Tips on buidling PC

boffin54321

Interested in building a PC as a hobby over the winter. Any tips appreciated! What tools do u need. Is it hard to do? Best place to get suplies etc. What about costs? I have an old gateway frame - can I use that for new pc. Any good websites etc. thanks

tc2010

Id suggest deciding on a budget, then parts then confirm they all go together with someone with experience.

Its very easy to select parts but harder to get parts that benefit or even work with each other

Its also very easy to put it together once you have it all

the untitled user

Building the PC itself will only take a few hours, most of your time will be spent deciding on parts. The only awkward bit is perhaps mounting the CPU cooler, but that depends on the size of it and the mounting mechanism that comes with it. The rest is mainly like lego, just slot into place and hook up the cables. Plenty of guides on Youtube anyway to walk you through the process. And the only tool you need proper is a Philips head screw driver.

Best place to get parts is the net. Ebuyer.com or Hardwareversand.de seem among the more reasonable vendors, although there are others like komplett.ie that have pickup points in Dublin.

You could possibly use the old case, the only issue would be what motherboard form factor it uses. A lot of the major brands would use proprietary standards making it difficult to get compatible parts off 3rd parties. You'll probably be better off just buying a new one tbh.

As tc2010 says, best bet is to decide on a budget and go from there. You'll probably want to allow at least €400-500.

PogMoThoin

Be sure to check out the last few pages Budget Gaming PC thread in the stickies for some up to date bargains

tc2010

As for a graphics card id recommend a 6870. youd build a pc around it for about 700 - 800

If your looking to save a few euro probably go the AMD route with everything possible

Also make sure you ask if parts are ok as if you buy the wrong hardware it could be a costly mistake

Icyseanfitz

id recommend pixmania.ie as i built my first pc with them about 2 months ago and they had a great service, also building the pc is fairly easy the only trouble i had was with the intel stock cpu cooler as it has an odd attaching method

Unregistered.

tc2010 wrote: »

As for a graphics card id recommend a 6870. youd build a pc around it for about 700 - 800

Not so fast. The i3/i5 chips have decent enough graphics for most users, ie, non-gamers.

uberpixie

boffin54321 wrote: »

Interested in building a PC as a hobby over the winter. Any tips appreciated! What tools do u need. Is it hard to do? Best place to get suplies etc. What about costs? I have an old gateway frame - can I use that for new pc. Any good websites etc. thanks

1) Buy a new case.

2) Buy a new good quality power supply.

You don't skimp on a case as this directly affects how loud and how hot your pc will run.....

You don't skimp on the power supply as a bad one will cause problems or just fry your parts at random....

Tools needed: phillips head screw driver
Not required but nice to have: a torch and a set of needle nosed pliers.

Costs: how much do you want to spend? What do you want to use the pc for at the end?

It is very easy to build a pc, the real skills to learn are how to research parts/the build itself, how to troubleshoot issues after you have built, configuring the OS and how to build neatly.

Spend the time on your research and it always pays off.....
So get a book, have a look at the endless guides online on how to build a pc, google is always your friend!

boffin54321

Thanks for the info guys..