Yea....Ocforums doesnt have a tutorial section so i have no idea where to slap this tut....o well
Check out my other tutorial: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=2526613#post2526613
AZNmodder’s guide to building your own computer 1-11-04
Welcome to xoxide forums and hope this tutorial will help you when you are building a computer.
Part 1: Choosing the correct internal parts.
When making a computer most of your time should be spent planning the computer out. There are many things to look for and you want to make sure you are getting the most for your money and are satisfied with your computer. This guide is for making gaming computers and nothing else. You can buy hardware from www.newegg.com and get your extremely high quality second to none cases and mod supplies from www.xoxide.com .
Processor: The core of your computer. Things to look for are the name of the core (Northwood, Prescott, Barton, etc.), Internal Clock speed (usually now in ghz cept for million year old computers), FSB, and other features(hyper-threading, 64-bit, etc)
Intel:
Best: Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.2 ghz
Best overclock: Pentium 4 2.4 ghz C
Best budget: If you want budget then intel is not for you
Best price/performance ratio: 2.6, 2.8,or 3.0ghz C
AZN’s choice: Pentium 4 3.0 ghz C (well what do you know…I have it)
Intel is AMD’s competition. They make pretty pricy processors that are nice for gaming. They have 20 pipelines which means technically (but not always true) they should be better for gaming and multimedia then AMD. Extreme Edition is very overpriced and I don’t recommend it to anyone unless you want to buy me one too.
AMD:
Best: Athlon 64 FX-51
Best overclock: Athlon XP Barton 2500+
Best budget: Athlon XP Barton 2500+
Best price/performance ratio: Athlon 64 3000+ or Athlon XP Barton 2800+
AZN’s choice: Athlon 64 3400+
I don’t know very much about AMD but 64 bit is nice. AMD has a much better price/performance ratio on all their processors then intel. FX-51 is over priced but not as bad as Extreme edition. 10 pipelines means technically its better for photoshop, and video editing.
Motherboard: It connects everything together and probably has more features than any other part of the computer.
Intel:
Best: Abit IC7-Max3 or Asus P4C800-E Deluxe
Best overclock: Abit IC7-Max3 or Asus P4C800-E Deluxe
Best budget: Asus P4P800
Best Price/performance ratio: Asus P4P800
Best crazy look: DFI LanParty Pro 875B
Best normal look: Abit IC7-Max3
Best features: Abit IC7-Max3
AZN’s Choice: Abit IC7-Max3 (I got this too!)
Intel has two main northbridge chipsets: i865 and i875. 875 comes with extra stuff but it’s usually useless to the average Joe. All Abit and Asus boards are great. Asus however tends to be ugly while Abit is usually a sleek but simple motherboard. OTES (outer thermal exhaust system) on IC7-MAX3 is really nice looking. Features you should look for are: Northbridge core, Dual channel, hyper-threading, cooling, and features.
AMD:
Best: Asus SK8V (only works with athlon fx-51)
Best overclock: Unsure but most likely an Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe (athlon xp)
Best Budget: Maybe Asus A7N8X (athlon xp)
Best Crazy look: DFI Lanparty NFII ultra B
Best normal look: the heck if I know
Best features: Abit KV8-Max3
AZN’s Choice: Asus SK8V
I don’t know anything about AMD.
RAM(memory sticks):
Ram is very important in your system. First you must know how fast the ram must be to run with your system. If you are using a intel Pentium 4 with 800mhz FSB then you need PC-3200 at least and more if you want to overclock. Company names are important too. Corsair and OCZ are the best IMO. Value ram if your poor. Try to get 512mb or 1gb but any more is mostly wasted money. Things that matter: PC-#### (higher the better but only get the amount you need), amount of ram (1gb, or 512mb is good), Company, Dual channel, timings/CAS latency (lower the better).
Wow finally done with the system core.
Power Supply Unit: Most important part of a computer because it makes it go. Never go cheap on your power supply because you risk destroying your system. Watts don’t mean everything in a PSU(power supply unit). (Get the wattage need for your computer). Antec True and Enermax are the best. Vantec and Thermaltake are close runner ups. There are many other good power supplies out there but these are the best (at newegg anyways).
Best extreme power: Enermax 650watt
Best high power: Antec True 550watt
Best medium power: Enermax 465watt or Antec 480watt
Best low power: Antec true 380 or 430watt
Best look: Thermaltake Butterfly 480watt or Aspire 500watt
Best price/performance ratio: Aspire 500watt
AZN’s Choice: Antec true power or enermax for the amount of hardware you need….you can’t go wrong
Video Cards: Most important gaming hardware. I really like ATI because they are better then nvidia but that is just my opinion but benchmarks seem to support my opinion rather well.
Best Extreme price range: Sapphire Radeon 9800xt Asus 9800xt (asus has better cooling but can’t use catalyst drivers)
Best mid price range: Sapphire 9600xt
Best high price range: Sapphire 9800pro 128mb
Best Budget: powercolor 9600pro 128mb
AZN’s choice: 9800xt or 9600xt from Sapphire
Keep in mind you can get TV tuners on your video cards such as ATI Radeon 9800pro all in wonder.
Sound Card:
Best: Audigy 2 ZS Gamer
Best Price/performance value: Audigy 2 zs
Budget: Live! 5.1
External: Audigy 2 zs platinum pro
AZN’s Choice: Audigy 2 ZS
Creative Sound Blaster is really the best. If you don’t care much about sound quality remember some motherboards have on-board sound. Platinum and platinum pro aren’t better then regular they just come with extra stuff like software, remotes, and stuff.
Best Hard drive(no Scsi):
Fastest speed (read and write): 2x western digital raptor any size in RAID 0
High end speed: Western digital raptor
Fast/Big/Price: Western Digital 120gb SATA 8mb cache
Best price/performance: Western digital 80gb special edition
Budget: Western Digital 80gb special edition
Biggest: On newegg the 300gb hdd but u can get up to a terabyte(1000 gigs)
AZN’s Choice: 2x western digital raptor 72gb in RAID 0
You should get only as much space as you need…. Raptors are very fast(you can feel the speed difference) Western Digital is probably the top brand for hard drives but there are many others. Special edition gives you a 8mb cache which is really nice. If you can afford the few extra bucks get the SATA drives because they will be used in the future.
Floppy: Any one will do…even no floppy will do
Just CD-RW: Lite on 52x32x52
Combo drive(dvd-rom also): Lite on 48x24x48x16
DVD-ROM: Lite on 16x48
Not sure about DVD burners but sony is a great brand.
