floppy disk drive, and make the
proper electrical connections. To this day I have never used it.
After
closing and securing the computer case; I attached the keyboard,
the mouse,
the monitor,
the printer,
and my DSL line. All of these were
salvaged items. I was now ready to test the computer. This was building
a computer from scratch.
I
began to power up my first PC, watching the monitor to see if
everything was progressing correctly. It was; the operating system
started to boot up, showing each of the programs. Next, I ran tests on
each of the peripherals to check performance. They also ran correctly;
was I lucky. Every thing was working perfectly. Over the years I have
upgraded the computer by adding a microphone, speakers, a webcam, and
some additional software.
You to can use these tips for building a computer for yourself!!
Return
from this page The first PC I ever built to Build
a computer home page.
THE FIRST PC YOU EVER BUILT
I've written about the first PC I ever built. It was fun and very satisfying. Now its your turn to tell of your story of computer building. The readers want to know how you felt and your experiences both humorous and otherwise when building your first computer. Be forthcoming, everyone screwed up with their first.
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