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If anyone out there is in a similar situation, building a new computer, especially if you have a lot of parts from an old computer to cannibalize, is actually q

If anyone out there is in a similar situation, building a new computer, especially if you have a lot of parts from an old computer to cannibalize, is actually quite easy and much less expensive than buying a new pre-built PC. Don't be intimidated! If you can turn a screwdriver, you can build a PC. (For an upgrade, you can often buy just the motherboard with CPU already attached, potentially also upgrading the power supply and RAM. Or upgrade the drive if you're running out of space. Or upgrade the graphics card if you want to play games. Everything else is pretty static and just plugs in.)

mynameisvlad 4y ago
Not if you have a Corsair One like the article author. On that particular model, even updating the SSD is a pain in the ass since (IIRC) the 2.5in one is at the bottom of the case and the m.2 is on the back of the motherboard which has been perfectly engineered to fit in that case. It also uses water-cooling on the CPU and for the upper models the GPU, using a custom loop that was created specifically to fit in the tight dimensions of the case. So good luck upgrading either the CPU or GPU easily.
- deckard1 4y ago
  sounds like every mITX. My m.2 slot is on the back of my motherboard. That drive has been full for more than a year and I don't care enough to take apart my entire PC just to replace the damn thing. Going mITX was a mistake for me. I wanted to build a NAS and reuse parts from my mITX last year. Only thing I could salvage was the CPU and RAM. Now I have an old CPU on a new MB for my NAS and a newer CPU on my old mITX board for my main PC. SFF really limits your upgrade and reuse paths going forward. Limited PCI slots, limited SATA ports usually, limited RAM slots, the case is just too small and horrible to work with. Looks pretty sitting on a desk though.
  - flyinghamster 4y ago
    Another problem with SFF: proprietary case and/or power supply designs. I got bitten by that one with an old Shuttle cube. Great-looking design, but it was not mITX, it was its own thing. When it became too obsolete, there was no upgrade path.
  - mynameisvlad 4y ago
    Most mITX cases don't open up like this, though: https://hardwarecanucks.com/wp-content/uploads/Corsair-ONE-1-i165-6.jpg https://hardwarecanucks.com/wp-content/uploads/Corsair-ONE-1... In order to support that, they had to make a lot of custom components. This means that you wouldn't even be able to use the water coolers, for instance, since the loops are tiny. To get to the m.2 slot you'd have to basically disassemble the whole thing, and you weren't the one that put it together in the first place so good luck! They're absolute beasts in a tiny form factor, which is the only real thing going for them. They cost far more than any mITX build.
  - Sakos 4y ago
    I like my mITX case, but I'm only going to open up again if something breaks. I accidentally put my m2 SSD in a PCIe 3.0 slot instead of 4.0, so I'm not getting the full bandwidth. That's just how's gonna be for a while.
  - jsmith45 4y ago
    Yeah, mITX especially is super limiting. But ATX cases are pretty obnoxiously large, especially for anybody who has been buying HP or dell or the like desktops, where the Full ITX cases look mosterous in comparison. microATX size is probably more of a sweet spot. Smaller, but at least you are not completely . I would have done microATX on my last system update, but I was going with Ryzen, and the only microATX boards available at the time with the better chipsets just had poor overall quality, failed to pack in a lot of rear IO to compensate, etc. I think the intel side microATX offering may have been better.
cevn 4y ago
I have to agree, it's like building legos except you're getting paid $1k to do it (saving on prebuilts!) although of course there can be good prebuilts as well.. but in my experience they're usually cutting corners somewhere.
anotherman554 4y ago
The sheer amount of Youtube videos showing someone building a PC makes it much easier than it was in the pre- youtube days- you can follow along with the people in the video as they are building their PC. If you buy a popular case you can probably find a video of someone working with that exact case.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago
> Don't be intimidated! If you can turn a screwdriver, you can build a PC. However, be prepared to sacrifice some skin and blood. Many times you need to get into awkward angles with your hands with a bunch of sharp edges all around.
- neogodless 4y ago
  Having built dozens of PCs over two decades, I have not had the experience you're describing in at least 15 years. If this has been a recent experience for you, were you using an old case/enclosure, or a very inexpensive one?