Those are all the internal parts of a gaming computer….here are example completed systems that I randomized a little (alternate between corsair and OCZ and Enermax and Antec):
Extreme Intel computer:
Pentium 4 EE * Abit IC7-max3 (Asus P4C800-E Deluxe is good too) * OCZ pc-4000 1gb dual channel (if you want to overclock get a higher PC-####) * Sapphire 9800xt * Audigy 2 zs gamer * Antec true 550watt * Dual WD Raptors 72gb in Raid 0 * Lite-on 48x24x48x16
Extreme AMD computer:
Athlon FX-51 * Asus SK8V * Corsair PC-3200 Registered ECC (1 gb) * Sapphire 9800xt * Audigy 2 zs gamer * Antec true 550watt * Dual WD Raptors 72gb in Raid 0 * Lite-on 48x24x48x16
High End Intel computer:
Pentium 4 3.0ghz C * P4P800 deluxe * OCZ pc-3700 1 gb dual channel * Sapphire 9800 pro * Audigy 2 zs * Enermax 465watt * WD raptor 36.7gb or dual WD 80gb special edition in RAID 0 * Lite on 52x32x52
High End AMD computer:
Athlon 64 3400+ * Abit KV8-Max3 * Corsair pc-3700 1 gb * Sapphire 9800pro * Audigy 2 zs * Antec true 430watt * WD raptor 36.7gb or dual WD 80gb special edition in RAID 0 * Lite on 52x32x52
Medium-High Intel computer:
Pentium 4 2.6ghz C * P4P800 * OCZ pc-3200 512mb* Sapphire 9600xt * Audigy Live 5.1 * Antec true430watt * WD 120gb special edition or SATA * Lite on 52x32x52
Medium-high amd computer #1
Athlon 64 3000+ * Asus K8V Deluxe * OCZ pc-3200 512mb* Sapphire 9600xt * Audigy Live! 5.1 * Enermax 465 watt * WD 120gb special edition or SATA * Lite on 52x32x52
Medium-high amd computer #2
Athlon XP 2800+ * Asus a7n8x * Corsair pc-3200 512mb * Sapphire 9600xt * Audigy Live! 5.1 * Enermax 465 watt * WD 120gb special edition or SATA * Lite on 52x32x52
AZN’s computer: Pentium 4 3.0ghz C * Abit Ic7-max3 * Corsair pc-3700 1gb * Sapphire 9800xt * Audigy 2 zs * Enermax 465watt * WD Raptor 36.7gb * Lite on 52x32x52 * Lite on 16x48 DVD-ROM
The budget computers are hard to make up because no one knows your budget heheheh
How to build a computer part 2: Building the actual computer
Okay here is the part people actually worry about. It’s really not that hard. Check out all your manuals for special exceptions and anything you need to worry about. First look at the mounting holes on your motherboard. There should be several spaced out and usually have a ring of metal around them to keep them from breaking. If you have trouble check your motherboard manual to see if it tells you where all mounting holes are located.
Open up your case by going to the back and unscrewing the screws (usually 4 all together) on the sides only. Slide off the sides and lay the case down on its side with the motherboard tray (big flat thing with lots of holes that takes up the majority of the case) closer to the side your laying it on.
Using your problem solving skills and common sense, match up the motherboard holes with the ones in your case and remember where the holes line up with the tray. If the holes on the tray where the motherboard lined up with are very small, then in the packet of screws (should have come with your case if you bought it alone) find a brass spacer that has a screw on one side and a screw hole on the other and place it in by turning the spacer with your thumb on the correct location. Some cases use other means of filling up bigger holes and you should use common sense to decide what goes in which hole. Sometimes a little needle like object will be placed in a tray hole. You put a washer on top of this then clip the needle head through the hole on the motherboard.
Once all the screws are in (motherboard shouldn’t be in yet) set the case aside. Touch the metal of your case often to release any static build up (static will one hit ko your comp). On the motherboard you should have 3, 4 or 6 slots for your ram. These have tabs on the side of the slot and your motherboard manual should mark where they are. If you are going to use dual channel ram, read your manual to see where the ram must be located (dual channel only works when the ram is arranged in a certain way). If the ram slots are color coded then the ram must go in the slots that are the same color to activate dual channel. On the sides of the ram slots should be 2 tabs. Push these down and potion the ram correctly on the slot. Notice the notch on the bottom of the ram must match up with the piece of the slot that sticks out a bit. After making 100% sure everything is positioned correctly apply force to the top of your ram. It might take a bit of strength but the ram should slide in and the tabs click into their original position and the tabs each have a small piece that sticks into the ram preventing it from coming out. If you want to to remove the ram press the 2 tabs down all the way and the ram should pop out.
The hardest part of building a computer is the processor. It’s not mind boggling however it can and will screw your computer up if you mess up. Locate the CPU socket on your motherboard or look in your manual if you can’t find it. It’s usually beige and square with a lot of holes in it surrounded by either 4 holes or a large “fence(called guide rails)” that is used to retain the heatsink.
Lift the CPU lever on the side of this square and the Socket should move (shift) over to a side ever so slightly when the bar is perpendicular to the motherboard. Get your processor and look at the pins on the bottom. One pin is missing in a corner and if you notice on the socket one hole is missing. Align these up together and drop the cpu into the socket. This shouldn’t require force at all. If all the pins are straight it should slide. Check all sides and make sure it is seated in the socket correctly with no sides sticking up. Flip the lever down to its original position to lock the cpu in place.
Apply thermal paste to the top of your cpu. Usually you want a half BB or a piece of rice sized chunk of thermal paste on the center of your cpu. Read the instructions for applying your heatsink (big metal thing with lots of pins or fins to make a large surface area) that came with the heatsink or check the website of the company who made the heatsink or a review website. All heatsinks are attached differently. It can use spring loaded screws, retention brackets or clips etc. once your cpu and heatsink is secured completely add on a fan on top of your heat sink if there isn’t one already. Read your heatsink manual once again for instructions on how to do this as well. In your motherboard manual look for the location of the 3 pin CPU fan power connector. The fan on top of your cpu should have a 3 wire, small connector on it. Plug this in on that CPU fan slot on the motherboard. This allows your motherboard to control the fan.
In your case on the back there might be a pop out I/O panel. This is located next to the big hole for the power supply and if your case is still laying down the correct way it should be closer to the bottom then the top. Punch this out if it hasn’t been removed yet by bending it back and forth until the sides give way. With your motherboard should have come a different I/O panel. Apply this here. It should stick to the case decently.
Place the motherboard in the case with the I/O on your motherboard (near the processor and heatsink) close to the I/O panel you just placed in your case. Most I/O panels have pieces or metal stuck to them to secure the motherboards I/O. You must lift these up slightly and bring the motherboard under them (helps by going in from an angle). Once the motherboard is in the case the mounting holes should align with the spacers you applied in the case. If not maybe you need to press hard against the I/O panel or something until your motherboard aligns. Screw in the motherboard on the mounting holes with the screws (round) that look like they have a washer around the top and these should hold the motherboard in place.
Locate the AGP slot on your motherboard (usually brown) which should be under your heatsink and processor. If you have trouble refer to your motherboard manual. You must pop out the PCI slot on the back of this case that compliments the AGP slot. This slot is usually the second one down and is slightly lower then the actual AGP slot. If you were to take a ruler and make it line up with the center of the AGP slot it should hit just above the correct PCI slot. Once the slot is removed place in your video card into the slot and press it in just like the ram. When it is seated properly screw in the New PCI slot that is attached to your video card into the slot on the back. Your video card should now be secure.
Insert any PCI cards you may have (sound cards for example) in the same way by removing the PCI slot and then seating the card into one of the white slots under the video card and screw it in. A good tip is to keep some space between the rest of your PCI slto cards and your video card because the video card needs open space to cool of better. I recommend keeping 1 or 2 of the white PCI slots empty below your video card if possible.
Now for the Hard drive(don’t touch the bottom of your hard drive where the board is, grab it by the sides). On the back of your hard drive there are many plugs (or pins if you will). On SATA drives such as WD raptor there is an SATA power cable plug, SATA data cable plug, A few pins usually with a piece of plastic on it called a jumper, and unlike most SATA drives the raptor has a very convenient 4 pin molex plug. For IDE drives you get a large plug for the IDE cable, the same pins with a piece of plastic on it (the jumper) and a 4 pin molex plug. If you have only one hard drive remove the Jumper on your hard drive but keep it somewhere just in case you want to upgrade with another hard drive later. If you have 2 hard drives pick one to be the “master” and one to be the “slave”. Remove the jumper on the master. Look on the top of your slave hard drive. It should say what each jumper slot does. Remove the jumper and place it on the 2 pins that set this jumper to Slave or Slave if master present etc. Now weather you have 2 or 1 hard drives place the master hard drive in a 3.5 internal bay in your case. This is on the bottom near the front of your case. It is easier if you stand your case up like how it will be when its running. Set it in one of those small bays that do not have a slot to stick out of the case (those 3.5 slots on the middle of the case are not for the hard drive those are floppy drives.) Notice the hard drive holes must align with the holes of the bay. This doesn’t mean it is pushed all the way to the front of the case. Screw the hard drive in. Repeat for your second hard drive but make sure that it is under your first hard drive (this will make cable installation a lot easier especially if you can’t get round cables and are using ribbon cables). If possible leave a hard drive slot or 2 between your hard drives because they get really hot and need space to cool.
