The bits for my computer were finally delivered yesterday. As this is the second time in about a month that I've built a computer, I thought I'd record the adventure and turn it into a photo guide of sorts. Who knows, someone might find it mildly interesting.
These were the boxes that arrived from UPS yesterday, and the objective for the evening was to assemble their contents into a working computer. (I should point out that some of the boxes are actually other things that we shipped from California that arrived in the same delivery - I'm not assembling the Hubble telescope or anything.)
Step 1 - Finding Everything: The first difficulty was actually finding any of the components I'd bought, because all of the boxes were filled with styrofoam packing peanuts, making it look like a lucky dip at a school coffee morning. Throughout the process, I realized I was missing things and had to dive back into the fluffy mass to retrieve them.
Step 2 - Unpacking: Once I'd got all the packing fluff off everything, I was finally ready to begin. This is the case as it arrived, with nothing but a power supply and a few cables. I've never owned a case that wasn't beige before.
Step 3 - Getting it Apart: Getting to a stage where you can access the back board is the first real step. My habit of accidentally choosing the worst cases possible seems to have continued here, as there was no obvious way to get it out apart from unscrewing the whole case and removing the power supply. I tend to like cases with as few screws as possible (one of the computers at home is held together almost entirely with clips), but the manufacturers of this one liked them - there are about fifteen million of them holding the case together.
Step 4 - The Motherboard: The biggest and most vital of the components is screwed on to the back panel by a set of spacers, then a set of screws to go into them. This is actually fairly easy once you've lined up the screws correctly, but last time I built a computer only about five spacers were provided. There were plenty this time, with the supplier content with supplying only three plastic washers instead.
Step 5 - The Processor: If you're interested, this is what a processor looks like. Tiny and innocent, though also terrifying to handle - one static spark in the wrong place and you can zap the whole thing instantly.
Step 6 - The Processor Fan: The processor is placed on the square top socket of the motherboard and levered in, and the fan is stuck on top of it with thermal paste to aid cooling. The fan was the most difficult thing I've ever encountered - usually I don't like putting in memory, but this beats it easily. I had to remove the existing fan brace by forcing a couple of plastic clips off it, then place it on to the processor and force the same clips back on, all the time hoping not to break anything underneath.
Step 7 - Memory: Then it's time to put in the memory (1.5GB of it, actually). This came in two sticks, which as I mentioned before I've always found nightmarish to put in. They involve pushing down on the sticks evenly and much more firmly than you'd think was good for them, until those white clips at the sides snap into place.
Step 8 - Piecing it Together: It was about this time that I realized the motherboard would have to go back into the case at some point. Before doing that, it's worth checking that the ports on the back will line up with the back of the case - and as you can see from the first two photos above, they clearly weren't going to fit. Correcting this is just a matter of unscrewing the old plate and hammering in a new one.
And that's what the whole thing looks like when inside the case. I've also replaced the power supply, as you can see on the top left.
Step 9 - The Pins: With the main components on the board, the next step is connecting all the tiny little out-of-focus pins that come from the front panel. This is totally impossible, because they're squashed up together, about two millimetres square each, and labelled things like "VCC+" and "FPRST". I find the best way to do it is to tape them all together in the right shape, then plug them all in at once.
And with everything connected to the pins, my computer is beginning to look like it just got back from Pride Parade.
Step 10 - The Hardware: Now that the entire motherboard is connected up, the additional hardware such as the hard drives and graphics card can be inserted. I was particularly impressed with this case's front panel because I didn't have to knock through any metal protectors, which takes ages. Instead, the panels could be removed and inserted easily - but as I found out I only had one IDE cable, I had to come up with the fairly eccentric arrangement pictured above. With all that together, the computer should be in working order.
Step 10A...: Dash out to the local electronics place to get a graphics card that actually works in your system. (The motherboard has an MGP port, which no one in the world has ever heard of, and it only supports certain cards. I got a PCI Express one instead, even though I think PCI Express is a fairly terrible name, as it reminds me of Tesco Express.)
And this is the finished computer - complete with a slightly less mad hard/DVD drive arrangement, as I took the opportunity to get a second IDE cable while I was there.