  - Arrath 4y ago
    I have to agree. Fit and finish on cases has come a long way in the last decade or two. I do agree with GP that there used to be plenty of sharp edges and burrs lurking inside cases demanding their due of blood from the fool unwary enough to poke around inside, but that has greatly fallen by the wayside.
  - illuminerdy 4y ago
    For someone with large hands like myself, it can be a pain sometimes to deal with the space issues and angles. And those tiny screws.
    - neogodless 4y ago
      Also have large hands! I have had issues with screws - especially when my case was under my desk and I was trying to swap out a GPU like that. Though in the building process, where I place the case on a table or counter, I have a lot less issues with the screws! (And none of those issues involved sharp edges!)
      - illuminerdy 4y ago
        My most recent build was a micro atx case. The hard drive cage was especially a pain to work with. I've been thinking about a mini ITX but I'm not sure my poor knuckles could handle it.
intrasight 4y ago
I came here to say the same, and to add that with a good case (I've a Fractal) there is plenty of room to work. I'd go as far to claim that it's almost impossible to mis-assemble. Throw a bunch of computer parts on a bench and treat it like it's a jigsaw puzzle. You'll observe that it's much easier to assemble as a) there are many fewer parts and b) they can only go together the right way. I built my new desktop four years ago and it's been purring along ever since. It runs near 24/7 and has all the local VMs involved in my life and work.
- vladvasiliu 4y ago
  > I'd go as far to claim that it's almost impossible to mis-assemble. You may still need to know how to read the fine MB manual to not leave performance on the table (which is what you're trying to solve in the first place). I don't know how brand-spanking-new motherboards are; I remember that around the time when Intel's 8-9th gen core CPUs were all the rage, they had a ridiculously low number of PCIe lanes, even though some motherboards came with multiple 16x sized PCIe ports. Only one actually had the 16 lanes, the others had at best 4. You may or may not care about this, but seeing how OP talks about GPUs, he may.
  - nyanpasu64 4y ago
    One fun bit is that you need 2 RAM sticks, and to install them (usually) with 1 socket of gap in between, or you're leaving memory bandwidth and CPU performance on the table (especially on AMD).
13of40 4y ago
If you've got an old computer that's "getting slow" you can go a long way by just maxing out the RAM and putting an SSD in it.
- bdowling 4y ago
  You can also look up the fastest CPU that your motherboard supports and buy a used one on eBay. A top-of-the-line CPU that cost $1000 years ago will be trading for far less today. This is particularly true of Xeon CPUs pulled from retired servers.
  - landemva 4y ago
    Retired servers with Xeon can readily be bought used. Be aware the RAM will be ECC, which can also be bought used. Some motherboards are set up for two CPU sockets. I have three older server-class machines like this. With SSD they are workhorses.
    - ornornor 4y ago
      To add, registered ecc ram sells for rather cheap used. But servers in general tend to use much more power and generate much more noise than their home/office equivalents.
  - gruez 4y ago
    >This is particularly true of Xeon CPUs pulled from retired servers. Too bad xeon CPUs have different sockets/chipset requirements compared to desktop CPUs, so chances are the best you can do is upgrade from a 2/4 core to a slightly faster 4 core.
    - glenneroo 4y ago
      I'm guessing that's just typical Intel behavior requiring constant motherboard updates with almost every tik/tok CPU release? And... when was the last time Xeon had a 2/4 core?
neogodless 4y ago
Easy things include installing M.2 drives, RAM, hard drives. (Just read the motherboard manual to ensure you use the right slots/ports for optimal performance.) Medium difficulty might be installing the motherboard into the case (getting the rear I/O ports aligned just right) or installing the CPU with thermal paste into that motherboard, along with the heatsink. Hard difficulty is just getting all the wires run without obstructing airflow (or just looking "ugly"), and the little wires from the case to the motherboard in all the right places. Also if you install AIO (all-in-one cooling), you may have to try a few things to make sure everything lines up and it all fits nicely in your case. None of the above are difficult if you're experienced, but on your first run it might be tricky. And this doesn't include setting up the OS, tweaking and optimizing things... or knowing what to do if something doesn't work as expected. Sometimes you'll get a bad stick of RAM, but that usually gives off symptoms of half a dozen other issues, though with experience you start to default to that assumption, and find ways to rule it out earlier. Having done it dozens of times, I find it quite easy, but I also know that when things go wrong, they can be scary, and occasionally expensive. (A friend once dropped a CPU and bent the pins irrecoverably!)