If you have a floppy then it goes in one of the (usually 2 on a mid tower case) top 3.5 bays that are on the front middle of the case. You may have to punch out the front of your floppy bay to insert it in. Insert your floppy and push it until it is lined up on the front of your case. At that point the screw holes should align on the side of the bay. This installation is very similar to that of the Hard drive.
The CD drives and other 5.25 drives are installed like the floppy and hard drive. Punch out the front of the 5.25 bay if it needs to be. Just like the hard drive there are many plugs on the back of the CD drive. They are the 2 audio plugs, a few pins with a jumper on them, IDE cable plug, and 4 pin molex plug. If you are installing more then one CD or DVD drive you must decide which to be the “master” and which is the “slave.” On the top of your drives like the hard drives should explain which jumper does what. Sometimes however this is located on the bottom and most commonly of all on top of the plugs themselves. Remove the master drive’s jumper and place it on the jumper that says Master or MA. The Slave drive must do the same except placed on the slot that says slave or SL. If you have one drive just remove the jumper altogether. Insert it in the 5.25 bay and push until it is correct on the front. Screw in the sides of the CD drive using 2 screws per side. If you have a slave put it below the master for wiring purposes.
Congratulations you have inserted all you need inside your computer. However you still need to plug everything into each other.
Close the side of the case closest to the motherboard tray. Do this by placing the plate correctly over the side and screw the back of the case (usually 2 screws) but keep the other side open still. Insert the power supply if it is not in yet. It goes in the top back of your case with the switches on the outside of the back. The screw holes should align with the back of your case if it is correct. If not maybe your power supply is upside down. Screw it in from the back of your case.
If you have any fans you want to add they are pretty easy to figure out how to put them in your case. Find the slot and make sure they are the same size (screw holes align). Air comes in through the side with no frame supporting the center of the fan and it goes out the side with the frames that hold the center of the fan which is usually the side with the cables. Screw it in and that’s about it.
Out of the front of your case should be many 2 wired cables that come in a color and then white wrapped around each other. Remember the colored one is positive and the white one is negative. Refer to your motherboard manual to see where these cables plug in. they should be called Front panel connections and include but are not limited to: power SW, Reset SW, HDD led, Power LED, etc. Now get your ribbon cables or round cables. On your motherboard locate the 2 IDE plugs and the floppy plug. If you need help refer to your motherboard manual. If you have 2 CD or DVD drives you will need a 3 terminal (3 plugs) IDE cable (ribbon or round). Else you will need a 2 terminal unless you plan to upgrade in the near future. For hard drives if you have 2 IDE (not SATA) hard drives you will need a 3 terminal IDE cable for one hard drive you need 2 terminal and for using SATA you need no IDE cables for your hard drives (still get them for your CD drives). You are not suppose to use the same IDE cable for hard drives and CD drives so even if you have one of each get 2x 2 terminal IDE cables. You also need one floppy cable (ribbon or round) with 2 terminals.
Okay to plug them up they should have labels or stickers or something attached to the cable saying where it goes. For the CD drive(s), take an IDE cable and stick the “Connect to M/B or motherboard” side and put it in the first IDE slot on your motherboard. Align the notch on the cable with the space on the slot and it should snap in. Now if it’s a 3 terminal (means you got this because you have or eventually will have 2 CD drives) then you stick the one marked slave into the Slave drive and the one marked master in the master drive. The one pink cable should be closer to the side away from the motherboard tray. If the case is lying on its side flat with the heat sink pointing up then the pink should be towards you. The master terminal goes in the master drive and the pink cable faces toward you once again. If you have just a single CD drive then the master goes in the drive pink cable toward you and the other in the motherboard.
For the floppy cable the motherboard terminal goes in the floppy slot. Refer once again to your motherboard manual to find it. The other end goes in your floppy drive with the pink cable AWAY from you. Notice that this is different from the CD drive cables.
For IDE hard drive(s) you connect them the exact same way as the CD drives. Plug in an IDE motherboard terminal into the second IDE slot on your motherboard and the other ends go in your hard drive or if you have 2 then the master goes in the master drive and the slave goes in the slave drive. Like the CD drives the pink cable is toward you.
For SATA hard drive(s) you must have an SATA data cable which is small and the terminal is about 1 cm and it only comes with 2 terminals. You plug this in your sata hard drive and into your first SATA port on your motherboard for the master drive and if you have a second slave drive do the same but plug it in to the second SATA slot on your motherboard. This doesn’t require a lot of force so if it doesn’t go in then it’s upside down or something.
Now for the power cables. Most PSU (power supply units) have a few different cables. The biggest one is a 20 pin ATX cable that is used in you motherboard. The 4 pin that are about 1 inch wide and you have several of are what I call molexes even though all the power cables are technically molexes. There is a small white plug with 4 really small pins which is a floppy molex. Usually power supplies come with a 2x2 4 pin square molex that is the ATX12 which is used to power newer Pentium 4’s. Sometimes the power supply will come with SATA molexes which are black and thin. If you want to use an SATA drive you need this and if you don’t have it you need to buy a 4 pin molex (the thing I just call a plain old molex) to SATA molex cable which will change a regular 4 pin to a SATA power terminal. All other cables don’t matter for your Gaming rig but sometimes there is a molex for servers but it won’t matter with most computers.
Plug the 4 pin normal molex into: all CD-drives you have, IDE hard drives, video card if it has a slot for it (look for it) , and the rest of them are used for fans and lights and stuff but I will get to that later so leave that out for a while.
Plug the small 4 pin floppy cable into the floppy…..
If you have SATA hard drives it will be required to use a SATA power cable unless rarely some SATA hard drives like the WD Raptor can use either type of 4 pin (Don’t plug in both). Plug those in too the back. If it doesn’t go in then the terminal is probably upside down.
For the motherboard locate the large 20 pin slot for your ATX cable. If you have troubles use your motherboard manual to find the slot. Plug the ATX cable into slot with the notch on the cable aligned with the notch on the motherboard so it clicks in. If you have a Pentium 4 most likely you will need to use the ATX12 power cable. Locate the slot on your motherboard and even though it powers your processor it might be far away from it. Once again your motherboard manual may help you locate this slot. Plug in the plug in the slot and align the clip with the piece of the slot that juts out so it snaps in.
Now for fans. Any fans or lights you place in the case should be chained up to 1 or 2 molexes(4 pin regular same has hard drives and CD drives). What I mean by this is take a four pin molex, plug it into a fan or cold cathode etc. Take another fan or other light mod supply and on the fan should be a second plug that looks like the power supply’s male 4 pin molex. And plug that into the next fan and repeat.
Okay seal up your computer and everything after double checking that you’ve plugged in everything. Your computer is now complete. Plug in the back: PSU power cable, Keyboard and mouse into the I/O panel, and the monitor to the video card slot near the bottom. Don’t add on anymore until after you finish loading up everything. Turn on your computer and see what happens!!!!
How to build a computer part 3: BIOS, Software, Drivers, and overclocking.
A lot of things can go wrong when you mess with your BIOS or overclock so do it at your own risk.
