How to build a computer.

hokiealumnus · Dec 3, 2010

/begin OT/

Deathhorse said:
How do you take such good pics of pc components? i have a nice Nikon but cant use it for pics they always look bad. Anybody feel free to chime in?

It's all about lighting. If you want the best pics, take them during the day outside. That's not an option for me, so I light the heck out of stuff.

I use the cheapest home lighting I could find. You'll need two 100W equivalent (23W IIRC) daylight -don't get soft white, aka yellow bulbs- CFL light bulbs. Install them in two of these shop light clamp-on fixtures.

After that, it's a matter turning the flash off on your camera, selecting Macro mode and finding the right angle so you don't get any glare but still light it up well enough for photos.

Then take a ridiculous number of photos, lots at every angle. Case reviews are the hardest. I take literally hundreds of photos throughout a case review then have to sift through them to come out with the best ones to use in the review.

All photos in my reviews are taken with a five (six?) year old, 5MP Canon ELPH SD30. So it's not the camera for sure...it's all lighting.

/end OT/

Deathhorse · Dec 3, 2010

Nice, thanks hokie I have seen those exact fictures at home depot. When i buy them cause i will i am going to add a bunch of "good pictures to my gallery"

I have seen the macro mode option and used referenced greatly on the web. Why is that step so important.

hokiealumnus · Dec 3, 2010

It just sets the aperture/exposure/etc settings on your camera for maximum detail. Since the items we photograph are generally max 3ft across, it's always good to go with that setting. I have no idea what it changes, but in general it helps with items we'd be photographing.

WhitehawkEQ · Dec 20, 2010

Heatsink

Nice Joe, only comment I have is you forgot to mention putting the heatsink compound on the heatsink before putting it on the cpu, otherwise you could have a french fried cpu

I did see that there was some on the heatsink and cpu in your post on it.

jounkarry · Feb 15, 2011

Buddy this post is gorgeous and amazing you have done really really good job and helped many people who were looking for ,once again i would like to thank u thank u so match

FlubbyDG · Mar 12, 2011

These kind of guides are a godsend for people like me trying to get into building, thank you so much. One thing, you never mention using thermal paste when putting in the cpu/heatsink. That is required, yes?

andrethaiss · Mar 14, 2011

WOW, very helpful to those that dont know, i just sent this over to one of my friends that wants to build a cheap gaming rig.

I.M.O.G. · Mar 15, 2011

FlubbyDG said:
These kind of guides are a godsend for people like me trying to get into building, thank you so much. One thing, you never mention using thermal paste when putting in the cpu/heatsink. That is required, yes?

Unless its the stock heatsink yes. The stock heatsink comes with goo already applied. Some people like to replace that goo, but I wouldn't recommend it personally. If you want to use good thermal paste, you should replace the stock cooler also.

Neuromancer · Mar 18, 2011

I.M.O.G. said:
Unless its the stock heatsink yes. The stock heatsink comes with goo already applied. Some people like to replace that goo, but I wouldn't recommend it personally. If you want to use good thermal paste, you should replace the stock cooler also.

Depends on the setup and if you want to OC.

AMD units, stock cooler is adequate for 25% OCs. I have not tried sandy B on less than a overboard cooler. (which TBH I don't think is good enough)

TIM is also highly overrated. Went through the IC diamond guides. little differnce on Real world applications. Pressure more important than TIM. (Even IC admits, their TIM is useless without pressure...)

Prolimatech Megahalem, terrible mounting system. Might as well be a AMD clip and play.

That said.. good cooling is available. And depending on your setup, towers might be wrong. (going to test that soon, sick of air blocking that towers provide, going for a good top down cooler)

WhitehawkEQ · Mar 21, 2011

Before I got Cooler Master's HAF 932 full tower case, the full tower I had did block air in it, parts of the case was very warm.
I don't know about all full towers but I can say the HAF line of cases are very cool and no blocking of air in it.

Neuromancer said:
Depends on the setup and if you want to OC.