- glenneroo 4y ago
  I love building PCs and haven't bought a pre-built system ever in 30+ years. That said, thankfully, for inexperienced folk there are innumerable videos on YouTube explaining each step of the process. I admit I sometimes watch these videos to see if there are any new tips/tricks/secrets that builders have figured out for e.g. working with a new case and getting all that wiring done correctly.
- systemvoltage 4y ago
  Disagree. None of it is even moderately "hard". PC Building is the easiest thing out there. Right along with soldering, which has a similar reputation being "hard". If you can wear pants in the morning, you can build a pc and solder anything, even 0402 components and sot-23 packages with zero experience. You can't fuck it up even if you tried. Millions of people build IKEA furniture. PC Building is much easier than that.
  - 4y ago
bloomingeek 4y ago
I've been using an old Lanboy 2 case for years, I just update the MB and CPU. Swapping out parts is really easy IF you have some instruction materials to help out. (I don't need instructs anymore because I'm done it so many times now.) Adding memory, as mentioned by others is easy. Buying pre-built computers is both expensive and frustrating because they become outdated, parts wise, fairly quickly. When my computer becomes slower or new tech comes along I just do the updating myself and save a ton of money, not to mention learning something new.
deathanatos 4y ago
Up until you press the power button & get bumpkiss. Then you need a known good copy of half the components in the machine to weed out the bad one. (In my case, it was the PSU. It was particularly tricky as the PSU wasn't completely dead.)
- Sakos 4y ago
  That's the actually difficult part. Everybody can reasonably follow instructions to put together a PC barring any mental or physical disabilities. But if something doesn't work for whatever reason, layperson don't have the requisite knowledge or experience to properly diagnose and fix the issue. This is something nobody ever mentions when they say building your own PC is easy.
  - wink 4y ago
    Also the power connectors for graphics cards.. depending on your PSU and card there's what? at least 4 combinations of plugging in 4 pins, 8 pins (or was it 2+4?), or not plugging them in at all. Why are there extra cables that look just like those? Etc.pp. But not being able to troubleshoot components because you only have one PC or one compatible PC is the worst.
- lproven 4y ago
  Just for what it's worth, it's "bupkes": https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bupkes https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bupkes ... although the spelling varies a lot: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bupkis https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bupkis
wink 4y ago
Honestly, I don't think it's any easier than in the late 90s. If you research well enough and get components that work together (or are just lucky), then it will work, if you put it together correctly, otherwise it won't. I mean, there are Youtube videos that probably help if you've never done it, and then you still sometimes make these small errors that you make if you don't do it all the time. I certainly had to reassemble everything twice due to some cabling mistakes (new case) and not having done it in like 7 years because the hardware just won't be obsolete so fast. But I can totally understand why people would not find it easy. Mainboard manuals are still mostly a joke of a few sketches, you can be lucky if your case has a single sheet of instructions, there are now even more different sorts of screws, etc.pp.
- tonyarkles 4y ago
  > Honestly, I don't think it's any easier than in the late 90s. IRQ conflicts, DIP switches, flaky PNP… it’s not a ton easier, but there are definitely some improvements!
  - wink 4y ago
    I don't remember IRQ problems since the removal of the last ISA network card, with just one sound card it worked most of the time. Maybe I should've written very late 90s/early 00s to be fair :)
WhyNotHugo 4y ago
As a kid, I always saw brands like Alienware like fancy brands for rich people and never understood their value (kinda like paying €100 for a t-shirt). I'd never met anyone who came close to affording such things either. As an adult, I understand that not everyone has the know-how or time to assemble their own computer, but I still don't get why somebody would by from Alienware instead of having your local computer shop assemble one for you. The price difference is still ridiculous. Is it just good marketing?