Okay, so you’ve built your computer and it starts up and everything like that. Well now we have to get your computer up to date and stuff. Start by turning on your computer. When the computer says press ___ to setup or press ___ to enter BIOS or anything like that press that key that is in the ___. This is usually the Del , F1 or F2 key but I have seen other F# keys. Press it several times to make sure. You should go into a blue screen (no its not the BSOD) with a menu on it called the BIOS (Basic Input/Output System). If you’re not in BIOS restart and try again(sometimes the computer just doesn’t give a crap about you wanting to go to BIOS). Now you are in. Understand that all BIOS are different and that I will try to explain this using my knowledge of the BIOSes I’ve used and that yours might be different then how I’m trying to explain this. Notice the instructions on how to navigate through the BIOS are on the bottom of the screen. It only uses keyboard.
Most of the time your BIOS will have a section for overclocking your CPU. On my IC7-max3 this is softmenu but there are a bunch of other things it could be. Don’t overclock yet. You will see in an overclock menu that it shows you options. First you must usually change an option that says Use default speed to User defined and etc to be able to change the CPU’s stock Speed and all that good stuff. I will get to overclocking later. Navigate to the main menu.
Next in the BIOS there should be the Basic or Standard BIOS/CMOS features. In here you should change the Date and Time to whatever date and time it is at the moment. Then below that it should show what is connected to your computer as in Hard drives, CD drives, and floppy. It should be labeled IDE Channel 1 Master IDE channel 1 Slave, IDE channel 1 master, and IDE channel 2 slave. Whether or not you are using SATA ahrd drives or IDE somewhere should be the model for your hard drive(s). Like western digital puts WD somewhere in the model as well as some numbers representing the size of the hard drive and etc. Same with your CD Drives. Make sure everything is being read inside here. If you have 2 CD drives and one hard drive then you should see your 2 CD drives, the hard drive and then 1 empty slot. Under this is should say Drive A and Drive B. If you have a floppy it should tell you so here.
Go back to the main menu. There should be a section called Advance BIOS Features. This shows a butt load of options that you can change to optimize your computer the way you want it. A basic rule is if you don’t know what it does then leave it alone. Anyways you should notice the words First Boot Device somewhere followed by Second and Third. The first boot device you should put on is CD-ROM, Second should be Hard Drive, and last should be floppy or blank. Later on you can switch hard drive and cd drive if you want it to boot your hard drive first later when you get windows installed.
Other parts of the BIOS have many features depending on your motherboard manufacturer. Some have the ability to change your ram timings. Game Accelerator (this makes your video ram timings more aggressive.) and other options should be made available for you to do AT YOUR OWN RISK. When you think the BIOS is the way you want it then go to the main menu.
Go to the PC health status. Here you can check out all the things about your PC as in temperature, and alarms etc. Make sure everything is fine and dandy. Just for the sake of argument and to stop most questions imo…… 62*C is hot for a CPU even though it should be quite a bit lower then that. So don’t worry if your CPU is 55*C or whatever.
Go to the main menu and select Save and quit or some option like that near the end. When you save it your computer should restart. Insert your Operating System Disk (used to install windows) into the CD drive and wait for a while until you come to another blue screen (not BSOD) if it doesn’t then restart again with the disk still in. Wait for windows to load all their crap. It will prompt you to do a few things. If I remember correctly first it asks you if you want to repair your windows (you don’t want to), or Install windows, press enter (yea so press enter). Follow there stuff and the navigation instructions should be on the grey bar near the bottom. Do whatever you need to. Eventually it will show you a box with Unpartitioned Disk Space and then your Disk space amount in KB. You need to partition that hard drive so find out what you must press to partition it. It should go quickly. Then follow what you must until you can choose to Format normally or do a quick format. Honestly I have no idea what the difference is so if you have the time just go regular. It will take a long time to format (unless you got WD Raptor like me heheheh) and then you will go into an actual window’s like screen where you install the rest of the windows files. It should restart one or several times during the install and might ask you questions you must answer. Finally when you are all done and in windows you should notice, unless you installed from like a disk you got when you bought a whole computer from Dell or any other companies, that your desktop only has a recycling bin on it. If performance is really bad (aka it lags or seems choppy or something) don’t worry because you have no drivers installed yet. Right click your desktop (just click on the wall paper) and go to properties. A window should pop up. Click on the desktop tab. You should see a button that says customize your desktop where you can add on whatever icons you desire. I recommend keeping the Recycle bin on there and adding on Internet Explorer, My computer, and My Documents. Click apply then OK. Insert your motherboard Disk in the CD Drive.
A window should pop up. Install what you think is needed. This includes motherboard drivers, If your motherboard has onboard sound install them even if you have a sound card, All the utilities are helpful, If you have a gigabit Ethernet drive then you will need to install the gigabit driver even if you don’t have anything even close to gigabit speeds because nothing will work on that Ethernet even if its something like cable. Maybe you have USB 2.0 drivers, Anything else you might need. You will probably have to restart one or several times during the process. That doesn’t mean you’re done and you should double check the last time to make sure you installed everything you need off your motherboard CD. If the motherboard window doesn’t start right away try ejecting it and place it in again. If it still doesn’t work double click on my computer, double click on the CD drive that is the one your disk is in (will have a weird disk name usually) and then try to find a setup program usually with a icon that looks like a white window.
When you are done with your motherboard drivers insert your video card driver CD. This usually says Catalyst for ATI based card and I think nvidia based cards have their own driver card’s depending on the manufacturer. Insert this in and download the drivers along with anything else you might want which is usually Direct X 9 if you didn’t get it from your motherboard driver disk yet. Maybe the control panel things if it comes with one and you want an easy way to change your display settings. Most likely you will have to restart.
Now install the rest of the programs, games and drivers for any of the other things. Usually order does not matter. Connect your printers, scanners and other things and install those too. When you’re all done installing make sure you have the internet working and go double click on internet explorer. Go to windowsupdate.microsoft.com. Install all the Critical updates and service packs. Next on the right side should be windows ___ where the ___ has the name of your windows type. Install only the ones on there you think you will use. Install all the driver updates. You might have to restart one or several times to complete this.
When you are done installing everything then your computer is pretty much done. Somethings you might want to do are right click your desktop, click properties, and change your wall paper, theme and all the other things on here. On the last option you can change the resolution of your screen. Make sure your monitor and video card can handle the higher resolutions if you don’t want it to lag.
(Warning next section is on overclocking and can screw up your computer really really badly)
Restart your computer cause now its time for overclocking. I’m not very familiar with overclocking but because few people are willing to type a tutorial for others on xoxide forums I decided to include the very basics of overclocking. In your BIOS you should have many options for overclocking. Where ever that section of the menu is you must go there. If necessary change default speed to user defined. Find the area where you can change your FSB which should be set on 200. You can overclock by increasing this very slowly, starting up your computer and running some programs and stuff to make sure it works (www.futuremark.com) off futuremark you can get 3dmark03, PCmark04, and other benchmarks which will see if your computer is stable, and tell you a numeric score on how good your computer is so you can compare it with others. When its stable repeat the process of increasing your FSB little by little. Make sure the FSB of your video card and PCI cards stay at 66 and 33. Go until it isn’t stable anymore. Bring it down some(bring down your FSB) or increase your voltage by a small amount (never go higher then 1.7?) and keep going until you don’t want to risk destroying your CPU anymore. This is the very basic overclock. If you have an amd made processor you can also adjust your multiplier which will just your speed up by a lot more then FSB. You can adjust your ram to do whatever you want and all sorts of other things. You are risking your processor though so do this at your own risk.
Okay now your computer should be up and running and everything should be fine. If you made it here with no problems then congratulations you have a PC that you built yourself!
