New Computer Part I

I recently built a new computer.  My previous machine was garbage (destroyed by Vista and my choice of super-cheap computer parts) and doing even the most minor disk or cpu intensive activities sucked.  To deal with the situation, I just shifted to doing most of my work at Work, and just did simple web browsing and chatting at home.  I finally got frustrated with the six-minute bootup time and purchased the parts to build a new machine.

 My new computer is decently high end, especially compared to previous models.  When you build computers in college, everything is based solely on price.  An extra gig of RAM for $40?  Not happening.  Having this real job helped out quite a bit, and I was able to put something together for around $800.   This (to me) seemed to be a bit pricy, so I lied a little to myself to justify the cost: Well, if I get a new PC, I’ll code at home more, write more, and generally be a more awesome person. Okay, I lied a lot.

Intel Q9400S 65W (which was 35% of the cost, actually.)
WD Raptor 74GB
2x 4GB DDR2 SDRAM
ASUS p5N7A-VM LGA 775 Motherboard
Antec Mini P180 Black Steel MicroATX Mini Tower
Antec Earthwatts 380W PSU
XFX GeForce 7300GT (Salvaged from old PC)
3 19” LCDs (Already had)
1 52” Samsung TV (Also already had)
 
Assembly was a lot more difficult then I imagined.  The last computer case I bought was in high school (2003), and the last computer I built was in 2006.  The cases for do-it-yourself PCs are a lot more advanced now, and I didn’t understand a lot of how to put the new case together.  There was a seperate power supply area and paths for running cables behind the motherboard.  Reading the manual (which was translated poorly) cleared up my problems, and once everything was up and running, i decided to install Windows XP x64.  Almost all of my hardware installed fine, except my second graphics card and the HDMI conneciton to the 52” Samsung.
 
Thats where the troubles began.

Tags: computer