mynameisvlad 4y ago

Not if you have a Corsair One like the article author. On that particular model, even updating the SSD is a pain in the ass since (IIRC) the 2.5in one is at the bottom of the case and the m.2 is on the back of the motherboard which has been perfectly engineered to fit in that case. It also uses water-cooling on the CPU and for the upper models the GPU, using a custom loop that was created specifically to fit in the tight dimensions of the case. So good luck upgrading either the CPU or GPU easily.

deckard1 4y ago
sounds like every mITX. My m.2 slot is on the back of my motherboard. That drive has been full for more than a year and I don't care enough to take apart my entire PC just to replace the damn thing. Going mITX was a mistake for me. I wanted to build a NAS and reuse parts from my mITX last year. Only thing I could salvage was the CPU and RAM. Now I have an old CPU on a new MB for my NAS and a newer CPU on my old mITX board for my main PC. SFF really limits your upgrade and reuse paths going forward. Limited PCI slots, limited SATA ports usually, limited RAM slots, the case is just too small and horrible to work with. Looks pretty sitting on a desk though.
- flyinghamster 4y ago
  Another problem with SFF: proprietary case and/or power supply designs. I got bitten by that one with an old Shuttle cube. Great-looking design, but it was not mITX, it was its own thing. When it became too obsolete, there was no upgrade path.
- mynameisvlad 4y ago
  Most mITX cases don't open up like this, though: https://hardwarecanucks.com/wp-content/uploads/Corsair-ONE-1-i165-6.jpg https://hardwarecanucks.com/wp-content/uploads/Corsair-ONE-1... In order to support that, they had to make a lot of custom components. This means that you wouldn't even be able to use the water coolers, for instance, since the loops are tiny. To get to the m.2 slot you'd have to basically disassemble the whole thing, and you weren't the one that put it together in the first place so good luck! They're absolute beasts in a tiny form factor, which is the only real thing going for them. They cost far more than any mITX build.
- Sakos 4y ago
  I like my mITX case, but I'm only going to open up again if something breaks. I accidentally put my m2 SSD in a PCIe 3.0 slot instead of 4.0, so I'm not getting the full bandwidth. That's just how's gonna be for a while.
- jsmith45 4y ago
  Yeah, mITX especially is super limiting. But ATX cases are pretty obnoxiously large, especially for anybody who has been buying HP or dell or the like desktops, where the Full ITX cases look mosterous in comparison. microATX size is probably more of a sweet spot. Smaller, but at least you are not completely . I would have done microATX on my last system update, but I was going with Ryzen, and the only microATX boards available at the time with the better chipsets just had poor overall quality, failed to pack in a lot of rear IO to compensate, etc. I think the intel side microATX offering may have been better.

cevn 4y ago

I have to agree, it's like building legos except you're getting paid $1k to do it (saving on prebuilts!) although of course there can be good prebuilts as well.. but in my experience they're usually cutting corners somewhere.

anotherman554 4y ago

The sheer amount of Youtube videos showing someone building a PC makes it much easier than it was in the pre- youtube days- you can follow along with the people in the video as they are building their PC. If you buy a popular case you can probably find a video of someone working with that exact case.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago

> Don't be intimidated! If you can turn a screwdriver, you can build a PC. However, be prepared to sacrifice some skin and blood. Many times you need to get into awkward angles with your hands with a bunch of sharp edges all around.