AMD units, stock cooler is adequate for 25% OCs. I have not tried sandy B on less than a overboard cooler. (which TBH I don't think is good enough)

TIM is also highly overrated. Went through the IC diamond guides. little differnce on Real world applications. Pressure more important than TIM. (Even IC admits, their TIM is useless without pressure...)

Prolimatech Megahalem, terrible mounting system. Might as well be a AMD clip and play.

That said.. good cooling is available. And depending on your setup, towers might be wrong. (going to test that soon, sick of air blocking that towers provide, going for a good top down cooler)

Neuromancer · Mar 23, 2011

Very nice build. Still waiting on my noctua top down to replace the shoddy megahalem (mounting system is terrible, completely cranked down I can still spin it)

AMD setup went from a mid tower to a modded LC-20 silverstone cae (removed hdd cage and added 2x120mm in front (slow and quiet) temps dropped a ton. I am now OCed to 3.5 vice 2.8 GHz and temps are still lower.

Case design is what it is all about. With 2x120mm in front on the LC-20.. sucking less dust (no longer negative to the extreme) it still sucks dust in the cracks... but pressure is more balanced. fans are designed at 0 pressure. Keep it as close as possible.

I used to thing that DAC was best, (direct air cooling) pressure aside getting the cool air on the hot components is tops. But if you exclude case pressure you are wrong. High positive makes terrible case flow. High negative makes a dusty optical drive (which I do not use)

Balanced but tend to negative pressure is best. (at least better than the alternative)

nanogeekpro · May 10, 2011

Hya peeps, I just bought this setup to put together myself... Is it all good or might there be a problem with the mother board?

I ordered a case not listed here, and it's only got a 500W PSU, will that be enough? =S

LG 22x Int DVD±RW Bare Black Drive SATA GH22NS50 No Software 1 12.49 12.49
G-Skill 4GB Ripjaws DDR3 Memory PC3-10666 1333MHz 1.5V Cas9 1x 4GB with heatspreader 1 28.61 28.61
Gigabyte motherboard PH67-UD3-B3 Intel LGA1155 Sandy Bridge 1 68.33 68.33
Seagate 500GB hard disk drive Barracuda SATA 6Gb/s 7200rpm 1 27.27 27.27
Intel CPU Core i5 2500 Sandybridge LGA1155 1 132.50 132.50
EVGA GeForce GTX 550 Ti 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-E 2.0 (16x) Dual link DVI-I Mini-HDMI Graphics Card Retail 1 95.99 95.99

I.M.O.G. · May 10, 2011

I deleted your post in this thread since it asked the same question in 2 places:
http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?p=6854516

The parts look fine, but I would buy a power supply and not use the 500W that comes with the case - PSUs with cases are typically very poor quality and if they die they can damage other components. Don't skimp on the PSU.

OpaqueShadow · Jun 15, 2011

so is there a major difference between ATX and UATX mother boards or is it just pyhsical size?

EarthDog · Jun 15, 2011

Just size really.

OpaqueShadow · Jun 15, 2011

I see, thanks for the info. I'm trying to plan my first gaming rig and so far this site has been a great help, I'll definately be putting my build up after i get every thing together.

I.M.O.G. · Jun 15, 2011

Size and features - due to size, it will generally have less ports, and maybe a few less bells and whistles as far as additional features.

unijabnx2000 · Sep 17, 2011

New age stuff:

PC -

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Mini ITX

ickie123 · Sep 17, 2011

First time desperado:

I bought the best I could afford, after saving specifically for this first build:

Mobo asrock p67 fatality1 professional, antec 300 case , Seasonic 100240vac power supply, and i7 intel cpu

Does not beep does not post!!!!

I have gone through basic trouble shooting steps of taking all parts out except MOBO, cpu, HEAT sink, but the case does not have a chasis speaker, it only has the HDA audio and/or ac’97 audio, I do not hear any beeps to help me troubleshoot.

I also had a galaxy gt450 fermi video card, and one paired memory sticks (ddr3 Patriot Memory gt2)

Pls any advice will be appreciated,

mroug · Sep 22, 2011

W0w i am amazed with the knowledge that i have gained from this tutorial thanks for the help

How to build a computer.

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