Lots of things are very weak in this guide (such as overclocking) because such subjects deserve a tut of their own
check out my other tutorial: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=2526613#post2526613
Check out my other tutorial: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=2526613#post2526613
AZNmodder’s guide to building your own computer 1-11-04
Welcome to xoxide forums and hope this tutorial will help you when you are building a computer.
Part 1: Choosing the correct internal parts.
When making a computer most of your time should be spent planning the computer out. There are many things to look for and you want to make sure you are getting the most for your money and are satisfied with your computer. This guide is for making gaming computers and nothing else. You can buy hardware from www.newegg.com and get your extremely high quality second to none cases and mod supplies from www.xoxide.com .
Processor: The core of your computer. Things to look for are the name of the core (Northwood, Prescott, Barton, etc.), Internal Clock speed (usually now in ghz cept for million year old computers), FSB, and other features(hyper-threading, 64-bit, etc)
Intel:
Best: Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.2 ghz
Best overclock: Pentium 4 2.4 ghz C
Best budget: If you want budget then intel is not for you
Best price/performance ratio: 2.6, 2.8,or 3.0ghz C
AZN’s choice: Pentium 4 3.0 ghz C (well what do you know…I have it)
Intel is AMD’s competition. They make pretty pricy processors that are nice for gaming. They have 20 pipelines which means technically (but not always true) they should be better for gaming and multimedia then AMD. Extreme Edition is very overpriced and I don’t recommend it to anyone unless you want to buy me one too.
AMD:
Best: Athlon 64 FX-51
Best overclock: Athlon XP Barton 2500+
Best budget: Athlon XP Barton 2500+
Best price/performance ratio: Athlon 64 3000+ or Athlon XP Barton 2800+
AZN’s choice: Athlon 64 3400+
I don’t know very much about AMD but 64 bit is nice. AMD has a much better price/performance ratio on all their processors then intel. FX-51 is over priced but not as bad as Extreme edition. 10 pipelines means technically its better for photoshop, and video editing.
Motherboard: It connects everything together and probably has more features than any other part of the computer.
Intel:
Best: Abit IC7-Max3 or Asus P4C800-E Deluxe
Best overclock: Abit IC7-Max3 or Asus P4C800-E Deluxe
Best budget: Asus P4P800
Best Price/performance ratio: Asus P4P800
Best crazy look: DFI LanParty Pro 875B
Best normal look: Abit IC7-Max3
Best features: Abit IC7-Max3
AZN’s Choice: Abit IC7-Max3 (I got this too!)
Intel has two main northbridge chipsets: i865 and i875. 875 comes with extra stuff but it’s usually useless to the average Joe. All Abit and Asus boards are great. Asus however tends to be ugly while Abit is usually a sleek but simple motherboard. OTES (outer thermal exhaust system) on IC7-MAX3 is really nice looking. Features you should look for are: Northbridge core, Dual channel, hyper-threading, cooling, and features.
AMD:
Best: Asus SK8V (only works with athlon fx-51)
Best overclock: Unsure but most likely an Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe (athlon xp)
Best Budget: Maybe Asus A7N8X (athlon xp)
Best Crazy look: DFI Lanparty NFII ultra B
Best normal look: the heck if I know
Best features: Abit KV8-Max3
AZN’s Choice: Asus SK8V
I don’t know anything about AMD.
RAM(memory sticks):
Ram is very important in your system. First you must know how fast the ram must be to run with your system. If you are using a intel Pentium 4 with 800mhz FSB then you need PC-3200 at least and more if you want to overclock. Company names are important too. Corsair and OCZ are the best IMO. Value ram if your poor. Try to get 512mb or 1gb but any more is mostly wasted money. Things that matter: PC-#### (higher the better but only get the amount you need), amount of ram (1gb, or 512mb is good), Company, Dual channel, timings/CAS latency (lower the better).
Wow finally done with the system core.
Power Supply Unit: Most important part of a computer because it makes it go. Never go cheap on your power supply because you risk destroying your system. Watts don’t mean everything in a PSU(power supply unit). (Get the wattage need for your computer). Antec True and Enermax are the best. Vantec and Thermaltake are close runner ups. There are many other good power supplies out there but these are the best (at newegg anyways).
Best extreme power: Enermax 650watt
Best high power: Antec True 550watt
Best medium power: Enermax 465watt or Antec 480watt
Best low power: Antec true 380 or 430watt
Best look: Thermaltake Butterfly 480watt or Aspire 500watt
Best price/performance ratio: Aspire 500watt
AZN’s Choice: Antec true power or enermax for the amount of hardware you need….you can’t go wrong
Video Cards: Most important gaming hardware. I really like ATI because they are better then nvidia but that is just my opinion but benchmarks seem to support my opinion rather well.
Best Extreme price range: Sapphire Radeon 9800xt Asus 9800xt (asus has better cooling but can’t use catalyst drivers)
Best mid price range: Sapphire 9600xt
Best high price range: Sapphire 9800pro 128mb
Best Budget: powercolor 9600pro 128mb
AZN’s choice: 9800xt or 9600xt from Sapphire
Keep in mind you can get TV tuners on your video cards such as ATI Radeon 9800pro all in wonder.
Sound Card:
Best: Audigy 2 ZS Gamer
Best Price/performance value: Audigy 2 zs
Budget: Live! 5.1
External: Audigy 2 zs platinum pro
AZN’s Choice: Audigy 2 ZS
Creative Sound Blaster is really the best. If you don’t care much about sound quality remember some motherboards have on-board sound. Platinum and platinum pro aren’t better then regular they just come with extra stuff like software, remotes, and stuff.
Best Hard drive(no Scsi):
Fastest speed (read and write): 2x western digital raptor any size in RAID 0
High end speed: Western digital raptor
Fast/Big/Price: Western Digital 120gb SATA 8mb cache
Best price/performance: Western digital 80gb special edition
Budget: Western Digital 80gb special edition
Biggest: On newegg the 300gb hdd but u can get up to a terabyte(1000 gigs)
AZN’s Choice: 2x western digital raptor 72gb in RAID 0
You should get only as much space as you need…. Raptors are very fast(you can feel the speed difference) Western Digital is probably the top brand for hard drives but there are many others. Special edition gives you a 8mb cache which is really nice. If you can afford the few extra bucks get the SATA drives because they will be used in the future.
Floppy: Any one will do…even no floppy will do
Just CD-RW: Lite on 52x32x52
Combo drive(dvd-rom also): Lite on 48x24x48x16
DVD-ROM: Lite on 16x48
Not sure about DVD burners but sony is a great brand.