neogodless 4y ago
Having built dozens of PCs over two decades, I have not had the experience you're describing in at least 15 years. If this has been a recent experience for you, were you using an old case/enclosure, or a very inexpensive one?
- Arrath 4y ago
  I have to agree. Fit and finish on cases has come a long way in the last decade or two. I do agree with GP that there used to be plenty of sharp edges and burrs lurking inside cases demanding their due of blood from the fool unwary enough to poke around inside, but that has greatly fallen by the wayside.
- illuminerdy 4y ago
  For someone with large hands like myself, it can be a pain sometimes to deal with the space issues and angles. And those tiny screws.
  - neogodless 4y ago
    Also have large hands! I have had issues with screws - especially when my case was under my desk and I was trying to swap out a GPU like that. Though in the building process, where I place the case on a table or counter, I have a lot less issues with the screws! (And none of those issues involved sharp edges!)
    - illuminerdy 4y ago
      My most recent build was a micro atx case. The hard drive cage was especially a pain to work with. I've been thinking about a mini ITX but I'm not sure my poor knuckles could handle it.

intrasight 4y ago

I came here to say the same, and to add that with a good case (I've a Fractal) there is plenty of room to work. I'd go as far to claim that it's almost impossible to mis-assemble. Throw a bunch of computer parts on a bench and treat it like it's a jigsaw puzzle. You'll observe that it's much easier to assemble as a) there are many fewer parts and b) they can only go together the right way. I built my new desktop four years ago and it's been purring along ever since. It runs near 24/7 and has all the local VMs involved in my life and work.

vladvasiliu 4y ago
> I'd go as far to claim that it's almost impossible to mis-assemble. You may still need to know how to read the fine MB manual to not leave performance on the table (which is what you're trying to solve in the first place). I don't know how brand-spanking-new motherboards are; I remember that around the time when Intel's 8-9th gen core CPUs were all the rage, they had a ridiculously low number of PCIe lanes, even though some motherboards came with multiple 16x sized PCIe ports. Only one actually had the 16 lanes, the others had at best 4. You may or may not care about this, but seeing how OP talks about GPUs, he may.
- nyanpasu64 4y ago
  One fun bit is that you need 2 RAM sticks, and to install them (usually) with 1 socket of gap in between, or you're leaving memory bandwidth and CPU performance on the table (especially on AMD).

13of40 4y ago

If you've got an old computer that's "getting slow" you can go a long way by just maxing out the RAM and putting an SSD in it.

bdowling 4y ago
You can also look up the fastest CPU that your motherboard supports and buy a used one on eBay. A top-of-the-line CPU that cost $1000 years ago will be trading for far less today. This is particularly true of Xeon CPUs pulled from retired servers.
- landemva 4y ago
  Retired servers with Xeon can readily be bought used. Be aware the RAM will be ECC, which can also be bought used. Some motherboards are set up for two CPU sockets. I have three older server-class machines like this. With SSD they are workhorses.
  - ornornor 4y ago
    To add, registered ecc ram sells for rather cheap used. But servers in general tend to use much more power and generate much more noise than their home/office equivalents.
- gruez 4y ago
  >This is particularly true of Xeon CPUs pulled from retired servers. Too bad xeon CPUs have different sockets/chipset requirements compared to desktop CPUs, so chances are the best you can do is upgrade from a 2/4 core to a slightly faster 4 core.
  - glenneroo 4y ago
    I'm guessing that's just typical Intel behavior requiring constant motherboard updates with almost every tik/tok CPU release? And... when was the last time Xeon had a 2/4 core?

neogodless 4y ago

Easy things include installing M.2 drives, RAM, hard drives. (Just read the motherboard manual to ensure you use the right slots/ports for optimal performance.) Medium difficulty might be installing the motherboard into the case (getting the rear I/O ports aligned just right) or installing the CPU with thermal paste into that motherboard, along with the heatsink. Hard difficulty is just getting all the wires run without obstructing airflow (or just looking "ugly"), and the little wires from the case to the motherboard in all the right places. Also if you install AIO (all-in-one cooling), you may have to try a few things to make sure everything lines up and it all fits nicely in your case. None of the above are difficult if you're experienced, but on your first run it might be tricky. And this doesn't include setting up the OS, tweaking and optimizing things... or knowing what to do if something doesn't work as expected. Sometimes you'll get a bad stick of RAM, but that usually gives off symptoms of half a dozen other issues, though with experience you start to default to that assumption, and find ways to rule it out earlier. Having done it dozens of times, I find it quite easy, but I also know that when things go wrong, they can be scary, and occasionally expensive. (A friend once dropped a CPU and bent the pins irrecoverably!)

