Building a computer (relative novice)?

Question

Hi, I've recently took a more serious interest into computers and I am interested in making my own desktop to learn and find out more about computers. I have some time on my hands during holidays so I think working though and building my own desktop will teach me more than reading and studying it ever will. I know a little about computers but having researched into it more the little I do know seems to be getting smaller and smaller by the day. I have replaced hard drives and ram on desktop PC's before and I am pretty good at all the software aspects however I can't seem to find a simple guide to building a desktop. I just don't want to make any silly mistakes as my budget won't be huge (around £200 Just to build the tower, I have a monitor, keyboard and mouse from previous PC's)

So what I would love to hear from you guys is an Idiots guide to building a computer or where to find one. I would like my motherboard and CPU to be as high spec as possible for that money. As I know I can upgrade almost everything else at various stages if I feel the need to.

Anyway thanks in advise for your help.

P.s. a list of parts I need would be a great start.Thanks

Answer 1

You might want to consider building in "stages" as you don't have the cash for the whole thing right now. I often do this for fun. I buy the "staples" first, like the Case, PSU, Hard drive, and DVD drive...There pretty much "standard" and don't change over time, that is, its not like CPU's that come out every 2-3 months making you wish you had bought something else! With the Case, PSU, Hard drive, and DVD drive You will have the time to put then in place and learn how to put things together, learn cable management, what goes were. You can print out a picture of the mother board and place it where the mother board would go so you can get a better idea of were cables will attach, and were the video card will go to see if it may touch the case...all the time your learning! The secret to making a good computer is learning! learning everything about it! OK now you have the "stock" items, its time to look for the important stuff. The mother board, CPU, CPU cooler, (if your not using the cooler that comes with the CPU), RAM, and OS. These item ain't cheap, so you want to get them right..the FIRST time! There are too many combinations to list here so all the while you doing this you should be thinking of just what you want. the last thing for me is the video card. Usually the mother boards I get have on board graphics so I can at least turn the machine up and do the bios and "tweaking" that keeps me busy for a while! I always have trouble picking a video card...don't know why..I know what I want..but there seem to be something coming out that's better! Like right now I have a great rig with the 1055T OCed to 3.6 all set up for gaming..but no video card! I'm thinking of the HD 6950 but still haven't made up my mind..nor have the bucks yet! Oh well...maybe next month! Take you time...do it in "stages", learn all you can, pick your items carefully, take the time to get it right! That way you will have the rig you want, be proud of it and your accomplishment, have a rig that will last & be trouble free for years! Have fun!

Answer 2

Well i will give some steps..



1st pick a motherboard that has all the functinality you would want you need to have an idea of wether you want to go Intel or AMD for the CPU then think usb ports, ram, processor support, PCI express ect..



2nd start finding the parts that your motherboard would suppport



3rd find a power supply with enough wattage to power your PC also power supply connections are very important such as how many sata power connectors, do you need a 6-pin power connector for the video card etc..



keep the motherboard specs up while you browse for parts so you can reference ram speed, cpu socket type etc.



lastly a case that will fit either an ATX or Micro ATX board.



Newegg.com is where i always go!

Answer 3

For 200GBP you cannot build anything really. For example the choice of motherboard, if you decide to build a certain system now, but you would later like to be able to upgrade to an Intel Core i5 series processor for example, you would now already need to purchase a motherboard which will support an Intel Core i5 series processor, otherwise you will not be able to upgrade to it in the future. If you wish to purchase an Intel Core 2 Duo processor now for example, the motherboard which you will purchase will never support an Intel Core i5 series processor, so that is a problem now already. Purchasing a motherboard now however which will support an Intel Core i5 series processor for example means that you will now have to buy another Intel Core i series processor, such as the i3, but a motherboard and an Intel Core i3 series processor will not fall within your budget and you would still need to purchase a case (50GBP for a slightly better case should not surprise you, cheaper cases will be more difficult to install, are more noisy and do not deal with heat as well as better cases), RAM, a hard drive, disc drive, graphics card, et cetera. If you want to use Windows 7 for example, you will have to spend another 80GBP. Save more money and build your own computer when you have at least 500GBP to spend. If you want to game on it, save another 100GBP first.

Answer 4

List of parts needed:



- Case

- Case Fans

- CPU (Processor)

- CPU Cooler

- Display (Monitor)

- GPU (Video Card or onboard video)

- HDD (Hard Drive)

- Keyboard

- MOBO (Motherboard)

- Mouse

- Optical Drive (i.e. DVD-ROM)

- PSU (Power Supply)

- RAM (Memory)

- Speakers



You would save a lot more money if you just bought a used desktop.

Answer 5

200 Pounds isn't enough unless you are building a really low end system. This is what you will need though.



Motherboard (To match your AMD or Intel Processor)

CPU (amd or intel)

Memory (RAM to match your motherboard ddr3 probably)

Video Card (PCIE 2.0)

Case (adequate ventilation)

Power Supply (500w for a low end system and then on up.... watch the efficiency)

Hard Drive ( I run an SSD and HDD setup for speed and size)

After Market CPU cooler

OS (Either Windows $$$ or a Version of Linux)



Good Luck!

Answer 6

£200 will get you know where mate, i built mine on a budget and its cost £550.