Just Built My Sister Her 1st Brand New PC
to date she's just had 2nd hand and hand-me-downs
Wednesday, March 19, 2014 by starkers | Discussion: Personal Computing
I feel really good today because I could ring my sister and let her know that all the parts we'd ordered had arrived and that I'd almost finished building her very first brand new PC. After years of my hand-me-downs and 2nd-hand rigs that were more trouble than they were worth sometimes, and being repaid a wad of money she was owed, she bit the bullet and splurged out $AU 1100 for the build and another S250 on a mobile rack and a 4 bay Vantec caddy just like mine.
The build is as follows:
Case; Thermaltake Chaser A31 mid tower;
PSU: Aywun Megapower 750 Pro;
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-H87M-DH3;
CPU: Intel i5 4440 3.1ghz;
RAM: 16gb G-Skill 1333 RipjawsX'
SSD Samsung 840BW EVO 250gb;
GPU: Gigabyte 650 GTX Ti 2gb
ROM: LG Bluray Combo;
CPU Cooler: Corsair Hydro Series H55;
PCIE 4 port SATA 3 card;
Fans x3 Zigmatec 120mm.
I've done as much as I can build-wise because I'm still waiting on the mobile rack to arrive from Sydney, but the rest is done a raring to go. Hopefully it will be here tomorrow morning and I can give her a bell to come pick it up, cos frankly, I can't wait to see the look on her face when she sees it in action. After the last couple of years on a dual core AMD rig with a regular HDD, this SSD, Intel quad core is blow her away. It mightn't be top end but I gave it a test drive and it' s quite a nippy little machine with some kick.
So why is this important to WC? Buggered if I know! I just felt so good I wanted to shout it from the highest hill, even tell the golden daffodil, but the hilltop was too far off with my bung hips, etc, so this was the next best thing since I can't afford to go to a massage parlour for a bit of slap n' tickle.
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Reply #22 Wednesday, March 26, 2014 6:30 PM
once you've finished mine, i expect it to be personally delivered asap. remember, i don't use thermaltake parts. top tier intel (cpu), corsair, samsung, lian-li, asus, amd/ati (video) only. i'll do the cabling, though.
Reply #24 Friday, April 4, 2014 1:16 PM
I was thrilled when I built my sister her first 10 speed bike! Times change.
Reply #25 Friday, April 4, 2014 5:51 PM
Hehe, my sister really wanted a blow-up man, but rubber aggravates my dermatitis so she had to settle for a a PC instead. However, I did tell her that as my tech skills increase, I could possibly build her a well endowed cyborg if she bought the parts.
Seriously, though, it was fun putting it all together. However, we have run up against a snag and I have no idea how to resolve it as I can not get power to the front panel and now seemingly the mobo.... thus it will not post, or boot. Everything was fine until I installed the 3 bay IcyDock portable rack [which finally arrived on Wednesday]... the machine booted once after that, then nothing.
I have practically stripped the machine down to the case and started from scratch, but alas, no solution to the problem.... it's like it's dead. I have tried an alternate power supply but still no go. I also reseated the CPU; RAM: GPU and anything else that's not nailed down, still no go. Yup, I am totally baffled and have no idea where to start next to resolve the issue.
Hopefully somebody here may be able to offer some answers... and soon. Right now she is using a 6 y/o laptop that's as slow as a wet week, and I keep apologising because I haven't been able to hand it over to her in full working order. So yeah, people, speshully them wot knows a fing or 2 'bout puters, please see if yer can maske an old fart and his sister happy.
Strange thing about it, though, I purchased the exact same mobile rack, and my PC wouldn't start afted I had installed it... like it was as dead as a dodo as well. Again, I backtracked to before the rack was installed and nothing. I even re-routed the power cables so that the front panel and rack were on connected separately - thinking too much draw on the one may have shorted something - but that wasn't it, either. In fact, I'm not entirely sure what I did to get my rig booting again but it is.... touch wood.
I think the key diffrence between our machines is that I have a motherboard with more restart/reset options and was able to kickstart it using one of those options. Sadly, my sister's mobo is quite basic and I'm not sure how to kickstart it.... like I don't know how I can clear the CMOS or reset the BIOS if no power is reaching the front panel to turn the machine on.
Reply #26 Friday, April 4, 2014 7:03 PM
One would imagine there's still a jumper for shorting the cmos for a reset. Power only needs to be to the mobo...front panel is irrelevant.
One would also 'expect' that having the issue the first time would shy you away from using that hardware a second time...
There's probably an RTFM somewhere that tells you to alter some settings in the bios BEFORE attaching the rack....
Reply #27 Friday, April 4, 2014 7:44 PM
The CMOS jumper works by completing a ground circuit and you don't want it turned on, or any power to the machine when clearing it anyway so unplug the machine and hold the power button down for a minute to discharge the caps and then set the jumper to clear it.
Alternately, you can remove the CMOS battery for 20 minutes while the machine is unplugged then put it back in. (Again, hold the power switch down for 60 seconds with the battery out and the machine unplugged.)
I'm with Jafo, that particular bit you are connecting will let all the magic smoke out of a motherboard someday.
Reply #28 Saturday, April 5, 2014 6:41 AM
Thing is, the problem didn't manifest itself to me until I tried to reboot the 1st machine upon completion of the 2nd, hence I had no reason to suspect anything until attempting to boot the 1st machine for the 2nd time.
Oh well. I'll just have to insure it for magic smoke loss.
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Reply #21 Wednesday, March 26, 2014 12:41 PM
Awesome, starkers, just awesome. By the way, the sata cables ad an artistic flair to the entire composition! Don't cut yourself short. Great job, great look, great performance, great bro. What else could a sister want?