So, sorry laptop - but you're getting replaced -
And as you can see I'm using it to continue my current ZZT spate. Which is a perfect application for a $90 graphics card.
These were the boxes that arrived from UPS yesterday, and the objective for the evening was to assemble their contents into a working computer. (I should point out that some of the boxes are actually other things that we shipped from California that arrived in the same delivery - I'm not assembling the Hubble telescope or anything.)
Step 1 - Finding Everything: The first difficulty was actually finding any of the components I'd bought, because all of the boxes were filled with styrofoam packing peanuts, making it look like a lucky dip at a school coffee morning. Throughout the process, I realized I was missing things and had to dive back into the fluffy mass to retrieve them.
Step 2 - Unpacking: Once I'd got all the packing fluff off everything, I was finally ready to begin. This is the case as it arrived, with nothing but a power supply and a few cables. I've never owned a case that wasn't beige before.
Step 3 - Getting it Apart: Getting to a stage where you can access the back board is the first real step. My habit of accidentally choosing the worst cases possible seems to have continued here, as there was no obvious way to get it out apart from unscrewing the whole case and removing the power supply. I tend to like cases with as few screws as possible (one of the computers at home is held together almost entirely with clips), but the manufacturers of this one liked them - there are about fifteen million of them holding the case together.
Step 4 - The Motherboard: The biggest and most vital of the components is screwed on to the back panel by a set of spacers, then a set of screws to go into them. This is actually fairly easy once you've lined up the screws correctly, but last time I built a computer only about five spacers were provided. There were plenty this time, with the supplier content with supplying only three plastic washers instead.
Step 5 - The Processor: If you're interested, this is what a processor looks like. Tiny and innocent, though also terrifying to handle - one static spark in the wrong place and you can zap the whole thing instantly.
Step 6 - The Processor Fan: The processor is placed on the square top socket of the motherboard and levered in, and the fan is stuck on top of it with thermal paste to aid cooling. The fan was the most difficult thing I've ever encountered - usually I don't like putting in memory, but this beats it easily. I had to remove the existing fan brace by forcing a couple of plastic clips off it, then place it on to the processor and force the same clips back on, all the time hoping not to break anything underneath.
Step 7 - Memory: Then it's time to put in the memory (1.5GB of it, actually). This came in two sticks, which as I mentioned before I've always found nightmarish to put in. They involve pushing down on the sticks evenly and much more firmly than you'd think was good for them, until those white clips at the sides snap into place.
Step 8 - Piecing it Together: It was about this time that I realized the motherboard would have to go back into the case at some point. Before doing that, it's worth checking that the ports on the back will line up with the back of the case - and as you can see from the first two photos above, they clearly weren't going to fit. Correcting this is just a matter of unscrewing the old plate and hammering in a new one.
And that's what the whole thing looks like when inside the case. I've also replaced the power supply, as you can see on the top left.
Step 9 - The Pins: With the main components on the board, the next step is connecting all the tiny little out-of-focus pins that come from the front panel. This is totally impossible, because they're squashed up together, about two millimetres square each, and labelled things like "VCC+" and "FPRST". I find the best way to do it is to tape them all together in the right shape, then plug them all in at once.
And with everything connected to the pins, my computer is beginning to look like it just got back from Pride Parade.
Step 10 - The Hardware: Now that the entire motherboard is connected up, the additional hardware such as the hard drives and graphics card can be inserted. I was particularly impressed with this case's front panel because I didn't have to knock through any metal protectors, which takes ages. Instead, the panels could be removed and inserted easily - but as I found out I only had one IDE cable, I had to come up with the fairly eccentric arrangement pictured above. With all that together, the computer should be in working order.
Step 10A...: Dash out to the local electronics place to get a graphics card that actually works in your system. (The motherboard has an MGP port, which no one in the world has ever heard of, and it only supports certain cards. I got a PCI Express one instead, even though I think PCI Express is a fairly terrible name, as it reminds me of Tesco Express.)
And this is the finished computer - complete with a slightly less mad hard/DVD drive arrangement, as I took the opportunity to get a second IDE cable while I was there.
So, sorry laptop - but you're getting replaced -
And as you can see I'm using it to continue my current ZZT spate. Which is a perfect application for a $90 graphics card.
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