Advice on getting started please

virtus

Hi all,

Ive been eager to get into building machines for a while. Now that im finished college and am starting my first "real job" next week I can!

Unfortunately my first attempts to scout components on the internet has been less then successful.. I assumed that it would be as easy as fitting pieces together like lego and that I would pick it up pretty quickly.......

I also thought that components are actually supposed to do what they say they do! From what I understand some lower spec components (eg graphics cards) can outperform higher spec ones. For example, I saw a 1gb graphics card on sale for 70-80e and thought "something's not right here", considering other brands cost 150e+. So rather than buying the card, or any components for that matter, i decided to buy the most up to date book on building computers i could. 20e wisely spent i think!

Ill be posting questions in the future, and probably be submitting a few builds, (once ive digested that book!).

Any pointers for someone starting out?

Whats the best source for component performance information? Im just a little mystified how someone says "dont buy x, its cack, y is much faster/reliable/better" even though x and y seem to have the same spec.

I have a dell which is around 5 years old which im going to tinker around with for the next few weeks. Im hoping to salvage perhaps the power supply, case and a few other bits and pieces.

Thanks for reading my rather lengthy first post! Now that introductions are over ill be looking forward to contributing/asking stupid questions on this forum!

guil

welcome to boards, kompett.ie dabs.ie and hardwareversand.de are good for components

jonny72

Try to find and read quality reviews on components.

A 256mb video card can be twice or three times as fast as a 1 gig video card, a 2.4 ghz processor can be faster than a 3.4 ghz processor, etc