Those are all the internal parts of a gaming computer….here are example completed systems that I randomized a little (alternate between corsair and OCZ and Enermax and Antec):
Extreme Intel computer:
Pentium 4 EE * Abit IC7-max3 (Asus P4C800-E Deluxe is good too) * OCZ pc-4000 1gb dual channel (if you want to overclock get a higher PC-####) * Sapphire 9800xt * Audigy 2 zs gamer * Antec true 550watt * Dual WD Raptors 72gb in Raid 0 * Lite-on 48x24x48x16
Extreme AMD computer:
Athlon FX-51 * Asus SK8V * Corsair PC-3200 Registered ECC (1 gb) * Sapphire 9800xt * Audigy 2 zs gamer * Antec true 550watt * Dual WD Raptors 72gb in Raid 0 * Lite-on 48x24x48x16
High End Intel computer:
Pentium 4 3.0ghz C * P4P800 deluxe * OCZ pc-3700 1 gb dual channel * Sapphire 9800 pro * Audigy 2 zs * Enermax 465watt * WD raptor 36.7gb or dual WD 80gb special edition in RAID 0 * Lite on 52x32x52
High End AMD computer:
Athlon 64 3400+ * Abit KV8-Max3 * Corsair pc-3700 1 gb * Sapphire 9800pro * Audigy 2 zs * Antec true 430watt * WD raptor 36.7gb or dual WD 80gb special edition in RAID 0 * Lite on 52x32x52
Medium-High Intel computer:
Pentium 4 2.6ghz C * P4P800 * OCZ pc-3200 512mb* Sapphire 9600xt * Audigy Live 5.1 * Antec true430watt * WD 120gb special edition or SATA * Lite on 52x32x52
Medium-high amd computer #1
Athlon 64 3000+ * Asus K8V Deluxe * OCZ pc-3200 512mb* Sapphire 9600xt * Audigy Live! 5.1 * Enermax 465 watt * WD 120gb special edition or SATA * Lite on 52x32x52
Medium-high amd computer #2
Athlon XP 2800+ * Asus a7n8x * Corsair pc-3200 512mb * Sapphire 9600xt * Audigy Live! 5.1 * Enermax 465 watt * WD 120gb special edition or SATA * Lite on 52x32x52
AZN’s computer: Pentium 4 3.0ghz C * Abit Ic7-max3 * Corsair pc-3700 1gb * Sapphire 9800xt * Audigy 2 zs * Enermax 465watt * WD Raptor 36.7gb * Lite on 52x32x52 * Lite on 16x48 DVD-ROM
The budget computers are hard to make up because no one knows your budget heheheh
How to build a computer part 2: Building the actual computer
Okay here is the part people actually worry about. It’s really not that hard. Check out all your manuals for special exceptions and anything you need to worry about. First look at the mounting holes on your motherboard. There should be several spaced out and usually have a ring of metal around them to keep them from breaking. If you have trouble check your motherboard manual to see if it tells you where all mounting holes are located.
Open up your case by going to the back and unscrewing the screws (usually 4 all together) on the sides only. Slide off the sides and lay the case down on its side with the motherboard tray (big flat thing with lots of holes that takes up the majority of the case) closer to the side your laying it on.
Using your problem solving skills and common sense, match up the motherboard holes with the ones in your case and remember where the holes line up with the tray. If the holes on the tray where the motherboard lined up with are very small, then in the packet of screws (should have come with your case if you bought it alone) find a brass spacer that has a screw on one side and a screw hole on the other and place it in by turning the spacer with your thumb on the correct location. Some cases use other means of filling up bigger holes and you should use common sense to decide what goes in which hole. Sometimes a little needle like object will be placed in a tray hole. You put a washer on top of this then clip the needle head through the hole on the motherboard.
Once all the screws are in (motherboard shouldn’t be in yet) set the case aside. Touch the metal of your case often to release any static build up (static will one hit ko your comp). On the motherboard you should have 3, 4 or 6 slots for your ram. These have tabs on the side of the slot and your motherboard manual should mark where they are. If you are going to use dual channel ram, read your manual to see where the ram must be located (dual channel only works when the ram is arranged in a certain way). If the ram slots are color coded then the ram must go in the slots that are the same color to activate dual channel. On the sides of the ram slots should be 2 tabs. Push these down and potion the ram correctly on the slot. Notice the notch on the bottom of the ram must match up with the piece of the slot that sticks out a bit. After making 100% sure everything is positioned correctly apply force to the top of your ram. It might take a bit of strength but the ram should slide in and the tabs click into their original position and the tabs each have a small piece that sticks into the ram preventing it from coming out. If you want to to remove the ram press the 2 tabs down all the way and the ram should pop out.
The hardest part of building a computer is the processor. It’s not mind boggling however it can and will screw your computer up if you mess up. Locate the CPU socket on your motherboard or look in your manual if you can’t find it. It’s usually beige and square with a lot of holes in it surrounded by either 4 holes or a large “fence(called guide rails)” that is used to retain the heatsink.
Lift the CPU lever on the side of this square and the Socket should move (shift) over to a side ever so slightly when the bar is perpendicular to the motherboard. Get your processor and look at the pins on the bottom. One pin is missing in a corner and if you notice on the socket one hole is missing. Align these up together and drop the cpu into the socket. This shouldn’t require force at all. If all the pins are straight it should slide. Check all sides and make sure it is seated in the socket correctly with no sides sticking up. Flip the lever down to its original position to lock the cpu in place.
Apply thermal paste to the top of your cpu. Usually you want a half BB or a piece of rice sized chunk of thermal paste on the center of your cpu. Read the instructions for applying your heatsink (big metal thing with lots of pins or fins to make a large surface area) that came with the heatsink or check the website of the company who made the heatsink or a review website. All heatsinks are attached differently. It can use spring loaded screws, retention brackets or clips etc. once your cpu and heatsink is secured completely add on a fan on top of your heat sink if there isn’t one already. Read your heatsink manual once again for instructions on how to do this as well. In your motherboard manual look for the location of the 3 pin CPU fan power connector. The fan on top of your cpu should have a 3 wire, small connector on it. Plug this in on that CPU fan slot on the motherboard. This allows your motherboard to control the fan.
In your case on the back there might be a pop out I/O panel. This is located next to the big hole for the power supply and if your case is still laying down the correct way it should be closer to the bottom then the top. Punch this out if it hasn’t been removed yet by bending it back and forth until the sides give way. With your motherboard should have come a different I/O panel. Apply this here. It should stick to the case decently.
Place the motherboard in the case with the I/O on your motherboard (near the processor and heatsink) close to the I/O panel you just placed in your case. Most I/O panels have pieces or metal stuck to them to secure the motherboards I/O. You must lift these up slightly and bring the motherboard under them (helps by going in from an angle). Once the motherboard is in the case the mounting holes should align with the spacers you applied in the case. If not maybe you need to press hard against the I/O panel or something until your motherboard aligns. Screw in the motherboard on the mounting holes with the screws (round) that look like they have a washer around the top and these should hold the motherboard in place.
Locate the AGP slot on your motherboard (usually brown) which should be under your heatsink and processor. If you have trouble refer to your motherboard manual. You must pop out the PCI slot on the back of this case that compliments the AGP slot. This slot is usually the second one down and is slightly lower then the actual AGP slot. If you were to take a ruler and make it line up with the center of the AGP slot it should hit just above the correct PCI slot. Once the slot is removed place in your video card into the slot and press it in just like the ram. When it is seated properly screw in the New PCI slot that is attached to your video card into the slot on the back. Your video card should now be secure.
Insert any PCI cards you may have (sound cards for example) in the same way by removing the PCI slot and then seating the card into one of the white slots under the video card and screw it in. A good tip is to keep some space between the rest of your PCI slto cards and your video card because the video card needs open space to cool of better. I recommend keeping 1 or 2 of the white PCI slots empty below your video card if possible.
Now for the Hard drive(don’t touch the bottom of your hard drive where the board is, grab it by the sides). On the back of your hard drive there are many plugs (or pins if you will). On SATA drives such as WD raptor there is an SATA power cable plug, SATA data cable plug, A few pins usually with a piece of plastic on it called a jumper, and unlike most SATA drives the raptor has a very convenient 4 pin molex plug. For IDE drives you get a large plug for the IDE cable, the same pins with a piece of plastic on it (the jumper) and a 4 pin molex plug. If you have only one hard drive remove the Jumper on your hard drive but keep it somewhere just in case you want to upgrade with another hard drive later. If you have 2 hard drives pick one to be the “master” and one to be the “slave”. Remove the jumper on the master. Look on the top of your slave hard drive. It should say what each jumper slot does. Remove the jumper and place it on the 2 pins that set this jumper to Slave or Slave if master present etc. Now weather you have 2 or 1 hard drives place the master hard drive in a 3.5 internal bay in your case. This is on the bottom near the front of your case. It is easier if you stand your case up like how it will be when its running. Set it in one of those small bays that do not have a slot to stick out of the case (those 3.5 slots on the middle of the case are not for the hard drive those are floppy drives.) Notice the hard drive holes must align with the holes of the bay. This doesn’t mean it is pushed all the way to the front of the case. Screw the hard drive in. Repeat for your second hard drive but make sure that it is under your first hard drive (this will make cable installation a lot easier especially if you can’t get round cables and are using ribbon cables). If possible leave a hard drive slot or 2 between your hard drives because they get really hot and need space to cool.