glenneroo 4y ago
I love building PCs and haven't bought a pre-built system ever in 30+ years. That said, thankfully, for inexperienced folk there are innumerable videos on YouTube explaining each step of the process. I admit I sometimes watch these videos to see if there are any new tips/tricks/secrets that builders have figured out for e.g. working with a new case and getting all that wiring done correctly.
systemvoltage 4y ago
Disagree. None of it is even moderately "hard". PC Building is the easiest thing out there. Right along with soldering, which has a similar reputation being "hard". If you can wear pants in the morning, you can build a pc and solder anything, even 0402 components and sot-23 packages with zero experience. You can't fuck it up even if you tried. Millions of people build IKEA furniture. PC Building is much easier than that.
- 4y ago

bloomingeek 4y ago

I've been using an old Lanboy 2 case for years, I just update the MB and CPU. Swapping out parts is really easy IF you have some instruction materials to help out. (I don't need instructs anymore because I'm done it so many times now.) Adding memory, as mentioned by others is easy. Buying pre-built computers is both expensive and frustrating because they become outdated, parts wise, fairly quickly. When my computer becomes slower or new tech comes along I just do the updating myself and save a ton of money, not to mention learning something new.

deathanatos 4y ago

Up until you press the power button & get bumpkiss. Then you need a known good copy of half the components in the machine to weed out the bad one. (In my case, it was the PSU. It was particularly tricky as the PSU wasn't completely dead.)

Sakos 4y ago
That's the actually difficult part. Everybody can reasonably follow instructions to put together a PC barring any mental or physical disabilities. But if something doesn't work for whatever reason, layperson don't have the requisite knowledge or experience to properly diagnose and fix the issue. This is something nobody ever mentions when they say building your own PC is easy.
- wink 4y ago
  Also the power connectors for graphics cards.. depending on your PSU and card there's what? at least 4 combinations of plugging in 4 pins, 8 pins (or was it 2+4?), or not plugging them in at all. Why are there extra cables that look just like those? Etc.pp. But not being able to troubleshoot components because you only have one PC or one compatible PC is the worst.
lproven 4y ago
Just for what it's worth, it's "bupkes": https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bupkes https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bupkes ... although the spelling varies a lot: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bupkis https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bupkis

wink 4y ago

Honestly, I don't think it's any easier than in the late 90s. If you research well enough and get components that work together (or are just lucky), then it will work, if you put it together correctly, otherwise it won't. I mean, there are Youtube videos that probably help if you've never done it, and then you still sometimes make these small errors that you make if you don't do it all the time. I certainly had to reassemble everything twice due to some cabling mistakes (new case) and not having done it in like 7 years because the hardware just won't be obsolete so fast. But I can totally understand why people would not find it easy. Mainboard manuals are still mostly a joke of a few sketches, you can be lucky if your case has a single sheet of instructions, there are now even more different sorts of screws, etc.pp.

tonyarkles 4y ago
> Honestly, I don't think it's any easier than in the late 90s. IRQ conflicts, DIP switches, flaky PNP… it’s not a ton easier, but there are definitely some improvements!
- wink 4y ago
  I don't remember IRQ problems since the removal of the last ISA network card, with just one sound card it worked most of the time. Maybe I should've written very late 90s/early 00s to be fair :)

WhyNotHugo 4y ago

As a kid, I always saw brands like Alienware like fancy brands for rich people and never understood their value (kinda like paying €100 for a t-shirt). I'd never met anyone who came close to affording such things either. As an adult, I understand that not everyone has the know-how or time to assemble their own computer, but I still don't get why somebody would by from Alienware instead of having your local computer shop assemble one for you. The price difference is still ridiculous. Is it just good marketing?