If you have a floppy then it goes in one of the (usually 2 on a mid tower case) top 3.5 bays that are on the front middle of the case. You may have to punch out the front of your floppy bay to insert it in. Insert your floppy and push it until it is lined up on the front of your case. At that point the screw holes should align on the side of the bay. This installation is very similar to that of the Hard drive.
The CD drives and other 5.25 drives are installed like the floppy and hard drive. Punch out the front of the 5.25 bay if it needs to be. Just like the hard drive there are many plugs on the back of the CD drive. They are the 2 audio plugs, a few pins with a jumper on them, IDE cable plug, and 4 pin molex plug. If you are installing more then one CD or DVD drive you must decide which to be the “master” and which is the “slave.” On the top of your drives like the hard drives should explain which jumper does what. Sometimes however this is located on the bottom and most commonly of all on top of the plugs themselves. Remove the master drive’s jumper and place it on the jumper that says Master or MA. The Slave drive must do the same except placed on the slot that says slave or SL. If you have one drive just remove the jumper altogether. Insert it in the 5.25 bay and push until it is correct on the front. Screw in the sides of the CD drive using 2 screws per side. If you have a slave put it below the master for wiring purposes.
Congratulations you have inserted all you need inside your computer. However you still need to plug everything into each other.
Close the side of the case closest to the motherboard tray. Do this by placing the plate correctly over the side and screw the back of the case (usually 2 screws) but keep the other side open still. Insert the power supply if it is not in yet. It goes in the top back of your case with the switches on the outside of the back. The screw holes should align with the back of your case if it is correct. If not maybe your power supply is upside down. Screw it in from the back of your case.
If you have any fans you want to add they are pretty easy to figure out how to put them in your case. Find the slot and make sure they are the same size (screw holes align). Air comes in through the side with no frame supporting the center of the fan and it goes out the side with the frames that hold the center of the fan which is usually the side with the cables. Screw it in and that’s about it.
Out of the front of your case should be many 2 wired cables that come in a color and then white wrapped around each other. Remember the colored one is positive and the white one is negative. Refer to your motherboard manual to see where these cables plug in. they should be called Front panel connections and include but are not limited to: power SW, Reset SW, HDD led, Power LED, etc. Now get your ribbon cables or round cables. On your motherboard locate the 2 IDE plugs and the floppy plug. If you need help refer to your motherboard manual. If you have 2 CD or DVD drives you will need a 3 terminal (3 plugs) IDE cable (ribbon or round). Else you will need a 2 terminal unless you plan to upgrade in the near future. For hard drives if you have 2 IDE (not SATA) hard drives you will need a 3 terminal IDE cable for one hard drive you need 2 terminal and for using SATA you need no IDE cables for your hard drives (still get them for your CD drives). You are not suppose to use the same IDE cable for hard drives and CD drives so even if you have one of each get 2x 2 terminal IDE cables. You also need one floppy cable (ribbon or round) with 2 terminals.
Okay to plug them up they should have labels or stickers or something attached to the cable saying where it goes. For the CD drive(s), take an IDE cable and stick the “Connect to M/B or motherboard” side and put it in the first IDE slot on your motherboard. Align the notch on the cable with the space on the slot and it should snap in. Now if it’s a 3 terminal (means you got this because you have or eventually will have 2 CD drives) then you stick the one marked slave into the Slave drive and the one marked master in the master drive. The one pink cable should be closer to the side away from the motherboard tray. If the case is lying on its side flat with the heat sink pointing up then the pink should be towards you. The master terminal goes in the master drive and the pink cable faces toward you once again. If you have just a single CD drive then the master goes in the drive pink cable toward you and the other in the motherboard.
For the floppy cable the motherboard terminal goes in the floppy slot. Refer once again to your motherboard manual to find it. The other end goes in your floppy drive with the pink cable AWAY from you. Notice that this is different from the CD drive cables.
For IDE hard drive(s) you connect them the exact same way as the CD drives. Plug in an IDE motherboard terminal into the second IDE slot on your motherboard and the other ends go in your hard drive or if you have 2 then the master goes in the master drive and the slave goes in the slave drive. Like the CD drives the pink cable is toward you.
For SATA hard drive(s) you must have an SATA data cable which is small and the terminal is about 1 cm and it only comes with 2 terminals. You plug this in your sata hard drive and into your first SATA port on your motherboard for the master drive and if you have a second slave drive do the same but plug it in to the second SATA slot on your motherboard. This doesn’t require a lot of force so if it doesn’t go in then it’s upside down or something.
Now for the power cables. Most PSU (power supply units) have a few different cables. The biggest one is a 20 pin ATX cable that is used in you motherboard. The 4 pin that are about 1 inch wide and you have several of are what I call molexes even though all the power cables are technically molexes. There is a small white plug with 4 really small pins which is a floppy molex. Usually power supplies come with a 2x2 4 pin square molex that is the ATX12 which is used to power newer Pentium 4’s. Sometimes the power supply will come with SATA molexes which are black and thin. If you want to use an SATA drive you need this and if you don’t have it you need to buy a 4 pin molex (the thing I just call a plain old molex) to SATA molex cable which will change a regular 4 pin to a SATA power terminal. All other cables don’t matter for your Gaming rig but sometimes there is a molex for servers but it won’t matter with most computers.
Plug the 4 pin normal molex into: all CD-drives you have, IDE hard drives, video card if it has a slot for it (look for it) , and the rest of them are used for fans and lights and stuff but I will get to that later so leave that out for a while.
Plug the small 4 pin floppy cable into the floppy…..
If you have SATA hard drives it will be required to use a SATA power cable unless rarely some SATA hard drives like the WD Raptor can use either type of 4 pin (Don’t plug in both). Plug those in too the back. If it doesn’t go in then the terminal is probably upside down.
For the motherboard locate the large 20 pin slot for your ATX cable. If you have troubles use your motherboard manual to find the slot. Plug the ATX cable into slot with the notch on the cable aligned with the notch on the motherboard so it clicks in. If you have a Pentium 4 most likely you will need to use the ATX12 power cable. Locate the slot on your motherboard and even though it powers your processor it might be far away from it. Once again your motherboard manual may help you locate this slot. Plug in the plug in the slot and align the clip with the piece of the slot that juts out so it snaps in.
Now for fans. Any fans or lights you place in the case should be chained up to 1 or 2 molexes(4 pin regular same has hard drives and CD drives). What I mean by this is take a four pin molex, plug it into a fan or cold cathode etc. Take another fan or other light mod supply and on the fan should be a second plug that looks like the power supply’s male 4 pin molex. And plug that into the next fan and repeat.
Okay seal up your computer and everything after double checking that you’ve plugged in everything. Your computer is now complete. Plug in the back: PSU power cable, Keyboard and mouse into the I/O panel, and the monitor to the video card slot near the bottom. Don’t add on anymore until after you finish loading up everything. Turn on your computer and see what happens!!!!
How to build a computer part 3: BIOS, Software, Drivers, and overclocking.
A lot of things can go wrong when you mess with your BIOS or overclock so do it at your own risk.
Okay, so you’ve built your computer and it starts up and everything like that. Well now we have to get your computer up to date and stuff. Start by turning on your computer. When the computer says press ___ to setup or press ___ to enter BIOS or anything like that press that key that is in the ___. This is usually the Del , F1 or F2 key but I have seen other F# keys. Press it several times to make sure. You should go into a blue screen (no its not the BSOD) with a menu on it called the BIOS (Basic Input/Output System). If you’re not in BIOS restart and try again(sometimes the computer just doesn’t give a crap about you wanting to go to BIOS). Now you are in. Understand that all BIOS are different and that I will try to explain this using my knowledge of the BIOSes I’ve used and that yours might be different then how I’m trying to explain this. Notice the instructions on how to navigate through the BIOS are on the bottom of the screen. It only uses keyboard.
Most of the time your BIOS will have a section for overclocking your CPU. On my IC7-max3 this is softmenu but there are a bunch of other things it could be. Don’t overclock yet. You will see in an overclock menu that it shows you options. First you must usually change an option that says Use default speed to User defined and etc to be able to change the CPU’s stock Speed and all that good stuff. I will get to overclocking later. Navigate to the main menu.
Next in the BIOS there should be the Basic or Standard BIOS/CMOS features. In here you should change the Date and Time to whatever date and time it is at the moment. Then below that it should show what is connected to your computer as in Hard drives, CD drives, and floppy. It should be labeled IDE Channel 1 Master IDE channel 1 Slave, IDE channel 1 master, and IDE channel 2 slave. Whether or not you are using SATA ahrd drives or IDE somewhere should be the model for your hard drive(s). Like western digital puts WD somewhere in the model as well as some numbers representing the size of the hard drive and etc. Same with your CD Drives. Make sure everything is being read inside here. If you have 2 CD drives and one hard drive then you should see your 2 CD drives, the hard drive and then 1 empty slot. Under this is should say Drive A and Drive B. If you have a floppy it should tell you so here.
Go back to the main menu. There should be a section called Advance BIOS Features. This shows a butt load of options that you can change to optimize your computer the way you want it. A basic rule is if you don’t know what it does then leave it alone. Anyways you should notice the words First Boot Device somewhere followed by Second and Third. The first boot device you should put on is CD-ROM, Second should be Hard Drive, and last should be floppy or blank. Later on you can switch hard drive and cd drive if you want it to boot your hard drive first later when you get windows installed.
Other parts of the BIOS have many features depending on your motherboard manufacturer. Some have the ability to change your ram timings. Game Accelerator (this makes your video ram timings more aggressive.) and other options should be made available for you to do AT YOUR OWN RISK. When you think the BIOS is the way you want it then go to the main menu.
Go to the PC health status. Here you can check out all the things about your PC as in temperature, and alarms etc. Make sure everything is fine and dandy. Just for the sake of argument and to stop most questions imo…… 62*C is hot for a CPU even though it should be quite a bit lower then that. So don’t worry if your CPU is 55*C or whatever.
Go to the main menu and select Save and quit or some option like that near the end. When you save it your computer should restart. Insert your Operating System Disk (used to install windows) into the CD drive and wait for a while until you come to another blue screen (not BSOD) if it doesn’t then restart again with the disk still in. Wait for windows to load all their crap. It will prompt you to do a few things. If I remember correctly first it asks you if you want to repair your windows (you don’t want to), or Install windows, press enter (yea so press enter). Follow there stuff and the navigation instructions should be on the grey bar near the bottom. Do whatever you need to. Eventually it will show you a box with Unpartitioned Disk Space and then your Disk space amount in KB. You need to partition that hard drive so find out what you must press to partition it. It should go quickly. Then follow what you must until you can choose to Format normally or do a quick format. Honestly I have no idea what the difference is so if you have the time just go regular. It will take a long time to format (unless you got WD Raptor like me heheheh) and then you will go into an actual window’s like screen where you install the rest of the windows files. It should restart one or several times during the install and might ask you questions you must answer. Finally when you are all done and in windows you should notice, unless you installed from like a disk you got when you bought a whole computer from Dell or any other companies, that your desktop only has a recycling bin on it. If performance is really bad (aka it lags or seems choppy or something) don’t worry because you have no drivers installed yet. Right click your desktop (just click on the wall paper) and go to properties. A window should pop up. Click on the desktop tab. You should see a button that says customize your desktop where you can add on whatever icons you desire. I recommend keeping the Recycle bin on there and adding on Internet Explorer, My computer, and My Documents. Click apply then OK. Insert your motherboard Disk in the CD Drive.
A window should pop up. Install what you think is needed. This includes motherboard drivers, If your motherboard has onboard sound install them even if you have a sound card, All the utilities are helpful, If you have a gigabit Ethernet drive then you will need to install the gigabit driver even if you don’t have anything even close to gigabit speeds because nothing will work on that Ethernet even if its something like cable. Maybe you have USB 2.0 drivers, Anything else you might need. You will probably have to restart one or several times during the process. That doesn’t mean you’re done and you should double check the last time to make sure you installed everything you need off your motherboard CD. If the motherboard window doesn’t start right away try ejecting it and place it in again. If it still doesn’t work double click on my computer, double click on the CD drive that is the one your disk is in (will have a weird disk name usually) and then try to find a setup program usually with a icon that looks like a white window.
When you are done with your motherboard drivers insert your video card driver CD. This usually says Catalyst for ATI based card and I think nvidia based cards have their own driver card’s depending on the manufacturer. Insert this in and download the drivers along with anything else you might want which is usually Direct X 9 if you didn’t get it from your motherboard driver disk yet. Maybe the control panel things if it comes with one and you want an easy way to change your display settings. Most likely you will have to restart.
Now install the rest of the programs, games and drivers for any of the other things. Usually order does not matter. Connect your printers, scanners and other things and install those too. When you’re all done installing make sure you have the internet working and go double click on internet explorer. Go to windowsupdate.microsoft.com. Install all the Critical updates and service packs. Next on the right side should be windows ___ where the ___ has the name of your windows type. Install only the ones on there you think you will use. Install all the driver updates. You might have to restart one or several times to complete this.
When you are done installing everything then your computer is pretty much done. Somethings you might want to do are right click your desktop, click properties, and change your wall paper, theme and all the other things on here. On the last option you can change the resolution of your screen. Make sure your monitor and video card can handle the higher resolutions if you don’t want it to lag.
(Warning next section is on overclocking and can screw up your computer really really badly)
Restart your computer cause now its time for overclocking. I’m not very familiar with overclocking but because few people are willing to type a tutorial for others on xoxide forums I decided to include the very basics of overclocking. In your BIOS you should have many options for overclocking. Where ever that section of the menu is you must go there. If necessary change default speed to user defined. Find the area where you can change your FSB which should be set on 200. You can overclock by increasing this very slowly, starting up your computer and running some programs and stuff to make sure it works (www.futuremark.com) off futuremark you can get 3dmark03, PCmark04, and other benchmarks which will see if your computer is stable, and tell you a numeric score on how good your computer is so you can compare it with others. When its stable repeat the process of increasing your FSB little by little. Make sure the FSB of your video card and PCI cards stay at 66 and 33. Go until it isn’t stable anymore. Bring it down some(bring down your FSB) or increase your voltage by a small amount (never go higher then 1.7?) and keep going until you don’t want to risk destroying your CPU anymore. This is the very basic overclock. If you have an amd made processor you can also adjust your multiplier which will just your speed up by a lot more then FSB. You can adjust your ram to do whatever you want and all sorts of other things. You are risking your processor though so do this at your own risk.
Okay now your computer should be up and running and everything should be fine. If you made it here with no problems then congratulations you have a PC that you built yourself!
Lots of things are very weak in this guide (such as overclocking) because such subjects deserve a tut of their own
check out my other tutorial: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=2526613#post2526613
same with cooling tutorial 
